Very rare 50 year old Photo. Sycamore XG518 desert rescue.

[Old Photo.Fanatic]

A rare 50 year old slide of Bristol Sycamore XG518 during an actual desert rescue. Slide dated 1963.
I aquired this Kodak slide in the 70s via a work collegue "Mark De-silva, ex RAF" of Berkshire. Copyright passed to me.

This Sycamore is now restored in the Norfolk and Suffolk museum in Flixton.

So come on you old wrinklies, is there anyone out there remember this Helicopter during its operational life and afterwards upto its present resting place?
I know its a long shot but I would also like to know where this Sycamore was operating in 1963, to give me some idea of the location.http://i611.photobucket.com/albums/tt200/phredd10/963RescuephotoviaMarkde-SilvaBerkshireregTerryBurke_zps547ad68c.jpg
I have vague recollections that Mark told me it was at one of the Near/Middle East RAF staging posts.


http://i611.photobucket.com/albums/tt200/phredd10/Miscellanious/963RescuephotoviaMarkde-SilvaBerkshireregTerryBurke_zps66e3a945.jpg

OPF

Mods, May I ask that if you feel this is better in "Rotary" forum, that it be left here for a while under the wider scope of this Forum.

[500N]

Try Aden 1963 / 64 ?

Quite a few photos here of the helo.

RAF Khormaksar (http://www.radfanhunters.co.uk/khormaksar.htm)

[keesje]

What, this photo has been up here for so many hours and the RAF crew still hasn't turned up? PPrune isn't PPrune anymore ;). BTW great picture.

[Rossian]

...the poor old buggers are still getting out of bed and having their breakfast for Gawd's sake. Give them a bit of time to put their teeth back in.

The Ancient Mariner

[airborne_artist]

...the poor old buggers are still getting out of bed and having their breakfast for Gawd's sake. Give them a bit of time to put their teeth back in.

And they were up four times in the night :ok:

[just another jocky]

And they were up four times in the night http://images.ibsrv.net/ibsrv/res/src:www.pprune.org/get/images/smilies/thumbs.gif

So they could have replied then! Tch! :}

[Fareastdriver]

Judging by the shadows the time is about midday. That means that the navigator, the chap in the blue suit and helmet, is putting the casualty in the left hand seat so that the pilot can keep an eye on him, The Sycamore, because its take off performance is so bad, will fly the casualty to wherever and then return for the navigator.

In El Adem the pilot would winch the survivor up, who then had to get in by himself, and the winchman would wait in the dinghy for the Sycamore to return.

[chopper2004]

Very nice and sharp photo :) though nice to see the Flying Bulls / Hangar 7/8 peeps have the one and only airworthy flying Sycamore in old RAF Transportation Command colours. I saw it by Hangar 8 in Salzburg last year and year before :)

Guess the Sycamore did well for its basic technology as a SAR machine at the time,

Cheers

[Cornish Jack]

I would think late-ish, datewise ... I only have 309 and 504 from the introduction of the Sycamore to K'sar. The scenery in the 'photo is very reminiscent of the area around Mukheiras - on the plateau (5-6000' asl) - you wouldn't expect anything like that amount of greenery around the coast. If it was there, the take-off could have been 'interesting' !! We did a search for an out-of-contact Regiment platoon and eventually found them in a wadi at about 3000' asl. I think the pilot was M.Plt 'Tommy' Tomczak (later Pavey) and having landed, he reckoned getting airborne needed a 'jump' takeoff. Wind up the power and revs to max pull to the hover and ... pray!!:eek: It worked but only by virtue of the light local breeze drifting us along the gently descending wadi. The dear old Sycamore was not noted as being over-powered - as evidenced by my first 'wet barrels' - got hooked on (after an absolute age!) and started to pull in the rope - which succeeded in pulling the helo' towards the welcoming sharks and mantas - the joys of ignorance!!:ok:


"Nurse, Nurse,! - two more of those tablet things, a brow soothing hand and a cup of Horlicks, if you please - the excitement is getting too much for me!":p:p

[Rosevidney1]

The blades were made of wood (gulp)

[Herod]

The blades were made of wood (gulp)
So was the Mosquito, and it seemed to manage. Having said that, I gather that the blades could absorb differing amounts of moisture, which made blade tracking a bit difficult. I'm sure Cornish Jack can enlighten us, once he's finished his Horlicks. I just missed the joys of the Sycamore, and was on one of the first courses on the Sioux. (CJ, which tablets?)

