Old Tech thread

I too am 6'4" and the worst car I ever tried to get into was a Triumph Spitfire. It just wasn't going to happen! :lol: That's why many years later I bought myself a Triumph Stag instead. Now that was a car!
 
Those extra three inches (of height!) must make a difference - I'm 6'1" and had no problems with my Mk 2 Spit. Mind you, I was a third of my present age, and a bit more lish in those days: didn't bother opening the door, just hopped over and slid down...
 
As’t thee ‘iver sin a cuddy lowp a five bar yat? Sin thee 'as, it were a gey lish cuddy, or a gey laal yat...;)

(Have you ever seen a donkey jump over a five bar gate? If you have, it was a very agile donkey, or a very small gate...)
 
Now here's a brilliant idea that never happened - reminds me a bit of the Thunderbird 2 pod system...

54519
 
pyan said:
Now here's a brilliant idea that never happened - reminds me a bit of the Thunderbird 2 pod system...

View attachment 54519
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Fiat tried to develop something like that in the 80s with the first Fiat Panda.
They thought that if you bought a basic chassis and standard 4 seat cabin tops, then we would rent different tops when we needed them.
I saw a design for a six seat version. They made a test piece of a cabin designed to carry two bicycles down one side and driver and passenger tandem style on the other. That looked cool.
 
pyan said:
Until the (alloy) cylinder head and the (cast iron) block parted company...:LOL:
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Yes we had the original engine and to say it had overheating problems - which typically resulted in said parting problem - would be an understatement. There's a lot to be said for the people that put the Rover V8 (all aluminium) engine in.
pyan said:
Now here's a brilliant idea that never happened - reminds me a bit of the Thunderbird 2 pod system...

View attachment 54519
Click to expand...
Now you see this isn't so different from the Stag; it had a hard top that you could put on in Winter and then in summer you'd go with the soft top!
 
From the Wiki article on the Blériot 125:
When flown the following year, it displayed very poor flight characteristics and although attempts to improve it continued on into 1933, certification could not be achieved and the sole prototype was scrapped the following year.
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Not a complete surprise, really.
 
With four tail fins and rudders it must have been hell on the legs to stear!
There was a WW2 glider the Germans built, it could carry troops plus a tank, it was huge, but they had a hell of a job towing it, first they used three ME110 fighter-bombers, then two HE111 bombers that were welded together at the wings to give it three engines!!
Finally they fitted it with engines and turned into a plane, on its first test flight it nearly crashed because it's control surfaces were so big the pilot had a hell of a job moving them.
To solve this they gave it two pilots, working in tandem, but it was slow and very easy meat for allied fighters so not many were used!!!
 
BigBadBob141 said:
With four tail fins and rudders it must have been hell on the legs to stear!
There was a WW2 glider the Germans built, it could carry troops plus a tank, it was huge, but they had a hell of a job towing it, first they used three ME110 fighter-bombers, then two HE111 bombers that were welded together at the wings to give it three engines!!
Finally they fitted it with engines and turned into a plane, on its first test flight it nearly crashed because it's control surfaces were so big the pilot had a hell of a job moving them.
To solve this they gave it two pilots, working in tandem, but it was slow and very easy meat for allied fighters so not many were used!!!
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That would be the Me 321 Gigant. It eventually became the six engined Me 323 Gigant.
en.wikipedia.org

Messerschmitt Me 321 Gigant - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org
 
Alaska is full of float planes, and many of them were built in the 40's and 50's. They were a treat to watch during my recent vacation.
 
Parson said:
Alaska is full of float planes, and many of them were built in the 40's and 50's. They were a treat to watch during my recent vacation.
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I was reading a book written by a distant cousin who was a pilot (First World War, then Commercial later, secret missions with VIPs aboard in Second World War.) He worked in the Far East trying to find beaches where aircraft could land in order to open up routes there. Without concrete runways, aircraft would dig into soft soil, beaches and marshes. Flying boats were thought to be the answer for a very long time until better airports were built. They still are the only answer in more difficult to reach places such as Alaska.
 
Is that the 'clipper' service, that staged via the Canaries and Bermuda?
 
Dave said:
I was reading a book written by a distant cousin who was a pilot (First World War, then Commercial later, secret missions with VIPs aboard in Second World War.) He worked in the Far East trying to find beaches where aircraft could land in order to open up routes there. Without concrete runways, aircraft would dig into soft soil, beaches and marshes. Flying boats were thought to be the answer for a very long time until better airports were built. They still are the only answer in more difficult to reach places such as Alaska.
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Do you know the title of the book? It sounds like an interesting read...
 
It was actually Imperial Airways that he worked for. He opened their Bermuda to New York service in 1937.

The book is called "Pioneer Pilot" by William Armstrong, Blandford Press. 1952. I bought the book for about £10 second hand. I can see it advertised at the moment for £15. It is a really good read considering it is non-fiction, (up until the last chapter when he starts to proselytise.) He also talks about the home movies that he made during the 1930's during flights to Spain and Morocco undertaken for rich passengers. He says that he was the first person to strap such a camera on the bottom of an aircraft, though I can't verify that claim. I actually tracked down these movies to the University of Brighton, who put them online for me in their Screen Archive here: http://screenarchive.brighton.ac.uk/search/William%20Armstrong/ There are some great old films of a street procession. It also includes some family scenes in Egypt (where they lived until one of the children got sick and nearly died) and a Wedding in Surrey (lived somewhere near to Croydon Airport.)
 
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I live a few miles from an old flying boat "airport", i.e. Poole Harbour.

Here's a page containing a (recent-ish) aerial photograph of the harbour and here's page containing a map showing the "runways". According to the text on that second page:
Throughout the war and until 1948, BOAC had 600 staff in Poole to support their various flight crews and the Flying Boat services. Up to 24 of its passenger Flying Boats were based in the Harbour.

Its Marine Department had 60 more staff operating 12 high speed launches used to convey flight crews, passengers, mail and freight from Poole Quay and the Marine Terminal to the Flying Boats. There was another fleet of 14 fast launches used for Water Control - operated by the Ministry of Civil Aviation and maintained by the British Power Boat Company with its Poole base in West Quay Rd. These marked out runways, and kept them clear of all obstructions.

Sometimes small, powerful boats called pinnaces were required to assist the Flying Boats between the runways and their moorings.
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