JimAttrill

Often you get topics about what won the war - from various aircraft including the C47 etc. But personally I think the Pratt and Whitney R2800 had a lot to do with winning the naval war in the Pacific as it was fitted to the Hellcat and the Corsair. "A total of 125,334 R-2800 engines were produced between 1939 and 1960."

As someone who worked on Harrier engines in the RAF from 1970-73 I found this most interesting. The aircraft I worked on were the 'pretty' GR1's and 1A's, 2 and 2A's. (the only difference was that the A had a bit more engine power). Engine changes could be murder and take a long time because there are very few panels underneath so a dropped spanner could set you back to the beginning. All spanners were tied to us with string! I once wrote a rather tongue-in-cheek story about an engine change which was attempted outside in Germany. We had an exchange US Marine pilot on 4 Squadron even before the Marines bought the Harrier. http://www.harrier.org.uk/history/engine_change.htm Altogether a wonderful aircraft and some things were almost ridiculously simple like the nozzle actuation system which was rather like a 4wd car with drive shafts from the air motor. The final drive to the nozzles was by chains! (which never failed). And apart from the nozzle lever the normal controls were used even in the hover. Clever stuff! ps we had the water injection in those days but didn't use it because it took the engine life down to about 5 hours! The max engine life in those days was 200hrs but few engines made it that far - there was an electronic box that told you when to change the engine depending on how it had been used. One thing he doesn't mention is why the engine is called a Pegasus (Americans don't like names for things) but Pegasus was a flying horse with 4 legs and the Harrier flew on four columns of air! ps. The engine was developed from the Bristol Orpheus with American money via th MAP, something that many British people don't know or don't mention.

I must say it all looked most depressing. I don't know if any of you read the book 'Saturday Night and Sunday Morning' which was something about a worker who spent all his working time on an automatic lathe. I once, as a job from school to make some money, worked on a production line making Bata shoes or rather sandals. Unfortunately I could see a clock from where I stood and watching the second hand go round was terrible. Some of the people had been there on the lines for up to 8 years but I could only stand it for 3 weeks. Later on I went on a tour of Ford's Dagenham plant when they made Escorts there. Mind-blowing depressing jobs. No wonder they went on strike all the time. I think it is a great thing that most of these jobs are now done by robots. Then the 'workers' can stay at home and watch TV.

Strangely enough I am a mad sci-fi fan but avoid most movies as many of them are rubbish. I have over 1 600 books on my kindle 95% of which are sci-fi. The one film I watch over and over again is 'Blade Runner'. I am NOT a fan of any Star Wars stuff and can't watch Aliens because it is too scary Oh, and I also like Terry Gilliam's movies (he of Monty Python) which include 'Brazil' and '12 monkeys'.

Actually I have never seen "District 9" although it is possible that the screen writer just picked a common name. Another common Afrikaans name is 'Theron' (as in Charlise) but here it is pronounced 'tron' with a rolled R. I used to think there were two names with different pronunciations! Another funny is 'du Toit' which is pronounced here in a rather English way as 'doo Toyt'. Oh, and the 'Merwe' is pronounced with a 'v' sound as in Dutch/German.

I learnt my German from those comics about the RAF in WWII. German is a very small language which consists of "Achtung! Spitfeur!" and "Jawohl mein Herr!" It seems that it is a human characteristic to denigrate some other people for fun. Like the English tell Irish jokes, the French tell Belgian jokes, the Americans tell Polish jokes, etc. In South Africa, the butt of the humour is a man called "Van der Merwe" which is a very common Afrikaans name. Here is an example (change the name to suit yourself) Van der Merwe is flying in a Jumbo jet to London from Joburg. The pilot comes over the speakers to say: "Ladies and Gentlemen, we have had one engine fail so will be one hour late at Heathrow". A bit later he comes on again: "Ladies and Gentlemen, we have had another engine fail so will be two hours late at Heathrow". And then he comes on again: "Ladies and Gentlemen, we have had another engine fail so will be four hours late at Heathrow". At which point, van says: "If another engine fails we'll never get there!"

Graham Chapman did such wonderful British Army senior officers. The great thing was that they actually did speak and act like that! Here is a German joke. Don't blame me, I found it on Wikipedia: "Zwei Männer gehen über eine Brücke. Der eine fällt ins Wasser, der andere heißt Helmut." ("Two men walk over a bridge. One falls into the water, the other is called Helmut."). Apparently East Frisia is also the butt of jokes. Sorry about that Olham!

I remember watching Monty Python on German TV - it was the only thing worth watching!

I do remember the occasional goggo as they were called. Looking it up, they were not made by FIAT but were a purely German vehicle. Quite advanced in design I would say. Here is something from Wiki: "Goggomobil was a series of microcars produced in the Bavarian town Dingolfing after World War II by Glas. Glas produced three models on the Goggomobil platform: the Goggomobil T sedan, the Goggomobil TS coupé, and the Goggomobil TL van. The engine was an air-cooled, two-stroke, two-cylinder unit originally displacing 250 cc, but later available in increased sizes of 300 cc and 400 cc. It had an electric pre-selective transmission built by Getrag and a manual clutch. The engine was behind the rear wheels. Suspension was independent all round using coil springs with swing axles. 214,313 sedans, 66,511 coupés, and 3,667 Transporter vans and pickups were built from 1955 to 1969. I suppose you could get four rather modestly sized people in one! If you click on the Glas URL above you will see the whole history of the plant. They now make bodies for Rolls-Royce, they say.