[Cornish Jack]

G'day Herod - ah, yes - wooden blades - works of art, always supplied as a matched set and total change if one damaged; balanced such that cyclic forces were minimal Can't vouch as I only had about 10 minutes 'famil' on the controls. Its big limitation was the power - the Lycoming was not suited to 'hot' OR 'high' and demonstrated this regularly in K'sar. Apart from the oddities such as the Hillman Husky hub cap idea:ugh:, I seem to recall Tommy pointing at 44" of power and translational lift to lift a 5 gallon barrel out of Steamer Point inner harbour!!:ooh: Blade tracking, IIRC, was enough to reduce the strongest to tears!!
You are to be congratulated on missing the 'joys' of the Sycamore. Among its many pecularities, its tricycle gear (and 3 blades) made it particularly prone to ground resonance:eek: I recall one of the Tern Hill QHIs telling me that, on his conversion course, he touched down in the middle of the airfield and held it a little too lightly as he settled - one moment, good - next sitting strapped into a seat surrounded by mega fresh air and only a limited remainder of centre console bits ... VERY rapid!!

Tablets?? Don't know what they are, but the nice lady nurse says that the pretty blue colour is to make them easy to find again when I've dropped them - shaky hands due, I reckon, to Nursey constantly displaying her talents ... that's what we used to call them in the good old days!;):E More Horlicks, please!

[alisoncc]

"Desert Rescue", that's not real desert wiv lots of green stuff and a few rocks lying around. This is real desert:

http://users.on.net/~alisoncc/OmanDunes.jpg

Always reckoned the K'sar mob were a bit naff!!

[Kluseau]

Don't know why, really, but it was quite a surprise to see this aircraft in yellow, a tradition of course carried on through the Whirwind, Wessex and Sea King in the rescue role. But it does raise a question in my mind: what was the origin of the all yellow colour scheme in the rescue role? Was it with the Sycamore? It was a traditional colour for training aircraft much(?) earlier, but at what point did it cross roles?

[Agaricus bisporus]

what was the origin of the all yellow colour scheme

In view of the ridiculous and laughable "power" margins of this toy I think it might simply be down to it being a lighter colour...

And continuing on that thought one has to wonder why it was felt necessary to squander payload by having a "navigator" on board. You'd think it would be obvious, even to their airships in their monumental wisdom that the answer would be to teach the damn pilot to navigate especially in an aircraft that could barely cope even with lifting a map. Adding a gash 200lb body to achieve that (weightless) feat is a blinding bit of Whitehall brilliance is it not?

[SASless]

We used to dream of Wooden Blades....back when we had Fabric Blades.:uhoh:

The helicopter pilots of yore....were very brave fellows they wuz!

[zetec2]

Cornish Jack could I suggest Alvis Leonides power, never did have Lycoming, prototype had P & W, rgds, PH.

[Fareastdriver]

Correct. Powered by the Alvis Leonides mounted horizontally across the fuselage. The control system was a gimballed rod that went up through the rotor shaft to a spider on top that was connected to the pitch horns on the blades from above. A system later used on the Scout. This gave you two benefits; appalling power margins and limited control authority. It was used as the Royal Air Force’s basic helicopter trainer up to 1965 and as so was a brilliant choice because if you could fly a Sycamore you could fly ANYTHING.

The drive system was a centrifugal clutch so when starting the engine one had to be careful not to crash engage the rotor if the engine rpm went over 1,500. The starting was typical Leonides. Fuel pump on, magnetos on, starter motor switch with one hand, primer switch with the other and throttle with the third. The fourth would be holding the cyclic in case the rotor brake slipped. A failure to start was normally accompanied by a conflagration from the exhaust in which case the drill was to gun the starter motor until either the fire went out or grew in intensity so that everybody, including you, left the immediate area. When it burst into life it was stabilised at about 1,200 rpm to warm up. Whilst this was happening the generator was on line so you could switch on electrical services. This gave you an necessary opportunity to check the fore/aft CofG.

As I mentioned before, control authority was somewhat limited. It didn't matter so much laterally but there was insufficient for all circumstances fore and aft. To cater for this there was a hydraulic trimming system; basically a tank of water under the pilot’s seat and a smaller tank in the boom by the pylon. The front tank had a gauge and the contents were adjusted to suit the single /two pilot and/or passengers. Get this wrong and when you lift into the hover you go backwards or forwards quite rapidly.

