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Old 26th Feb 2010, 15:22
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Jig Peter
 
Join Date: Feb 2008
Location: Toulouse area, France
Age: 93
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Angel REALLY ugly duckling ...

For a really complicated back end, what about the Percival Prentice? (Sorry, I haven't a photo, but perhaps the experts might find shots of the prototype and then the production model, specially from 3/4 rear) ...
From a neat "Proctor-ish" fin and rudder to a large squarish thing, then anti-spin strakes and huge lumps out of the elevators, and the upturned wing-tips, all to cope with the airflow from the huge glass-house, which was meant to house a "listening and learning" u/t pilot - a system which never caught on (I wonder why !!!).
Watching Prentices taxi in a cross-wind, waddling round in circles hissing like geese as the pneumatic brakes failed to hold the weather-cocking is just one of many hilarious moments. But the most hilarious was seeing another Prenthawk in loose formation inverted during a barrel roll. Its lurching way of entering a spin was a fascination too ...
Laugh a minute, it was, though you still had to learn to drive properly ... Flying the Pattern B instrument test was most enlightening, with all that power (I jest) the de Haviiland Gipsy Queen could put out was toilsome - but very instructive ...and then, the Harvard ... a young driver's dream ...
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