Your best ever aeronautical 'find'

Oops sorry been in a shed for the weekend – all interesting stuff chaps – I wonder how many items, we have saved have gone on to help airworthy or static rebuilds…..

About 30 years ago the Midland A.P.S. (now Midland A.M.) acquired the propellor from ‘DIN – can we have the rest to fit it onto please?

Roger Smith.

Yes Texan Tomcat did let us know that it was with you, its amaizing whats turned up!! even had one guy who had an interplane strut!
And sorry no you carnt!!

Loads thrown back in dump and built on…..loads taken away and I believe scrapped when the group folded in the late 80s 😡

B@stards 😡

Were they calling themselves preservationists?

Oh if only

Cees

My best recent find was a collection of eight 8mm B&W “home-movie” films taken by, I suspect, a Sgt. Pilot with No.s 33 and 80 Squadrons in N.Africa c.1938-40.

Just under an hour of film more of social activities and local sights than of aircraft but there are aircraft. These are mainly Gladiators with a smattering of civil airliners and the Wellesleys of the RAF Long Range Flight.

I bought these when I spotted the film canisters in a box of bric-a-brac at a local auction house about five years ago.

One strange fact is that I subsequently discovered they came from the deceased estate of someone I had worked with for a short time about 30 yeras earlier.

Roger Smith.

Remains of Gloster Gamecocl G-ADIN still in a barn somewhere in Northamptonshire, and thats where there staying for now!!
Why is the Bulldog still in the Bush!!!!!!! Tomcat get a barrow were off!!!

About 30 years ago the Midland A.P.S. (now Midland A.M.) acquired the propellor from ‘DIN – can we have the rest to fit it onto please?

Roger Smith.

Halifax screens????? 😮 Any further info???
Still around?

Cheers

Cees

Loads thrown back in dump and built on…..loads taken away and I believe scrapped when the group folded in the late 80s 😡

Just remember chaps that this is about what you HAVE found, not what rumours you hve heard. Rumours are fun but publicising them can screw up deals and cause all sorts of nastiness. I have heard some great rumours but mentioning some of them could get the stuff scrapped!

I did find a copy of the “Red Air Fighter” that used to belong to Robert Lorraine, a WW1 pilot and pre-WW1 flyer as well as noted actor. A friend bought an aviation textbook in Southampton only to find that the original owner had written his name in, someone called “Bert Hinkler”?!

Don’t buy bits of historic aeroplanes. Bought a whole one instead!

And it cost me less to acquire than some of you pay for cameras!

MH

Melve, if your refering to the Gamecock, parts of it are alive and well and i found them still in the barn where i remember seeing it as a very small boy!!! There still there under lock and key untill such time as we have enough information to satisfiy the powers at be that we can start a rebuild. But it wont be ready for Le ends next year!

I have been asked to put these photos in a dedicated thread, and have now done so.

The Vernon in post #19 is a Mk I model, J6867. These aircraft cost GBP 6000 each!

Regarding posts #14 and #51, an identical photo of Vickers Viking Mk V serial N157 with uncowled Lion engine is on page 123 of my Putnam “Vickers Aircraft since 1908” by C.F. Andrews. This was one of two attached to 70 Sqn in Iraq to explore the feasibility of using amphibian aircraft in such areas as the Middle East.

That’s awesome – it’s great when this stuff turns up out of the blue – and best of all, you don’t have to pay extortionate prices for it.

There is a T-34 parked round the corner from Whitley HQ (my house). I think it’s ex-Serbian.

A former client of mine turned up one day with a cardboard box and said ‘here you go you will like this lot’.
It contained various spitfire and tempest instruments including a gunsight with brand new seimens bulbs ( 1940 ), a gun camera and a turret gunsight which I donated to the Halifax project at Elvington. I particularly like the curved spitfire rear view mirror.
Didn’t cost a penny.
If anyone is interested there is a Cheifton tank dumped in a paddock in our village, it’s getting in a state and I worry about it’s condition, lets just say that the owner prefers dresses!

A former client of mine turned up one day with a cardboard box and said ‘here you go you will like this lot’.
It contained various spitfire and tempest instruments including a gunsight with brand new seimens bulbs ( 1940 ), a gun camera and a turret gunsight which I donated to the Halifax project at Elvington. I particularly like the curved spitfire rear view mirror.
Didn’t cost a penny.
If anyone is interested there is a Cheifton tank dumped in a paddock in our village, it’s getting in a state and I worry about it’s condition, lets just say that the owner prefers dresses!

I’m not sure if this is my best find of all time, but it is certainly my most recent! I just sat down for lunch with a 3.5′ section of Hawker biplane aileron.

I noticed it hanging up in the basement of St Thomas’ Hospital last year – almost mint apart from a few holes in the fabric.

The last place I would ever have expected to find a bit of plane!!

When I was working for a local developer a load of tanks were found in a barn, they were identified as self sealing tanks from a B17, Duxford were contacted but were’nt interested, eventually an over zealous ex-employee had a big bonfire to clear the site rubbish and chucked them on while we were’nt about, notice I said ex employee.

When I was working for a local developer a load of tanks were found in a barn, they were identified as self sealing tanks from a B17, Duxford were contacted but were’nt interested, eventually an over zealous ex-employee had a big bonfire to clear the site rubbish and chucked them on while we were’nt about, notice I said ex employee.

Hunter cockpit rescued for £50? Hunter cockpit rescued for £150? Going older, a friend found 6 Hurri canopys, I got two which was nice. Loads of nice finds at Chippenham yard…..a dump (old MU) full of spitty parts (when we first got there there were ammo bay doors and windscreen fairing skins up trees!
A dump that yielded 14 complete spitfire armoured screens (nice mix of internal & external screens & glasses), 12 or so hurri screens, 3 whirly screens, umpteen b17, halifax screens. Various finds in antique shops including a mint leather seat back pad for a spitty for £5, spit tailwheels (10+ at mean prices of £3 each)….more up to date a month ago we found a garage full of WW2 parts including half a B17 ball turret, prop, prp boss, bomb aimers seat, control column and wheel blah blah blah…..even yesterday’s Beltring managed to turn up a nice Spit mainwheel with nice tyre for £30

Halifax screens????? 😮 Any further info???
Still around?

Cheers

Cees

Likewise. Excellent thread this, but those pictures of yours Steve, really deserve a thread all of their own!

Steve Bond’s Golden Oldies.

Steve,

High jack the thread!!

Could I suggest that you please start a new thread with these with a title that will reference them for archive search in the future. (In theory I, as a moderator, have the authority and technical ability to do that. 🙁 )

I am sure I am not alone in thinking these rarities are a breath of fresh air for the forum.

So come on you experts from the 1920’s/30’s era expand our knowledge.

Mark

Mike, the Vernon was shot over Hinaidi. Since you asked, and not wishing to hijack this thread, here are just four more;

AWA Atlas I of 208 Squadron Heliopolis, detached to Ramleh in 1930/31
Fairey Gordon of 6 Squadron after a forced landing at Kolundia on 17 August 1935
Spad 56 probably taken at Hinaidi or Heliopolis
Vickers Viking at Hinaidi in 1924.

Thanks for showing an interest.

Cost a bit more to fix though Melv. 🙂

No axe to grind, I’m still on a steam-driven 35mm SLR, (or 8, I think).

Me too. I may upgrade from 27 mega pixels one day though.

And it cost me less to acquire than some of you pay for cameras!

MH

Cost a bit more to fix though Melv. 🙂

No axe to grind, I’m still on a steam-driven 35mm SLR, (or 8, I think).