After this you engage the rotor. On modern helicopters you check the needles and hydraulic pressures as the rotor accelerates. On the Sycamore, no such problem, no hydraulics. It had manual controls with Q feel, i.e. big adjustable springs that had trim wheels, fore & aft and lateral, to enable you to retain control. At flat pitch and IIRC 245 Rrpm you checked the cyclic movement and the trim effect. You also checked the freewheel because if that didn't and the engine stopped you were dead. Once you had set the trim to two notches right and on notch back you lifted into the hover.

They had installed a pilot's aid in the Sycamore. It took the form of a cam on the collective linkage that opened the throttle progressively as you raised the collective. Unfortunately it used to drag and lead quite ferociously. To overcome this and maintain a constant Rrpm one had to close the throttle for the first third of travel and open it for the last bit. The throttle was mounted laterally on the end of the collective pointing inwards to the pilot so it worked in the opposite sense to a motorcycle which caused a multitude of amusing situations. Once in the hover you adjusted the trim and checked available power.

The Leonides as fitted to the Provost T1, my previous experience with it, had a normal take off rating of 2,800 rpm, 4.5 lbs boost/38 in MAP for five minutes and an emergency rating of 3,000 rpm 8 lbs boost/46 ins MAP from two minutes. A Sycamore with two up and full fuel would hover at 2,850 rpm and 42-44 lbs MAP so you didn't do it for long. Should you for various reasons, temperature, altitude, etc not be able to hover then one could use the previously mentioned 'jump takeoff'. This involved speeding the rotor up tp 275 Rrpm pulling the collective up as high as you could at the same time applying full throttle. The aircraft would 'jump' into the air and when you were airborne you would trickle the aircraft forward so that you acquired transitional lift before the Rrpm died off too much. To give you an idea of how much collective you had available there was a notched plate on the floor with an indicator pin.

Once airborne the incredible efficiency of the Hafner rotor blades in forward flight would show itself. One could sit back, trim out the cyclic so that it flew by itself at 125 knots in perfect comfort. Any other manoeuvre required brute force and an excellent memory because if you wanted to do what you were doing again you noted the control positions because that was where you were going to have to put them.

Being a training aircraft in its later days one had to teach and practise engine off landings. Because of the afore mentioned throttle cam the engine had to be shut down because otherwise the cam would rev the engine when cushioning the landing. This gave rise to the following procedure on finals to a suitable landing area, ideally an airfield in from an altitude in excess of 1,000 ft.

Throttle closed collective down to the bottom, flare, wait for the rotor to start to overspeed then pull the collective up two notches on the gauge to stabilise Rrpm. At 60 kts autorotate and accelerate the engine to 1,200 rpm to stabilise and cool it. This is to make sure it starts after landing. After, preferably 30 seconds shut the engine down. At about 200 ft start flaring off the speed and as soon as it drops to approx. Zero add two more notches of collective. The aircraft will now descend quite rapidly so at about ten feet before entombment pull half the available collective. This will arrest the rate of descent sufficiently to enable the remaining collective to cushion the landing. However:---------- one cannot land vertically because of the design of the undercarriage. This is mounted in such a way that when the weight goes on the wheels they move out sideways. At best this would cause the tyres to roll off the rims and at worst one would dig in and leave the aircraft lurching over with a decaying rotor and no authority. To overcome this the aircraft is moved forward at the last moment so that it rolls on to the ground.

Then the panic No 1 starts! The droop stops were notoriously unreliable so the engine had to be started before the Rrpm dies away and the blades hit the boom. That being achieved heart conditions advise a return to dispersal and coffee.

On shutdown the engine is throttled to idle and above the windscreen are mirrors so that you can see if static droops stops have engaged. When the three rods are vertical then the engine can be shut down. Should one or more not engage then Panic No 2 comes into play.

The blades will not clear the boom if the droop stops are not engaged. The mass balance on the end of a blade sticks out forward of the tip and resembles an inert 20 mm. cannon shell. In extreme condition to stop these chopping the pylon off a large leather patch is glued to the boom to encourage them to bounce of. At base we were slightly more sophisticated.

To prevent the blades hitting the boom the fire section would come out with a high pressure hose. They would aim a jet of water over the boom/pylon joint from the starboard side so that as the blades slowed and lost lift they would bounce off the water and over the boom.

The RAF stopped using them for training in 1965 after a series of rollovers so they were only used by 32 Sqn at Northolt, day only. I flew one there after a few years on Whirlwinds and I realised that I was ducking at 3 Rrpm all the time. It was because I had forgotten how close the rotor blades missed the cockpit roof by.

