Newark Air Museum – Page 14

Sea Harrier at Newark Air Museum

Newark Air Museum Sea Harrier

Since the start of 2016 Sea Harrier FA.2, ZA176 at Newark Air Museum has been receiving an ‘armament upgrade’, which has given the airframe more of an operational appearance.

For several years the museum has been acquiring a selection of Sea Harrier compatible weapons fit, which, until now this has been displayed underneath the airframe. A new volunteer has recently joined the museum and he has been using his former skills as an Armourer to assist with fitting the weaponry to the aircraft.

Amongst the first items fitted were a set of CBLS (Carrier Bomb Light Stores) units. In service the CBLS units allows military aircraft to carry up to 4 light stores (or practice bombs) on each weapon station. The use of practice bombs during training helps reduce costs and minimises risks during aircrew weapons training. These units help illustrate the important training aspect of Sea Harrier operations and fits in with the museum’s own themes of flight training.

Two rare, ADEN 30 gun pods have also been fitted to ZA176 to replicate the units carried operationally by the Sea Harriers until they came out of service in 2006. These pods have been refurbished and repainted using a grey paint that has been carefully matched to the airframe colour.

Sea Harrier ZA176 joined the Newark Air Museum collection from RNAS Yeovilton, Somerset, on Wednesday 21st July, 2004. ZA176 helped complete the V-STOL airframe lineage displayed at the museum. This started with the Meteor FR.9 flying test-bed and associated RB.108 vertical lift engine and now moves along to the Sea Harrier, which is complemented by a recently acquired Pegasus engine. ZA176 was also the seventh Fleet Air Arm aircraft to be displayed in the museum collection.

www.newarkairmuseum.org

Newark Air Museum Events for 2016

Newark Air Museum Vulcan

Here at Newark Air Museum, a registered charity, we’re have some exciting special events planned for our 2016 season:

5 March 2016 – Indoor Aeroboot / Aerojumble Table Top Sale 48 sellers tables all hosted inside Display Hangar 2 amongst the aircraft at the museum site in eastern Nottinghamshire. {Special discount admission rates apply, open to everyone to attend.}

6 March, 2016 – Ransome & Marles Commemorative Day throughout the day re-enactors will be participating in a variety of commemorative activities at the museum to mark the 75th Anniversary of the Newark bearing factory being bombed.

21 & 22 May, 2016 – Tribute to the V-Force event dedicated to the aircraft and personnel that flew Valiants, Victors and Vulcans. This slimmed down event includes a reunion of former V-Force personnel. Based around the museum’s Vulcan aircraft it will also feature many visiting displays and is open to the public. {Normal admission rates apply}

18 & 19 June 2016 – Cockpit-Fest 2015 & Aeroboot / Aerojumble; this regular two day event provides the perfect opportunity for the public to view a diverse range of visiting aircraft cockpits. {Normal admission rates apply}

15 October 2016 – Indoor Aeroboot / Aerojumble Table Top Sale 48 sellers tables all hosted inside Display Hangar 2 amongst the aircraft at the museum site in eastern Nottinghamshire. {Special discount admission rates apply, open to everyone to attend.}

Full details about these and other museum activities can be found on the news & event pages of the website, which are regularly updated www.newarkairmuseum.org

Harvard news round-up from Newark

Harvard at Newark Air Museum

The in-depth restoration of the North American Harvard II B in Newark Air Museum’s on site workshop continues and recently work has been undertaken on preparing to refit the front section of the engine to the fuselage.

A lack of significant engine part means that this part of the project will be a largely cosmetic exercise for display purposes, which will allow for the refitting of the restored engine cowlings.

The airframe being restored is 42-12417 (Dutch AF B-163 and RCAF FE930) and the restoration programme is now well underway; however the final choice of markings; either Dutch or Canadian still remains to be made.

www.newarkairmuseum.org

Monospar Update August 2015

Newark Monospar project

Work is now progressing well on applying fabric to the wing of the Monospar at Newark Air Museum.

This work is now taking place alongside the aircraft in Hangar 1 at the museum, where it is attracting a lot of attention and interest from those people visiting the museum from around the world. Two new recruits have been added to the restoration team, who are both now learning the ‘art’ of fabric application and rib-stitching.

The complex wing folding arrangements can be seen on the re-covered wings that have also recently been refitted to the fuselage.

The General Aircraft Monospar at Newark Air Museum is the only Monospar preserved in the United Kingdom. The aircraft type was designed by H. J. Stieger and VH-UTH was built at Croydon, Surrey in 1935. For over 20 years the aircraft operated as VH-UTH in Australia with both New England Airways (later Airlines of Australia) and Butler Air Transport. On 11th July 1936 whilst carrying the former Australian Prime Minister Billy Hughes the aircraft crash landed, fortunately the occupants and the aircraft survived.

