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British Railways Class 60 60002 with Railfreight Petroleum Livery at Barnetby with Ore Empties on the 22nd August 1996.
Stolt Capability, (tanker) and BrightStar, (bulker), in New York, USA. January, 2022. Copyright Tom Turner
Crewe Hall, a notable Jacobean mansion near Crewe Green in Cheshire, England, was built between 1615 and 1636 for Sir Randolph Crewe. Regarded as one of the finest Jacobean houses in Cheshire, it's listed at grade I. The hall underwent extensions in the 18th century and Victorian alterations by Edward Blore. After a fire in 1866, it was extensively restored by E. M. Barry, featuring works by various artists like J. Birnie Philip and Henry Weekes. The estate's park, landscaped by renowned designers including Capability Brown, is adorned with formal gardens by W. A. Nesfield. Now a hotel, restaurant, and health club, Crewe Hall retains its historic charm.
U.S. Marines with Alpha Company, 1st Battalion, 3rd Marine Regiment conduct MOUT training with Indonesian Marines during the Korps Marinir (KORMAR) Platoon Exchange 2019 program in Surabaya, Indonesia, August 9, 2019. The KORMAR platoon exchange program between Indonesia and the U.S. involves each country sending a platoon of Marines to live and train together at the other's military base. This program enhances the capability of both services and displays their continued commitment to share information and increase the ability to respond to crisis together. (U.S. Marine corps photo by Cpl. Eric Tso) www.dvidshub.net
After squeezing the last miles out of its Leyland PD3s, Weardale has capitalised on the huge people-moving capability of some of the biggest double-deckers to be found anywhere. After a rumoured interest in ex-China Motor Bus tri-axle Metrobuses, it took the plunge in 2006 with a former Citybus tri-axle Leyland Olympian, which was to prove a valuable but unique member of the fleet. Whilst entirely fictional, this former Kenya Bus (via Stagecoach Magicbus) Dennis Dragon, based on an original photo by Howard Piltz, looks entirely at home in contemporary Weardale livery (19-Nov-11).
STRICTLY COPYRIGHT: You may download a copy of any image for your personal use, but it would be an offence to remove the copyright information or to post it elsewhere without the express permission of the copyright owner.
Broadway Tower is a folly on Broadway Hill, near the village of Broadway, in the English county of Worcestershire, at the second-highest point of the Cotswolds (after Cleeve Hill). Broadway Tower's base is 1,024 feet (312 metres) above sea level. The tower itself stands 65 feet (20 metres) high.
The "Saxon" tower was the brainchild of Capability Brown and designed by James Wyatt in 1794 in the form of a castle, and built for Lady Coventry in 1798–99. The tower was built on a "beacon" hill, where beacons were lit on special occasions. Lady Coventry wondered whether a beacon on this hill could be seen from her house in Worcester — about 22 miles (35 km) away — and sponsored the construction of the folly to find out. Indeed, the beacon could be seen clearly.
Over the years, the tower was home to the printing press of Sir Thomas Phillipps, and served as a country retreat for artists including William Morris and Edward Burne-Jones who rented it together in the 1880s. William Morris was so inspired by Broadway Tower and other ancient buildings that he founded the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings in 1877.
Today, the tower is a tourist attraction and the centre of a country park with various exhibitions open to the public at a fee, as well as a gift shop and restaurant. The place is on the Cotswold Way and can be reached by following the Cotswold Way from the A44 road at Fish Hill, or by a steep climb out of Broadway village.
Near the tower is a memorial to the crew of an A.W.38 Whitley bomber that crashed there during a training mission in June 1943.
Claremont estate
The first house on the Claremont estate was built in 1708 by Sir John Vanbrugh, the Restoration playwright and architect of Blenheim Palace and Castle Howard, for his own use. This "very small box", as he described it, stood on the level ground in front of the present mansion. At the same time, he built the stables and the walled gardens, also probably White Cottage, which is now the Sixth Form Centre of Claremont Fan Court School.
In 1714, he sold the house to the wealthy Whig politician Thomas Pelham-Holles, Earl of Clare, who later became Duke of Newcastle and served twice as Prime Minister. The earl commissioned Vanbrugh to add two great wings to the house and to build a fortress-like turret on an adjoining knoll. From this so-called "prospect-house", or belvedere, he and his guests could admire the views of the Surrey countryside as they took refreshments and played hazard, a popular dice game.
