The Vampire T11 in `thawes`s photo was built at Hawarden and delivered between Nov52 and 56 and may have been on 54Sqdn at the time of the photo--difficult to see any colours on the front nose-wheel door. I flew it`s `clone`, ,ex-Swiss T55 (U-1230) about 18 months ago, on a gear down ferry from B`mth,after it had been bought,and was in 54 Sqdn colours,red/white chequers on fuselage, and tail-booms.
Minimum rpm on finals -5500, until assured of landing--Pilot`s Notes
After a refurb I did the airtests for the CAA for it`s Permit- not without some drama,as on the first airtest , just after `gear-up` the `fire` warning illuminated, but the audio did not go off( Swiss a/c have an audio fire warning as well as the light-)-quick circuit,r/t to check if there`s any smoke trail,throttle back, light goes out-,
HP cock off as we cross the threshold , and coast to a halt, open canopy and survey the scene- no smoke, no fire,no smell of burning. Further
investigations revealed nothing to show any excess hot air/gas leaks,and ground running could not reproduce the fault. Same thing happened next flight.Anyway, the situation resloved itself after one of the lower compressor cans was changed and the cockpit wiring combining/junction boxes were recleaned, and all went well after that. The a/c now resides in Norway..Syc
PS-Always expect the unexpected, and dont stop a Vampire on tarmac... but that`s another story!