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Post by denysjones on Jul 12, 2020 16:09:32 GMT 12
Well done Mark go to the top of the class, I found it today in the PV-1 IPC on a page of "miscellaneous storage" showing a dozen or so boxes of one size or shape for such sundry purposes.
I'll see if it's of any use to our buddies at Queensland Air Museum for their PV-1.
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Post by corsairarm on Jul 12, 2020 16:27:18 GMT 12
Have you tried MoTaT to see if they need it for their Ventura?
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Post by markrogers on Jul 12, 2020 18:20:33 GMT 12
I second corsairarm's suggestion, try Motat first. It would be fitting to put it in the Motat Ventura if it was missing from it.
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Post by denysjones on Jul 22, 2020 15:00:41 GMT 12
A mid-week poser to see how we go on stump-the-brains-trust but first, the radio junction box from the other week is now complete resplendent with Angus's lovely laced cable. He tells me there are two ways to do lacing, the military way and the correct way. So I suspect said cable to not be militarily-correct! However the poser is this little beast which came our way of late. We know it is US in origin but it bears no part number, serial number, patent number etc, just a small plaque proclaiming "Washington Institute of Technology Inc". It is an aerial switch with three sets of dual connectors, one each side (inputs) and one bottom (output). They are labelled "Homing", "Long Range", and "Receiver" respectively. On the rear as it sits is the shaft for a knob to do the switching, the shaft projects through the hole in the faceplate which is sitting to the right in the shot. The cut-off ends of two input feeds remain on the right, secured by a bar and butterfly nut screwed onto the threaded shaft as per the two others left and bottom. Anyone recognize it? cheers
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Post by denysjones on Aug 1, 2020 21:51:51 GMT 12
Hi folks a day of small bits here and there on various projects. Firstly..the other week among those bits of a Hudson nature coming to hand came a small bit of plumbing in a U-shape with unequal length of the legs which rang a bell and led to it being id'ed as running from the auxiliary fuel pump to two valves in the fuel system and located below the pilot's area. So this resolved how said pump had to locate (problems here as all the details from other Hudsons conflicted with other original in-stitu items in 2035 which led to the making of a mounting bracket) so today this took up residence in the hell-hole of plumbing...now said bright item at the bottom of shot awaits the acquisition of the valves it connects to .... Then on the F27 front... Amazing how the root ends of the outboard flap segments got so encrusted in burned fuel residue (this is the spare stbd one we have) but once cleaned the bearings are bright and shiny but also not just one but three data plates come to the fore albeit that the grime has become so engrimed that best not to try to remove it and so damage the plates (port flap due to go on BXG). So just to round off the day we also got another piece of the Vampire's Goblin into play namely the Rotax starter (sorry about the dark shot late in the day). Hope you enjoy another happy day in Ferymead land, all the happy Saturday night subscribers!
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Post by Dave Homewood on Aug 1, 2020 23:10:56 GMT 12
Good progress. Great that the bits turning up actually fit into places where they were missing.
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Post by agile on Aug 2, 2020 13:44:58 GMT 12
Today's Mosquito post is a tale of two dinghy boxes. The dinghy in the Mosquito lives in a plywood box suspended from the top of the fuselage behind the cockpit. Some years ago we acquired a box from Australia. It was NOS and presumably was produced in Aussie. We gave it a lick of paint and set it to one side. More recently a second box was donated by one of our NZ contacts. This one has clearly been used, as there are holes around the perimeter for the alclad flashing strip, and for the bolts to fasten it into the aircraft. Unlike the Aussie box it also doesn't have a postwar mod to the woodwork around the electrical connector embodied (the hole was opened out because there were instances of the plug fouling the hole when the dinghy deployed, presumably causing the dinghy to be tied to the aircraft when ditching). Here are the two boxes: Note the lovely piece of protective carpet covering the sharp edges of the nut at the bottom of the box. We suspect this should actually be felt. We decided that our British-built aircraft should use a British-built box, so a bit of time has been spent cleaning up the new acquisition and doing some small repairs: One of Dave's fellow S+S tradies has been at work here "No rations, no paddles ?? or ?? 24/3" The number 944 is inscribed on the side. This raised the tantalising prospect of tying it to an airframe, but I don't think any of the NZ aircraft were ??944, so it may have been swapped out of an aircraft in the UK. It's cleaned up nicely and just needs another coat of paint - we'll keep all the pencil markings of course. One of our Australian contacts has placed dibs on the now surplus Aussie box, so this will eventually be heading back across the ditch to its birthplace.