In the clear eighteenth-century air it was apparently possible to see Windsor Castle and St Paul's Cathedral. The Earl of Clare named his country seat Clare-mount, later contracted to Claremont. The two lodges at the Copsem Lane entrance were added at this time.
Landscape garden
Main article: Claremont Landscape Garden
Claremont landscape garden is one of the earliest surviving gardens of its kind of landscape design, the English Landscape Garden — still featuring its original 18th century layout. The extensive landscaped grounds of Claremont represents the work of some of the best known landscape gardeners, Charles Bridgeman, Capability Brown, William Kent (with Thomas Greening) and Sir John Vanbrugh.[2]
Work on the gardens began around 1715 and, by 1727, they were described as "the noblest of any in Europe". Within the grounds, overlooking the lake, is an unusual turfed amphitheatre.
A feature in the grounds is the Belvedere Tower, designed by Vanbrugh for the Duke of Newcastle. The tower is unusual in that, what appear to be windows, are actually bricks painted black and white. It is now owned by Claremont Fan Court School, which is situated alongside the gardens.
In 1949, the landscape garden was donated to the National Trust for stewardship and protection. A restoration programme was launched in 1975 following a significant donation by the Slater Foundation. The garden is Grade I listed on the Register of Historic Parks and Gardens.[3]
Capability Brown's mansion, built for Lord Clive of India
The Duke of Newcastle died in 1768 and, in 1769, his widow sold the estate to Robert Clive, 1st Baron Clive, founder of Britain's Indian Empire. Although the great house was then little more than fifty years old, it was aesthetically and politically out of fashion. Lord Clive decided to demolish the house and commissioned Capability Brown to build the present Palladian mansion on higher and dryer ground. Brown, more accomplished as a landscape designer than an architect, took on his future son-in-law Henry Holland as a junior partner owing to the scale of the project. John Soane (later Sir John Soane) was employed in Holland's office at this time and worked on the project as a draftsman and junior designer.[4] Holland's interiors for Claremont owe much to the contemporary work of Robert Adam.
Lord Clive, by now a rich Nabob, is reputed to have spent over £100,000 on rebuilding the house and the complete remodelling of the celebrated pleasure ground. However, Lord Clive ended up never living at the property, as he died in 1774—the year that the house was completed. The estate then passed through a rapid succession of owners; first being sold "for not more than one third of what the house and alterations had cost"[5] to Robert Monckton-Arundell, 4th Viscount Galway, and then to George Carpenter, 2nd Earl of Tyrconnell, and finally to Charles Ellis, 1st Baron Seaford.[6]
A large map entitled "Claremont Palace", situated in what is called "Clive's room" inside the mansion, shows the mansion and its surrounding grounds; giving a detailed overview of the campus. The map likely dates back to the 1860s, when the mansion was frequently occupied by Queen Victoria (thus it having been christened "palace"). However, the exact date is still unknown. The relief in Claremont's front pediment is of Clive's coat of arms impaled with that of Maskelyne, his wife's family.
+++ DISCLAIMER +++
Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based historical facts. BEWARE!
Some background
The Imperial Japanese Army Air Force's fighter force, especially the Nakajima Ki-43, had been underestimated in its capability, numbers and the strategy of its commanders. Within a few months, Japanese forces had conquered vast areas of the Pacific and South East Asia. During these campaigns, the ill-prepared Allied air forces in the Pacific suffered devastating losses.
Because of political and cultural ties between the United Kingdom and Australia, British manufacturers were the main source of RAAF aircraft. However, the British aircraft industry had long been hard-pressed to meet the needs of the RAF. Although United States companies had enormous aircraft manufacturing capacity, their output was now intended first and foremost for US air units. Even if aircraft built overseas did become available, they would be shipped long distances in wartime conditions, with consequent delays and losses. As a consequence, CAC came into its own with the development of the Boomerang fighter, which was not operational before late 1942.
Following the outbreak of war with Japan, 51 Hurricane Mk IIs were sent as a stop-gap in crates to Singapore, with 24 pilots, the nucleus of five squadrons. They arrived on 3 January 1942, by which time the Allied fighter squadrons in Singapore, flying Brewster Buffalos, had been overwhelmed in the Malayan campaign. Even though the Hurricanes were a significant progress, they suffered in performance.