As I said before, the best training aircraft the Air Force ever had; an experience never to be repeated.

[Cornish Jack]

Zetec2 and FED - of course!!:\ My only excuse is aging memory and the blue tablets!! FED's exposition of the Sycamore's eccentricities was superb. From the winching point of view it also had the disadvantage of the exhaust (mega-hot!!) being in EXACTLY the right position to fall naturally to hand as a hand hold when approaching the cabin on the winch ... spoken from personal experience:ugh:
Re. colour - I've just had a look back at one of my B&W shots from that period - not definitive but looks as though it is NOT yellow.

http://i647.photobucket.com/albums/uu193/CornishJack/Syc01-1.jpg

Re having a Nav - although characterised as such, the role was actually much more a winch operator. When K'sar first got their Sycamores, there was a shortage of Navs so we (Valetta 'siggies') were offered a chance to fill in for about 3 months - combining with the Valetta work. Three of us had a go - self, Jeff Wigley and Brian Fletcher - fascinating and great fun:ok:

[Herod]

This is real desert

Nah; THIS is real desert.

http://i494.photobucket.com/albums/rr302/peter46/WessexandScoutWadiJizi_zps8501b8ab.jpg

Wadi Jizi, near Buraimi, UAE

[GreenKnight121]

What year?

[SASless]

FED,

She sure sounds like a Pilot's Machine!;)

[Herod]

Green Knight, if you're referring to the Wadi Jizi photo, it was taken during exercise "Gold Leaf", which took place March 10th-16th 1968.

[GreenKnight121]

Yes, that was what I meant. Thanks.

[keesje]

Enjoyable feedback / insights into fifties helicopter technology / flying thnx!

Sycamore HR.14 XG518 | Flickr - Photo Sharing! (http://www.flickr.com/photos/faversham-gallery/5044052269/in/photostream/)

[alisoncc]

The blades were made of wood (gulp) Few people are aware that the very early Vulcans had wooden turbine blades.

:ok:

[500N]

Interesting.

I supposed engines of the Avro Vulcan would have been
designed pre commercial manufacture of titanium.

[Fareastdriver]

That's why they were so smoky on takeoff.

[Blacksheep]

That's the origin of carbon fibre.

When I was on 32's Whirlwinds in the 70s we had a chap who had been there on Sycamores. He had a lump missing from one of his calves where he was hit by a lump of rotor blade during a Sycamore ground resonance event.

Re: droop stops, on the Whirlwind, for a stuck droop stop we would climb up the side, open the service platform and crouching down below the whirling machinery, knock the stop into position with a two foot length of broom handle. Happy days.

[sycamore]

B-S,you`d need a very long pole to try that on the Sycamore,as the `stops are above the rotorhead...
Well described by FED the eccentricities of learning to fly it...known to put hairs on your chest or even other parts...
Apart from the Gazelle,it`s the only helo in which one was taught `max rate turns`..full power ,crank the bank and pull.....
Even had wind-up windows and leather seats,well polished of course,and that certain characteristic perfume` je ne sais quoi` when getting aboard....
You were taught to `play it by ear` listen to the `song of the Leonides ensemble behind you`,and the whistling of the woodwinds(blades !),and if it`s out of tune, it`s DOWN(collective),OFF(engine),Up to 2(degrees of collective)...
Ahhhhh...nostalgia,ain`t wot it used to be...baby helo pilots now don`t know they`re born.....

[GIGFY]

Thanks to you all for the reminisces of the Sycamore & Whirlwinds on the SAR Flight.

After sailing to Aden on the last trip by SS Nevasa, I was so unfortunate to do a year down at RAF Eastleigh, Kenya. Obviously, the powers that be came to my rescue and got me a cushy billet at Khormaksar on the Flight. This was 1962 and I was to stay there until 1964.

My first, ever, flight in a chopper was on XG518. That's the good news. What I wasn't prepared for was once I got Jock Aberdeen out of bed at 4:30AM, and into the chopper with a mug of coffee, he would lift off and very soon expect you to take control while he had a nap. :eek:
I soon learned the basic controls and started to enjoy the privilege of being on the Flight.

As I explained to Zetec2 (were you there, to, PH?), my memory has taken a bashing over the years but I still have flashes remembering such people as Tone Bell, Den Bryer, Barry (?) Davies (we were sent to Westlands on a Whirlwind course for a month), and yet I cannot recall the boss!

Tracking the blades were an experience using a flag pole, masking tape, crayons and a block of wood with a deep grove along its middle (:precision tool: to alter the tabs).

