wonwinglo

Now I will tell you a little story about my name,and why I was christened 'Barry' you see there is more to it than meets the eye,during the last war and just afterwards the name was very popular,names just happen like that suddenly a pop star or personality makes the news and people christen them after that person,but in my own case it was for a very different reason that is very special to me,now let me start at the beginning-
Just after World War one it became obvious that more pilots were lost through accidents in aircraft than at first expected,the reason was that these youngsters were thrown into action with little or no real experience of flying,sometimes as little as 8 to 12 hours if you were lucky on frail slow aircraft that could have nasty characteristics,these fledgling pilots knew nothing about spinning and its consequences,they found out the hard way by experience that is if they lived ?
The Royal Naval Air Service as it was then called realised that something should be done to standardise flying and to bring with it quality instruction,to this end they appointed a chap called 'Smith Barry' to set up a flying school that would standardise on flying instruction,using the old Avro 504 biplane he did just that,and with his no nonsense approach not only taught people to fly safely,but wrote everything down to make the very first standard flying manuals that even in todays civil flying clubs owe a lot to the Smith Barry School of flying at Gosport.
So where does the gosport tube bit fit in ? well in those far flung days there was no sophisticated small intercom sets like today,instead a rubber tube with a mouth piece was rigged between pilot and instructor,to communicate you just literally yelled into the tube,sometimes a deafening experience especially if the instructor was angry,the system became well known as the 'Gosport tube' and was fitted into aircraft up until WW2 such as the Tiger Moth and Miles Magister.
So there you have it,my name belongs to the most famous person involved with standard pocedures in flying tuition,and I am very proud of that fact.
The pseudo Wonwinglo came a lit later,and was connected to a well known forum ? so perhaps in some way that too was a direct offshoot from when pilots flew 'One Wing Low' at the Smith Barry school of flying ?

__________________
'And there I was oil on my goggles from a broken pipe,then I looked at the altimeter,all I could see was the makers name !'
www.wonwinglo.scale-models.net/

wonwinglo

The former Shuttleworth Trust Percival Gull G-ADPR in flight,the aircraft was sold and went on exhibition in New Zealand,Jean Batten made many famous long distance flights in her.


G-ANXR Proctor 4,preserved as RM221,shown here at a Waddington air show,the finish was silver with a red cowling.


G-ANZJ Proctor IV,seen here at Staverton in maroon and white trim.This aircraft was used as a crew ferry when Tipper air transport delivered Avro 19 Anson aircraft to Coventry airport in 1969.
She was broken up shortly afterwards.


Military Proctor 5 in camouflage with yellow trainer bands,these aircraft were used as wireless trainers in the R.A.F.


VH-BQA with an Oxford in the background.


ZK-ARP Proctor 5 preserved in New Zealand.

__________________
'And there I was oil on my goggles from a broken pipe,then I looked at the altimeter,all I could see was the makers name !'
www.wonwinglo.scale-models.net/

wonwinglo

How good it is to see a Proctor in flight again,the beautifully restored New Zealand example gets an airing.


G-AERD Vega Gull in Australia 2006.





Wings of G-AERD Vega Gull still crated in Australia,thanks to Captain Nigel Hitchman for these pictures.

__________________________________________________ __________________________________________________ ___

PERCIVAL Q6
Building a solid model of the Percival Q6 Petrel.

__________________
'And there I was oil on my goggles from a broken pipe,then I looked at the altimeter,all I could see was the makers name !'
www.wonwinglo.scale-models.net/

wonwinglo

Proposed sale of BA Connect
British Airways has announced that it has reached agreement in principle to sell the regional operation of its subsidiary airline BA Connect to Flybe.
BA Connect also operates from London City Airport and between Manchester and New York. The airline said these services will not form part of the proposed sale nor will the regional ground handling business, British AirwaysRegional Ltd.
Chief executive Willie Walsh said: Point to point regional operations are not a strategic part of our business and we believe that such activities are better undertaken by a regional low cost airline.
Despite the best efforts of the entire team at BA Connect, we do not see any prospect of profitability in its current form.
The proposed sale to Flybe provides the best opportunity to secure the long-term future for the many dedicated staff in BA Connect. British Airways will have a 15 per cent investment in Flybe on completion of the disposal.
London City services complement our mainline business at Heathrow. For this reason they are not included in the proposed sale.
It is envisaged that once the sale of the regional business of BA Connect to Flybe is completed, there will be a transition period until the start of the summer schedule on March 25, 2007 while the handover of responsibilities is undertaken.

__________________
'And there I was oil on my goggles from a broken pipe,then I looked at the altimeter,all I could see was the makers name !'
www.wonwinglo.scale-models.net/

wonwinglo

THE OLD SMITHY BAGINTON

News cutting dated 25-08-1964
A new tenant for the Old Smithy at Baginton village was found during 0ctober 2006,an artist blacksmith is renovating the forge in order to get it up and running again,here is a small flashback to 1964 when the place was used as an artists studio.