Because of inadequate early warning systems, Japanese air raids were able to destroy 30 Hurricanes on the ground in Sumatra, most of them in one raid on 7 February. After Japanese landings in Singapore, on 10 February, only 18 serviceable Hurricanes remained out of the original 99. After Java was invaded, some of the pilots were evacuated by sea to Australia. 31 Hurricane airframes, which had been on the wayby ship, not been assembled and lacked Merlin engines, were directed to Australia in the wake of events.
From these unfinished machines, the Hurricane Mk. VI was quickly devised: the airframes were mated with P&W Twin Wasp engines, which were produced under license at the CAC plant in Lidcombe, Sydney, for the RAAF's Boomerang and Bristol Beaufort. It was clear from the start that these Twin Wasp-powered machines would rather be stop-gaps and no true fighters, rather fighter bombers and more suited for the ground attack role. Hence, like the latest fighters at the time, planning for the Mk. VI included automatic cannons. As no such weapons were manufactured locally, a British-made Hispano-Suiza 20 mm which an Australian airman had collected as a souvenir in the Middle East was reverse engineered – and four of them replaced the eight and partly twelve 0.303 machine guns of the original Mk. IIB machines. Additionally, the pilot received extra armor plating, and the wings were reinforced for external ordnance.
The RAAF Mk. VI Hurricanes carried A60-02 through -32 registrations. As a side note, A60-01 was a single Hurricane Mk.I serialled V-7476. This aircraft served with No.2 and 3 Communications Flights RAAF and was used on occasion for experimental work at RAAF Base Laverton on the outskirts of Melbourne. The aircraft was scrapped in 1945.
The Hurricane Mk. VIs actively took part in Pacific operations with RAAF’s No. 4 Squadron and No. 5 Squadron, being joined by Boomerangs in early 1943. They were operated in New Guinea and during the Solomon Islands Campaign as well as the Borneo Campaign, mostly in the close support role and with marked success.
Flying in pairs (one to observe the ground, the other to observe the air around them), their tasks included bombing, strafing, close infantry support and artillery spotting. When attacking larger enemy formations, the Hurricanes often operated in conjunction with the smaller and much more agile Boomerang fighter. In this role, a Boomerang would get in close to confirm the identity of the target and mark it with a 20 lb (9 kg) smoke bomb with the "cooperating" Hurricane, Beaufort or Havoc delivering the major ordnance in a quick run and from a safer distance. The partnership between RAAF planes and Royal New Zealand Air Force Corsair fighter bombers during the Bougainville Campaign was said to be particularly effective.
The Australian Hurricane Mk. VIs soldiered on until early 1945, when they were finally retired. The Twin Wasp engines were used for spares, all airframes were scrapped, no plane survived the war.
General characteristics:
Crew: 1
Length: 32 ft 3 in (9.84 m)
Wingspan: 40 ft 0 in (12.19 m)
Height: 13 ft 1½ in (4.0 m)
Wing area: 257.5 ft² (23.92 m²)
Empty weight: 5,745 lb (2,605 kg)
Loaded weight: 7,670 lb (3,480 kg)
Max. takeoff weight: 8,710 lb (3,950 kg)
Maximum speed: 331 mph (531 km/h)
Range: 650 mi (1.045 km)
Service ceiling: 36,000 ft (10,970 m)
Rate of climb: 2,303 ft/min (11.7 m/s)
Wing loading: 29.8 lb/ft² (121.9 kg/m²)
Power/mass: 0.15 hp/lb (0.25 kW/kg)
Engine: 1× Pratt & Whitney R-1830 Twin Wasp radial engine, 1,200 hp (895 kW)
Armament: 4× 20 mm (0.787 in) Hispano or CAC cannons; 2x 45-gallon (205 l) drop tanks or 2× 250 or 500 lb (110 or 230 kg) bombs
The kit and its assembly
The Hurricane Mk. VI is a whif, even though with little effort but a good story behind it. The original idea to mate a Hurricane with a radial engine came when I found a drawing of a Russian Hurricane, mated with a Schwezow ASch-82 engine. It looked… interesting. Not certain if this had been done for sure, but a great inspiration.
While browsing through the scrap heap I later found a Twin Wasp engine – that fueled the idea of a respective conversion. The Russian option was dead, but when I checked contemporary planes I came across the small Boomerang, and the historical facts were perfect for an obscure Australian Hurricane variant.