The experienced learned here during those long months came to fruition in 1979 when I was allowed to restore XJ380 Sycamore Mk14 at RAF Finningley.
XJ380 now at Boscombe Down and in a sh**ty state:
Sycamore XJ380 - Picture of Boscombe Down Aviation Collection, Salisbury - TripAdvisor (http://www.tripadvisor.com.au/LocationPhotoDirectLink-g186414-d3310055-i66064410-Boscombe_Down_Aviation_Collection-Salisbury_Wiltshire_England.html)
also:
Sycamore (http://www.boscombedownaviationcollection.co.uk/index_files/Page1714.htm)

This was prior to me moving up to Lossie on Seakings followed by a stint ot Leconfield on Wessex.

[NutLoose]

After sailing to Aden on the last trip by SS Nevasa

In my last couple of years at school, I went on a school cruise, about 74..75 ish around the Med on the Nevasa :}
I was taught French kissing by a 15 year old girl who took no prisoners... But, that is another story.. :p

[brakedwell]

This is real desert
Nah; THIS is real desert.

http://i494.photobucket.com/albums/r...ps8501b8ab.jpg

Wadi Jizi, near Buraimi, UAE

Even realer desert.

http://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c32/sedgwickjames/aviation/TinpinSOman_zps19b89d17.jpg

Southern Oman

[Oldsarbouy]

Back in my blanket stacking days in, I think it was 1965 or 1966, I was in the left hand seat of our trusty Bedford 3 Tonner heading down the tree-lined road from AMQ's towards the RAF Ternhill entrance when a rotor blade sailed through the tree tops above us. As we approached the main road the remains of the Sycamore had settled into the corner of the airfield in front of us and both aircrew were doing their best efforts at a sprint upwind. I can only assume that they were attempting a "confined area" landing or had a blade strike on a nearby tree but I would guess it was the dreaded ground resonance. Anyway it didn't put me off applying for SAR a few years later but then things had moved on to the Whirlwind.
:ok:

[Basil]

FED, thanks for that essay. In '66 my JP boss suggested I go for choppers so, even had I done so, I'd have missed the joys which you describe so eloquently and terrifyingly.
I think I'd have had a much more enjoyable experience on helicopters than I did on Argosies but I planned to leave asap and go airline so I thought it best to fly multi planks.
I subsequently discovered that guys who went rotary to fixed tended to do so very successfully and 'had a good pair of hands' - I wonder why ;)

[Old Photo.Fanatic]

I note that the Photo . was not showing in my original post .
I did not delete this , so why was it removed?
Blxxdy Photoshop!!!!!
I have re entered it back in the Post.

OPF

[NutLoose]

The Sycamore that used to sit as a "gate guard" outside 240 OCU was previously flown by one of the Instructors on the OCU ( Taff Walker )

[parabellum]

Thanks for that Fareastdriver, I feel as though I have just done my Sycamore conversion! :)

[brakedwell]

My first encounter with a Sycamore was in 1956 when this one parked in front of the officers mess. Don't know who the VIP passenger was as I was only a lowly student on a Provost course. Later, in 1959, I escorted an Aden based Sycamore from Sharjah to Bahrain with a Twin Pioneer and then had to suffer being winched from a dinghy two miles off Muharraq Island. I never have trusted choppers!

http://i24.photobucket.com/albums/c32/sedgwickjames/aviation/Sycamore_zpscd1ecb62.jpeg

[Buster Hyman]

Cornish Jack - Out of curiosity, is that "Rescue" in Arabic aft of the Roundel? Also, where was this B&W piccy taken? (Assuming I'm not breaking operational secrecy...) :ok:

[camlobe]

FED,
Thanks for the clear and visual description of the joys of Sycamore. Bit before my time (phew). Hats off to you and your brethren.

NutLoose,
Ahh, the 'educational cruises'. Mine was '74 around the med in a bucket entitled SS Uganda. We passed 'our' sister ship in the middle of the Med. While we shaked and rolled Eastwards in our tub, the sleek and velte lines of the Canberra going Westwards left us with more than a tinge of envy.

Eight years later, the SS Uganda later carried out honourable and respected work as a hospital ship 'somewhere down South', Canberra IIRC was converted to troopship config for same.

Camlobe

[GIGFY]

I just remembered the sister ship to SS Nevasa was SS Oxfordshire; both taken out of military use around 1962.

