hi Danny,
You ask: "(and where did that weird cockpit panel come from ? - it is unlike any Mk. I-III, which all had the same panel, no reflector sight, just a simple ring 'n bead)".
I am trying to source its E/E 88 Aircraft Status Card (equivalent of the RAF Movement Card) which might shed more light on the particular dates, but my understanding is it probably went direct from storage (in its wooden box) to the Sydney Technical College in 1949. Now I think the late Mr Harold Thomas at the Camden Museum got his hands on it in the early 1960s.
So what we have are those pesky undergraduate apprentices climbing all over your beloved steed for almost 15 years, and stripping bits, changing components, and adding to what may have been a basic Mk.1A all the goodies from the spares boxes (which may have been from a Mk.IV aircraft). By the sound of it, they had instruments and dials and switches, and being trainees let loose on a real aircraft, manufactured brackets and panels (oblivious to the confusion caused 60 years later!).
This to me is a logical conclusion from its life as an instructional airframe, and its cockpit condition was of no great concern to the Museum. But I do not mean to denigrate this approach - as Mr Thomas stepped in and saved this precious unique airframe.
I will write some notes too on the colour scheme/markings of the basic airframe. I last touched it 15 years ago, and its "bottle-green" and earth camouflage just looked a bit suss. Perhaps we can learn some details from this, but who knows - maybe some of those apprentices were trainee surface-finishers, and painted it !!
cheers
Last edited by BBadanov; 5th Aug 2015 at 02:33.