The “Dinky” Buffalo

I have managed to get hold of a few 1/72 Buffalo kits over the last few months, and have put together some examples including 3 Finnish Buffs (1 in overall aluminium – Finnish Staff Flight) as well as an RAAF and a RNZAF example and not forgetting a gaudy coloured USN model too! I’ll try and post these soon if I can suss it all out! I would love to see one of these aircraft for real, maybe 1 day I’ll get the chance!

The Mighty Belfast

I remember these giants quite well, as an air cadet I visited Brize Norton regularly and recall seeing them on the “pan” along with 99 and 511 Sqns’ Britannias and 10 Sqn’s VC10s. I was fortunate enough to get a short flight in one, XR365, in May 1970, after our ATC Wing Parade at RAF Abingdon. I seem to recall that they managed to get loads of us inside! IIRC the Belfast was powered by 4 RR Tyne turboprops (similar to the Vanguard airliner) and it was very slow! One took away the airfield fence at Brize after crossing the Bampton road on a particularly bad undershoot – at least that is the myth/urban legend that pops up when the Belfast is mentioned in our crew room these days! 😀

Jet Provost Flight

Excellent Stuff! I hope you enjoyed it! My first trip in a JP was in 1971, I think! as an air cadet and yes, I was sick! Whilst serving at CFS at Scampton in the early 1990s I was fortunate to be able to fly in the Mk3 and the Mk5 (my Boss was the CFS Chief Ground Instructor but still had to fly regularly) and I recall doing a tour of Linconshire golf courses at 250 feet. Whilst I was at Scampton all the JPs were replaced by the Tucano, which are much less noisy in the air and don’t guzzle juice to the same extent.

The Hunter, a beauty and I hope you can get a trip in one. I had the chance of a trip in one at Yeovilton but couldn’t fly then because of an ear infection, pardon Doc? Blast!

Happy Birthday

Have a great day! 🙂

Scrapyards

Spamcan
I agree about the “No Barry for planes”. I was fortunate in being able to help recover 2 “kettles” from Barry yard, Nos 2807 and 4277. A group of us still owns the former and it is on its way to working order. The latter was sold to a wealthier person and it is currently resting after nearly 10 years “displaying” on the heritage track circuit! Sorry, back to aviation then….. :rolleyes:

Happy Birthday

Have a lovely day! 🙂

The Few

A promising looking site, many thanks for posting the link. I count myself as fortunate as having met both Tony Pickering and “Stapme ” Stapleton at RAF Battle of Britain Dining-In nights (one of the “few” perks of being in the RAF!) and what characters they are. Gentlemen, we salute you.

The Mighty Vulcan

A work colleague, who has flown many hours in the “tin triangle” as a Nav, informed me that the aircraft hardly ever went into hangars, except when undergoing a “major”, so they spent quite a lot of time sitting out in the cold and wet, that said, they were looked after quite well! If XL391 has uprated 301 olympus engines fitted, then some titanium may also be present – so perhaps the new owner might not be out of pocket after all!