Lee HowardSome people just don’t get it, do they. As Bruce says, if the ORIGINAL tail wheel and oleo assembly as featured on the Barracuda website happens to ‘turn up’ then there won’t be a need to re manufacture it. Same goes for the elevator and other bits mentioned in the very carefully worded FAAM press release. I suggest before making any more comments you ought to re-read it and ask yourself again why bits are having to be ‘replicated’, as you call it.
Lee Howard‘The Scimitar File’ by Air-Britain has a photo of one such. Book is a must for those interested in the Scimitar and I think it is still available (if not, second hand copies are fairly easy to come by).
Lee HowardThe P was not always in a circle and not always yellow. Pics here: http://forum.keypublishing.com/showthread.php?119197-WORLD-AIR-FORCE-ROUNDELS&p=2223577#post2223577
Err….I think you’ll find they’re all yellow and all in circles (read the thread – it tells you about orthochromic film). The Marathon is a red herring: that’s not a prototype marking ‘P’…
Lee HowardFleet Air Arm Helicopters since 1943 is only £44.50 from the Air Britain web site.
Indeed it is! I don’t know where youve got £75 from Comet102. And likewise I’m not sure how you’ve ‘ordered’ SoTFAA as it’s been out of print for years. Second hand copy, yes.
Seems that many prefer to consult the internet for free rather than support the organisations and individuals that produce the goods in the first place but whose work is then flagrantly lifted and put onto the internet.
Lee HowardThe second edition of that book is now 21 years old, I believe a much updated 3rd edition is in preparation, a must have for anyone interested in British Naval Aviation when it is published, start saving now chaps
We’ll be sitting down to start laying out the beginning of the 800-series squadrons at 1000 tomorrow morning…..!
Also, don’t forget ‘Fleet Air Arm Helicopters since 1943’, also published by Air-Britain and still available. Has all of the information you need, plus much more.
Incidentally, no record of any Wessex carrying codes for Fearless – neither ‘FS’ nor ‘SQ’ (where did that one come from??), nor Regent using ‘RE’ (it was ‘RG’). You’ve missed RFA Resource (‘RS’). Glamorgan was ‘GL’, not ‘GA’.
Lee HowardI think there is some confusion over the use of CU as a location designator as that was the fin marking on the aircraft based at Culdrose.
Where did ‘CU’ creep into the debate? The aircraft are coded ‘CH’ which was Culham’s station code.
The photo was, as has already been determined by Pagen, taken on the north eastern dispersal area. The line of three Fromsons and two Pentads to the west was the Receipt and Despatch Unit (RDU). When I last visited in the late 1990s the skeletal frames of the Fromsons were still there, as were both Pentads. Sadly one of the latter had been badly damaged by a fire and I see that it has now been pulled down. I didn’t attempt to get any further along from that enclave probably due to time restraints but I cannot recall if you could actually get through that far. The whole hangarage areas to the west are accessible as they form an industrial unit.
The Swordfish mentioned earlier was, of course, LS326 (now RNHF) which was used by the Station as a communications aircraft.
Lee HowardBill
Can you confirm Ernesettle for the location of the Seafire when with 335 ATC Sqn? I have Saltash which is, of course, across the Tamar in Cornwall.
Thanks
Lee
The Seafire was with 335 Sqn ATC at Ernesettle, Plymouth in the early ’60’s. I was a cadet at 335, leaving in 1957 to start an apprenticeship at Fleetlands, before the arrival of the Seafire. I think we had a couple of old radial engines (probably Cheetahs) that we used to pull apart at that time. I went back for a visit, I think in 1960, when the Seafire was with 335 Sqn, but I remember it being in poor shape. It looks much better in the picture.
Regards
Bill
Lee HowardSo what are you hoping achieve in going on and on about it and using inflammatory words such as ‘lies’? Regardless of who is right and who is wrong, that approach is not helpful. If you’re right about FAAM’s inability to produce a Barracuda then why not sit back and quietly watch it happen while you re-focus your efforts on talking about the work you’re doing on other peoples projects instead of wasting it on one that is at an end? Surely that’s a more dignified and positive way of moving on? Garnering support on here from those who have no involvement in the project just to bolster any grievance claim is lamentable.
Lee HowardJust what is it that the main movers and shakers on this thread are hoping to achieve by pursuing this line of discussion, I find myself asking?