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Post by Dave Homewood on Aug 2, 2020 17:44:08 GMT 12
Very interesting. The 'carpet' is possibly horsehair felt. We used it in the S&S Fabric Bay occasionally for this sort of thing.
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Post by agile on Aug 2, 2020 17:54:03 GMT 12
Oh interesting Dave. It has a very carpet-like coarse weave through it, would that be right for horsehair felt? The texture is certainly right for horsehair.
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Post by Dave Homewood on Aug 2, 2020 18:25:32 GMT 12
It's hard to ascertain without a better look at it. Can you get a close up photo at some point please? Horsehair felt is/was used as a carpet underlay. It's a sort of thick mat, often used for insulation or for rub points such as in your box to protect the raft from the nut. Here's an example from the web, not exactly like we used but close.
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Post by denysjones on Aug 8, 2020 21:38:59 GMT 12
No pretty piccies this week but good news stuff...
Graeme Tucker from NAC/AirNZ arrived bearing gifts, namely the three log books for BXG from birth till 1981.
There must be a fourth covering the time till her accident in 1988 but he's on the case so to find.
Another valued part of caring for the old girl!
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Post by Dave Homewood on Aug 8, 2020 21:55:58 GMT 12
That's fantastic news to have all that history turn up!
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Post by davidd on Aug 9, 2020 11:57:35 GMT 12
Harking back to the Mosquito emergency dinghy storage boxes, the late Ross Cleverley (Safety & Surface worker) has this contribution to make (from recesses of my memory alone). Ross undertook much of his very early career on Mosquitos of 75 Squadron, and it was discovered at this time that the miscellaneous equipment stowed with the dinghy included a "distress" flag for hoisting in the dinghy (I don't know why a tiny dinghy required a comparatively tiny flag when any ship or aircraft coming across such a vessel during their travels, might rightly assume that any occupants might be in some distress). Regardless of this consideration, the RNZAF had a long-standing aversion to this flag (which was apparently an Internationally agreed design from perhaps pre-war days, may still have been currently "legal" in 1951/52) as one of its pilots (F/O Ken D Lumsden, No. 18 Squadron) had an interesting experience about 8 years previously (actually on 1st November 1943, the American landings at Empress Augusta Bay, Bougainville). He was shot down by Japanese fighters: to quote the official history (J M S Ross, page 208); "He had been chased by two Zekes over the landing area, and was fired on by a United States destroyer which holed his aircraft. Then a Corsair fired on him, and shortly afterwards he was forced to ditch. He was later picked up by a (American) barge, after nearly being machine gunned by the crew, and returned to his unit two days later". This incident (and some earlier ones during tours of 15 and 14 Squadrons during May and June of that year) convinced RNZAF to finally make changes to their identification roundels and make them look more like American insignia, by adding horizontal white "bars" to each side of the roundels, in all six positions. Something overlooked in most accounts of Lumsden's adventure was that the greatest peril he faced was the armed American barge, which reported that the New Zealander's dinghy was flying a red and white flag. Strange but true - the flag was a red one, with a white central disc, as approved pre-war. It is unknown what (if any) flags were issued to United States aircrew for their rafts, and it is not known which type the RNZAF was using (supplied in early days of war from RAF sources, or even locally made, or actually issued by the Americans themselves?), but result was that all raft kits in use by RNZAF were checked, and if containing the red/white flags, these were supposed to be destroyed. In Ross Cleverley's personal collection of "war trophies" (he "joined the mob" about 1950/51) was one of the discredited "distress" flags, in all its glory. I THINK Ross donated this item to the RNZAF Museum, as he realized that very few if any of these flags might have survived in New Zealand, apart from his specimen. David D
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Post by denysjones on Aug 27, 2020 19:46:58 GMT 12
Going back to Aug 1st before Alex interrupted Things have been small items on the various fronts so haven't posted for a tad but thought best catch up. On Vampire items we have now got this wee fella in place on one of the engine mount members. Its a PLV (Pressure Limiting Valve) and it is part of the inflation plumbing for the canopy seal air system. Cam MacKenzie passed it our way some time ago but now it's home. A deal is in progress with Des and Dave at Classic Flyers for another of the mounting brackets it sits on so we can install a second such unit and they get another plug for the IFF cabling of the TBF up there. In Hudson land have followed on from the report of Aug 1st and the target is the completion of the fuel system in said hell hole bay which is this (a snip of one Lockheed's blueprints) The green shaded unit up top is the engine selector valve which splits