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Post by 109augsburgeagle on Aug 11, 2008 14:33:35 GMT 12
enjoy
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Post by Dave Homewood on Aug 11, 2008 14:37:02 GMT 12
Very interesting stuff. I had assumed there would be little to see on the surface these days. Amazing. That piece of blue metal is in good conditon.
Unlike some grease covered, wrapped new part, these parts you see are almost all gauranteed to have seen actual combat and were flown by heroes, so they're special in that way, even if they appear to be junk to the average eye.
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Post by 109augsburgeagle on Aug 11, 2008 14:48:29 GMT 12
Don't get me wrong I am amazed by what i've found, I wouldn't have been scrabbling about on my all fours all day if I wasnt! But when you deal with restoring warbirds and sift through crash and scrap parts often you do soon become a bit more realistic about what your dealing. It would be nice to take every rusty piece home with me and preserve it accordingly to its historical significance but its just not realistic.
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Post by Dave Homewood on Aug 11, 2008 19:04:20 GMT 12
Yes, I agree. It is possibly worth preserving some of the painted parts that the paint has lasted well on, they might make good references to the unique NZ paint used in WWII. Sadly most bits will be somewhat faded and eroded compared to their original colour but you might still get lucky.
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Post by Bruce on Aug 11, 2008 19:18:24 GMT 12
Amongst the bits I recognise are Curtis Electric and Hamilton Standard prop hubs, Corsair or Ventura Engine cooling baffles, and the Oblong, slightly triangular piece with all the Dzus fasteners, which is off the accessory bay section of a Ventura Cowl (The hump in the middle is the back of the top intake fairing)
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Post by 43willys on Aug 14, 2008 19:52:03 GMT 12
There was also some aircraft wrecked in storey ave in Te Rapa. I have seen some parts laying in a stream there that runs through the backs of the sections. Not sure of the time period of when this happend. And also Ruakura Research station wrecked several Hudsons for parts.
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Post by Dave Homewood on Aug 14, 2008 20:59:50 GMT 12
I was told by John Smith that his Hudson and others had, before disposal, been offered to universities and labs to strip any useful parts from because in the late 1940's they were desperate for guages and things like that to use on laboratory equipment. He said this is why their panels were empty when sold off. This might be the reason why Hudsons were stripped at Ruakura Farm? I onder if the airframes remained there or went back to the RNZAF, or to a scrapper.
I'd be interested to know more about the Te Rapa wreckage too.
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Post by shorty on Aug 14, 2008 21:11:36 GMT 12
NZ2001 and NZ2003 are shown as being issued to Dept of Agriculture at Rukuhia, Presumably these were the one and were either taken to Ruakura and stripped there or broken up at Rukuhia and the required bits taken to Ruakura.
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Post by Dave Homewood on Aug 15, 2008 11:05:57 GMT 12
Very good point Shorty. I had always wondered what the Dept of Ag wanted them for.
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Post by 43willys on Aug 26, 2008 17:28:41 GMT 12
The Remains of the two hudsons at Ruakura were buried in their rubbish dump. As for what was broken up in storey ave im not sure. i will have to ask a couple of my mates but i definently remember seeing remains of aircraft in the stream back in the 70's.
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Post by Dave Homewood on Aug 26, 2008 21:01:09 GMT 12
Thanks for that 43willys, I'd love to go for a dig in the Ruakura dump but who knows what else might be in there, could be scary.
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Post by 43willys on Aug 27, 2008 20:36:15 GMT 12
Rang my mate to find out what the story was with the aircraft stuff in storey ave. There seems to be several storys of how the stuff got there. He tells me shortly after the war a barge was bought into Tauranga that had been in the islands and this was full of aircraft parts, and this stuff was sent to Hamilton and put out at storey ave.
Version 2: A barge came back from the islands full of trucks and aircraft parts and came in through the Waikato heads up to Hamilton were all this stuff was unloaded.
Version 3: It was parts dumped from Te Rapa air force base.
He tells me there were Kittyhawk and Corsair parts but he also found a zeros undercarige leg. Most of this stuff was pretty buggered and that was back in 1975/6.
