Brilliant period shots Dave.

[SIZE=”2″]Thanks for sharing these superb Pics. Dave.-:D

I passed through Changi ,stayed in Transit in Oct. 62 and back through in April 65. Those colonial Barrack blocks were quite something too.

It was all Hastings, These Aircraft,PSP and manned machine gun emplacements then, but I got the flavour OK, Pity I missed the Beaufighters. Ar well, funny how memories stick down the years, awakened by pics. like these.

Brilliant Dave,

Bill T.:D

Sea-Hawk WV-910.

Hi Steve,
Funnily enough ,was about to contact you anyway about your Sea- Hawk 2004 Flight Sim Model, I’ll PM you about this shortly.

I’ve had a good comb through my Info. on Sea-Hawks and their dispositions during working lives and found that WV-910 was a 1955 Armstrong Whitworth built Aircraft, built at Baginton, Coventry. It would have been in the same production run as WV-903 (which I have as a Gutted ex-scrap yard project static display re-build along with XE-339 ) Both Aircraft were built as Mk.4 FGA’s – and although WV-903 was converted to a Mk 6 FGA in 1956, 910 never was and she stayed on as a Mk.4 FGA.

WV-910 moved to Farnborough at some point in her life and then I have Worthy Down, scribbled in with a ?

I’ve not been able to find any record of 910 serving on Carriers, but from Farnborough, you can see why she ended up at Boscombe Down, both being important Aircraft research centres. ( Wonder what she was used for during her time at Farnborough ? )

There are better records than mine out there somewhere and if you can find a copy:- ” Fleet Air Arm Fixed Wing Aircraft since 1946″ by Sturtivant / Howard /Burrow—-Air Britain 2004. that will help.

I do have a very tatty saved from a wet -end copy of:- ” Royal Navy Instructional Airframes ( No3 ) by British Aviation research Group ( Circa 1980 ) and although pages 65-70 are missing, can find no evidence of 910 being used as an Instructional Airframe. Wheras WV-903, 908-911 and XE-339 were.

Also Roy Coates of Liverpool who has just passed on his C/pit of WV-838 to Jon Howard, ( Very nice Restoration ) has more info than I do–So– Roy !!
Are you out there ?

XE-339 is a straight built FGA-6, built one month after 903 at Baginton, but was used by Airwork as an FRU Aircraft ( June 1965 to Feb. 1969 ) after her in between yrs. on Carrier service and intention is to put her back into FRU colours ( Black ) and markings. ( I’m an ex-Airworkie anyway, so that sealed that -:D ) and your Flt. Sim FRU Sea- Hawk strikes a chord.

As you can see in your pics. 910 had her C/pit stripped out at some point and what looks like a procedures trainer gear put in. Externally she is quite complete (though minus nose cone ) and even canopy looks good as does the windscreen assy. You can see that if canopy is closed, the front edge sits lower than the windscreen arch, I’ve noticed that many but not all Sea- Hawks had this Canopy arrangement, but have no idea why. Roy /Jons WV-838 C/pit is the same and it puzzled Roy and me for a long time.
Also 910 still has her rubber canopy /Rails fairing in place, –amazing ! 😮

And finally, while we are here on 910, would some kind person have a close look at the C/pit build Ser. No and post it on Graham Sparkes thread on his unidentified mystery Sea- Hawk C/pit. The thread shows where to look.

Hope all this helps solve these Sea- Hawk mysteries.–LOL-:D.

Bill T.

Sea-Hawks Nth.West.————————

Hi Dave,
Sea-Hawks Nth.West, Ha-Ha !!!–I like that.:D

Yes, not far off “going Public” anyway, but still have loose ends to tie up with Speke and Hooton, although we are unified in doing that. If that’s OK ,could I leave this point for a while and get back to this thread later.

Back to these elusive Ser. Nos. though. I’ve looked through my other pics taken of 339 ‘s Mod. Plate and that No. is:- S4 / VB-7642 and looking again carefully at 903’s pics. her No is:- S4/ VB-7269.

Thnx Lee for that VB Bit and the slash before 269 is actually a 7.

And that gentlemen,has to clear up the 269 mystery. Time to toast in the New Year nearly, so I wish you all a very Happy 2009 and talk to you then.

Bill T.

Haltons Beaufighter Ground running Engine Rig.

Anyone know what this was all about…A Beaufighter-powered shed at Halton 1957!

Cheers, Chumpy.

Hi Chumpy,
I was a Halton Apprentice, ( 88th. Entry Airframes ) down there between Jan 1958 and Dec. 1960 and that Beaufighter Rig took pride of place down in it’s little compound on ” The Airfields “.

Standing close to far hanger from entrance gate, this wonderful piece of WW2 nostalga was regularly run up to speed by Engine Fitter Apprentices under instruction from NCO’s. The noise on full song was marvellous and even back then, when she was being ground run, folks would emerge from everywhere to see it in operation.