On 22nd August 1961 VH-UTH piloted by Dr J Morris and B J Harrison took-off from Darwin, Australia on a 12,000 mile journey through 22 countries to Lympne airfield, England. The aircraft and crew survived monsoon, war, revolt and prison, the story of the flight was the subject of a book Two Men in a Flying Machine, written by Dr Morris.

After flying on to Biggin Hill, VH-UTH later spent a number of years at Panshangar, Herts. The aircraft was then bought by the Tiger Club and it was moved to Croydon. By 1967 VH-UTH was in open storage at Booker, and it was falling into bad repair. The aircraft was first moved to Newark and later in 1972 to the museum’s Winthorpe Airfield site.

A sad epitaph to the Monospar’s history was the death of pilot and author Dr J. Morris in a flying accident in the spring of 1981.

The restoration programme for VH-UTH commenced during the summer 1995, when its wings were taken to Innsworth, allowing work to be undertaken by members of the Cotswold Aircraft Restoration Group.

Since its return to Newark the restoration work has progressed steadily, with the work being undertaken without any working drawings or airframe plans. Work will soon commence on the ‘top hat’ longerons on the Monospar fuselage. Once this has been undertaken the fuselage fabric will also be applied.

www.newarkairmuseum.org

Cockpit-Fest 2015 – a wet but fascinating weekend

Newark Cockpit Fest

Cockpit-Fest 2015 proved to be another great event at the Newark Air Museum site in eastern Nottinghamshire, which taking into account the terrible weather on the Saturday was quite well attended by the public.

Last minute changes the layout on Saturday to get some displays inside provided a boost to exhibitors in Hangar 2 and the weather did not seen to dampen everyone’s enthusiasm for this ever popular gathering of cockpit owners from around the UK.

The museum trustees were particularly thankful to a host of people: all of the Cockpiteers and Exhibitors, their friends and families; the Aeroboot stall holders; the museum staff, aircraft openers and volunteers who helped during the build-up, during and after the event. A special thank you goes to everyone who stuck it out in the wet conditions on Saturday

For this year’s event they would also like to extend a big thank you to the following people and organisations:

Ken Ellis (‘Wrecks & Relics – Spirit of Cockpit-Fest’ Awards)

David Gledhill

Pen & Sword

The Museum Shop

Everyone who displayed at the event was a winner and a credit to this wonderfully diverse hobby, with some tremendous exhibits proudly displayed around the site; the 2015 results are as follows:

Grand Champion (Visitors Award) – de Havilland Hornet project – David Collins

Visitors Award Non-Cockpit – Lightning panel display – Darren Swinn

Cockpiteers Cockpit Award (Joint Winners) – Beagle Pup HB-NAV – Bill Fern; and Lightning F6 XR754 – Matt Buddle

Cockpiteers Award Non-Cockpit – Women in World War II – Karen Wilson

Wrecks & Relics Spirit of Cockpit-Fest Award (Ken Ellis) – HS125 G-AVAI – Andy Rawden

Wrecks & Relics Spirit of Cockpit-Fest Award (Ken Ellis) – Harrier AV8B – Robbie Burgess

Peter Green, Wrecks & Relics Spirit of Cockpit-Fest Award (Ken Ellis) – Sopwith Camel project – Tony Dyer

We would like to add a special thank you to the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight for persevering with the weather to provide an excellent Spitfire flypast. Also thank you to Vulcan XH558 for the unexpected low level transit flight over Vulcan XM594.

We will be back with the 2016 event, which will take place on 18 & 19 June, 2016

www.newarkairmuseum.org

New exhibit at Newark Air Museum

Lightning XR757 cockpit

Newark Air Museum has entered into a loan agreement, which will see the cockpit of former English Electric Lightning F6, XR757 displayed at the museum’s Drove Lane site into summer 2016.

The wonderfully restored cockpit was moved from its former location at RAF Scampton on Thursday 12th June 2015 by its owner Trevor Garrod. It was displayed at the museum’s annual Cockpit-Fest event, where it was exhibited alongside two other Warton veterans the Canberra PR9 cockpit and the TSR2 cockpit.

The arrangement for the loan was finalised during recent weeks and the museum trustees were pleased to be able to provide accommodation for this particular trailer mounted cockpit section. The single Lighting cockpit will help illustrate the differences with the museum’s own two-seat training version.

www.newarkairmuseum.org

Cockpit-Fest 2015 Late Update

TSR2 cockpit

With less than a week to go the staff and volunteers at Newark Air Museum have received a last minute boost in relation to the 2015 Cockpit-Fest event, which takes place on Saturday 13th & Sunday 14th June 2015.

The museum trustees are delighted to confirm that the TSR2 cockpit, which is currently on loan at the museum from the Brooklands Museum at Weybridge in Surrey, will now be on display at Cockpit-Fest.

