Duxford today

[GDPR]

I'm going to try to get up to Duxford today to see the Vulcan fly - notusing the Stag in this weather though..

Is there anyone can give me a clue what the weather's like up that way? The various weather forecasting services can't agree on conditions so was hoping someone is up that way and can stick their head out of the window for me....

Cheers

Russ:dude:

[nib]

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Im about 15 miles away Russ,its been raining earlier on and its overcast but not raining at the moment.

Next sunday is the Triumph day at Duxford and they talk about a warm dry spell after this eventually passes.(Hopefull)

Mark

[TimShoubridge]

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nib wrote:

Im about 15 miles away Russ,its been raining earlier on and its overcast but not raining at the moment.

Next sunday is the Triumph day at Duxford and they talk about a warm dry spell after this eventually passes.(Hopefull)

Mark

Marvellous, that's 3 things in 1 day I'd like to go to all on the same day:

Duxford

Windsor classic

Beaulieu autojumble.

It's like buses at the moment :X

[GDPR]

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Seriously peed off - the Vulcan was scratched from the running list for today's show due to low cloud at Brize Norton and having to do Southport as that was rained off yesterday....after all that faffing about getting there with the whole family and getting wet while waiting ....

Problem for me is I'm in Amsterdam for it's last appearance of the year on the 4th Oct, and I haven't been able to get to see it this year at all.......

Oh well, hopefully if they have the funding to fly, maybe next year....

Russ:dude:

[Stagdad]

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Unlucky Russ

http://ie.youtube.com/watch?v=VECwLl06ik0



Just to tide you over till next year.



Steve

[GDPR]

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That borders on rubbing salt in the wound, Steve, but on this occasion I'll forgive you.

I really wanted to add to my 7 yr old boys education with the sound of 4 Olympus engines at full chat as he (unlike me) will never get to sample the delights of Concorde and he's already pretty fed up that I got to cross the Atlantic twice inG-BOAC and he won't even get to hear a live one (although he did get to fly in a VC-10 last year).

Vulcan is the next best thing, and on it's own merits quite a thing of beauty.

Ah well!

Russ:dude:

[DJT]

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kryten wrote:

I really wanted to add to my 7 yr old boys education with the sound of 4 Olympus engines at full chat as he (unlike me) will never get to sample the delights of Concorde and he's already pretty fed up that I got to cross the Atlantic twice inG-BOAC and he won't even get to hear a live one (although he did get to fly in a VC-10 last year).

Vulcan is the next best thing, and on it's own merits quite a thing of beauty.

I can understand. He really ought to hear it if he gets the chance. I was lucky to see and hear a Vulcan and a Lightning strut their stuff at Farnborough when I was about 10. Never forgotten it. Never will (I hope). I don't use the term 'awesome' very often, but it describes the experience exactly :shock:.

Dave

[al-stag]

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The Vulcan, that brings back memories, of course the engines were earlier Olympus's, and not fitted with the more powerful afterburners like the 593 and the TSR-2 engines. What I remember was sitting in the canteen at Bristol Siddeley (as an MOD now Qinetic apprentice) when the flying Vulcan testbed overshot the runway stoving in half the windows and flattening the petrol pumps on the road between the factory and the airfield.

We used to think the Vulcan was the lumbering beast of an aircraft, much preferring the sleek lines of the Victor which could almost have been designed by Michelotti. My trombone playing pal (in our jazzband), was a Victor pilot who used to drive his crew mad, playing his trombone in the cabin whilst stooging up and down the Norwegian coast on 8 hour sorties with an H bomb slung underneath.

Its a pity no-one has preserved any Victors (except the one at Duxford which doesnt fly) which were later converted to tankers.

I still maintain my interest in aircraft and took a German pal and his son to Heritage day at Duxford where there were 9 Spitfires and 1 ME109 flying along with a Flying Fortress that had flown in from the States amongst about 50 to 50 vintage aircraft.

