Aviation fans! A nice F-16 video

[ajm]

I grew up with Buccaneers almost constantly overhead (and quite often only barely "over"!) They were great to watch and a lovely shape, I was quite upset when they were scrapped... there's always something appealing about a machine so well designed and constructed for one purpose, apparently even when that purpose is actually a pretty horrible one.

The F-111s, Jaguars and Tornadoes just weren't and aren't appealing to me, but the Eurofighter / Typhoon is... not sure why that is really.

Never really saw Lightnings flying when I was younger but became interested in them a few years ago when researching and then modelling one for a flight simulator (FlightGear) - they're certainly dramatic in every way, if not particularly beautiful!

 

[silverclaws]

Two pirate ships sailing alongside each other, and one pirate captain on one ship shouts to the other; '' Where's your Buccanears ?'' The other captain shouts back; '' On my Buccanhead !''

 

[Midlife]

Hi Silverclaws

What did you do to them? I have worked on the Eurofighter Typhoon LOL

Trawled around the airshows in the 60's and 70's so have sat in quite a few planes. The front end of a Canberra was always a favourite. I was born in the 50's so very Dan Dare

I've also sat in a Folland Gnat trainer, in the rear all I could see was the seat in front, god knows what instructor could see. Uncle told me the Gnat was so bad they sold it to India who re-designed it so that the only thing in common was the guns

Shaun

 

[silverclaws]

Avionics training, although I started as an Air Radar Tech, as I was an RAF AVTech, and ended up specialising in flight systems, as I enjoyed the electro mechanical and clockwork mechanisms in that part of the trade and for the fact I did not get on with working inside a faraday cage for weeks on end, so I kept myself clear of Air Comms and air radar was really comms so boring. The PR9 was particularly impressive in terms of Avionics given it's age, but I finished with knowing everything there was to know about VC10 autopilot and a situation where higher ranks over signed my work on trust as they had no idea how I fixed the issue, but my repairs never came back. I was a difficult person then, but I knew my stuff which deflected a lot of crap I caused to head my way.

The Gnat was tiny compared to the modern Hawk trainer, but I just about remember the Gnats in service as the original red arrows and talking of them, I was rewarded with some reasonably good pics of the arrows from the armed forces air day on Saturday, shot from in front of my house, where at times they were flying lower than the level at what I was standing.

Annoyed I missed the Typhoon though, I saw a bit through the window and was vey impressed with the display, that delta and canard wing set up is impressive in terms of what the thing can do. It went low over my house and woke me up, I thought it was a Tornado going over.

But the air day consisted of the BB memorial flight, a sea fury ( which I recognised as a kitty hawk and was not), the typhoon, a spitfire, a bunch of helicopters pratting about, a Douglas DC-3 to finish with the Arrows who were as impressive as usual and where I was outside of the show arena, they were low, the smell of Avtur brought back good memories. If you are on facebook you might find my pics as they are set to public and tagged.

But the 1950's has got to have been the heyday of the RAF, such aircraft that they had, now everyone has the same, but I suppose it now comes down to skill not aircraft edge.