Last Friday I went to the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight's base at RAF Coningsby for a Spitfire "technical tour". It's a scheme that they're piloting (ba-da-
tish) to perhaps do more of in coming months and years.
The hangar and everything in it of course is the RAF's domain, the visitor centre and the tours are run by Lincolnshire County Council. The two seem to cooperate very well. The tour was supposed to last three hours... but over-ran to
five. We were in the hands of an ex RAF guy called Phil who was
incredibly knowledgeable about the planes.
After a briefing we went into the hangar and spent about an hour learning about the Merlin engine. From there we looked at the planes - you can't get very close to them (priceless artifacts and all that, and there were RAF tech crew busy at work) but they were all in various states of stripped-down-ness for winter maintenance and we got a pretty good look at their innards. As well as the Lanc, the Dakota and the two Hurris they have a Mk II (oldest Spit still flying and a BoB veteran), a Mk V, a Mk IX, a mk XVI which is a new arrival and is being restored, and a PR Mk XIX painted up to look like the famous PS888 "The Last" (their other PR XIX is elsewhere having work done on it).
After that a fascinating slideshow about construction of the Spit - it's amazing we ever built
one, let alone 22,000 - and after that an hour in the company of a Hispano 20mm cannon, three rounds from which can take the wing clean off a Bf 109, ha. Lots of freebie drawings and stuff to take away, tea and coffee thrown in and all for the princely sum of 15 quid.
Superb day out!
There are tours coming up for the Dakota and the Lanc, but i think they're booked up. However if they repeat it i wouldn't hesitate to go again. Highly recommended.
I took tons of pics - photos OK for personal use, not to be used in books or on the internet, which I respect... oh heck, I can't resist one (probably be the subject of a precision strike by a Tornado later for this)... this is me happy as Larry with the Mk V currently painted up to look like Jan Zumbach of 303 Sqn's "Donald Duck" Spit. This is going to be my Christmas Break build!
Cheers