cypherusThe CAA would never allow a Lightning to fly and warned both Thunder City and the SA CAA about their safety concerns.
If you have a spare hour, pull up the accident report and have a read. It makes interesting but shocking reading. It will prevent any Lightning flying again anywhere.
Rgds Cking
The CAA has never made a secret about there problems with the Lightning series, it’s tenderness in certain areas was well known and fully understood, but even so suffered a number of losses while in service due to known problems, As such some might say the airframe had design flaws from day one but which airframe does not.
The published information was passed onto the SA authorities at the relevant time and if you do actually take the time to read the accident report in detail some of these factors came together with a lack of care and attention to cause the loss of the aircraft and it’s pilot. it was a defective airframe that should never have been allowed to fly on that day until rectified, sadly no one stepped up and said ‘No’ at the time.
cypherusOne very nice catch if you can get it, solid little airframe simple to maintain and nice to fly.
Oh for space right now….:)
cypherus[QUOTE=467 sqn RAAF;1975316]according to wiki…
North American had scoured the literature to find any additional advantage. This led them to an obscure report by two NACA wind tunnel experts who wrote a report in 1956 entitled “Aircraft Configurations Developing High Lift-Drag Ratios at High Supersonic Speeds”. Known today as compression lift,
A very brutal solution considering the elegance of a certain European designed Atlantic shuttle….:p
cypherusYou make a valid point, i work with people in their late twenties and early thirties who dont know what the Berlin Airlift was, Have never heard of Douglas Bader and think the geneva convention is a meeting of Swiss Bank managers! I kid you not!
Sadly far to near the truth these days, if it cannot be controlled with Play Station buttons most Youth do not even recognize it as worth consideration if my two sons are anything to go by, in spite of strenuous efforts to educate them of the importance of history to there current lives.
Eastbourne airshow and the arrival of XH558 only brought the comment, ‘No wonder they got rid of those things making a racket like that’.
I guess with such a disposable society the live in it is not surprising they have no comprehension of such things.
cypherusGets my vote, but not wishing to pour cold water on the idea, surely even if the CAA relax a little on it there cannot be a lot of life left in the spars and they would need changing out fairly soon.
cypherusAs if.
In context, £40 million is just chump change to Airbus industries. There decision to rescind authority reflected the ongoing costs to them for maintaining it over the realistic projected life of the remaining Concorde fleet as it stood at the time of the announcement.
Should they choose to reinstate oversight it would I feel be on the grounds that they profited significantly and if Virgin could not tempt them to do it I very much doubt some ad-hoc group of enthusiasts will no matter how much money they throw on the table.
People are going to have to face the fact that possibly ‘An’ airframe might be coaxed into a semblance of safe ground running/Taxiable condition, the cost of which might equate to that currently mentioned, had it been possible one would currently be trundling up and down and to the great enjoyment of many at places like Bruntingthorpe maybe.
Other than that BA/AF did what they said they were going to do and ‘Grounded’ the fleet permanently, Politically motivated possibly, financially dictated certainly, either way they did a hatchet job on the fleet and that is the end of the matter, H & S will ensure that decision remains static.
As for moving Alpha Delta from it’s current location to London look simply at the logistics of the task, Movement from Heathrow to the Thames is currently impossible given the infrastructure of the route without serious cutting being required, far more than the previous movement, followed by a lot of expense rebuilding the chopped up bits into a semblance of it’s former integrity, better to obtain a whole airframe toss it on a barge and tow it directly up the Thames to site and all that depends on the current condition of the airframe given the abuse of sitting in the open on a barge over a brackish inlet for all those years, those of us that have seen what such exposure can do very quickly to Alloys will understand how deep such problems can extend.
While I applaud the idea of exhibiting Concorde for the public to enjoy I take serious issue with the suggestion that such a venture might lead eventually to returning an airframe to flight with the inference that should the public donate enough cash this would make it feasible.
Call me a sceptic if you wish but I would be very wary of this one.
cypheruscypherus- Thanks for the info. I wonder what the fourth recuperator was for- perhaps the flaps, U/C and bomb doors (?). We’ll keep searching as some are bound to turn up at some point.[/QUOTE]
The four hydro circuits were as listed in my earlier post, the forth one would be for the absent ‘Lower Mid Turret’ if fitted, I have not seen a Lancaster myself fitted with such an item but my assumption is it’s circuit would be installed if required.