This constant name calling and mud-slinging is, I find, pretty unprofessional – especially seeing as it’s omni-directional (silence doesn’t necessarily imply ‘guilt’, I might add; sometimes people find it more productive to simply move on and it’s a shame that everyone else seems more content to jump on the proverbial bandwagon and point fingers when they presumably have no personal involvement in any of the preceding private discussions). To rubbish the skills of volunteers of ANY organisation like this is just out of order. I say that for ANY organisation – national or otherwise – and I am posting this in a totally non-partisan way. I’ve been involved in numerous restoration projects with various organisations over the past 30 years and it saddens me when I read such negative, hurtful comments.
But I think it pertinent – and right and proper – to remind everyone on here of the tremendous work that has been done on the Corsair and, latterly, the Martlet by the FAAM – all done ‘in house’. Yes, granted, a very much different proposition to the rebuilding of the Barracuda, but still ground-breaking in preservation in their own way nonetheless. I think it also important to point out – as the subject has been raised – that I’m aware that the work on the Gladiator has been slowed significantly due to the amount of legwork being done behind the scenes to source and organise all of the original Barracuda drawings that were needed for the project. Just because you can’t see things happening on the surface, it doesn’t follow that everyone is resting on their laurels.
I wonder, too, just how many of those on here so willing to condemn the FAAM have actually visited there in the past year and witnessed all of the other projects that are ongoing? I know of few other aviation museums where the themed displays are changed so often and the aircraft rotated through from storage. And that’s to their credit. It may be a small team of people working on the aircraft, but it’s a determined and highly skilled team.
So, perhaps time to let bygones be bygones and move on and wish the guys at Yeovilton the very best with the Barracuda rebuild? Endlessly raking over the matter won’t necessarily change the situation; certainly not by slating them in such a public manner as this.
As ever – just my PERSONAL view.
Lee HowardYou can’t. I haven’t reported yet. 😀
Not wishing to be pedantic, but re-read your earlier comment. You said ‘I’ve reported responsibly,’….
…..pig wrestling in here.
Your turn of phrase. But kind of aptly describes what’s been going on.
‘Trial by Forum’? The FAAM and RN aren’t going to be burnt by this kind of discussion Lee.
How very naive, James.
Don’t bother replying with quotes. Not really interested. Good luck with your ‘White Knight’ role.
Lee HowardSimmer down, James. My comment over ‘juicy column inches’ actually wasn’t aimed at you so don’t make out that it was, okay? But I reject the claim of reporting responsibly. The more responsible thing is surely to not stoke the fire any more than it already has been by publishing subjective views over who said what to whom and when, when in fact you – nor most of the other contributors to this thread – have not been personally part of the process? I haven’t been privy, which is why I’m not passing comment over the details of this subject; I’m merely airing my view that it has been the WRONG medium in which to raise them. That deeply troubles me. And it wouldn’t matter who the parties concerned were. ‘Trial by Forum’, comes to mind. It’s a poor way to try and resolve any issue.
Lee HowardJames
With respect, I doubt – like me – that you are privy to any of the original discussion on this from BOTH sides. Be it a national museum or not, that doesn’t necessarily mean that we are all given automatic access to the finer details of sensitive contractual discussions, does it? I’m sure this will all generate some juicy column inches at some stage but I don’t see it being a particularly helpful topic in its current mud-slinging form. I think you nailed it yourself in your last line: appropriate public scrutiny. I fail to see how using this forum counts as ‘appropriate’. And that is my point. I have no particular opinion on the subject, other than I feel the way in which it has been brought to everyone’s attention and the subsequent tone of discussion has been lamentable and most likely counter-productive. It’s something I would have expected of a tabloid newspaper; not of a forum linked with some of the most respected aviation magazines around.
That is all.
Lee
Lee HowardMy PURELY PERSONAL view (i.e. NOTHING to do with FAAM or RN etc., and I would kindly ask everyone to respect that distinction): As I see it, this was an entirely PRIVATE matter. Bringing it into the public domain in such a way has, in my opinion, just generated a lot of largely uninformed conjecture which can only serve to make matters worse and in the process potentially may cause a lot of damage to ALL parties concerned.
A great shame that the moderators cannot see that and call a day on it, for everyone to simply shut up and allow things to take their natural course behind closed doors purely with those intimately involved. For everyone’s sake.
Lee HowardPresumably the same machine discussed here;
The one at Trivandrum should be IN174.
Lee
Lee HowardSome more information and photos here – http://www.globalaviationresource.com/v2/2014/09/19/aviation-news-sea-vixen-faw2-xp924-g-cvix-handed-over-to-the-fly-navy-heritage-trust/
“Two Sea Furies that the Trust operates”?? The Trust operates neither. NAL operates the T.20; RNHF operates the FB.11.
“Badly damaged Sea Fury”. Has GAR actually seen it, then?
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