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Post by Bruce on Aug 27, 2008 23:40:19 GMT 12
Version 2 has some credibility. Long time Waikato Riverboat magnate Caesar Roose purchased a US Navy LST (landing ship, Tank) in Hawaii immediately postwar with a view to using it to cart aggregate etc on the Waikato river, with services to Onehunga and other river mouth ports as required. The vessel was renamed "Rawhiti 3" (previously a 190ft long Roose paddle steamer Rawhiti 2 was the largest vessel to use the river - its hull still exists on the riverbank just upstream from Mercer - visible from SH1). As it would be unstable in the open sea without some load he combined efforts with a Hamilton trucking operator, Jack Tidd ( founder of current Hamilton truckbuilder TRT ltd) who had purchased a bulk lot of US Marines trucks, also in Hawaii, but who was having trouble finding shipping space. As a result Rawhiti 3 brought the trucks back to the Waikato, where the were off loaded at Tuakau. The size and manouverablity of the ship meant that it couldnt get much further upstream, and was in reality unsuitable for the intensive operations originally envisaged. Someone back in the Islands (Fiji or Samoa) made Roose a good offer and Rawhiti 3 was onsold (for a moderate profit) and the vessel departed northwards again after only a few months in NZ. Going by the way both Roose and Tidd worked, it is highly likely other war surplus bits and pieces came back from Hawaii onboard the vessel - the sort of componentry that would be useful to farmers and contractors - aircraft bits perhaps?
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Post by Dave Homewood on Aug 28, 2008 12:00:14 GMT 12
Amazing story Bruce. I've always wondered about that wreckage at Mercer. What happened to thje steam boat to get in that state? Was it retired and left? Or did it get holed?
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Post by Bruce on Aug 28, 2008 17:47:53 GMT 12
The Rawhiti 2 Hull (and a smaller Hull belonging to the Roose Paddle steamer "Freetrader" were stripped and abandoned on the river bank when they were retired (Late 1940s?) Somewhere along that stretch or river is also the Manuwai (another Roose boat) but it has sunk into the riverbed and is no longer visible. At some stage flood waters undercut the Rawhiti's hull causing it to break its back in two places.
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Post by Dave Homewood on Sept 3, 2008 0:13:38 GMT 12
Bruce, my Dad's cousin Bob reads the forum and he spotted this thread. He has tonight sent me the following email which he's happy for me to post here, as I'm sure others will find it of interest, despite being a tangent from the original subject: "Hello Dave, Hows things down your way ,you must be sick of the rain by now, I was reading through the threads on your forum ,regarding the trucks etc that Tidd's brought in just after the war ,below is a link to some photos of the Boat that brought them into Port Waikato,I believe they would have been barged down the Waikato River from there ,perhaps Mercer as the loading ramp existed there in those years for the car ferry across the River I did know a old chap who worked on the River for Roose Shipping for years ,he passed away years ago but I remember vaguely him telling me about boats from o/seas coming into Port Waikato,I sort of imagined a scow or similar,but nothing this big ,it was the largest ship to ever come into Port Waikato, another friend of mine actually sailed one of the old tug's out through the Wakato Heads and around to Onehunga ,it eventually finished its days at Drury down by the Motorway Bridge ,you may remember it laying there,can tell you a bit more about it if you are interested . Take care Talk soon Bob Homewood" www.oceaniashippingforum.com/showthread.php?p=794
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Post by 43willys on Dec 1, 2008 18:42:01 GMT 12
Finnaly figured out how to download my photos so will start sorting them out. Here are two taken down the back of Asplins in the mid 70's
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Post by 43willys on Dec 1, 2008 18:52:26 GMT 12
2 photos i took in the gully at Rukuhia one showing Corsair Blast tubes: The other showing part of a flare pistol being held and a 50 cal reciever even with a empty shell sitting in it.
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Post by Tonys18 on Jan 22, 2009 16:35:24 GMT 12
Hello all that are talking about the dump! We own that land right next to it and yes it has lots of nice parts! I was just 12 years to late to dig up what 43willys did! Made a sort of makeshift track into it. Man I like the parts so much I draged them though the bush and up the hill so I knew they were safe. Found some data plates as well down there. Some parts looked like they were shot at.
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Post by 43willys on Jan 24, 2009 12:21:25 GMT 12
Hi Tonys18 Looks like you have some really cool stuff from the dump, i first started going down the gully over 30 years ago. Thats where some of the good stuff was sitting on the top, the rest was sticking out of the ground or you had to dig for it. As you know there is still as much stuff there as we ever took out. I suspect the Browning gun in my photo is at your place. As for the story of aircraft buried under the runway, i suspect that most of the stuff buried on that side of the airport is the same type of stuff that was bulldozed over the gully by your place. Most of that being steel and stainless steel. The Aluminum was worth too much to be dumped and so was melted down. Here's a few more photos of Rukuhia that you guys out there may not have seen.
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