[NutLoose]

NutLoose,
Ahh, the 'educational cruises'. Mine was '74 around the med in a bucket entitled SS Uganda. We passed 'our' sister ship in the middle of the Med. While we shaked and rolled Eastwards in our tub, the sleek and velte lines of the Canberra going Westwards left us with more than a tinge of envy.


Ours got off to a cracking start with a major storm in the bay of Biscay, Steak and Kidney pie with chocolate sauce, followed by sponge cake and gravy... I kid you not, they got them mixed up!!!!!

We then were due to arrive in Lisbon in the early hours of the morning, we awoke to find ourselves in Gibraltar, a failed military coup having taken place in Portugal as we were about to dock, hence the quick itinerary change, we then did Minorca, Majorca, Corsica, Naples, Capri, Pompeii, Stromboli, Rome, the Vatican etc.. we had loads of Canadians on board too.
My sister did her cruise on the Uganda, and mine on the Nevasa.

here you go, relive your history, that bucket carried on for another 12 years :)

ss Uganda virtual museum - Home (http://ssugandavirtualmuseum.weebly.com/index.html)

SS Uganda Trust Home Page (http://www.ssuganda.co.uk/index.html)

[GIGFY]

Yes, the blades were wood with bullet type ends BUT the helicopter only had 5 threads on the "chuff nut" to keep the head and blades on and the chopper in the air.
BTW - the same 5 threads are still in existance on most choppers today.

[Cornish Jack]

Buster - Best reply I can make is "Very likely"!! My Arabic was (shamefully) very limited, spoken only and limited mainly to "expletives deleted"!!
The photo was taken outside the combined Sqn/Flt hangar for APCSS/ACS/84 Sqn and the newly formed ??? heli Flt. Can't refer to my logbooks at the moment as they are recovering from the house destruction in December:sad:
Sqn offices in view behind the tail rotor and a Valetta fin to the right of the nose. Fascinating few months introduction to 'fling-wing' operations.

[India Four Two]

It certainly looks similar to "Rescue", particularly the last two letters on the left:

http://i30.photobucket.com/albums/c309/india42/rescue_zps96adcd4b.png

[Lee Howard]

Can't see anyone providing the answer to the original question on here (unless I've missed it), but XG518 was with 208 Sqn at Bahrein for this period.

HTH.

[Buster Hyman]

Cheers CJ, IFT. :ok:

[Royalistflyer]

I do recall once seeing an all-yellow Dragonfly - but I have no idea if it was usual.

[LowObservable]

So the Belvedere was basically two four-bladed Sycamores bolted end to end :eek::eek::eek::eek::eek:.

[brakedwell]

Can't see anyone providing the answer to the original question on here (unless I've missed it), but XG518 was with 208 Sqn at Bahrein for this period.


Then it must have been detached from Aden to cover an 8 sqn or 208 sqn detachment at Muharraq. BTW 208 were based in Nairobi at that time. I escorted an Aden based Sycamore from Um Said (Qatar) to Bahrain with a Pembroke (SAR cover for a Rhodesian Air Force Sqn Venom detachment from Aden) on 8/2/60. 208 sqn (Hunters) wasn't stationed in Bahrain until 1964 by which time the Sycamores had been replaced in the middle east. On the other hand that landscape does not look like anywhere in the Gulf, but it does remind me of parts of Kenya.
I was flown to the Jufair Jetty in the (yellow) Sycamore after being winched from the sea during a dinghy drill, but didn't record the serial number in my log book.

[Oldrotor67]

As a very junior helicopter pilot (first tour!) I flew XG518 many times around the Aden Protectorate, in 1963 and 1964. I flew its final sortie from Khormaksar on 28 March 1964, landing on HMS Albion in the harbour with the other three Sycamores; we then had Whirlwind HAR 10s to play with.

So the photograph is of 518 "up country", probably on a training sortie.


XG518 finished up at CFS(H) Ternhill, where I met her again in 1965 for the instructor course.

Happy Days!

[knarfw]

It was at Halton in 1968


The Aviation Photo Company | Bristol Sycamore | RAF 1 School of Technical Training Bristol Sycamore HC.14 XG518/S-E (1968) (http://www.aviationphotocompany.com/p705776973/h51ADBC24#h51adbc24)


http://forum.keypublishing.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=198391&d=1312456480

[PTR175 U/S]

Would welcome link to Tony Bell Sycamore Pilot RAF Khormaksar mentioned here earlier in this thread. Tony was a member of Aden Services Gliding Club at Sheikh Othman circa 1964. We have a Facebook page,Tony was mentioned today. All the best.