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Post by denysjones on Jul 14, 2018 21:50:30 GMT 12
Fairly quiet time of late as in the last couple of weeks....must be the frosty days deter some from coming out! Dag returned from his UK jaunt today and all sorts of pressies await shipment! However Rob has been busy following on with the work on the Hiller post installing the mast. I've been working on the surface work on the BXG centre section and now the upper areas that should be the grey colour have been dealt to and just the white area that is the upper fuselage line needs to be attended to before we move onto to more exciting things!!!!
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Post by Dave Homewood on Jul 14, 2018 23:44:56 GMT 12
Looking really good, both those projects.
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Post by denysjones on Jul 29, 2018 13:23:24 GMT 12
Again a period of steady work but the results seem a little underwhelming however best post them here to show things are on the go. The cowls we're going to use on BXG came off the F27 VT-NED which was broken up at Woodbourne. They came to us in well used condition inside and out which means scrapes, dings, dirt etc and of course they were painted white not NAC grey. So its been the old clean, sand, prime and paint routine again. Also having gone through that process is the tail cone of the nacelle at the rear of the shot, Rob had a bit of down time on the Hiller while waiting for parts so he pitched in and prepped that for me. The other little work in progress is making the down lock for the nose gear. Its a bit frustrating to know that there is a genuine article over in the Chathams and we've got to make one, however onward we go. We found two different illustrations in the manuals each giving a different representation of shape and also there is an outline left in the paint in the aircraft so combining those here's our rendition of the backing plate and now we've to turn up a pin that goes onto this for the claw on the gear to latch onto.
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Post by denysjones on Aug 23, 2018 19:47:12 GMT 12
Again not a super spectacular thing but just to keep the focus/interest up. If you revert to the post of Jan 21 and refresh the image of the firewall and the rust issues, well things have moved on. After some experiments and deliberations the matter of the rusted dome headed rivets and the rust around them and creeping down the firewall led to the decision to remove the rivets, clean the rust off the firewall with our friendly team of vinegar and scotchbrite, and the insert new rivets. So after that we now have a more presentable firewall. The various electrical connectors were separated from the firewall and then hung up in bags of vinegar to deal to their rust. There are still more issues to deal to, especially the bottom centre bit but that has to wait until the centre section is otherwise supported (hint of things to come) as access to certain screws etc is precluded by them resting on the current support blocks. As always hope you enjoy!
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Post by Dave Homewood on Aug 23, 2018 20:50:42 GMT 12
Good work Denys!
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Post by ZacYates on Aug 24, 2018 21:16:26 GMT 12
Hear hear, what a change!
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Post by nuuumannn on Aug 25, 2018 19:34:26 GMT 12
Great stuff Denys and team; really looks good.
Almost all airliners have wing inspection lights. They also prove useful for doing inspections on the ramp at night.
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Post by denysjones on Sept 12, 2018 12:43:48 GMT 12
Just a bit of progress from Saturday. BXG moved towards her final position in the hangar thanks to some good old muscle power from some of the troops. We've now got to adjust the angle of abutment to the wall, jack her up to correct floor height, fabricate the permanent cradle to support the rear of the fuselage, and then drop the nose gear down and lock it in place. Other bits and pieces around the airframe of course get their turn for attention and one is the handle on the forward door. As you can see some 20+ years out in the elements does take its toll! We were fortunate enough to get our hands on a whole door from the AirNZ training school and so at the moment the unit from that is undergoing a colour change. As a wee aside I wonder where said door had come from as overall it was blue and white (akin to BXG's red and white) so the unit was blue but when I stripped it the layer under the blue was a yellow not too dissimilar to the old Mt Cook colour scheme one. Perhaps Shorty might know something about this from when Mt Cook used the leased DCA F27s. Does this door come from one that got painted in full Mt Cook livery and then reverted to DCA's blue prior to the door being removed from the a/c altogether?
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Post by mit on Sept 12, 2018 19:33:55 GMT 12
Just a bit of progress from Saturday. BXG moved towards her final position in the hangar thanks to some good old muscle power from some of the troops. We've now got to adjust the angle of abutment to the wall, jack her up to correct floor height, fabricate the permanent cradle to support the rear of the fuselage, and then drop the nose gear down and lock it in place. Could you please take a picture or let me know the size of the nose wheel tire? Cheers
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Post by denysjones on Sept 13, 2018 8:42:13 GMT 12
It's a 28 x 9.00-12
Why the interest?
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Post by denysjones on Oct 6, 2018 20:41:59 GMT 12
WARNING THIS POST IS RATED NOT FOR THE VIEWING OF THE FAINT HEARTED! In the recent weeks we've been busy preparing BXG for her final location in the hangar in preparation for the re-attachment of the centre section and things like undercarriage and engine etc. The technical thing is that in the hangar there is an oblique corner tilt slab that she is to abut to and so the other week we had to cut the aft end to mate thereto so here you see the cut details and now she has a plywood aft end. Today we rolled her back to the wall and next week's schedule is to jack her up to operating height (the Fokker manual calls out a floor level of 3'3" to 4' so we're going to the latter to provide clearances to other things unforeseen)! which then shows the interior and now the end is sealed off All in the interests of the old girl's salvation and public accessibility (viewing).
