Scrapyard Photos; Any More?

I did manage to rescue front and rear Bucc ejection seats from Williamson’s for £35 the pair!

Other aircraft scrapyards around Moray were:
Another of Williamson’s yard in the early 1970s just to the north of the old Elgin cinema (now Joanna’s nightclub), which contained large bits of a naval Buccaneer, and a Hunter T8.
In Forres in the early 1980s, there was a yard adjacent to the Mosset Tavern, later to became the site of Forres’ first Tescos. In it were large pieces of very dark blue RAF Neptunes (probably ex-Kinloss), and B-29 (presumed RAF Washington) engine silver cowls…

Nice pics… any more greatfully received.!:D

Some of the many Buccaneer S2Bs on north side of RAF Lossiemouth awaiting collection by Williamson’s scrap merchants (1991?)
XW529


XZ432

Unknown

I’m glad I found this forum, having stumbled on it while browsing for information on various scrapped aircraft locations around Elgin, Scotland.
There seems to be some misapprehension about the actual location of Quarrywood, as mentioned in this forum previously. Williamson’s wonderful scrap yard, where I would spend many happy hours as a kid in the 1960s, is actually called Brumley Brae, and sits across a small valley from Quarrywood.
I make the distinction because Quarrywood itself also contains parts of scrapped aircraft, the sparse residue of literally thousands of wartime aircraft broken up by the RAF MU’s at Kinloss, Lossiemouth, and Brackla, immediately after 1945. Williamson’s scrap merchants also received a lot of the aircraft, and are known to have put 240 Spitfires and Seafires through the crusher!
An acquaintance of mine, now deceased, told me of an area in Quarrywood where he used to play amongst WW2 aircraft wreckage as a boy in the late 1940s. He described how he and his friends used to climb down a hole in the ground (Quarrywood is full of them!), which was filled with Frazer-Nash turrets. Apparently Moray Council later filled the hole in, just in case someone killed themselves.
What I did find 20 years ago, when I went to the spot he described, was an open sandstone quarry, peppered with sundry pieces of aircraft brake shoes, steel web ‘bags’ to catch bomber’s spent cartridge cases, smashed aircraft batteries, smashed Lancaster cockpit instrument panels, clear plastic Lancaster instruction panels, and various steel fuselage tubing. Moray Council have since filled that quarry too!
Williamson’s yard, opposite Quarrywood, was a delight for a young lad in the late 1960s and early 70s. On entering the front gate (usually on a Sunday!), a beautiful intact gloss black Sea Hawk used to sit on its wheels, wings folded, on the left. On the right, a huge quarry hole was filled with post-war jet cockpit sections, mainly Sea Hornets and Vampires, complete with instrumentation, bakelite seats, gunsights, and spade-type control columns. As kids we used to strap ourselves in, upside down, to hacksaw the most difficult columns out, which we sold as ‘Spitfire’ relics at school!
Other aircraft types there included Sea Fury cockpit sections and engines (still there in the 1980s!), and large sections of Sea Balliol, Buccaneer, Sea Venom, Firefly, Gannet, Vulcan intakes, and a Wessex tail.
Enough talking – here are some photos I’ve taken of Williamson’s scrapyards over the years…
Merlin engine at Williamson’s main yard (then adjacent to Elgin Railway Station) circa 1984.

Buccaneer S1 XN922 at the Brumley Brae yard, (circa 1982?). This aircraft crashed at Farnborough in 1962, killing the navigator and someone on the ground.

Shackleton AEW2 at Brumley Brae (circa 1982?)

Shackleton AEW2 Griffons outside Williamson’s main yard, circa early 1990s

As kids we used to strap ourselves in, upside down, to hacksaw the most difficult columns out, which we sold as ‘Spitfire’ relics at school!

I wonder whether, today, those kids are certain **** sellers who have acquired a certain notoriety? Move over Andy Saunders, I think that I’m going to have to tread the same road that once you trod!

Ahh, would that you could get away with having toy box’s like that now! As an RAF brat in Aden in 1960-61 I was forever being dragged out of the scrap yard on the edge of RAF Khormaksar camp. In there were complete Vampires, Venoms, Meteors, Vallettas and the like, all piled on top of each other. Rumour had it that there were also a couple of Brigands in there also.
I can just about remember another RAF scrap yard on a satallite airfield (Gt. Massingham) near RAF West Raynham in Norfolk. The aircraft there were also piled one on top of the other!

Jeff

appologies if this has already been mentioned in the thread

are there any pics of current scrapyard finds in the UK? would be interested to see some and possibly go down and maybe aquire whats in them?

