8th June
Amongst my engineering friends talking about next year's centenary of Bristol Aviation enterprise, some doubts expressed as to whether this will be be some kind of festival of music and poetry only, with next to zero technical content, and a lot of new Arts Graduates drafted in from elsewhere. Maybe not, but I have a play here about the career of Captain Barnwell if anyone wants to redress the balance. It's even got slightly naughty bits...
6th June
The item on 29th May about US101/EH101 helicopters was correct insofar as it said "difficult to distinguish" I gather Yeovil has delivered the machines under its current contract with Lockheed, but that seems unlikely to be the end the story, especially as experience shows that such aircraft will be around for a number of decades. To say that "billions" are involved seems tame now, in the light of Bank Bail-outs, but it's still a lot of money.
6th June Engineers will be familiar with two distinct Project Threat Syndromes (good buzzword eh?)
30th May
The recent talk at University of the West of England about the new engine for the Airbus 400M detailed the steady progress at Marshall's of Cambridge with the Hercules flying test bed, so maybe the 400M programme will be saved after all. If not, the RAF has almost lost its chance to buy Boeing C17s as the production line is soon to be shut down. Meanwhile our elite parachute forces, so the papers say, cannot find any aircraft to practise jumping out of, as the Hercules, which were due to start being replaced by A400M by now,are all either in Afghanistan or unserviceable.
29th May
The new US Administration is clearing out its Defence Procurement lists and amongst other things for the chop are the helicopters from Yeovil based on the EH101 or Merlin. As usual it is difficult to distinguish if these are late, or overspent or whether it's a matter of added requirements, but one thing seems certain - Barack Obama can't see why the Presidential Flight needs anything so big. It's a cultural thing, he not being a Texan, perhaps.
18th May
Hearing that this column was starting up again, a friend of a friend enquired where I got my stuff from to write in it. He must have heard I worked for MI5 in my youth.
17th May 2009
2010 will mark the centenary of the Aviation Industry in Bristol. In 1910 Sir George White announced to a shocked meeting of the Tramways Company that he was founding the British and Colonial Aeroplane Company, and work began at once in a former Tramways Shed at Filton. Within a year or so the Bristol Boxkite was flying not just on Salisbury Plain but in India and Australia. Led by his son Sir Stanley, and renamed The Bristol Aeroplane Company, it grew to great size and built thousands of aircraft and engines until 1960, when a series of Government-forced mergers took place. However the factories at Filton and Patchway still form the biggest aeronautical centre in Britain, still recognisable as the successor to "The BAC".
In 2010 this centenary will be celebrated, though it is not clear in exactly what form. Ideas that float up naturally include the start (at least) on the aviation heritage museum at Filton about which much has been said in various Committees. We all live in hopes though. There is talk of Carnivals and Parties (fun, not political!) and artistic endeavours. And the Bristol Aero Collection will be proudly showing progress with its Blenheim bomber restoration.
This website has been resurrected after an inactive period, to support this Centenary. Only the other day at the Helicopter Museum we had a visit from one of the organisers, viewing the Bristol helicopters on display, and looking for people who might help. As days go by, I will put any details I get onto the site. However, the site remains entirely independent, as it always has been.
Chris May (Ed.)
Part of the above doubts refer to Bristol Museum, with its apparent policy of preferring placards to artifacts, though with Patrick Hassell of the RRHT elected as a Councillor of the ruling Party, this may well come under scrutiny. Though that may be the wrong technical term in the Council bureaucracy.
(1)the one to do with budgeting and downward-revised requirements that are out of our hands and take longer and cost more
(2)things that break, catch fire or crash when they aren't supposed to. These can be dealt with, but take longer and cost more. But like the A400M, it is much better if they are anticipated and so don't actually happen.
It doesn't make such a good story though.
Well yes, it is a bit like that. Let's take the example of the A400M, over which I think it fair to say a cloud hangs, because of delays. How do I know this? Well one source is the BBC Parliament Channel which recently gave us a Commons debate on Defence procurement - a topic of local interest you must agree. MPs of all parties were worried it might be scrapped, for the simple reason that there is a clause in the Contract to that effect if the delay goes past a certain date. So if you like, an MP told me...well, sort of.
There is a talk at UWE next Thursday 21st May at six in the evening, all about the engine development for the A400M.
On another topic, the Government announcement that RAF Lyneham is to close, its worth considering that the original reason given was that the A400M was too big for Lyneham and needed to operate out of Brize Norton. So if there wasn't any A400M...? But don't worry, Spain will make sure that doesn't happen.