The rest was quickly done: the basic kit is a Hurricane Mk. IIC (Trop) from Hobby Boss, the Twin Wasp comes from a wrecked Matchbox PB4Y Privateer. The original Merlin was simply cut away and replaced by the "new" and relatively small radial engine. A surprisingly easy task, even though I had to widen the area in front of the cockpit by about 1mm to each side. With some putty and a new exhaust pipe with flame dampers, the surgical part was quickly done. A pilot was added, too, in order to distract from the rather bleak cockpit.
To make the plane look more interesting and suitable for a display on the ground, the flaps were lowered (scratch-built) and vertical and horizontal stabilizer were moved away from OOB neutral position. Additionally, the cooler under the fuselage was omitted, what creates together with the radial engine a very different side view. This "Aussie'cane" looks stout but disturbingly realistic, like a Boomerang’s big brother!
Only other changes/additions are a pilot figure and two wing hardpoints, holding bombs. The rest is OOB.
Painting
I have always been a fan of all-green RAAF WWII planes, so I chose such a simple livery. Inspiration came from real-life 4. Squadron Boomerangs, so I adopted the “QE” code and tried to mimic the overall look.
Interior surfaces were kept in Humbrol 78 ('Cockpit Green', dry-painted with light grey). The plane was painted with “Foilage Green” on all outer surfaces - a tone which seems to be heavily debated. Most sources claim FS 34092 (Humbrol 149) as a nowaday's replacement, but to me, this color is just too green and blue-ish. IMHO, “Foilage Green” has a rather yellow-ish hue - Humbrol 75 ("Bronze Green") would be better, if it wasn't too dark.
After some trials I settled for Humbrol 105 ("Army Green"). I think it is a sound compromise. It resembles FS 34096, but is (much) less grey-ish and offers that yellow hue I was looking for. Heavy weathering was done, esp. at the panel lines with dry-painted FS 34096 (Testors) and some panels "bleached" with Humbrol 86 ("Light live Green"). After deacls had been applied, some dry brushing with olive drab and light grey added to the worn and faded look, as well as flaked paint around the engine and the wings' leading egdes and soot stains at exhausts and guns. I wanted to emphasize the harsh climate conditions and duties of this fictional machine.
Only other colors are typical white quick recognition markings on tail and wings, painted with a mix of Humbrol 130 and 196 for a very light grey, with some white dry painting on th eleading edges.For a final clear coat, I used a matte varnish which still has a light gloss to it - “Foilage Green” and RAAF finishes were AFAIK supposed to be semi-matte and of higher quality that USAF paintjobs.
Markings come mostly from the scrap box. The RAAF insignia were taken from a Vultee Vengeance aftermarket sheet by Kanga Decals, which also provided the mid sea grey codes. The Australian registration numbers were improvised with single white letters from TL Modellbau decal sheets.
All in all I am happy with the result - a simple measure, a good story and even a very simple livery that allows room for imagination and painting effects. A nice lil' whif, the "Aussie'cane" Mk. VI.
Built between 1754 and 1760, Croome Park is a National Trust property set perfectly in Capability Brown's very first landscape and is the site of a secret Second World War air base.
Members of the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) and the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) load a F/A-18 aircraft inside an RCAF CC-177 Globemaster as part of the Interim Fighter Capability Project, at RAAF Base Williamtown, Australia, February 7, 2020.
Photo: Sergeant Vincent Carbonneau, Canadian Forces Combat Camera
20200207ISA0008D017
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À la base Williamtown de l’Aviation royale australienne (RAAF) en Australie, des membres de l’Aviation royale canadienne (ARC) et de la RAAF chargent un avion F/A 18 à bord d’un CC-177 Globemaster de l’ARC, dans le cadre du Projet de capacité des chasseurs provisoires, le 7 février 2020.
Photo : Sergent Vincent Carbonneau, Caméra de combat des Forces canadiennes
20200207ISA0008D017
The auto start and stop feature combined with the Kenworth Idle Management System for the Kenworth T680 76-inch sleeper enables truck operators to more effectively manage climate control and other hotel loads during truck downtime. The battery-based APU system for air conditioning is linked directly into the T680 ducting system. An optional fuel-fired heater provides full engine-off heating capability. The integrated system extends air conditioning performance and is appreciated by drivers who want cool comfort in their sleepers during their rest period.
