Well the main reason for not over using steel in aircraft is weight. The Hurricane, a close air support (CAS?) type in N.Africa was built of steel tube with fabric covering, think the Lysander was, too …a common form of construction in the early 1930s
Broadening the field weren’t the V-1s wings made of steel? and just after WWII the Budd Conestoga was unusually built from spot welded thin-gauge Stainless Steel

EDIT…the guy has been identified as lifelong photographer Ceinfryn Robins and the Moth is VT-AND…..the set features a Harvard ‘deHavilland plane used for towing gliders’ :-)….google ‘ mystery photos Cardiff bus station’, go to WalesOnline page

And a flock of 4 at Southend in here
http://www.abpic.co.uk/results.php?q=ys-11+england&fields=all&sort=latest&limit=50

Good find, Adrian….. Photo of Drew about 24 pics down here (and he’s wearing that hat !!) :
http://www.afleetingpeace.org/index.php/business-pleasure/14-business-and-pleasure/167-the-pilots-of-imperial-airways
Characters under the pax windows in the delcampe pic look more like numerals but could be just read as ‘BLEU’

Are you the fellow working on an account of the Empire Boats?…..Mick

they had a spectator enclosure there at one stage in the 50s

the first enclosure I can remember was on the North side and having to cross a taxiway to get to it, must have been 49/50

See my post #155 page 6 this thread for a timeline of the enclosures….the one you’re thinking of was 1953 Coronation year…(there was later a public enclosure temporarily by the old Fairey hangar in Oct 1953 for the UK-NZ air race)

Here’s some Flickr galleries for Heathrow 1953, 1955, 1958 [work in progress 🙂 ]
https://www.flickr.com/photos/74784995@N00/galleries/72157655686007878/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/74784995@N00/galleries/72157655685112838/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/74784995@N00/galleries/72157656095671691/

Yes, the DC-7C works…props spin, does a taxy routine, doors open. The steps come from another DC-&C in TWA colours 🙁
Not sure about the gap at the chicane…might be a movable fence…on reflection, I think you’re right
I like this one of the southeast corner of the Central Ground enclosure from flickr…year is either 1954 or 1955 and the QB isn’t quite finished

and this is closeby

I recently rediscovered a (long mislaid) Air International article on the Valiant which contained this account (though not about the B.2)….
…..’ Sir George Edwards recalls a much less well-known but intriguing ‘what might have been’ in the Valiant programme.Obviously having been impressed by the aircraft’s performance in the U.S. bombing contests, the redoubtable General Curtis LeMay, head of the U.S. Strategic Air Command (SAC), led a high-level USAF team visit to Weybridge to study the Valiant further. Much impressed by its take-off performance, they were even toying with the idea of PUTTING IT ON AN AIRCRAFT CARRIER. (my caps) However, all that eventually resulted was that LeMay insisted that Boeing put side-by-side pilot seating, as in the Valiant, into the B-52 Stratofortress bomber instead of the tandem seating of the B-47 and B-52 prototypes, so at least the USAF pilots received a lasting benefit from this episode.’
(Dr Norman Barfield, ‘Vickers Valiant’, pp153-161 A.I. Oct92)
Presumably the U.S. visitors included a U.S. Navy contingent and would have been in the period when the U.S. Navy had the North American Savage operating from carriers with nuclear weapons as part of the U.S. deterrent a type followed in service in 1957 by the Douglas Skywarrior. The article doesn’t mention if the Americans watched the Valiant take-off from the Weybridge factory short runway at Brooklands, though all the production Valiants did before landing at the nearby Vickers airfield at Wisley for pre-delivery test flying

Some northside shots from Frank Hudson’s sets, top two from BOAC cargo top floor window, I think

http://www.abpic.co.uk/photo/1001282/

http://www.abpic.co.uk/photo/1001513/

and the Languedoc shot shows 28R being used for aircraft parking by the sole Canadair C-5 and a BEA Ambassador

http://www.airliners.net/photo/Air-France/Sud-Est-SE-161-Languedoc/1067035/L/

edit: and I just stumbled on a Getty page of shots which must have been assembled for the 65th anniversary of London Airport in 2011?

http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/waterlogged-runways-at-londons-heathrow-airport-one-week-news-photo/3069465