Can anybody ID this piece of wreckage found on the north coast of the Lleyn Peninsula, just to the west of Porth Dinllaen? It is about eight inches long and has two sandwich layers of presumably insulating material inside the outer alloy casings. It might be a segment of a very large circle and could be part of the Valley Gnat which crashed a few miles north in the 1960s after the pilot(s) ejected. There is also an Atcham P-47 in the water near Nefyn, plus many other possibilities over a wider area. The bolt heads bear the inscription Z6F or it could be 26F.
By: Atcham Tower - 24th August 2005 at 08:18
Thanks for that, Mark. I take your point about this still being a “belt”. Unfortunately, years of seawater corrosion have made it impossible to dismantle the thing without total destruction, apart from the stainless steel nuts and bolts.
By: mark_pilkington - 23rd August 2005 at 22:37
Atchum,
I think you might find the original design allowed the bolts to swivel freely with the nylon lock nuts holding them secure, allowing the “belt” to flex into a circular shape and rotate, I think your section still holds part of the circumference of the belt shape.
regards
Mark Pilkington
By: Atcham Tower - 23rd August 2005 at 22:18
Further to my last message, I meant that the numbers and letters were on the bolt heads, not the nuts.
By: Atcham Tower - 23rd August 2005 at 22:16
Interesting theory, Mark, but the thing appears to be solidly fixed together with bolts right through secured by a nut. Further cleaning revealed an L and RC16 in a circle on one of the nuts. All the others have what under a strong light and a magnifying glass appears to be Z6F rather than 26F. The font is rather like an old typewriter’s.
By: mark_pilkington - 23rd August 2005 at 12:07
I think the bolt head marking is unlikely to be an aircraft part number prefix related to the aircraft type, it is far more likely to be simply a code relating to the bolt/thread type and either size or tensile strength, ie the USA bolt standards use AN4-3 to describe a particular type of bolt.
I am unsure what the whitworth, BA or metric codes might use?
The device itself appears to be a wartime belt drive where the “red” insulation is actually a rubber substitute and the bolts hold aluminium links between each pair of bolts on either side similar to a bike chain, I cannot recall where I have seen these applied in aviation but they appeared to be a WW2 response to a shortage of rubber?
end of my guess
regards
Mark Pilkington
By: Atcham Tower - 23rd August 2005 at 09:41
Thanks for that info Ross, I had forgotten the RAF stores ref thread. From the list, I suspect it may be a piece of Jindivik but the wreckage from these tends to have washed up further south in Cardigan Bay. There is only 26F on the bolts; no further suffix. Could be a Hunter or Vampire from way out in the Irish Sea.
By: Ross_McNeill - 23rd August 2005 at 09:04
Hi Atcham Tower,
A few months ago there was a thread on RAF Stores References. It included the aircraft references. So assuming the ref is 26F:
26FA Brigand
26FC Vampire & Sea Vampire
26FH Sea Fury
26FK Hastings
26FL Valetta & Viking
26FM Prentice T1
26FN Devon C
26FP Shackleton
26FR Winged Targets
26FU Balliol & Sea Balliol
26FV Dragonfly HC & HR
26FW Heron
26FX Hunter & De Havilland N139D(Type 110)
26FY Sea Vixen
26FZ Canberra
No Gnat, but it would be worth eliminating losses of these types first.
Regards
Ross
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August 22, 2005 at 8:56 pm