As TonyT describes it very well they are these days known as ‘Accumulators’ but these normally are single task items, those fitted to your airframe have obviously multiple components installed as a single unit serving different functions there being a manual priming pump section, the actual ‘Accumulator’ with pressure adjustment, and an inclusive manifold section for fluid routing.
If the aircraft is not being prepared for flight it would be feasible to rework this section of the hydro system to include the above functions using modern alternatives with the only component that may require manufacturing being the manifold to mount these onto.
A note I found indicates that there were two alternative pumps fitted with pressures being 500 or 300 psi and flow rates of 11.8/9 or 10 gallons per minute, still looking out the reference numbers for the two pump types.
cypherusLooking at a layout drawing of the Lancasters hydro systems I have above my desk, Odd what you keep hanging around, The aircraft appears to have been fitted with four Recuperators all identical with numbers A.M. REF. NO. 50 E 13545. though there apparently could be two different types of pump fitted, have a note of the type numbers somewhere though how detailed that information is I would have to rummage it out to check.
Presuming the A.M. may refer to the Air ministry.
The two starboard engine driven pumps running the Nose and Mid Upper turrets through separate circuits and the two port engine pumps running the Mid Under (if fitted) and tail turrets, each circuit having it’s own dedicated relief valves, Header tank, and ‘Volkes’ filter.
A relative now long since deceased had described working on the design of these, ‘Horrors’ as he put it, going into great detail about the workings of them and the equipment and used to proudly display his missing finger tips, lost while testing the nose turret rotating unit as he described it.
cypherusIf I am reading that article correctly, this appears to be an illegal attempt by developers to clean out the contents of a aero/museum type operation proposed for the former airfield site to make way for a shopping center development, bit of an extreme site clearance I guess.
Interesting that they report possibly ’70 units of Aviation’ stored there with some under restoration to fly.
cypherusA few years ago I recall catching part of a TV documentary which covered the disposal of munitions in East Anglia with one of the contributors reciting his own experience of them shoving large quantities of Mustard Gas bombs into pits and then as he put it, ‘shooting them with machine guns’, raised my eyebrows at the time but I guess this was as simple a way of opening the cases to allow the contents to escape rather than leave them intact.
The places mentioned were never specified directly but there were aerial images of the areas showing several large round stains at regular intervals said to be the disposal pits, a method apparently used by both US and UK forces, often near now former airbase sites.
Sadly I did not catch the name of the program as had to leave before it ended but it begs the question as to how much ordinance was disposed of this way, the why I believe we can all answer, the ‘Were’ is probably best left unpublished.
cypherusProbably one of these, very basic, a joy if not drafty thing to fly which it will and thermal too given the right conditions. :diablo:
cypherusHi all I would be interested to canvas opinion on wether it is approiate to use Isopon or similar car body filler to smooth out lumps and bumps collected by aircraft during their working life in an attempt to make them look pretty for static display.
I have used this product to great effect when re-profiling wing sections. easy to work with, sticks well to original materials once cleaned down, easy to profile
and takes paint well
cypherusBrings it all back
Once a resident of Gainsborough and in younger days spent a lot of time riding around the county investigating former and current RAF bases, one of which set me on the road to a very enjoyable time in Gliding.
I recall also the Otters who lived across the road until moving a little ways out of town, interesting how things come around out of the blue so to speak.
Watching the airlift of the Beachy Head memorial the other day also brought back the memory of sitting in Scamptons gate guardian as a boy.
It is to be hoped that those that make the trip out to visit this historic memorial will spend a few moments reflecting on what it’s presence really means.
cypherusDoubt if dismissing people is the answer here, nothing to be gained by doing so.
My money is on there procedures getting a right grilling.
cypherusPoor Procedures.
Seems someone forgot simple procedures here.
I see the silica bandoliers, what I DON’T see are the visual tell tales hanging from the intakes, simple length of shock cord and a red plastic flag would have prevented this happening.
‘Remove before flight’ tell tales have been a staple of avaition for decades now, seems TVOC tried to re-write the book on this one and almost wrecked the aircraft as a result.
Sorry to sound harsh here considering all the work the team have so far put in but as custodians of this national icon this failure to adhere to industry recognised procedures has now reduced the projects life span by a considerable amount if not finished it, something we have yet to establish if the project is at all viable from this time.
Lets hope for the sake of whats left of the project that there current internal investigations extend into the procedures as well.
Let us also hope that something can be done with the two engines currently stood down.
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