The hut fitted to rear of Fuselage was set out like a small 1950’s classroom, even the instructors pointer stick was stood in corner and on the Fuselage side wall was a complete Homemade set of Engine operating instruments and controls. ( Big Sized items ) Instructors serviced and generally looked after the rig and the U/T engine fitters were co-opted into this scheme as well.

I managed to persuade the instructors to let me sit in on a few sessions and it was a great experience. In fact, of a w/ends when I wasn’t playing in the Halton Pipe Band, I would leg it down to “The Airfields” to examine and rob bits off the 3 Mosquitos being scrapped, same again on this big pile of scrapped Swifts and Meteors that had a brown Brigand ( As I thought,) or now I know to be a Buckmaster sitting right on top of pile.

I was the only one around at W/ends, not a guard or soul in sight and this was a magic place to be. Soon after I left RAF Halton, I beleive all this stuff was removed and scrapped, but rumour control says that the BeauFighter Ground rig went to Staverton and parts of it are possibly still around.

I would like to think that she is still all together somewhere, any one else heard anything ?

I never found out the Beaufighter No. or it’s history either. RAF Folks weren’t too bothered about that then.

I have seen references to this rig here in the Forum in past threads,including another pic.

😀

Bill T.

H–mmmmm !–Interesting.

What an interesting piece of kit.

You can see that it has 2 sets of torque links and the upper ram is collapsed inside unit. I’ve never seen anything like this before. The whole lot is a rigid well braced structure, non-steerable and looks like Air Ministry says, a double acting long ram assy to absorb vertical loads, something like would be needed when landing on a carrier. The STI-Victor is intriguing too ! Electro Hydraulics would have made stuff for the Victor, but this –???? Wonder if it is some sort of special role equipment ?

Nearest item I’ve ever see like this unit was an outrigger leg on a B52 USAF Bomber, it was the size of a Lightning main leg. Don’t think this item fits.

Look fwd to finding out it’s purpose in life.

THE Under rated V-Bomber

Yes !
The Valiant never features much in anything these days does it.

I was lucky enough to be loosely involved with these V-Bombers at RAF Wyton in 1961-62. The Valiants at that time there were 543 Photo Rec. Sqdn.

As a young ex-Halton “Brat” ,I served in ASF Tyre and Hydraulic Bays. The Valiant mainwheel assy’s. were enormous pieces of kit and after a bay servicing these wheel assy’s. were delivered to the ASF Hanger and the line by us. The ASF Hanger was next door, so Servicing team members came and collected them and wheeled these items through to the Aircraft. Which was an amusing affair,because these airmen couldn’t handle these mainwheels at all. 3 guys would struggle at this and always give up,call us in and once wheel was lifted off the floor,we tyre bay whizzes would deftly roll the wheel —-,single handed,weaving around obstructions and drop the thing right by the axle needing it. Much to the annoyance of the “strugglers “.

The Tandem ( 2 Wheels ) arrangement of the Main U/C was pretty unique, from what I remember also, the U/C was raised by electric motors( Or actuators ) not the usual Hydraulic systems and to carry out an emergency release of Gear locked up, explosive charges were operated which blew off the up-locks, or a part of them.

I never heard of any bad defects on the Valiant, except the one that grounded them for good. The corrosion on the main spars was intercrystaline, rendering the whole main wing spar scrap. The cost of re-sparing was prohibitive, so that was the end in 1964 ( ish ! ).

I wonder what parts of Valiants are still floating around now ? I saw a couple of Eject. Seats sell on e-Bay a year ago. Isn’t there a Cockpit section somewhere in Scotland too. 😀

Bill T. ( WV-903. )

Victor XL-161.In Edinburgh Field,Adelaide,Sth.Assie. 1964.

Hi Jon, 😀 Close Roger,— I’m the small chap standing one foot on his shoulder, ( today–same height-just 44 years older ) This is most of the Victor Servicing Team on XL-161 for 1964. Us Airframes “riggers” on left and centre of pic. pic and elect-Arm Inst-tradesmen etc. to right. The chap on the Far right was Ch/Tech Johnny Walker, He was the designated Crew Chief Proper for XL-161, A good bloke to work for, in fact they were all excellent folks.

The Guy sitting is ( or was at that time ) Just off Crew Chiefing Victors, Ch/Tech “Dinger” Bell, who I met again at Goose Bay and same with Eric Garden on my right.

Such was the importance of keeping this Aircraft in the air for these Blue Steel trials, that thinking about it,– we actually had 2 ex-Crew Chiefs and John on the team, ” Doughy ” Baker, used to chase me up for jobs and regularly give the lads an ear-bashing, but like the others, you had deep respect for these people, something that seems to be a missing ingredient from our social structures today. He missed this pic. line -up.

If you look more closely at 161, you can just make out ( right of pic.) the back edge of the Blue Steel bomb bay fairings, — because the Victor was so close to the ground, one side of the bomb bay farings were all removed, ( Port ) and the Blue Steel Missile was slid in from the port side on a special low trolley and winched up into position,fitted,checks done and fairings put back on. This happened every time these beasts were loaded. Never a problem unloading them cos they wern’t there when she came back from firing up at Woomera/Maralinga.