When I first went to work at Baginton airport back in 1960 as a trainee aircraft fitter,I used to pass the Old Smithy every day on my bike,the place is near to the entrance at the airport,the place always used to intrigue me and over the years I have seen a steady procession of new tenants come and go,some of them had very little if any regard for this historic building,what it really needed was someone to move in with feelings for the place.
Three years ago I wrote to the Parish council who were in the process of being the benefactors for the Old Smithy from the Coventry council,my intentions was to have a go at creating an art studio in the building,as one of the stipulations was that it must be used for some craft purpose within the community,and what could be better than art and crafts ?
Anyway over the months correspondence came back and forth between myself and the council and I heard nothing more in the past 12 months about the place ? however it appears that someone has been found as a suitable tenant,an artist welder who creates sculptures in metal,I met him yesterday as he was knee deep and busy starting to restore the building,he certainly has his work cut out with a crumbling wall,electrics to fix and many other large jobs,it made me realise that it would have been too large a task for myself and I am pleased that a perfect person has been found in order to preserve the history of the building,he showed me around inside,the first time that I had been inside for many years,a most unusual layout and he showed me how a new portion had been built on in the nineteen thirties,the shackles where the horses were tethered,and also pointed out that the front of the building would have once been open,he has already made the place secure with a new door and plans to build a module inside one half to house his draughting equipment and office,this is ideal as he is not allowed to alter the original fabric of the building.
Although he is in employment as a nurse he does the welding already in another place in Coventry behind the Rose and Crown pub,however environmental problems can be an issue and here he can bang and thump to his hearts content as the building is quite remote.
When I asked him how he came to know about the place,he said that he literally stumbled across it by accident,whilst exploring by bike to find somewhere suiotable.
I think that a perfect match in heaven has been made here,a skilled craftsman and mated with an old historic property with great social history,I wish him well in his ventures and will record any progress here in the future.
The cutting above is from my collection of anything that is of interest to me.

__________________
'And there I was oil on my goggles from a broken pipe,then I looked at the altimeter,all I could see was the makers name !'
www.wonwinglo.scale-models.net/

wonwinglo

Miles Aircraft Ltd.

The products of the Miles aircraft company.


Miles M.2 Hawk G-ACHK written off 20-07-38.


The sad remains of G-AFRZ Miles M.17 Monarch currently stored at R.A.F Cosford in a damp leaky hangar,this is the former G-AIDE restored on 23-08-46 and used by air racing pilot W.P.Bowles,before this the machine served in the R.A.F as W6463.
Pictureave Peace.


The rare Miles Gillette Falcon L9705 shown here at Woodley.
Photograph donated.


The final days of G-AMGW Marathon 1 which was withdrawnfrom use and scrapped at Derby,Burnaston in 1961,this aircraft was formerly VR-NAN.
Thanks to Dave Peace for this picture from his personal collection.


Miles Messenger cockpit.


Miles Aerovam 4 G-AILM seen here at Chivenor,Wrafton Gate when with Devonair Ltd,she was sold in Greece as SX-DBA 05-1955


G-AIZK Miles Hawk Trainer 3 ex P2506 scrapped 1963 at Little Snoring,ex Mc Aully Flying group.

__________________
'And there I was oil on my goggles from a broken pipe,then I looked at the altimeter,all I could see was the makers name !'
www.wonwinglo.scale-models.net/

wonwinglo

Comper Aircraft Company.
Nick Comper was a genius of light aircraft design,he left a legacy of original thinking in his products which despite being built in very small numbers,has left them firmly embedded into the aviation history books,and much talked about even 70 years after they first apperared,even today they offer the chance to build them as a replica such as the delightful little Comper Swift aircraft which has its following worldwide,in fact there is just not enough Swifts left to go around,and many change hands from enthusiast to enthusiast over the years.
The Pobjoy radial will always be connected with this aircraft,another masterpiece of aeronautical engineering,anyone who has heard the po-popping of these little engines will know what I mean ? they are poetry in motion.
Here we have but a small selection of Compers designs from the days of flying when spruce,fabric,dope and varnish were the basis for most aircraft.



G-ABWE Comper Swift at the Kings Cup air races,Hatfield July 1938,in the background is G-ADVV B.A.Double Eagle ( to R.A.F as ES949 July 1941) G-AEGI Parall Hendy Heck IIC ( Damaged beyond repair 17-06-50) G-ABWE was sold abroad in February 1940.


Comper Mouse.

Comper Fly (scaled down Scamp) serial number T1788.


Lovely in flight shot of the Comper Swift G-ABWE (colours white & red)


Photographed at Old Warden on 10-08-2004 by Dave Peace is the famous 'Scarlet Angel' formerly VT-ADO which was flown to India and back by its owners in the thirties.


G-ACTF Bare bones whilst getting an airing at Orion Airways,Baginton 1958.


