I don’t know if this is a contribution worthy of forumites consideration but I admit to being somewhat confused.
In my time with OFMC, I remember Mark being really excited by the acquisition of this Casa. A lot of time and trouble went in to getting the thing to Duxford in the first place, due to it being restorable to flight status. Moocher has already posted about the three weeks he spent disassembling it in Spain and his opinion then was of an airframe that would take a lot of work, but could be returned to the air over time. Mark and Ray both considered the airframe to be a valuable “trader” at the very least.
I don’t understand why the wing spars are now considered to be so badly corroded they couldn’t support the weight of two Merlins! Having said that, I have not personally looked at the thing in 10 years, but assume its sojourn under cover in recent years could not have rotted the airframe THAT badly.
Interestingly, nobody here seems to know what IWM’s position is on this aircraft. Has anybody asked them? What I do know is that they wanted this type specifically for a very long time. I was standing next to Ray at the Southend auction when he turned and apologised to the IWM representative present for withdrawing from the bidding at £20,000. They were sorry too, but quite understanding. My assumption therefore, is that one way or another, they do intend to restore it to exhibition status eventually. Like everything though, money has to be made available first.
The arrival of the La9 at OFMC put any Casa restoration on the back burner,
but even the idea of turning preparatory work over to volunteers from Tiger Squadron were shot down by Mark on the grounds that he felt a full, professional restoration was more appropriate.
I guess all I’m saying guys is that perhaps we should give the IWM a break and assume they know what they are doing.
Oh, and finally, I do also remember Mark saying it was built to take Merlins, not Jumos.
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