WIX Archives
Whoops !
Posted by MGM on Wed Nov 21, 2001 07:41:46 PM
In reply top Re: Beware parts consolidation - I think I'll have another posted by MGM on Wed Nov 21, 2001 06:20:01 PM
Pressed the wrong button....Duuhhhhhhh....
The problem with all this is that these words that everyone throws around are given different meanings by whoever is saying or reading it.
For instance, Replica means...according to my liitle dictionary; ""A copy of a picture or a piece of sculpture made by the hand that executed the original; facsimile"
Never mind the picture and sculpture bit, an aircraft fits into that meaning perfectly.
Now if I build a "new build" aeroplane, or I use substantial new parts (everything but the dataplate) in a "restoration" of an "original" identity, then if you use words correctly......strictly speaking, my new build aircraft IS NOT a replica at all....because the original builder had nothing to do with building mine.
As it stands, all aircraft which follow the very first one are Replicas.
All aircraft which are built with incorrect spec and materials etc, like a fibreglass movie/gate guard Spitfire should really be called Full Scale Models or similar and NOT replica.
I think the various words should be thrown out, and replaced with a "Scale of Originality" for both static and airworthy aircraft.
As an example;
Spitfire Mk1A P9306 would be in the "Static Aircraft Group", and because it is 100% original it would be a "Class One" aircaft.
At the other end of the scale would be aircraft like:-
Spitfire MkV EE606 or Spitfire TMkIX PT462; basically data-plate restorations, virtually nothing of the original EE or PT is/was in those particular Spitfires any longer, it had to be that way to get them flying, which I don't particularly object to apart from the scrapping of genuine Spitfire components rather than using them in a static restoration...these two Spitfires would be very low on the "Scale of Originality"...assuming there were ten Classes they would be something like a "Class Nine" in my book....not Class Ten because they do/did have some genuine "Original Wartime Build" internal bits and pieces.
A 100% new production Spitfire, like TMkIX MH367 (?)of Harry Stenger with virtually all new build internal components would be a Class Ten, this also because the new Spitfire was started long before a "genuine ID" on the Frame Five Firewall turned up to provide a "legal" ID.
But no problem to me because the story of Stenger's Spitfire is well known to anyone who cares to look, and as far as I am aware, no-one has tried to hide what TMkIX MH367 truly is.
On the other hand, if someone was trying to hide it's true story/ID...then I wouldn't give it a classification at all, apart from maybe "Class U" for un-classified.....leading to a potential buyer or historian/enthusiast being made perfectly aware that "something is not quite right with it".
This kind of classification could be used when an aircraft is put up for sale , and would ensure a potential buyer was much more aware of what he/she was buying.
Much more straightforward than throwing mis-leading words like "replica" around to the un-wary.
Useful for the airworthiness authorities as well I should imagine.
Of course this wouldn't stop the crooks from still trying to con buyers who are not so knowledgeable, but the current systems have never stopped someone switching ID's to suit the paperwork, or rebuilding something from a data plate...or less...and then claiming that it is totally original, flown by a famous pilot, and that they just found it lying complete in a Turkish scrapyard....just for instance !
It would be nice to think that an international body could be established to oversee the historic aircraft movement,using a Classification System like I have outlined, and perhaps started up by the major institutions like the EAA, NASM, USAFM, RAFM etc; with input from the CAA, FAA etc; as well as the major restorers of historic aircraft.
Lots more paperwork to be sure, which most people hate.....but NO-ONE likes to be conned by a crook in the current balls-up of a "system".....do they???
Right now a data-plate rebuild of a Spitfire is all I could afford, with about 20 years expensive work.
I know that it wouldn't be the same plane that flew during the war, many people would look down on it, but it would still be a Spitfire none-the-less....perhaps the difference between me and some others though, would be that I would be honest about exactly what it was....both to other people and to myself....only a fool tries to fool himself....
Now before I go on too much about this, I will just finish by saying that whatever has been done to a Spitfire (for instance) to get it "restored" to flying or static....it is still a Spitfire at the end of the day.......it cannot realistically be called anything else...and most of what goes on is acceptable to me as long as people are open and honest about it, and they are not destroying too much history( the original manufactured bits) just to get it restored and sold.
Nuff Said
TTFN
Mick