Thanks Ant

Good to know that we have some followers still; I’ve been tempted to move over to UKAR but there’s a lot of history on here and I have some loyalty to this media; hopefully things will improve…but I have an account on there so will keep my options open

On the plus side we are definitely firming up on plans to start the bomb bay structure 

cheers

John

fingers crossed indeed. 

will keep people posted as and when I hear of anything concrete

John

Hi all

As promised last week, Graham has been putting the finishing touches to the Pilots’ Autopilot Control panel. There are some repro parts on there which we’re hoping to replace with pukka parts when they become available, so if anyone has any leads on a MkIV Attitude Controller and Steering Controller we’d be very interested to hear from you.

I carried on with the rear frame for the Glycol tank cradle as I didn’t fancy doing some sheet metal bashing to make the last frame portion for the forward part. The rear frame has now been trimmed to suit and has been drilled and gripped into position. there’s an additional closing strip to attach the 2 parts of the frame together. No attendance next weekend as it’s the Bank Holiday and we’ll be thin on the ground but I should make a start on the final frame portion ready for final assembly of the basic structure.

Take care all and keep safe

John

Hi Adrian

Glad to help 

A good bit of progress yesterday; Graham has completed the metalwork for the Autopilot Control Panel and has primed the panel itself and the wedge packer for the Autopilot Gauge. The latter took a fair bit of filing from scratch especially in this heat.

We also took delivery of the component parts for the Flying control assembly that sits under the first Pilots’ seat beam. This is a complex affair with the separate bellcranks, machined castings, bearings and a torque tube to link them all. This was based on a grainy black and white close-up photograph, some scant bits of wreckage and thankfully a very useful side view from the Modifications AP. One of the castings is actually an original unmachined spare item which was picked up from an Autojumble! Many thanks to John Scott from Bedford Model Engineers Club who has sweated blood to sort this out for us. The observant amongst you will note however that the torque tube is in fact made from cardboard as we will use this to check and set the lateral dimension to mount the castings.

Cliff has been refurbishing the Trim and Fuel C0ck Control pulley block at the rear of the coupe, this is nearly ready to start assembly but I forgot to take some photos…doh!

Finally, I made the 3rd of 4 frames for the Glycol tank cradle, some minor fettling of these is required to get it to sit right but with any luck I should be able to start assembling this in a few weeks’ time

take care

John

Hi Adrian

I have a sneaking suspicion it might be part of a gun turret. Are there any Part Numbers on the item?

regards

john