As the Science Museum has come up in this thread I have to say I agree with Graham Adlam and not Doc Stirling on what it’s become.

I went several times as a kid, up to around ’65 I guess, and hadn’t been back since. We went a few years ago, really looking forward to the Aladdin’s Cave we remembered. What a disappointment. As said, everythiing was interactive and aimed at kids. The aviation hall didn’t escape either. Once an hour, for about 30 minutes, the lights went out and there was a kids entertainment show. We left after less than a couple of hours and have no plans to go back.

I shudder to think what they charge for the *privilege* of hosting that race. I know a few years back here in the US that the AMA fee for a Superbike race at your faclity was in the region of $150K.
Local track owner (Willow Springs) decided ******* that* held his own end of season race instead & put the $150K up at prize money….

(hijack over..)

Hijack not quite over.

Silverstone are rumoured to have to cough up £12 million to stage the British Grand Prix. That’s just this year, there’s a fixed annual increase.

Hijack now over – I’ll be at Legends.

Cees, there’s a sectioned Sabre in a (large) display case upstairs in AirSpace. It would look better with a cockpit bolted to it.

Yes. One cockpit about in line with the leading edge and the other, presumably for a gunner, just aft of the trailing edge.

All in all, an odd looking contraption.

HJ711 is a “bitsa” in the extreme.

It started when Tony Agar bought the cockpit section at auction, probably what seems to him to be a million years ago.

Over the ensuing years, by scouring world wide, he’s managed to collect enough parts to make a complete aeroplane.

I went to the roll-out at Elvington on the 50th anniversary of the NF.II’s first flight. Without actually looking it up, I guess that was 1992.

I have no idea but, knowing a bit about engines, I offer the following observation.

The exhaust valve is usually smaller than the inlet valve. A nominal 3 inches (unless Axis, the dimensions would have been Imperial) is huge for an exhaust valve.

The Merlin has a bore of 5.4 inches and even the DB605’s bore is only just over 6 inches…

Mark Pilkington described them perfectly a few years ago:

The International Group for Not One Historic Aircraft Recovery