Mr Petter's Baby Jet - The Folland Gnat

[dmussen]

The Gnat

Great stories. I adore this little beauty. I was on 75 course at Valley. Many of our instructors were ex-74 Frightning jocks and they were great folk to be around and to fly with.
Loved that shot going round the corner in the A5 pass and the one with South Stack light in the background.
I too was fooled by my instructor on a roller at Mona in unlock. Boy did we go up when I retracted the gear.
My proudest moment at Valley was winning the 75 aeros comp.
The aircraft I flew was XP 502 which was the first production Gnat to enter service with the RAF.
It is now on static display at Delta Jets in Kemble.
To be posted to Victor Tankers was a great disapointment but that is another story.

Per Ardua Ad Loungebar.

[neilf92]

Could'nt resist another dabble with Photoshop using a couple of landscape photos I took while watching Hawks at the Ogwen corner . Added a couple of shots of a 1/72nd Gnat and added wing tanks (roughly).
I guess it would have looked something like this around 1964.
Mods - whizz it if inappropriate.

[Auster Fan]

I believe my flying instructor did a lot of the trials work on the Gnat at Valley....

[BOAC]

The cockpit issue was thigh length - too long and your kneecaps would disappear on ejection. Formation - a doddle!

[airpolice]

Some of us were too small, not too big.

I was so skinny when I did my first Gnat trip that we could not get the seat straps to tighten on my shoulders. The Squiffer SNCO sent me back to the block to get my wooly pooly so that I had a wee bit more padding as he thought that on ejection I could slip out of the seat harness.

Last week I found it tricky trying to get the seatbelt on a PA28 to reach all the way round me. I was six and a half stone when I went to Valley and I am now 118 Kilos. I don't want to do the conversion to stones & pounds, I'd just get upset.

[Loki]

I found a single seater recently at Cosford....there is also one at Southampton

Here's the Cosford one nestling peacefully under the wing of the Lincoln

[soddim]

In over 30 years flying, including seven fighter types, the only non-martin baker seat I sat on was in the Gnat. I seem to remember a unique safe seat arrangement that replaced the use of safety pins with a simple 'head knocker'. Hard to forget to put the seat to live because it would remind you by hitting the back of your head whenever you put your head up straight. The safety record of the seat was also pretty good as I remember it.

[Rallye Driver]

A bit of thread drift, but the current centre of Gnat flying is North Weald. Two currently airworthy with two more being restored to flying condition. They were out displaying at the weekend.

Here's G-RORI returning after a sortie earlier in the summer.

[Wander00]

Gnat Photos

There have been some lovely pics, but anyone got anymore -especially low level in Wales - previous Mrs W saw to mine!

[dmussen]

Gnat Photos

Wander00,
Not low level but somewhere I have a shot of a diamond 16 practicing for a flypast over Birmingham the following day. It's in one of several shoe boxes in a trunk. I'll have a look.

[A2QFI]

I30th December 2004, 23:23

I don't think pitot tube sabotage ever happened at Valley but I found this in a Thread re damage at Airshows,

"30th December 2004, 23:23

A pitot tube incident also happened while 4 x Iraqi Mirage F1s were on their delivery overnight stopover in Greece. A Guard leant on a pitot tube, bent it, then decided to bend the three others so they'd look the same!

[Krystal n chips]

A2..sorry to disappoint you but..the pitot incident did happen at Valley, in the very late 60's and was caused by one, possibly two disgruntled line mechs.

The basis for my assertation is not hearsay, but more to do with the fact I did a tour in Gaydon hangar in the early 70's and we were all made aware of this event.

[A2QFI]

Thanks. My only disappointment, if any, is that professional people could see fit to damage aircraft!

[dmussen]

The Pitot Tube Saga.

There was a very bent pitot tube hanging on the wall of "A" flight instructor's crew room in 1973. Perhaps proof positive?

[bonajet]

Birmingham flypast

Hi dmussen - I would love to see the 16 a/c Birmingham flypast photo as I was in the formation - purely as a back seat student from 74! Practice on the 11th Aug 73 and the real thing on the 18th - both with Graham Larke, our RCAF exchange instructor.

[mike rondot]

I have one too

Al B-H and Roy Lawrence, 48 course with one of the first red/white jets at Valley during August 1969.[IMG][/IMG]

[1.3VStall]

Good Lord! B-H was never that young was he?

[A A Gruntpuddock]

As a teenager I remember seeing one of the single seaters at Leuchars.

Not only was it tiny in comparison with the Meteors, but it was the first aircraft where I was able to look into the cockpit whilst still standing on the tarmac.

Looked very cramped inside but I always loved the Gnat since then.

Ah, the days when you could actually wander round the planes, look up into the wheel wells and bomb bays.

[Wander00]

I must be getting old - I thought they were that colour scheme in '66

[Cornish Jack]

I thought they were that colour scheme in '66

indeed they were - unless my colour perception was faulty too. I was there from 64 to 66 and the only different colour schemes I saw were the Yellowjacks.