Croome Court is a mid 18th century Neo-Palladian mansion surrounded by an extensive landscaped parkland at Croome D'Abitot, near Pershore in south Worcestershire. The mansion and park were designed by Lancelot "Capability" Brown for George Coventry, 6th Earl of Coventry, and was Brown's first landscape design and first major architectural project. Some of the internal rooms of the mansion were designed by Robert Adam.
The mansion house is owned by Croome Heritage Trust, and is leased to the National Trust who operate it, along with the surrounding parkland, as a tourist attraction. The National Trust own the surrounding parkland, which is also open to the public.
Location[edit]
Croome Court is located near to Croome D'Abitot, in Worcestershire,[1] near Pirton, Worcestershire.[2] The wider estate was established on lands that were once part of the royal forest of Horewell.[3] Traces of these older landscapes, such as unimproved commons and ancient woodlands, can be found across the former Croome Estate.[4]
House[edit]
Croome Court South Portico
History[edit]
The foundations and core of Croome Court, including the central chimney stack structure, date back to the early 1640s.[5] Substantial changes to this early house were made by Gilbert Coventry, 4th Earl of Coventry.[6]
In 1751, George Coventry, the 6th Earl, inherited the estate, along with the existing Jacobean house. He commissioned Lancelot "Capability" Brown, with the assistance of Sanderson Miller, to redesign the house and estate.[7][1] It was Brown's "first flight into the realms of architecture" and a "rare example of his architectural work",[8] and it is an important and seminal work.[9] It was built between 1751 and 1752, and it and Hagley Hall are considered to be the finest examples of Neo-Palladian architecture in Worcestershire. Notable Neo-Palladian features incorporated into Croome Court include the plain exterior and the corner towers with pyramidal roofs (a feature first used by Inigo Jones in the design of Wilton House in Wiltshire).[1] Robert Adam worked on the interior of the building from 1760 onwards.[10]
The house has been visited by George III,[2][11] as well as Queen Victoria[7] during summers when she was a child, and George V (then Duke of York).[11]
A jam factory was built by the 9th Earl of Coventry, near to Pershore railway station, in about 1880, to provide a market for Vale of Evesham fruit growers in times of surplus. Although the Croome connection with jam making had ceased, during the First World War, the building was leased by the Croome Estate Trust to the Huddersfield Fruit Preserving Company as a pulping station.[12]
The First World War deeply affected Croome, with many local casualties, although the house was not requisitioned for the war effort. This is possibly because it was the home of the Lord Lieutenant of the County, who needed a residence for his many official engagements.[13]
During the Second World War Croome Court was requisitioned by the Ministry of Works and leased for a year to the Dutch Government as a possible refuge for Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands; to escape the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands. However, evidence shows that they stayed two weeks at the most, perhaps because of the noise and fear created by the proximity of Defford Aerodrome. They later emigrated to Canada.[14]
In 1948 the Croome Estate Trust sold the Court, along with 38 acres (15 ha) of land, to the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Birmingham, and the mansion became St Joseph's Special School, which was run by nuns[15] from 1950[11] until 1979.[15]
The house was listed on 11 August 1952; it is currently Grade I listed.[10]
In 1979 the hall was taken over by the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (Hare Krishna movement), who used it as their UK headquarters and a training college[16] called Chaitanya College,[15] run by 25 members of the movement.[16] During their tenure they repainted the Dining Room.[17] In 1984 they had to leave the estate for financial reasons. They held a festival at the hall in 2011.[16]
From 1984 onwards various owners tried to use the property as a training centre; apartments; a restaurant and conference centre; and a hotel and golf course,[15] before once more becoming a private family home,[2][15] with outbuildings converted to private houses.[15]
The house was purchased by the Croome Heritage Trust, a registered charity,[18] in October 2007,[19] and it is now managed by the National Trust as a tourist attraction. It opened to the public in September 2009, at which point six of the rooms had restored, costing £400,000, including the Saloon. It was estimated that another £4 million[2][20] to £4.8 million would be needed to restore the entire building. Fundraising activities for the restoration included a 2011 raffle for a Morgan sports car organised by Lord and Lady Flight. After the restoration is complete, a 999-year lease on the building will be granted to the National Trust.[21] An oral history project to record recollections about Croome was funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund.[15] As of 2009, the service wing was empty and in need of substantial repair.[22]
