The Chequers at Fowlmere used to have a lot of RAF[Duxford) and Fowlmere (USAF) photographs on the walls but I believe there have been changes recently.

Thanks for that. Next time I take my aircraft to Little Staughton for service I’ll have to look for the skid-marks (joke!)

I think UK designs failed due to politics but not necessarily in the political (Labour/Tory) sense. For example, the Trident was designed to fly the “right” number of passengers but BEA demanded that it be downsized which killed it’s sales potential. Similarly the VC-10 was killed off by the prevarication caused by BOAC who wouldn’t make their minds up whether they wanted it or if they did how many they needed. Neither design was a failure in itself but “politics” got involved to affect their potential. Beagle of course nearly made it but Wedgwood Benn withdrew the funding from Beagle to finance a Scottish shipyard, which subsequently went bust as well. The fact that although the Pup design was a winner.it couldn’t be built for it’s selling price. I suppose the real success is the Europa with over 1000 kits sold so at least that did well but I agree that not many other postwar GA aircraft other than the Islander made much impression.

Fieldhawk, I think you are spot-on in that the Firecracker was defeated by politics. As I understand it the Government of the day wanted to do something to thank the Brazilians for their “non-interference” in the Falklands War and so awarded the contract to the Tucano. According to the “high up” I spoke to, the Pilatus was what the RAF really wanted but it was too expensive.

Classic Wings are offering Spitfire flights at Duxford according to their website.

Agreed

I believe they were offered an ATP but refused it due to lack of manpower to maintain it.

It would, of course, be wonderful to have all the DAS aircraft under cover but the Ambassador joins the list of great British airliner failures with only 20 sold to BEA. I guess things may have been different if they’d fitted Darts and then perhaps it could have given the Friendship a run for it’s money. Instead Vickers fitted the Dart to the Viscount and introduced the world to turboprop power and managed to sell 444 examples. As for the Hermes, BOAC couldn’t wait to get rid of them and is a fuselage really a worthwhile exhibit? One could say that sales success is not the only criterion for preservation but in this case I think it overcomes the undeniable elegance of the Ambassador.