WIX Archives
"Centre section, big deal...? No, essential!" ... hmmmm!?
Posted by Richard Allnutt on Sat Oct 05, 2002 01:34:43 PM
In reply top Re: Centre section, big deal...? No, essential! posted by Paul Coggan on Fri Oct 04, 2002 02:53:09 PM
This is an interesting debate, in that I am pretty sure there are a couple of "dual" id's out there already, ie. two aircraft claiming the same original serial number. One I can think of is the former Royal Navy Historic Flight two seat Sea Fury WG655. There is a chap (in Kenosha, WI I believe) whom has the center section, and is well on the way to restoring the aircraft as WG655, and someone else (I forget where now) has the rest of the aircraft and is/was also claiming it as WG655. I seem to remember hearing a similar thing about a P-51 as well, but don't remember the details. In each of these cases, I am sure it is more of an issue of the paper work than it is in provenance of an aircraft's history, but it does raise an important issue.
Also on another detail, I believe that the data plate for at least some P-51s resides on the outer skin of the fuselage, just below the left horizontal stabilizer, rather than in the center section. Perhaps there is also one in the cockpit, but I have photographs of a number of P-51's showing the data plate in the place I mentioned. Would this mean that if you have the tail of a P-51, where the data plate resides, that you have the identity of the aircraft? I somehow doubt it, but it is an interesting wrinkle in the debate. This is not unique to the P-51 either, as I know other aircraft have their main dataplates on the airframe exterior... the CAF's former Fleet Air Arm Stinson Reliant being one example.
On the matter of what constitutes an original airframe, I seriously doubt that many flying warbirds out there consist of more than 50% original hardware to that particular airframe. Even when an original airframe that's never had a crash or been restored from dereliction is taken into consideration, most times there are significant overhauls that have had to take place in order to maintain it in airworthy condition... Take for instance OFMC's Spitfire MkIX, MH434, an impeccably maintained and extremely historically significant aircraft. This aircraft went through a major overhaul a number of years ago, which involved much re-skinning... since the skin of a stressed-skin airframe constitutes the bulk of the airframe structure does this mean that MH434 is somehow no longer original? I doubt you'd find many people who would say so, most probably considering it a natural phase of maintenance in the aircraft's history... afterall, many airframes, especially in wartime, were cobbled together from several sources (new-build and scavenged components) to keep them flying in the service of their country. Or perhaps you would consider Lancaster PA474, which had a completely new spar installed, and I am sure quite a bit more of the wing material replaced a number of years ago. Or take it a step further, and look at BBMF Hurricane LF363, 85% of which is a replacement material following it's crash in the 1990's. This still flies with its original operator, the RAF, how is this restoration different or less authentic to that it might have experienced 60 years ago with the same operator during WWII?
This debate on authenticity could go on, ad-infinitum, but the truth of the matter comes down to the fact that if you fly the aircraft long enough, eventually there will be little of the original structure left. What it comes down to is that if you want to see old aircraft remain flying you will have to accept the compromise that a lot of what you see will be a faithful replication of the original. It still doesn't take away from the joy of seeing and hearing that beautiful (however brutish or ungainly the type) aircraft flying... they are tributes to all those whom built, maintained, and flew them in our name, and that is the important part in the end, that they remind us of all whom sacrificed so that we might be free.
Hope I haven't ruffled any feathers. I must admit though that I find it difficult to accept that someone could take the remains of Karen's uncle's airframe, as minute and unrestorable as they are, and then pass off the restored product as that airframe. In my opinion such an airframe should not have a serial number... there are a number out there like it, take Bob Odegaard's P-51D, it was cobbled together from about 25 aircraft plus a lot of new-build components. It is every bit a P-51, but, is not (or at least was not) attributed to any particular airframe id. Sometimes though, due to the peculiarities of the laws on getting an airworthiness certificate, paper work has to be fudged (a very kind expression at that) in order to get the proper authorizations without jumping through a lot of very expensive hoops or having severe restrictions placed on the use of the aircraft.
Anyway, I have said my piece, I hope that it contributed usefully to the debate.
Cheers,
Richard
: Phil Says
:
: "If however, I had the bird's original engine mount, cowli
: ngs, rear fuslage, tail feathers, wing centre section, out
: er wings, U/C etc, etc, but a new cockpit framework, would
: it no longer be that aeroplane???
:
: Me thinks it would!
:
: Paul Says
:
: But if someone else had the centre section i.e. bathtub fo
: r the Harvard who would have the aeroplane then Phil? Furt
: hermore if you had all the bits EXCEPT the bathtub and the
: y had that piece I can see an ownership dispute coming on
: here.....
:
: For years and years and years (even before I was a lad) th
: e centre section carried the identity -- and has pretty mu
: ch always been used by historians (again, this goes back a
: LONG way!)
:
: You know my opinions. More recently individuals seem to be
: moving the goal posts, particularly where it suits them t
: o do so. I find it hard to tell someone that has just spen
: t years and lots of dosh recovering an airframe that they
: didn't need to do that.......
:
: Also. I note in another post someone else changed one pers
: on's post that described the aircraft in question from 're
: construction' to 'reproduction'. That was very interesting
: - the two are different, imho of course.
:
: On a different subject I notice how even fibreglass struct
: ures in the form of a warbird are being called 'Replicas'
: . Like the Feggans Brown Spitfire and Hurricanes (I am g
: uilty of this too) - but are they really replicas? Me thin
: ks NOT! Full scale models perhaps.
:
: Who cares a twopenny damn I hear lots of people say. Many
: people expressed concern when the revisionists try and rew
: rite the history books. What is happening here is not much
: different.
: Watch the flak start flying (with the writs too perhaps) w
: hen we start talking about dual identities!!!
:
: Just my Euro's worth...........
:
: cordially
:
: Paul