Just realised I had forgotten to update this thread after our little Museum tour last year.
I got in contact with both the BA Museum at Waterside and Brooklands regarding the Viking Logbooks, obviously to reunite G-AGRU with her maintenance record at Brooklands but also to see if BA were interested in the complete set of documentation for G-AJJN, which was the Vickers sales demonstrator for two years and toured Nz & Aus (unsuccesssfully as they were chock-full of old C47s!) and then came back to be re-engineered to BEA spec.
The documentation I had was all of the maint logs from the re-engineering to being scrapped including the original inventory and handover docs from Vickers to BEA at Northolt.
BA were eager to have the logbooks as they are short on Engineering exhibits as most of their museum is aimed at aircraft, aircrew and pax, so we stopped off there first on our tour with my two Children (aged 14 and 11 then)
some of the G-AJJN Docs:
6 Logbooks
Details of work done to re-engineer from demonstrator to BEA spec
Handover to BEA in the Logbook:
Inventory of the aircraft at Handover:
We had a tour of the museum where they have some fascinating items and some great stoies, it is well worth booking for a visit, including Concorde’s maintenance logbooks!
We then went on to Brooklands, unfortunately the Curator was very busy and a bit tied up in other stuff, but we did the handover and then went for a wander to see the old girl herself
something nice about getting hands-on with an aircraft that my Grandfather looked after
Here are the logbooks
last page of the logbook showing how all the useful parts were swapped with those that had just enough life to get ‘RU to Holland!!
It felt very good to re-unite the logbooks and I hope the team working on ‘RU are pleased to have them
I have found a photo fo the Channel Airways Auster G-AGTX which would have been built/registered just after G-AGTO and actually have her CofA as Grandad had her in pieces in the Hangar (along with the ex-Ipswich Tiger Moth) when Channel went bust:
not sure if this is one of the Southend or Ipswich Austers
Thanks chaps, I will do some more scanning and posting over the coming weeks. I am focusing on going through the old Viking maintenance logbooks and putting some on ebay at the moment. Amazing how the Vikings came out of the factory with 26 seats, got upgraded to 34 by putting lighter seats in and then Channel squeezed another 6 in to take it up to 40!!
I had the opportunity for a flight in an ME108 yesterday (well a Nord 1002) through a relative of a friend, basically the aircraft was made by Messerschmitt in 1945 and then shipped in pieces to be assembled in France and an inverted Renault engine (220HP) strapped to the front.
Fantastic experience and a real sense of history, everything is basic, rods, cables and chains, with all the controls machined from solid. She flew very sweetly if LOUD in the cockpit, extremely stable in pitch with very responsive ailerons but my feet had to work very hard to keep her balanced in the turns, the trick is to lead with rudder and then use a bootfull of adverse rudder to maintain the turn. It would make a very stable but maneuvrable gun platform… ;);)
This aircraft was ahead of its day when designed in 1933 with an aluminium stressed-skin airframe, they weren’t allowed to make fighters in those days so a fast trainer, communications and mail plane was the closest they were allowed to get….and was Genesis for the BF109 when they decided to ignore the restrictions
It is a 4 seater with a long, narrow cabin, huge glass doors make it easy to get in and out, although you can’t avoid standing on the seat. The stick between the seats is for pumping the undercarriage up and down, 40 pumps each time!!
We did some general Low-level hooning around
Kind of a interesting feeling to see green fields of England below a German-crossed Wing:
Cooling down after our sortie:
A fantastic experience!
Thanks Rochford
Here are some of the Postcards Dad had of Southend:
This one is interesting as I had to double-take but it is a Continental 707 rather than Channel….
But it does give us an insight into this image in the 21st anniversary Brochure:
Thanks for the Correction Rochford! That was the one that took a load of Kids to Cyprus, wasn’t it? that must have been quite a trip!
Saying that, one of the sets of Viking logbooks that I have shows that it spent a couple of years travelling between Blackbushe and Tripoli which must have taken quite a few hours each way!
Speaking of Vikings, here is a set of rather sad looking ones:
Thanks all, I will either start new threads or add to existing ones with some photos from Sywell, Ipswich and his time in the Met Office at Cardington
meanwhile here are some more Southend:
Handover of first 111 to Channel, my Grandfather is on the Left:
Channel Viscounts, I have some CofAs for these, including the one who’s cockpit is at Stuttgart (G-AVHE) so will give it to themn next time I am there:
Daks!
Channel Vikings:
Other Operator’s Vikings:
Bristol Freighters:
748s:
Sorry to resurect an old thread (again!) but going through some of my late Father’s stuff I found an old Museum Brochure, one of the guys on the SEN Facebook page was one of the models!
and finally painted-n Red Arrows!!
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