At that time, these Victors were fitted with retractable nose-flaps on the front outer port and stbd. mainplanes. Every morning and on Turn -rounds we had to drop access panels to charge up Hyd. accumulators for this system with nitrogen. The panels were held in their rear locations by 2 pip pins per panel,as well as normal fasteners and you had to put the pip pin clip on the end of your “G.S.” Screwdriver, line it all up and push in, I found it a real pain in the you know what,– as being a S****A**** ! The guys would delight in watching me struggle. Once the Victors were converted to Tankers in late 60’s this all passed into history, as from then on, Victors had fixed nose flaps.

Hey Robert, That very nice Badge looks to me like the one that was fixed to the Victor Pilots Control Yokes centres, a nice reminder.

Going back to the Goose Bay Victor “Flap-Crew-In” Incident, from what I remember looking into the Bomb Bay of the Victor that arrived with the new flap, was that it was empty of everything Robert, no HDU (Hose Drum Unit ) and the flap iself was fited into a wooden space frame, like I said, it was a work of art how the riggers at Marham got the thing in there. One thing I did like about the Victor from a riggers point of view was that the 2 Hydraulic systems were fitted with “Stop Cocks” points in the Main part of System and these points were mounted down the inside walls of the bomb bay, nice and accessible, so any internal leaks in the systems could very quickly be located to a particular service. Handley Page were good like that. (I know, A quality British Company gone to the wall )

Thats one pic. in,—:) I do have some more,which I’ll put in soon as I can.

If you go into “Google Earth” and fly over to Edinburgh Field Airfield,Nr. the town of Elizabeth, nth. of Adelaide. You can see the Centre big hanger where we operated from. There are 5 Hangers there now and were 3 back in 1964.

The V-bombers, once loaded with Blue Steel were towed down to Southern end of Airfield to a special pan on its own iust off end of Peri. track. This Pan was surrounded by it’s own massive wire hawser Chain mail link type of fence that was about 12 ft high. I cannot make out where the Pan used to be for it was dismantled many years ago, ( slueths-step fwd. )

The V-Bombers were backed into here and this is where the final preparation for flight was carried out on the Blue Steel Missile and where the missiles where filled with Twin mix fuels of kerosene and HTP. ( High Test Peroxide ). The place was known as “The Pens” and “Submarine Pens”, This highly dangerous toxic brew was like something left over from the German WW2 Rocket Planes Experiments, ( You know T-stoff and D-stoff I think they were called ) Which is why the fence was there —to contain an explosion, because if that happened, several tons of kerosene and aluminium sitting above the missile would help to make a pyro technic show that would make your eyes water.

When mixed, these 2 fuels gave the combustion to operate the missile and several times the Blue Steels went into venting off mode whilst the whole rig was in “the Pens”. It happened to me and a Welsh Elect Sgt. over one lunch time, we were on standbye, to look after XL-161 and missile while everyone else went off for lunch, including the Fire crew and Tender, before an afternoon Launch. The Kerosene started venting out of ( Rear, I think -vent)

So I grabbed a Bass broom and kept sweeping at it, but the pool got bigger.
Another ” Crack” noise and the HTP Vent Valve at front end blew and out pumped HTP, Memerised ,we watched these 2 pools of liquid grow in size till panic took over, Taff grabbed another broom and went flat out at sweeping this HTP away( It wrecked his boots ) It hissed and cracked as it went down cracks in concrete, and we started to lose the battle, Taff downed his broom and legged it for the Emergency telephone. Uproar ensued, Fire engines -Land Rovers-Ambulances swept into the Pen while we were still giving it maximum welly on the brooms. They got it under control and me and Taff dunked our lower ends into 2 of the Water barrels around edge of pan for such an occasion. That HTP will burn you up something akin to an acid burn, but we were OK. ( Imagine if Health and Safety were presented with this today:eek: ) After a C/plete Washdown and re-check of all Aircraft and Missile systems, the Crew arrived, got on -board and away XL-161 went with missile out onto end of Peri track onto main runaway and away, everything worked OK. Well– when I say OK, at least the beast left the Aircraft, because from most of the 16mm “rushes” (films ) we were all allowed to watch of ea. firing, most of the these were dismal affairs, with the missile wandering all over the place and having to be remotely blown up. I know there was a lot of trouble with The Elliot Brothers Guidance systems on board, but these were early days for this sort of technology and you couldn’t expect much else. There was tremendous effort poured into all this on the Blue Steel by the civillian Technicians of WRE, ( Weapons Research Establishment ) of Salsibury, nr. the Airfield.

Still, this is all academic now, No V-Bombers-No Blue Steel and No more UK research out in Aussei -Woomera shut in late 70’s and Edinburgh Field is now home to the Royal Australian Air Force planes. More pics. soon

Bill T.