Gooday All

Heard that they are shredding (poke them into a big machine – little bits come out the other end) the old F111’s at Amberley, maybe someone might have more info on that

cheers

Found a website with detailed aerial imagery taken by the RAF in 1946, showing the amount of surplus WW2 aircraft awaiting destruction at:
Kinloss
http://canmore.rcahms.gov.uk/images/l/1132607/&keepThis=true&TB_iframe=true&height=500&width=600&modal=true
Brackla
http://canmore.rcahms.gov.uk/images/l/876107/&keepThis=true&TB_iframe=true&height=500&width=600&modal=true

Usually a lurker this string has reminded me of a story related to me by the owner of a junk shop on Stratford Rd in Birmingham some years ago who was ground crew with an RAF sqn.
He served in the far east with a DH Hornet sqn, when the Hornets were replaced by jet aircraft all the Hornets were scrapped by burying them, they may have been at RAF Butterworth but I do know that whatever station they were at had an auxiliary strip on an island not far away.
Looking at a little sketch he drew with the runway of the auxiliary airstrip running say N to S (may have been some other direction) the control tower was at bottom left originally but was later moved to centre right, a long trench was dug north of the tower parallel to the runway and all flyable Hornets moved over and they were then cut up and dumped in the trench.
Once this job was complete the aircraft were run over with the bulldozer before the trench was back-filled, just whether there is any truth in this I do not know so perhaps you lads can take up the trail and identify the station and history of same, this is the first time I have ever bothered to relate this info to anyone,

best regards, Terry

Thanks for the local area photos Alan and welcome to the forum, I recall a great lift on the back of your Harley to see the Loch Ness Wellington at Lochend.
Still got one like it Gary!
Did you ever see the wreck bits behind the Northside hangars at Kinloss? I recall visiting the area and noting part numbers which turned out to be Whitley. It is possible the parts are buried because on later visits to the flying club the area was landscaped.These Whitley parts likely came from a recovery by KAS in the seventies.
In the dunes by the bomb dump were Anson bits and nose frames from Lincolns.
www.scotaviaimages.co.uk

I remember you took me out in the ATC Landrover to inspect the bomb dump Lincoln nose sections & glazing, and the tubular steel Anson frames lying around. One used to languish near the woods where the engine testing bay is now.

Do you have the website address pls?

Sure Andy – it’s at http://www.scotlandsplaces.gov.uk/

Found a website with detailed aerial imagery taken by the RAF in 1946, showing the amount of surplus WW2 aircraft awaiting destruction at:
Kinloss
http://canmore.rcahms.gov.uk/images/l/1132607/&keepThis=true&TB_iframe=true&height=500&width=600&modal=true
Brackla
http://canmore.rcahms.gov.uk/images/l/876107/&keepThis=true&TB_iframe=true&height=500&width=600&modal=true

Do you have the website address pls?

Thanks for the local area photos Alan and welcome to the forum, I recall a great lift on the back of your Harley to see the Loch Ness Wellington at Lochend.
Did you ever see the wreck bits behind the Northside hangars at Kinloss? I recall visiting the area and noting part numbers which turned out to be Whitley. It is possible the parts are buried because on later visits to the flying club the area was landscaped.These Whitley parts likely came from a recovery by KAS in the seventies.

In the dunes by the bomb dump were Anson bits and nose frames from Lincolns.

I have done some recent aerial recon of Brackla it is possible parts are buried by the river.

Gary
www.scotaviaimages.co.uk

Some more pics that might be of interest to someone…
A very sad Nimrod R1 XW666 ‘The Beast’ sitting on the north side of Kinloss in 1995. It was recovered from 70 feet in the Moray Firth, after a successful ditching due to a catastrophic fuel fire. The cockpit section is now on display at Aeroventure, Doncaster.
Incidentally, it looks like scrapping the Nimrod MR2 has commenced at Kinloss…


And an ex-Shackleton Griffon, complete with engine bearers and radiator, which languished in a garden in Burghead (between Lossiemouth and Kinloss) for years. Photo taken in the early 1980s. The owner had bought it to power a motor boat…

You can see one from the Forres-Burghead road, on a pan to the east of the ATC tower, with various large pieces missing…

Incidentally, it looks like scrapping the Nimrod MR2 has commenced at Kinloss…

😮

Have you any details ?

With regards to the Nimrod scrapping, wasn’t there some post on here last year that XV254 was going to Highland Air Museum but as a forward fuselage only?

Is that the aircraft being chopped?

TS

Cape Town scrapyard Spitfire

Yesterday I Googled for something and came across Mark12’s post of 4 February 2005 regarding the Spitfire Mk IX that was displayed at Harry Barnett’s scrapyard in C.T. up to the early eighties.

I knew I had a old article on this,….but where? This morning a mad search in my files and boxes followed…….and eureka!…here it is as well as a photo I took during the “unveiling” in Feb. 1978.

The article contains some interesting information on the plane’s history prior to it ending up in Harry’s scrapyard.

Enjoy.

Here’s an RAF photo of Lossiemouth taken in 1946, when the MU was in full swing. At one point there were over 1000 aircraft being scrapped there. Most of the heavies seem to be Lancasters, but some may be Liberators. Ansons can also be seen in the middle left. It must have been quite a sight.
After scanning this image from an old Lossie air day magazine, I noticed two large, white, unusual, circular objects straddling the main runway, and another two further down the image. What could they be…? Circular marquees? Radar installations? UFOs? Then it dawned on me that I had punched holes in the magazine to fit it into a folder…!

I’ve had this Griffon conrod and piston clock for around 30 years, and is one of the few items I’d grab if there was a house fire.
It was presented to me by a friend on 8 Squadron, after one of their AEW Shackletons had thrown a rod, which smashed the engine casing, and sent metal particles through the oil system. The gudgeon pin bronze bearing still shows signs of those particles…

Wow… what a fantastic piece. Definately worth sending the missus back into the fire to rescue it for you ;).