It’s surprising how little of an original aircraft you need to make an airworthy one!

In fact you don’t need any of it at all. When it comes to re-using old bits, however, the less original the more likely to be airworthy, and vice versa.

Did bomber airfields have pigeon lofts? And someone to look after the birds? I’d not really thought about this before

Thanks – look forward to the results.Having said that I’ve had another look at the cylinder and it LOOKS like it’s a left hand rotation – and the one I really would like to see would be a right-hand 4330. However, I guess these are rarer than hen’s teeth (the many radials using 4330’s being LH rotation, only the RR Peregrine, as far as i know, requiring a RH 4330).

I got carried away as I made out ‘4330-4’ on the stamp, which suggested it was they type used on the Whirlwind. However, the full number seems to be 4330-4A and now I suspect that the A is significant and this is just another LH rotation 4330 sub-type. Does anyone know definitively what the 4A was used on, and can anyone get their head round the orientation of the cylinder in terms of what its shape says about direcion of rotation? I make it left-hand, but..