well a good job done considering the timescale you had. good luck with her. I bet shes in for a good spruce up

well done Kurt, great result, thats 3 times 770 has now been moved and not cut up, so shes used to it by now!shame you had to split the wing, whats the rules these days on transport width then? I always thaught that it would be possible to transport the wing in one piece, canted over on a low loader, without leading edges fitted. glad you chose 770, she was the best available on many levels. Other airframes that hadn’t been apart before, really would have been a 5-6 day job to get apart and a big big headache. like wise, if we can help with bits, give us a heads up or Jase seeing as hes on your doorstep.

lol, murphys law. always the way. never mind. i will gie you a ring this week re the shrouds though, that’d be great thanks, Im only in Crawley, so up the road from you.

brilliant, she looks fantastic, well done to all…

returning an aircraft back to bare metal after it has been etched and painted is a mamoth task. in order to paint an alclad shiny aircraft like the Lightning in the first place, you have to destroy the shiny surface by using an acid chromate etch primer, that is extreemely difficult to remove without at least some destructive measures, such as powder blasting it off. It would cost 10K to put a lightning back to bare metal, and it would never be the same. Most of the RAF examples were painted because they had been polished away anyway. continuous polishing of the skins wore the cladding down to a point where it came time to paint them, amongst other reasons.I don’t blame the guys for not even entertaining putting them back in metal, it really isnt an option. I can testify that keeping on top of a bare metal example is very time consuming, even if its inside.the skins have to be inspected continuously and oiled regularly. Plus its hard to get a tidy consistent look ona bare metal example. The only reason 53-671 is kept bare metal is because its easier to keep track of the skin condition when there is no paint on it. Nice thaught, but not really doable.

chippie and aedie

we are also after spares,(GAM) namely a tail wheel back end section, nav lights, taxi lamp covers, taxi lamps, a few canopy bits, and a main wheel with tyre, Can I PM if you have bits you are wanting to sell?

there is man power around, but there was no way 173 was ever coming apart properly. myself and an experienced Lightning team went and surveyed her last year, and it became evident almost immediately that she would have to be chopped, the amount of corrosion and the condition of the fixings and undercarriage meant that, most would not have come out without a serious amount of work, and would have required at least 10 days continuos work. The cost and effort just couldn’t be justified on this one.