I think the white balance is wrong in the second picture. The camera should not get the colour that far off on its own and, in any case, the colours in the image should not be changed simply by changing shooting mode.

I suspect you changed autofocus mode and accidentally turned the dial on the back of the camera at the same time – this would change the cameras colour balance setting

Tony Andrews

Does anyone know the opening times for this museum, looks an interesting little museum might have to give it a look as its quite local to me.

The museum’s open 1000-1600 Saturday and Sunday. Not the biggest display in the world but it’s crammed with interesting stuff about RAE Farnborough.

Here’s their website again

http://www.airsciences.org.uk/

Tony Andrews

FAST had a new Hunter F6? nose arrive Thursday/Friday, its in Blue Diamonds colors. Would anybody happen to guess at a serial for it? Will try and get a photo later on. I think a Jindivik is due also soon.

Flypast says it’s FGA9 XE650. I may wander down later and see if it’s there.

Tony Andrews

… Some small trinkets of the super Corsair are still with us though……….

Here’s the rudder – in the Planes of Fame collection
Nearby are some remains of Red Baron (that weren’t needed when it was restored to fly again!)

Tony Andrews

I think it was at the Phoenix Air Race in Arizona. PoF Super Corsair.

Yes – that is correct for the Kevin Eldridge accident. The Super Corsair suffered a catastrophic engine problm during the race and he bailed out over a car company’s test circuit.

The other accident referred to involving the 2 Corsairs and 2 Bearcats at Oshkosh occurred when the Corsairs started their roll while the Bearcats in front were still stationary. The main casualty was the Cavanaugh Flight Museum Corsair which hit Howard Pardue’s Bearcat during its take-off roll. The Corsair crashed off the runway on fire seriously injuring the pilot an virtually destroying the aircraft (although it’s under rebuild!). Howard’s Bearcat was seriously damaged but was rebuilt. Tom Woods Bearcat wasn’t affected. Jim Reid manoeuvred his Corsair onto the grass to avoid the collision which I though was a great piece of skill. The aircraft was slightly damaged due to bumping over the rough terrain.

Tony Andrews

The route I’ve followed a few times from Chicago has been to drive down to Dayton to visit the USAF Museum – that’s about 300 miles but the roads are good and generally quiet once you’re away from Chicago. From there one can head up to Canton to MAPS to see the B-26 and SBD restorations etc. and then to the Crawford Museum in Cleveland. From there it’s a modest run up to Detroit with the Neil Armstrong Museum en route. Around Detroit there’s a reasonable display at Selfridge AFB but it’s only open on Sunday afternoons and also the Henry Ford Museum with a range of interesting aircraft plus a vast array of vehicles and general ‘stuff’. On the way to Kalamazoo which is a convenient stop on the way back towards Oshkosh one can deviate south and visit the display at Grissom AFB. Continuing back past Chicago it’s worth visiting the Museum of Science and Industry to see the Stuka amongst others. Finally just off the main road between Chicago and Milwaukee is the Kenosha Military Museum with a few helicopters on show.

Tony Andrews

I’m not sure when my photo was taken but it was mid 80’s which does not fully rule out the one that crashed but makes it more likley the Duxford resident. Below is another photo taken the same day of the TBM before restoration if that helps put a date on things?

There were once two Varsities at Duxford – this flier plus a static one with the IWM.

As mentioned elsewhere, it was the other airworthy UK Varsity (painted in a similar scheme to the airworthy Duxford one) that crashed killing Mike Twite amongst others. Following this the Duxford one didn’t stay flying for much longer and it passed to the IWM. Since it was in better condition than their own one they scrapped their original one and kept this one for the museum

Tony Andrews

North West G-AMPY

Got any of AMPY in Northwest colours c. ’85/’86?

Not the best picture but it’s the only one I have immediately to hand. North Weald 1986

(PS The Otis Spunkmeyer aircraft shown earlier is a C-41 – and the crew were very proud of that!)

Tony Andrews