The early 60's was an exciting time to work in the aircraft industry - get a load of the crew cars in this http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fu...ideoID=8549416

Al

[GDPR]

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I thought XM715 at Brunty was still "live" and doing taxy runs and I think XL721 at Elvingtonis also still a runner and trundling about when they can afford a gallon or two of fuel.

OK they'll never fly again, shamefully, along with those wonderful hotrods the EE Lightning, and the Blackburn Buccaneer (how come the South Africans can get all the fun?) The springboksget to fly our old Lightnings and Buccs and we can'tthanks to the CAA (or Campaign Against Aviation)

Still if you want to hear a Conway in a Victor, hear this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x-5D0aw5uGc

Russ:dude:

[al-stag]

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Informed opinion amongst aircraft designers says that the Bucaneer should have been developed further, it was a very strong and capable aeroplane. And, if we hadn't wasted all that money on the Typhoon subsidising the Germans, know nothing Spanish, and 'never there' Italians (I am talking about the Munich based so called consortium) we could have saved money and had a bigger more profitable industry exporting to the Arabs etc.

Oh woe, another direct hit from Britains army of useless bean counters!

One day...

Al

[GDPR]

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I have one thing to say: TSR2

Whenever political parties/commitees/consultants get involved they just think short term. TSR2 was flying, had huge potential, would have been a great export, but was scrapped, and crucially the jigs and tooling required to make it were ordered destroyed because politically it was better to buy a vastly inferior American aeroplane.

The Lightning only got through by the skin of it's teeth and the fact it was a "private" project of English Electric.

Russ:dude:

[jbuckl]

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I am a member/friend of the vulcan to the sky club (for what its worth)and theres never any word of where xh558 will be flying next....its maddening how the 'old boys network' have taken lots of money for the project and keep everyone in the dark...very 'clubby' with real information about where and whenyou can get to see 'your contribution' flying.



If you know about xh558 next appearance please post it here!!! or pm me if your on the inside and want your info to stay less broadcasted!

Thanks

Julian


PS.

It looks like it was flying on sunday and there is actually a schedule for displays:-

http://www.tvoc.co.uk/flightoperations.asp

make sure you dont buy a cook book from here thinking its a ticket (it wont be)

they still arent saying anything about where the takeoffs are from

any way, 5 good pics here:-

http://www.talkphotography.co.uk/for...d.php?p=908529

[GDPR]

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All I know is what they have on their Ops Board on the TVOC site - like you I have pumped fair quantities of cash into that project when they were desperate and it looked like it would go t*ts up without it - now that it's done, as you say it's become an "old boys club" and the proles who actually raised the money are kept at bay.

When voices of dissent started on the TVOC forum, which incidentally was an organ for begging from the faithful, me included, and the final funding to return to flight was in place, then they decided to make it for paid-up TVOC members only - it was good enough for us when they really needed us, but then we became expendable......

I just want to see it fly once, to get a return on cash paid so to speak - being that it's 1.6 million a year to operate it may not fly for much longer....

Russ:dude:

[al-stag]

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kryten wrote:

I have one thing to say: TSR2

My friend, a lecturer at Cranfield in Aircraft Structures had his won personal TSR2. It was given to Duxford in the end after he had stripped most of the control systems out with his students. Its still there. Denis Healey, the Americans, and the Germans who bought the rottern Starfighterhave a lot to answer for. Thats when I left the aircraft industry. Most of what I worked on is now in the South Ken science museum.

We had a fire in a TSR2 engine at the Gypsy Patch test bed. We closed the shutters and flooded it with Halon and it wouldnt go out So a brave fireman stuck his head in the afterburner (giant French blowlamp)and dealt with it using a big extinguisher. It looked a bit like that Volvo on the M25.

Al

[Greenstag]

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Going back top the Vulcan (bombers always been an interest of mine with Dad beingin Liberators and Lancasters) I picked up an amazing book on holiday...Vulcan 607 by Rowland White.

Its the story and associated logisticsof how we got a single Vulcan down to The Falklands to bomb Port Stanley airfield. The father ofa guy I worked with was the Victor squadron commander on Ascension so I knew a bit about it,but if you're into Vulcans this book is amazing.