the fuel off to the two Cyclones (which was original in 2035) while the yellow shaded area at the bottom is a Tee joint onto which the U-bend featured Aug 1st joins. Looking at the photo of Aug 1st the ESV is prominent (black) in the upper foreground and the silver filter/strainer can be seen lower left background with the word "Top"on it Historically we'd added the pink items of plumbing (off the ESV) and also the fuel filter/strainer bottom right. The good Mr Mike Nicholls came forward with the two valves shown in blue, and the orange-brown items we've got from stock but we're keen to get any of the missing 1" plumbing if there are folks out there who can help please get in touch! edit 28/8 sorry I should have stressed that the plumbing items are AC811 (AC corps' 1930s stuff) not modern AN/MS...the trials of being a Hudson perfectionist!
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Post by denysjones on Sept 19, 2020 20:10:04 GMT 12
I know it's been quiet for some weeks but there's not too much spectacular stuff in the dark stages of various matters till they come together at the end. Coming forward on the above matter of the fuel system of the Hudson it's been a quest of locating the plumbing items but today the first (the upper) valve went in (that's it hanging at the bottom in the foreground above the end of the U-bend). Then a bit of time spent first using some wire to trace the pipe track from the connector on the away side of the valve up and over the top of the fuel pump and around other plumbing to the top of the fuel filter (follow the plan above). Next find suitable selection of pipe and end fittings followed by a session with the trusty bender and voila we have connection. Now it's off to painting and fitting next Saturday. (In the above photo you can just make out the aluminium colour of the upper stage of the fuel filter in the left of the shot). On F27 front it has been indirect progress namely the old NAC air stairs. Many hours, and wire brush disks for the angle grinder have stripped off the paint and corrosion, rotten members have been cut out and new welded in and then over the course of this week daily missions have seen it rolled this way and that, and that side and this spray primed and top coated and today the side lettering and hand rails top coated, now it's onto the foot treads but we're nearing the end! cheers
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Post by denysjones on Sept 26, 2020 21:17:16 GMT 12
Moving on from last week's Hudson stuff having installed said piece of plumbing now means that ages of contorted access to the plumbing hell-hole is over as the balance of items (hopefully) can all be installed through the two fuselage wall access hatches. So now attention can turn to the centre line of the area and so this is first up the bomb aimer's bench. Dag kindly cut out the wooden base following the Lockheed plan and this week I got it painted. This week's duty is the strip prime paint of the two side members which furnish the mounts for the safety strap, but I struggle to figure out how a person lying face down straps themselves in with a strap over their back! The piece sitting on the forward of the base is one half of the hinge front support of the bench which has a reverse identical half and there's a screw jack that raises and lowers the front of the bench. Never mind here we are today .... Today also saw progress on the port wing of BRF. Now that all the wing walk markings are in place the surface can be polished and waxed so now the real pseudo-metallic look of the paint comes into play. The next move is the funding of the major lettering NAC to go over the outboard segment before we install the wing on BXG which will overhang the area (remember our GiveALittle page for this if you will)
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Post by denysjones on Oct 3, 2020 20:29:16 GMT 12
As the old expression goes about the best laid plans of mice and men....things at the park fell apart this morning around 0930 when one of the two main power feeds into the site blew out taking out power to one half of the site...just so happens our buildings being therein. The local lines company eventually chased the fault to a cable recently relocated underground blowing out a phase. So about 1430 they had their emergency generator on site and hooked in and power back on. Service was somewhat restricted but major services were on for the park's monthly night market where we get in excess of 1200 patrons and today with daylight saving kicking this week we were working to a hopeful gate of 2000. So when there's no zubb-zubb juice work programmes get revised. Having a surplus of physical power available I grabbed some of same and we positioned the refurbished airstairs to the display hangar (despite s few minor tweeks to still do) and they now form a part of the NAC landscape. Albeit a tad higher than the door of an F27 with discharged oleos the effect is there. Thereafter the only thing to do was more cleaning and waxing of BRF's wing. Once the power came back on the refurbished edgings to the Hudson bombaimer's bench could be offered up and a start made to the insertion of the 78 screws that locate said same. ttfn
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Post by baz62 on Oct 4, 2020 13:13:59 GMT 12
Great work Denys. The last photo didn't attach.