Oh well, as a Brit myself I can go along with the saying that the British 'lose all the battles but win the wars'

Damn. I worked on Varsities in 1968-9 at 115 Squadron flight checking. Even flew to Gibraltar in one via Porto. Loved working on them - big radial engines with 28 spark plugs and lots of oil inside and outside! Of course it was hard to see that it was a Varsity and not a Valetta in the photo as the nosewheel and the bomb bay could not be seen. It was fun to fly in one lying in the 'bomb aimers' position underneath - we even used to stay there on landing which was quite frightening with the runway so close. This was 'illegal' but we all did it. Happy days! Oh, and I didn't have a Heinkel or Messerschmitt bubble car but I did have a BMW Isetta 3-wheeler! It had a 250cc four-stroke engine and the front opened just like the Heinkel. There is a bubble car club here and I sometimes see them all on a Sunday going somewhere. Worth lots of money I think.

Correct. So you win a

The trick is that it looks like an Me108 but it actually is not. There is not a German rivet in it

That conclusion is nothing new. I remember reading a book printed in the 1920's when I was a kid and even then it was (as above) viewed as a German Tactical victory but as the German Fleet never sortied again it was a British Strategic victory. And the German sailors were a 'revolting' lot in 1918 as were the Russians before them in 1905. Having a whole bunch of people sitting around doing nothing is not a good idea. The British Navy waited a few years before they, also, mutinied in 1931. Nowadays they have so few ships and sailors left that a mutiny would go unnoticed.

The Me108 had an Argus inverted V8 engine. The one in the picture has an inline engine.

Hmm.... two piston engines. Could be a Vickers Viking or an Airspeed Ambassador. I said the one I posted was a trick question. Yes, it looks like an Me108 but it isn't. The engine is not correct for an Me. But quite a lot of these were made for the Germans in WWII. It appears at airshows in England. Note the swastika which is not legal in Germany but is elsewhere.

Yes it is a Pilatus PC-9 but of the Slovenian air force. Got the roundel slightly wrong. Wiki has a nice picture of no 69. The PT-6 is pretty easy to recognise with its large exhausts on either side. As the engine has been used in over a hundred different aircraft it is a good guess that it is a PT-6. Out of interest, the engine is mounted backwards, so to speak, with the inlet underneath usually. The intake air goes forwards and through the turbine and out the exhausts at the front. Just to be different it has 3 or 4 axial compressor stages and a centrifugal stage. One of its uses is to re-engine DC3s! Try this one. Clue - this is a trick question

Well, it's a PW Canada PT6 powerplant so it had to be a Embraer Tucano or a Pilatus PC-9. The Thai roundel gives it away as a PC-9. This is the trainer the RAF wanted but were forced to have the Short-built Tucano instead. The RAF got a few 'free' armed Tucanos from the Argenitinians which were captured at Port Stanley in the Falklands war. I don't think they gave them back. I checked - there are two Argentinian Pucaras in England. Both are now in museums, one at Duxford and the other at Cosford. This last (sno A-515) was restored to flying condition and used by MOD Boscombe Down. This was in 1982 and it may not be a coincidence that the RAF ordered the Short-built Tucano with uprated Garrett engine in 1984.

I haven't seen that picture before but you get the prize

Try this one - it is a bit harder ... If you get this right you get a banana

Well done! The Finns bought used ones from the Aircraft Disposal Company which had got them from the RAF.

I am downloading WOFF V3 now. It's a pity that the Rand is now 15 to the dollar but as it will most likely get worse now is the time. I haven't even been flying WOFF much lately but I do like to suppord OBD and do want to see what the latest release looks like.

Looks pretty good .... Not many new aircraft but lotsandlots of other stuff.

Hauksbee wrote: "Squadron-for-squadron, the RAF and the Luftwaffe were seen as roughly equal. But Britain fielded 20 planes per squadron, while the Luftwaffe, only 12. After the first few weeks, German pilots wondered where all these British planes were coming from." Not true. RAF squadrons have always been made up of about 12 aircraft. In the early days there were 3 flights of 4 aircraft. In the 30s a flying squadron was made up of four 'vics' of three. Later on this became three 'finger fours' of four aircraft. If you look at squadron pictures from the BofB period there are always 12 pilots, sometimes less. In the 60s the 'flight' system was not used so much as the aircraft now normally operated in pairs and not in fours. This still applies today. The RAF squadron I was a part of for 2½ years had only two flights - now each commanded by a Squadron Leader with a Wing Commander as CO (this is inflation for you!). I will admit that at times we had 14 aircraft but it was hard to get 12 of them serviceable at any one time and one was a two-seater anyway. The two squadron photos I have show 12 and 13 pilots. I don't think the concept of a 'flight' meant much then in the 70s. The aircraft had tail letters A, B etc but no flight colours. Another anomaly then was that each aircraft had a pilot's name on it but he didn't necessarily get to fly his 'own' aircraft. The pilots had their own flying schedule and flew what was available. From what I have read, a Luftwaffe staffel normally consisted of 12 or so aircraft, so the staffel and the squadron were directly comparable. The reason the German pilots wondered where all these British planes were coming from was that both sides exaggerated claims, but the Germans tended to believe theirs which showed that the RAF fighter force had ceased to exist.

That's a great quote! Some things never change