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Post by denysjones on Oct 26, 2018 13:03:44 GMT 12
Time for a few updates Having finished his RR Dart job Tim has recently been a busy chap stripping down the FH1100 to the barest of structures as prep for the repaint etc. Now that that's handed over to Paul for painting Tim has taken on a project to create a "kiddycopter" that visitors can put their kids in and take a photo of them. We've found these sorts of things very popular onsite, especially our Fire Services Historical boys who took a Honda City car and make a "little flick". Tim's staring point is a spare R44 we had on hand. The mossie boys have been busy re-flooring the cockpit but of course its not simple and the inter-relationships of the a/c mean cannon bay etc have come into play but its getting there. They've also just received a shipment of mossie bits that Dag gathered up while in the UK a few months back. Ants Galbraith has found us a friendly farm machinery importer and Fred has brought the bits out in one of his containers...nice one Fred! One of the jewels in the parcel is the merlin header tank, possibly rivaled by the Gee set fit. The Hudson also advances with the floor hatch plugs, see the April 21st post, continuing. Its been one of those tasks that has been put down when other things jump the queue but now that 5 of the 7 have been made the main cabin floor is suitably enhanced. Of course the main queue jumper has been the Friendship and one of the recent tasks has been related to the fwd entry door (the only we now have of course). The doors on the F27 open by running upwards and overhead and their action is facilitated by cables on either side of the door and a cable drum near the top of the door track. The drum is driven by a coil spring and the aft spring had snapped and so the door wouldn't stay in the up position. This had obviously happened while the a/c was with one of it's previous owners and someone had made up a prop to hold the door up. However without the balance of springs tensioning cables either side the door didn't track straight when coming down and would jam which was a sod to free. We had a spare spring unit but found that spring also was snapped interestingly in exactly the same place as you'll see this one has. We're now trying to find a friendly spring maker who can and will, for a good price, make us a new one. Hopefully you'll enjoy some of this!
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Post by Dave Homewood on Oct 26, 2018 14:12:52 GMT 12
Great stuff Denys.
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Post by johnnyfalcon on Oct 26, 2018 16:57:06 GMT 12
Well I hadn't seen the previous post by Denys - missed it somehow - and now I'm feeling a little faint... However, I understand the preservation limitations and restrictions and I know I'll heal. Might need a drink or two though.
Love the updates. Keep up the good work!
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Post by agalbraith on Oct 27, 2018 6:24:14 GMT 12
Great update Den, nice to see you are still managing to get some quality work done on the Hudson, she looks amazing!
Pleased to see that header tank on the Merlin and pleased the parts arrived safely. I was going to come down today after spraying some Auster parts.....but I am now helping Baz fix the brakes on his Mondeo!
As Johnny and Dave say....keep up the great work!!
Cheers
Ants
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Post by baz62 on Oct 27, 2018 17:23:24 GMT 12
That Hudson is look fantastic (as is the Friendship). Surely one of the most complete Hudson restorations detail wise.
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Post by denysjones on Oct 27, 2018 19:05:35 GMT 12
Good lord Ants as if restoring an Auster isn't sad enough you also work on a Fix Or Repair Daily !
Baz...thanks for the compliment but keep your eyes on the upper left corner of the floor as farm machinery Fred is playing Santa and something is due here before xmas which I'm pretty sure will make 2035 unique as an NZxxxx Hudson in terms of equipment fit..keep your suspenders on ooops!
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Post by baz62 on Oct 28, 2018 13:31:42 GMT 12
Good old Fred. Sounds intriguing will look forward to the parts arrival.
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Post by kiwi285 on Nov 3, 2018 18:27:00 GMT 12
Fantastic work Denys - that Hudson is looking amazing and as always the workmanship is first class.
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Post by denysjones on Nov 3, 2018 19:13:08 GMT 12
Thanks Mike. Been a bit of muscle power on BXG the last two Saturdays. Last week we jacked up the rear to the height that the F27 aircraft recovery manual says the floor might be at (as the maximum of 48inches to give over wing clearance of BRF's wing when BXG's goes on.). During the week I fabricated a trestle and today we positioned it and dyna-bolted it to the hangar floor and then jacked up the nose to pretty much the same level (let's not quibble about say 5mm). So this week's mission is to fabricate the nosewheel down lock, the nosewheel retraction ram (b oth faux items of course), and then the support mount for the nose gear...ah life goes on! BUT if anyone out there has the genuine article of any of these please communicate asap as of course we'd love the real McCoy but we're working to a timeline of just three weeks. cheers
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