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Post by denysjones on Oct 4, 2020 18:36:26 GMT 12
hmm wierd Baz, it did this time, cheers
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Post by agile on Oct 6, 2020 22:07:51 GMT 12
On the Mosquito front the tidy-up of the aft fuselage is nearing completion. Referring back to the post on the previous page, the rudder cable pulley bracket that was missing at 'D' in the photo looking forward along the fuselage has been fabricated by George: While he was at it he also made this lesser-spotted one, which is attached to the front of bulkhead #3 where the aileron cables run up from the bomb-bay into the wing: If anyone has any of the AS104 paxoline pulleys shown we are still after quite a few. Another item that was missing was the power supply panel for the Bendix/Pioneer Magnesyn remote indicating compass. This panel is mounted at the top of the aft face of bulkhead #4, and appeared to have been removed in a less than scientific way: We repaired the damage to the bulkhead ages ago: But were hampered by the lack of a drawing and one of the electrical connectors from making and installing a new panel. In the end I did a CAD drawing of it based on a pic of the Air Force Museum's example: The comnponents from L-R are a suppressor, a 6-way junction box and an inverter. The inverter and suppressor were donated by Cam McKenzie and I acquired the junction box off EBay. I was on the point of making the new panel when one of our contacts (someone known to many forumites) saw this pic on Facebook and offered us the genuine article, complete with wiring and most of the bits. A bit of painting and wiring, and: Profuse thanks to the individual concerned. This is now in its new home (the pneumatic reservoirs have been temporarily removed while this work goes on): The observant will have noticed that the 'MIRROR' stencil in the earlier shot has been painted over. This indicated the stowage for the hand signalling mirror, part of the Tropical Equipment modification which would not have been present on aircraft in the European theatre. These markings have of course been recorded. One of the other more obvious tropical mods is the fitment of the extended tropical air intake filters. The entire lower cowling panel is swapped out, so we are keeping an eye out for a set of non-tropical ones, which will no doubt be scarce even by Mossie standards! There's at least one airworthy aircraft fitted with the correct ones..... nah, they'd probably miss them. Down the back, the plumbing running to the tail (2x hydraulic for tailwheel retraction, ASI static and hydraulic overflow) has been cleaned, markings replaced where missing and been reinstalled. Here are a couple of examples: 2 narrow blue and one broad yellow band denotes ASI static. Broad white denotes hydraulic and in this case '2' is the tailwheel retraction circuit. Friend of the project Luke Frogley (who some forumites will probably know) kindly 3D printed us some pipe clamps (the missing originals were cast in hard rubber) which have been temporarily deployed - I still need to form up the alclad strips that sit on top of these: The pulley bracket above has been fitted and the rudder cables (which were acquired from Ed Meysztowicz AKA powerandpassion) installed: Only a few wee bits to go now. Since this pic the wiring and plumbing on the lower starboard side have been tidied up - we still need to fabricate one missing hydraulic pipe and the fitting to attach it to the flow control valve. We need to make or acquire a bracket for the IFF blade aerial at the top of the compartment (we have the aerial itself in the UK waiting), find a beam approach aerial (bottom port side of compartment) and repair the elevator trim cables which were cut at bulkhead #7. Once doping of the fabric is complete we'll install the two downward ID lamps and we're basically done back here aft of bulkhead #5. Referring back to my previous post Dave was after a closeup of the felt in the dinghy box. Herewith: We actually had some very similar felt (probably the same material) from which I could cut a replacement. We can't quite claim the leaps and bounds what the lads oop North are making, but we are going in the right direction! Cheers A
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