pigsty

Something I’ve often wondered: why did some battleships have slightly unusual hulls? Most of the ships built after the end of WW1 had fairly conventional shapes. They got gradually wider from the bow to midships, maybe an untapered section, then got narrower again aft. Many were more or less symmetrical in plan, if not below the waterline. Most had some degree of sheer forward and the few that didn’t got a slightly lower elevation for A turret as the trade-off for a wetter bow. Whether or not a ship had a flared stem was almost a matter of style - both were common. The two that puzzle me are: The Iowa class had a long, narrow forecastle, with a concave deck-edge that then became convex (more conventionally) at A turret. This seems to go against the idea that a bit more volume above the bow helps to prevent plunging into an oncoming sea. The forecastle doesn’t seem particularly long compared with most other vessels, so that doesn't look like it compensates. The Yamato class had a similar plan shape to the Iowas, though a bit broader at the bow. And they had a deck that, heading forward, dipped downwards at B turret before adopting a long, steady sheer from between B and A turrets up to the bow. I’d love to know what the advantages of these shapes were. Did they make high speed easier? But then, the last generation of fast heavy cruisers didn’t look like that either, not even the Alaskas. So was it something else?

Paging @tempestfan - we're looking forward to your question ...

Can't see why it wouldn't be. I use odourless white spirit for cleaning enamels and it come across as basically the same as enamel thinners, but a quarter of the price. Unless the solvent base is radically different from that, you should be fine.

That's close enough - it's the very first question, after all. It went like this: Valiant XD869 crashed near Marham in 1959, and the most likely cause was that the tailplane trimming switch had operated in reverse, giving them nose-down pitch when they were expecting nose-up, and with no way of knowing that was what was happening. The apparent cause of that was that the fleet had had rudimentary equipment installed for heating crew rations for long flights; a heater for soup had leaked into the relevant panel and, over time, it had reversed the switch's polarity. Right then, Alex - you get to set the next question. Have fun!

Nope! (How would you get soup into that?) Next clue: it had four engines and there was only one prototype of the Mk.2.

Hmm ... no takers? So, another hint. It was painted white.

It was more progressive than that, but you're getting warmer. Which is also a hint.

It's not the Herald, and not anything from Handley Page. But it's about that period.

It's strange how wrong you can be ...

Hey, everyone - as there's quiz shows all over the TV these days, shall we have our own aviation trivia quiz? The format's simple: someone asks a question. the first person who answers it correctly (measured by time stamp) sets the next question. it's up to the question setter to decide whether an answer's correct, and their decision is final - but you have to be fair and not ask ambiguous questions or ones that are impossible to answer. if it looks as if no-one can get the answer, the setter can give unlimited hints. and if absolutely no-one does answer, the setter goes again. Or they can cede the setter's role to whoever they think got closest - again, the decision's theirs. I'll start it off. Your question is: which UK military aircraft crashed because of soup?

Passed today: a VW campervan registered SEA 510E.

That's the GRAU system. It's explained here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Missile_and_Artillery_Directorate. Now, I'm not saying it makes complete sense; but I do sort of understand it.

Another cracking show, thanks to everyone who ran it. Already looking forward to next year ...

Did you hear how that dyslexic rock star died? Choked on his own Vimto ...

That stupid anagram ... doesn't know his ears from his bowel.

... or has been charged too much for the licensing, or is trying to avoid people pinching its work off the interweb. That Tossit up the front end looks a bit fishy, though it's what I've always thought when I see the watch brand; and I'm sure the people who made all those drinks were called Ricard.

So's IPMS Kent. And we're downstairs again, hooray! The full roster of clubs and traders is on Brampton's website.

I wish! The Shackleton's span was three feet more than Ark Royal's beam, so if they'd tried it, they'd have had to go round on three engines with most of the right wing missing. The tale as told in one of the books about the Shackleton is that they approached a carrier with all four propellers turning, then with three, then two. When they went back for a one-engined pass (standard fare for Farnborough) the deck crew panicked and started chucking things out of the way because they thought it was in trouble and was going to attempt a landing.

Given the angle and the Lightning's height, I doubt it got much lower than that Nimrod did. (So nice to see a Nimrod in grey and white ... )

I saw a bin lorry today - the plate was RU61 SSH.

No, it suggests that each time your alignment was fixed it needed fixing again the next year, which means either none of the testing stations was fixing it properly, or it was inherently faulty and it kept failing year after year. I suppose if you knew for certain that its only possible failure mode was "too high", the 2013 test must have been wrong and the others right, but Occam's razor suggests otherwise.

Well, the kids are happy. They'd only just gone back, but school's broken up.

If it helps, ICM's next issue of their 1/72 kit will be a Ki-21-Ia in Thai markings.

I'll bet that dark blue soaked up the heat at cruising height, didn't it?