The cockpit, which was originally displayed at the TSR2 anniversary event in autumn 2014 will be uncovered and will be available for external viewing on both Saturday 13th and Sunday 14th June.

This will be a unique opportunity for visitors to see the TSR2 cockpit at Cockpit-Fest and we hope that you will take advantage of it being on display.

In Damien Burke’s excellent TSR2 book, the cockpit is described as follows: “Test forebody T5 …” and that it was “….Rescued from the Farnborough dump in 1992.”

www.newarkairmuseum.org

Cockpit-Fest at Newark Air Museum Coming Soon

Newark Air Museum

Preparations for this year’s Cockpit-Fest are well underway at Newark Air Museum’s site in eastern Nottinghamshire; close to the border with Lincolnshire. Newark Air Museum is a registered charity located on part of the former site of RAF Winthorpe; its two day Cockpit-Fest event attracts exhibitors from across the UK and Europe, to sample what one former-aviation magazine editor calls “grass roots aircraft preservation”.

At this year’s event nearly 100 years of aviation will be represented. This is thanks to a fantastic new cockpit build project that is being displayed for the first time. The project that has got everyone talking is an accurate fabrication of a famous British biplane fighter from World War I, a Sopwith Camel, which is being displayed complete with a period-instrument panel.

This Sopwith Camel cockpit project joins more than twenty (20) other cockpits from across the history of aviation and includes other notable items such as the evocative Spitfire P9451 cockpit project; a de Havilland Hornet cockpit; and a Harrier AV8B cockpit.

From its humble beginnings, when a few like-minded enthusiasts first displayed one or two aircraft cockpit sections at the museum; Cockpit-Fest now regularly attracts, many more visiting cockpits and associated displays. Cockpit-Fest allows the owners the chance to display their prized exhibits to their fellow enthusiast and the general public.

This year’s event takes place on Saturday 13th and Sunday 14th June; and has an international aspect to it, with visitors from Denmark and Belgium already booked in as visitors. We also have a Belgian seller booked in at the Aeroboot aviation and avionics sale that runs alongside Cockpit-Fest. Here enthusiasts and the public can search out those aviation artefacts, books and models.

The event is supported by a range of organisations and individuals; with the visitors being encouraged to have a say in deciding, which is the best cockpit by voting on their favourite display and from these results, prizes are awarded.

Cockpit-Fest also attracts other visiting displays like the Raptor Foundation with its owls; local history / archaeological groups; military re-enactors; book launches; and even more aviation related displays such as clothing and historical artefacts. As an added bonus this year’s event has a flypast by a Hurricane fighter on the Sunday.

Full details about the events can be found on the Museum Events page of the museum website at www.newarkairmuseum.org.

Planning Permission Granted for Museum Project

Newark Air Museum

The trustees of Newark Air Museum are pleased to advise that official notification has been received from Newark & Sherwood District Council, granting Full Planning Permission for the new Education Room, Café & Toilet facility.

Full Planning Permission represents a huge boost to the museum’s plan to construct this important new visitor facility on its Southfield Site. Over the coming weeks the museum will be working with its project architect, Studio G Architecture LLP (SGA LLP) of Collingham, Notts to discharge the five planning conditions that were applied to the Full Planning Approval.

The aim of this work with SGA LLP will be to have a strategy in place to tie in with the outcome of one of the grant applications connected to the project, which should be known towards the end of March 2015.

It is now even more important than ever that the museum steps-up its fund raising activities to support this project. Online contributions can be made via a Just Giving page for the project https://www.justgiving.com/Howard-Heeley2

The wider fund raising appeal still allows project supporters to make a donation towards a Photographic Panini, which will carry their name and brief message. These Photographic Paninis are being displayed in the current museum café; they will then being incorporated into a presentation folder that will be displayed in the new education / café building when it is completed.

Perhaps the simplest way people can support the project is just by visiting the museum and we encourage people to do this by using the Gift Aid admission scheme. This enables the museum to reclaim fund from HMRC, which can give a huge boost to the project.

Regular updates about the project will be posted on the museum website at www.newarkairmuseum.org

Monospar Update 2015

Newark Air Museum Monospar

In recent weeks good progress has been made on applying the polyester fabric to the complex latticework structure of the starboard wing of General Aircraft Monospar VH-UTH at Newark Air Museum.

The work is being undertaken in the museum’s on-site workshop by museum members who developed their fabric application techniques on the project during 2014.

The innovative yet complex structure of the Monospar wing can be seen through the recently applied fabric and by looking inside the covered wing. As the warmer weather approaches the work will be progressed and a top coat of paint applied.

As previously reported some work is still to be completed on the ‘top hat’ longerons on the Monospar fuselage, but once this has been undertaken the fuselage fabric will also be applied.

All of the rebuild work on the General Aircraft Monospar VH-UTH at Newark Air Museum is being without any working drawings or airframe plans.