G-ABUS Comper Swift at Baginton 04-10-64,whilst in the ownership of the late John Edwards.
She still retains the name 'Black Magic' and her well known race number '41'

__________________
'And there I was oil on my goggles from a broken pipe,then I looked at the altimeter,all I could see was the makers name !'
www.wonwinglo.scale-models.net/

wonwinglo

Emirates stands by Airbus despite delays
Emirates is confident about its A380 order, despite the latest delays announced by aircraft manufacturer Airbus which will mean enormous extra costs to the company.
The airline, which has ordered 45 of the superjumbos in a deal worth US$13 billion,was expecting its first delivery by August 2008.
However, despite a potential delay of approximately two years,Emirates has decided not to cancel its order.
European Aeronautic Defence and Space (EADS), the parent company of Airbus, said in a statement last month that it expected the A380 programme to cut expected cash flow by $8 billion from the previously estimated figure for the period 2006-2010. Part of this was an increase of $1.9 billion in the working capital needed to run the business.
However, due to industrial problems, the aircraft is facing a further two-year delay. Emirates is sending a team of technicians from its engineering department to the Airbus factory in Toulouse, France, to assess whether the revised timings the manufacturer had given for the delayed delivery of its A380s are achievable.
Habib Fekih, Airbus Middle East president, told Scale-Models that the delays and problems associated with the 550-seater airplane had "brought bad news for Airbus".
Airbus and EADS looked at the financial and management crisis facing the aircraft builder and launched a solution, Power Eight, as an mbitious cost cutting exercise. Additionally, it appointed Louis Gallois as the third chief executive for Airbus since July 2005.
However, Fekih said that the problems to do with the A380 were not political or technical, but lay with the industrial process to put the wiring in the aircraft for each individual customer,nobody has ever put this amount of wiring into a machine this big before .
The Power Eight programme is an ambitious global restructure to cut costs and streamline the business. The exercise will affect engineering, industrial and communications departments between the different sites scattered all over Europe.
The purpose, assures Fekih, is for Airbus to become more competitive. We're here to stay and we need to do whatever it takes to be leader in the field and we will achieve it. We are streamlining to be competitive and that's why I'm not pessimistic.
Tim Clark, Emirates president, said the airline would look into plugging the two-year gap by leasing five to seven Boeing 777-300ERs (extended range), although the actual type of aircraft has not yet been decided.
We believe the Airbus A380-800 is a great product, as evidenced by our order for 45 aircraft. Airbus has informed us that they will deliver our first aircraft in August 2008, he said and we are very keen to get her into service.
Singapore-based Richard Pinkham, an analyst at the Centre for Asia Pacific Aviation, a specialist aviation consultancy, said the current problem that Airbus is going through would certainly have put a "crimp" in Emirates' growth plans but loyalty to Airbus is evident.
This will have industry-wide ramifications. When Emirates has 45 A380s zipping around, it's going to have an effect on everyone's pricing. The airline was hoping to have 18 in revenue service by August 2008, but now they're not and that's going to have a short-term impact on their forward-looking growth, he said.
As an added headache,Emirates has installed a lot of infrastructure - both human and physical - to accommodate the aircraft that they're getting much later than they had wanted,everyone is watching Emirates and know they are the real airline leaders with this aircraft in service..
Pinkham also suggested that Airbus's troubles would not affect the sales of further A380 or even the redesigned A350 XWB. The A380 probably wasn't going to have too many sales before service entry anyway, with Airbus already having reached 150 orders. Airbus wasn't going to offer bargain pricing, so airlines would probably have waited to see how the aircraft performed before hopping aboard, he said,but hop they will.
Fekih also scotched rumours that the A350XWB would be ditched, saying: To be honest, announcing the A350 in the midst of the delay of the A380 doesn't make sense and it will have no impact.

__________________
'And there I was oil on my goggles from a broken pipe,then I looked at the altimeter,all I could see was the makers name !'
www.wonwinglo.scale-models.net/

Bunkerbarge

I wonder if the customer had been an American based airline whether they would have taken the same attitude or whether they would be more interested in suing Airbus to the point of destroying the company.

I think it is interesting that the success of this whole project is dependant on the decsions of an Arabian company that we wouldn't have even considered a few years ago as being a significant player in the aircraft industry. Now the future of the worlds aircraft industry is dependant on them.

__________________

“Dirty British coaster with a salt-caked smoke stack, Butting through the Channel in the mad March days"

wonwinglo

Hurlburt Field, Fla A transformation in special operations air power will begin when the first operational CV-22 Osprey is delivered here next month,everyone is looking forward to this exciting phase in the development and service entry of the unique Osprey twin rotor variable wing helicopter.
Gen. Doug Brown, United States Special Operations Command commander,will pilot the first Osprey to an arrival ceremony scheduled for Nov. 16.
This is the first of 50 Ospreys scheduled for delivery to AFSOC by fiscal year 2017.
Media representatives attending the arrival ceremony will have the opportunity to interview Osprey pilots, observe the CV-22 simulator in action, get up close and personal with a CV-22 static display, and talk
with AFSOC and Air Force leadership.
A media advisory will be sent out to all media representatives the week of the event.

__________________
'And there I was oil on my goggles from a broken pipe,then I looked at the altimeter,all I could see was the makers name !'
www.wonwinglo.scale-models.net/