John Aero

There are some very nice French Helldivers being towed across the US/Canadian border in thos archives. John

I'd question laquered Brass on the engines as they would be unnecessarily heavy.

Of course the "Wapiti fuselage for instruction purposes" is a Siskin. Canadian Wapiti's are strange beasts. For the record the Canadian canopy bears no relationship whatsoever to that fitted to the Wallace. The canopy on the Wallace slides forwards. Of interest to me is what was the purpose of the extra hump aft of the gun ring and what appears to be a deflector strake. The smaller hump on the RAF Wapiti held the radio equipment. J9237 was also the first metal winged Mk.II John

My younger brother David was with 30 Sqn (Beverlys) at Muharraq around the mid sixties. The only story I can remember from Dave, was one very hot afternoon when a few of the guys were doing Egyptian PT (snoozing on their beds), when the billet door opened and there stood a bright white newcomer, dressed in issue knee length shorts. "Who are you then" demanded one of the dozy inmates, "er'ma clerk" replied the apparation with a strong Brummy accent. "Ok then Irma, you can have the bed near the door" was the retort. The poor chap was known as "Irma Clark" for the rest of his tour. Typical of the RAF in those days. John

We've decided to name my latest car Tilly Shilling now the carburation problems seem to be sorted.. The main problem is that a wheel barrow has a slightly better weather protection than the car. John

Glidingbob has a full set of dimensions for the Mk.2 and Mk.3 ML winches.

Purely conjecture, but I'm thinking that Silver dope wasn't the best paint for hulls and they were probably given a protective varnish coat. over the Silver. You can put varnish over dope but not the other way round. Shorts floats were often finished in a White Emailene (I think that's the spelling) waterproof varnish. John

Direct drive, high revving propellers tend to be small and finer pitched. As engine power increases and with gearing introduced to keep the revs within limits, the extra power needs to be absorbed by a larger prop, but an increase in diameter may not be possible due to airframe and under-carriage design. By retaining the same diameter but increasing the number of blades was a practical solution initially for fixed pitch propellers. Just look at the Spitfire family, two blades to six, even with variable pitch props. A simple solution to a larger prop might appear to be an increase of the under-carriage length, but this can have an adverse effect, for instance by changing the ground angle and therefore the take off characteristics due to the wing assuming a greater incidence due to the ground angle. John

Wrong Shilling, Straight out of memory. I wish I had a Bob for every time I get that wrong! Cheers. I know that she used to race motor cycles. John

Thank you, an interesting read. Another of the forgotten ladies like Beatrice Shilling who sorted out the Merlin's carburetor fuel problem. (allowing pilots to stick the nose down, instead of having to roll over to dive after the fuel injected engines of the 109's). John

Yes S 61 will be a Shorts design number. I don't know of a list of Shorts designed floats. (there's one for Edo Floats). Unfortunately the histories often mention Shorts floats but they seldom ever give any technical details or design numbers. You should be able to work out a reasonable length for the floats from your source (photograph?). Shorts floats were all a pretty formulaic shape and scaled to suit The Shorts floats on a Queen Bee are approx 18' long. John

Patrik As usual I've found some information in my own library. Re post 26 the only one I've found with the shorter forwards cabane struts is in fact the PV.4 (so out of the scope of this discussion). I have found an excellent cutaway by Tordtsein Landstrom which confirms that the Swedish Hart has the same identical frame, aft of the firewall as other versions. On some photos of other radial versions the extra bulkiness of the fuselage to fair in the wider spaced and re-positioned guns make the cabane struts look different. I would have to agree that the engine mountings of Pegasus and Mercury versions would have been much the same as the crankcases and mounting ring of these two engines are virtually the same. John

Patrik, I don't have any frame drawings for the radial engined versions but I I have noticed that the forwards cabane struts appear to be shorter on the radial versions indicating that the top longeron tubes behind the firewall are parallel to the fuselage datum and therefore not sloped down as on the Kestrel versions. The other frame changes are the gun mountings. Bristol engines tend to have similar circular plate mountings carried on tubular frames, fixed to the firewall. There might be some information from Swedish sources and I would be pleased to see any build or restoration pictures which might be available. John

The Manchester props are 16' diameter and opposite rotation to the Merlin on the Lanc. John

Of note in the two pictures, besides the rear decking change and the second forwards firing gun on the Demon, are the immediate differences of the wheels. The Hind has the 15" wheels and the Demon has the 19" wheels. The 15" braked wheels are normally found on later airframes with tail wheels. The 19" wheels as originally fitted to the early types with a tail skid can also be seen on some aircraft with a tail wheel. On these aircraft the 19" wheels are of the 'Braked' type. John