Funny you should ask!!!
Only last weekend, in talking to a number of the different staff there, it seems that the museum has big progress ambitions in their sights, exactly opposed to what you are stating.
I did not ask for timescales etc, but they are planning on building what sounded like a very large building immediately in front of the existing main museum facade on the grassy area.
I was told that they are already trying to secure funding for the project.
This was much to the consternation of some of the staff who I gleaned from my conversations, would seem to like someone outside of the museum, to take it on board to object on planning grounds, on the basis that this well known and established view of the facade, should itself be protected from obstruction and this seems fair comment.
One indicated that the size of the building was so big that it sounded far bigger than it ought to be, whilst another indicated that the existing BofB museum would be demolished to help make way for the new building.

Now it may be probable that there are exaggerations about exatcly what is happening, but the discussions very magmanomously told me that this is the next direction for the museum. Bomberboy

I was told this was the reason for the delay in returning the Battle to display after the damage by the transport contactors. The opportunity was being taken to introduce hanging points into the airframe so it could be hung and viewed from “a spiral staircase in a high building”

Oh gawd – Not another ill concieved landmark building with hanging airframes like the Millstones of Flight at Hendon or the Origami hangar at Cosford – you would have thought that they would have learnt by now – but perhaps someone hasn’t got their KBE yet.

W.W.I Survivors by Ray Rimmell would perhaps be your best start.

Dave/James,

this book gives limited information as follows

IWM BE2c 2699

Served with No 50 Home Defence Squadron based at Dover
Built by Ruston, Proctor and Co in Lincolnshire in 1916.

There must be a typo in the book because it suggests that after service with 50HDS, transferred to 190 Night Training Squadron in April 1918, and to 192 NTS in October 1918. It then says that it served with 51 Sqn for the last two months of its service and was wfu in May 1918 following a forced landing. Some of the years identified must be wrong – either it was with the NTS during 1918 and withdrawn in 1919 or it was with the NTS during 1917 and withdrawn in 1918. There is no date given for its transfer to the IWM.

Le Bouget’s BE2c 9969
No service information – just that it was Blackburn-built for the RNAS

Norwegian BE2e 131
The picture in the book says F1380, the text says A1380. Purchased from surplus RAF stocks in 1917

HTH

sk

Wow. How on earth did that end up in Aus?

http://acms.sl.nsw.gov.au/item/itemLarge.aspx?itemID=393825

perhaps it was stripped out during these conversions or similar ones??

With a broad view, there are 17 Seafires and Seafire projects world-wide, three are WWII vintage, the remainder are late ’45 and beyond, build.

It will all be in the book. 🙂

Mark

could these be

LA546/LA564/MB293/PP972/PR376/PR422/PR426/PR432/PR451/PR503/RX168/SR462/SW800/SX137/SX300/SX336/VP441

with MB293/PP972 & possibly RX168 having a WW2 vintage

thanks for all your comments.

I think we’re all agreed that the new incumbent needs to……..

secure additional funding – by whatever means – to open all the areas for all of the time

turn the lights on – or at least improve the lighting levels somehow – how about a glass wall at the other end of the BoB hall as well – and ditch the sound and light show, using other ways to interpret the history

do something about the attendants – how about turning them from a policing role into an educational role with policing as a secondary concern – sort the former and the latter is no longer a problem

perhaps move the cafe from the middle of the historic hangars

look at reopening the the galleries or consider displaying the myriad of other items in addition to the airframes in some other way – perhaps then using part of the galleries area for a cafe.

My own view is that the “time line” of airframes which I remember so well when I visited a couple of weeks after Hendon’s opening (was it in 1972?) has been diluted by things like Millstones – how can you have a Great War gallery which doesn’t contain a Camel etc etc. but I guess the internal “collections” have thier value as well

One thing i would be adamant about though was to ensure that the existing buildings were used and presented to their best advantage before embarking on any more architectural follies.

The other option (which I know won’t happen) is of course to start with a fresh sheet of paper on a brownfield airfield site in the centre of the country, and co-locate the BBMF and restoration centre – which would be available for viewing at all times – to give the museum some life rather than it just being a dusty repository of inert airframes. Wouldn’t the sale of the Hendon site bring in some big bucks?

I thought that the early AI sets were pretty labour intensive – hence the need for a dedicated radar operator in the back seat.

Would it actually be possible to fly and radar operate at the same time?

Incidentally the first Jeeps didn’t come into wide use in the British armed forces much before the Spring of 42 – the first MB was only built in late 41 so April 41 till July 41 seems a bit early.

Built in 1942 MGB-81 was originally fitted with three ‘1250hp Packard petrol engines’. Would these have been Packard Merlins?

http://www.warboats.co.uk/index.htm

I think they were a development of a V-12 from an earlier war – the Liberty engine

Always felt it’s a shame that there don’t appear to be any of the archetypical Vosper-designed 72′ MTBs (as per the Airfix kit) in preservation. Do any still exist as houseboats which seems to be the well trodden path to preservation. There was a recently refurbished houseboat which had been an MTB in Grand Designs magazine but you didn’t see enough to confirm if it was one of the Vospers

This one??
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/30977019/

No – that’s Kevin Wheatcroft’s, S130, which came from Germany via the British Military Powerboat Trust.

I think it might have been S97 – it nearly made it into preservation and restoration but it was so far gone that it was subsequently broken up.

http://www.prinzeugen.com/S97.htm