Happy Easter everyone

It seems to have been a long time coming but I’ve finally started to get the closing panel on the first of the rudder pedal footrests (1st pilot inboard), thanks in no small part to some grafting by David Collins of the Hornet project who dropped by last weekend. I carried on where he left off and drilled the remainder of the holes and spent the morning countersinking the panel ready for the rivets to go in. Strangely, Shorts designed this this will all bar 10 rivets being countersunk with only the fore and rearmost rivets being snap head,:rolleyes:. You can just make the foremost ones out on some photos.

It’s our AGM next weekend but if I can get a few minutes the countersunk rivets should be fitted, there’s some longitudinal stiffeners (3 off) to be fitted to the underside of the closing plate but we’ve only got enough material for 2 of these, so I’ll have to get the bench folder prepared and make enough to finish this one off and the remaining 3 footrests.

Anyhoo, enough of my chit chat, on with the photos showing progress

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Thanks Cees

It’s great that you’ve offered to do that for us:applause:

We’ve been relatively lucky with some of the companies we’ve contacted, being a Charity certainly helps. Hopefully have another assembly to show soon which is being made FOC for us;)

cheers

John

just realised, I hadn’t posted any pics of the bare brackets themselves…doh!

see below

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Hi Cees

PM sent

Not sure what’s going on here all, I don’t normally have any problems on here 🙁

a bit more picture heavy update today which is perhaps an indication of just how chuffed we are to receive the coupe part from LK488 thanks to the generosity of NEAM.
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Having this piece, means that we now have much of the information we need to produce the spine of the cockpit coupe, the only part missing is the very front fairing above the windscreens and we know that the one from BK710 exists in Holland and to which we have access if required. It’s obvious that this section has been stored inside for many years as there’s very little corrosion on the various parts and the trim control box is eminently restorable to working condition. Whilst some parts are missing we are fortunate that we have the original drawings for these; this has sparked some interest from my son Andy (who happens to be a CNC turner), so he’s volunteered to strip this down and hopefully turn up the missing bits where needed.
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Whilst we were at it, we couldn’t resist offering up the Pilots escape hatch restored recently to the coupe, and gain an inkling of a sight that hasn’t been seen for over 70 years!
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Kev our resident expert Chippy has fabricated a storage box for the windscreen so that it doesn’t get damaged in the workshop.

Dave K has been rooting around our various spared holdings and has come across a ‘T’ handle used by Armourers to tension the bomb crutches. As we’re currently stripping down a crutch from a crash to draw the parts up, this is a really nice find
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Other than that, Cliff and I are still working on the rudder pedal footrests; no pics of latest progress as they’re just the opposite hand to the one worked on previously, Graham has been been recreating the Autopilot steering lever assy, as we’ve been able to borrow one from Flixton museum as a pattern.

lots of positivity moving forward and hope to keep you informed and entertained throughout 2019

John