I flew the V832 as a First Officer with Ansett-ANA in last part of 1964.
Must say I hated the bloody thing, always something going wrong with it and bugger all fuel.
It's performance out West and North was awful and when we used to transit in Mt Isa we had to cover the controls with blankets as there was no protection from the sun over that section and the controls were too hot to handle if not covered.
In the 6 months I flew it I had :
3 engine shut downs
2 partial hydraulic failures
1 gear failing to extend which luckily did after many attempts- no alternate extension available.
Several failures of the air cond heating system.
There were other small problems too many to mention here.
As mentioned it was a very early pioneer of prop jet aircraft so did not have the redundancies we do now. Single wing spar I think which was fatal in this crash- maybe 2 spars would have given time to get it on the ground.
Also the poor thing was designed for short-medium haul in cool European Climates , not hot dry Australian climates.
Boy, was I glad to leave it in 1965 when I did the B727 course- what a difference!!
It is nice to be able to say I did fly the thing but did not really enjoy it at all.
On a final note the F/O on the flight did a DC3 school with me in Essendon early 1964 . He was from Mandated Airlines. ( New Guinea Ansett subsidiary ) and was not flying for Ansett Mainland. He desperately wanted to be with Ansett so resigned from MAL , joined Ansett and did the Viscount school and was killed 3 months later. Very sad , John Gillam was a great bloke!