It could be a Getty stock photo of NN and if is not the one involved surely they should very clearly state this. “This is a Tiger Moth similar to the aeroplane that crashed”. I wouldn’t doubt for a minute that they didn’t know the letters mean something specific.

John

With tongue in cheek, I suppose they owed him that as he had spent nearly four years in the trenches, including Gallipoli and Ypres. 🙂

I also have other artifacts which included including his RFC forage cap (which sadly I lost). The only things I didn’t receive were two Mills Grenades kept in a bottom drawer. Some time after his death I asked his widow “what happened to them”. The reply was “I dropped them down the Lavvie” So nestling somewhere deep in a ‘long drop’ loo in a Manchester suburb… And “I’m the only one who knows where they are” said he to the echo of fiendish laughter.

John

John

They had orange paint on them for visibility as had all the tools in my Radio control aircraft field kit. So I can claim they have been used on aircraft. No doubt someone will come along with a comment that will put a spanner in the works. :stupid:

John

Like these. They were the property of an elderly gentleman who gave them to me when I was a boy and I believe them to be Bristol Fighter Magneto spanners as he had served at Coventry in 1918 at the RFC/RAF Aircraft acceptance depot, He had never owned a vehicle.

John

Pete
Please do use the photo. This is a period of which I have every little.

To quote John Buchan, ‘Memory hold the door’, well in my case with my early RAF days it’s only just ajar.

It must have been taken I think on a Sunspot detachment to Malta in 1967/1968 as the Vulcan’s were transferred from Cottesmore to form the Cyprus Wing soon after (Jan 1969).

I was then initially posted to St Mawgan but I swapped postings with a colleague who was a Cornish man and so I took his place on 231. OCU (Canberra’s) who were coming to Cottesmore from Bassingbourne. After a few months on 231 I was offered a posting to Malta and went there in late 1969.

Prior to the Vulcan’s, I had served at Coningsby with the resident 9 and 12 Sqn’s (Canberra’s). 35 Sqn (ex Upwood I think) joined the cadre Coningsby wing in Dec 1962 prior to the move to Cottesmore in Nov 1964 as Coningsby was to be the new home of the T.S.R.2.

The 1962 to 1964 period was I recall a bit disjointed as we lost the Canberra B.6’s prior to the arrival of Vulcan B.2 and for a time we had no aeroplanes and sod all to do. I also went on my fitters course at some point.

Whether it was historical or not, I don’t know, but the Coningsby crew room scholars, dubbed 35’s motto, Uno animo agimus ( We act with one accord) as “One agitated animal” and it’s, winged horses head badge, was known to us as ‘Foot and Mouth’.

With Centralised servicing the ground crew became totally divorced from the identity and esprit de coeur previously the cohesiveness of squadrons and so we adopted the motto, ‘Mind over matter’, (They don’t mind and we don’t matter).

John

For the Vulcan days I recommend the book The Vulcan story by the late Tim Laming (aka Tim McClellan)

“Might be mind numbing and irritating but people on here are talking about it – so job done”

I disagree , we are talking about the errors to be found on the supposed aeroplane and not whatever product this company is trying to sell, Whatever it is. The few programs we will watch on commercial TV are preferably recorded so adverts can be fast forwarded out. It’s amazing how much time can be saved and much less irritation.

John

Ship of Theseus . https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kVAHXiKjgRo

This never ending argument, ‘ is it a Spitfire or isn’t it’ is I believe a well known and old Philosophic argument. In the beginning was K5054, they called it Spitfire. People made changes to it and the drawings were amended. Someone said “lets make some more”. On some of these they put new bits on and recorded this on the drawings. They made lots of them, not always in the same place, then they stopped making them.

Later some more people used the original (developed) drawings to build a Spitfire shaped aeroplane using the correct materials . But some people said it wasn’t really a Spitfire it was a copy or a reproduction not later production. So what was K9787, just a copy.

You may replace the word Spitfire by any old aeroplane name for the sake of argument.

John