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The nostalgia thread seems to have been busy today.
Sycamore: Charming reflection of your Sycamore training days. All I can say is that you can be grateful they were not holding up score cards from the crew room in the way that many ground crews are fond of doing when air crews are performing autos!
Re: tyres rolling off the rim of the Brantly - I am wondering how this was solved among fixed-wings?
The Bücker Bü 133A Jungmeister also had inward facing wheels but did these 'roll off the rim' in the same way as the tyres on the Brantly were prone to doing?
XTEC: Look forward to seeing your images.
Sandy Toad: Great to see some more shots of BAVI - there are in fact very few images of her around. Even more interesting to note the existence of 'Oldway Helicopters'. I thought I knew most of the UK's civilian operators from the 70's but there we are, something new.
Nige321: What an excellent photo of ATSJ. 69ish means (according to Earl's records) that it was either still with Alan Mann or had moved on to Sunderland Print.
More Brantlys
G-ASXF at Plymouth on 15th April 1967. Operated by BEAS.
'Arthur' G-ATUR at Coventry 20th November 1971 bearing the name of its owner, Turriff Construction. Thanks to copyright holder Carl Ford for this shot.
G-ATSJ at Staverton (Gloucester) 11th June 1966 for the RAeS Show and owned at that time by Thomas Sopwith.
Earl: To resolve the conundrum of which 305 is in the Newport Docks photo; If ASUM was sold off to the States in '66 and if ASUN was a B2 (as confirmed by Planemike) then it can only be G-ASXF! To confirm this if you look carefully at the Newport Docks photo you can just make out a winged motif painted on the gearbox housing cover (it appears similar in design to the old Silver 'C' gliding award). This same motif appears on the photo of ASXF (above) and means that the PM's office had chartered the craft from BEAS to carry Wilson in '67.
JKAY: There were less than 50 305's built and, to the best of my knowledge only one remains flying. It is owned by Gary Goldsberry of Mooresville, Indiana, USA. If you are going Stateside and would like to fly in it I shall see if I can arrange it with Gary. Given your penchant for performance cars you might want to try having a go in the Hughes 500 sometime - they can be a lot of fun!
S.