Exterior[edit]
The mansion is faced with Bath stone,[7] limestone ashlar, and has both north and south facing fronts. It has a basement and two stories, with three stories in the end pavilions. A slate roof, with pyramid roofs over the corner towers, tops the building, along with three pair-linked chimneys along the axis of the house.[10]
Both fronts have 11 bays, split into three central sets of three each, and one additional bay each side. The north face has a pedimented centre, with two balustraded staircases leading to a Roman Doric doorcase. The south face has a projecting Ionic tetrastyle portico and Venetian windows. It has a broad staircase, with cast stone sphinxes on each side, leading to a south door topped with a cornice on consoles. The wings have modillion cornice and balustrade.[10]
A two-story L-shaped service wing is attached to the east side of the mansion. It is made of red brick and stone, with slate roofs.[10] It was designed by Capability Brown in 1751-2.[22] On the far side of the service wing, a wall connects it to a stable court.[10]
Interior[edit]
The interior of the house was designed partially by Capability Brown, with plasterwork by G. Vassalli, and partially by Robert Adam, with plasterwork by J. Rose Jr. It has a central spine corridor. A stone staircase, with iron balusters, is at the east end.[10]
The entrance hall is on the north side of the building, and has four fluted Doric columns, along with moulded doorcases. To the east of the entrance hall is the dining room, which has a plaster ceiling and cornice, while to the west is a billiard room, featuring fielded panelling, a plaster cornice, and a rococo fireplace. The three rooms were probably decorated around 1758-59 by Capability Brown.[10] The dining room was vibrantly repainted by the Hare Krishnas in the 1970s-80s.[17]
The central room on the south side is a saloon, probably by Brown and Vassalli. It has an elaborate ceiling, with three panels, deep coving, and a cornice, along with two Ionic fireplaces, and Palladian doorcases.[10] George III was entertained by George Coventry, the 6th Earl, in the house's Saloon.[2] A drawing room is to the west of the saloon, and features rococo plasterwork and a marble fireplace.[10]
To the east of the saloon is the Tapestry Room.[10] This was designed in 1763-71, based on a design by Robert Adam, and contained tapestries and furniture covers possibly designed by Jacques Germain Soufflot, and made by Manufacture Nationale des Gobelins.[23] Around 1902 the ninth Earl sold the tapestries and seating to a Parisian dealer. In 1949 the Samuel H. Kress Foundation purchased the ceiling, floor, mantlepiece, chair rails, doors and the door surrounds, which were donated to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, in 1958. In 1959 the Kress Foundation also helped the Metropolitan Museum acquire the chair and sofa frames, which they recovered using the original tapestry seats.[7][23] A copy of the ceiling was installed in place of the original.[10] As of 2016, the room is displayed as it would have looked after the tapestries had been sold, with a jug and ewer on display as the only original decoration of the room that remains in it. The adjacent library room is used to explain what happened to the tapestry room;[17] the former library was designed by Adam, and was dismantled except for the marble fireplace.[10]
At the west side of the building is a long gallery,[10] which was designed by Robert Adam and installed between 1761 and 1766. It is the best preserved of the original interior (little of the rest has survived in situ).[1] It has an octagonal panelled ceiling, and plaster reliefs of griffins. A half-hexagonal bay faces the garden. The room also contains a marble caryatid fireplace designed by J Wilton.[10] As of 2016, modern sculptures are displayed in empty niches along the Long Gallery
wikipedia
The current generation of the Ford Ranger (codenamed T6) is a range of midsize pickup trucks that is manufactured and sold by Ford Motor Company worldwide. Designed and engineered by Ford of Australia, the Ranger T6 replaces two previous Ford light-truck platforms: the North American-designed Ford Ranger sold in the Americas and the Ford Ranger derived from Mazda BT-50 sold in Latin America, Europe, and Asia-Pacific regions.
To develop North American specifications, Ford made several changes to the Ranger T6. To better meet US crash standards and to increase its payload, the frame rails were redesigned, becoming fully boxed. The front fascia was redesigned slightly, with Ford modifying the design to a steel, frame-mounted, front bumper separate from the bodywork. The tailgate was changed; along with the addition of a spoiler, the tailgate gained a locking capability (from the F-Series).
For the 2019 launch, the sole powertrain for North America-specification Rangers will be a 2.3L EcoBoost inline-4 paired to a 10-speed automatic; while output is not currently announced, the engine makes between 280hp (in the Ford Explorer) and 310hp (in the Ford Mustang EcoBoost).. Both two-wheel and four-wheel drive configurations are available. Although the Ranger is available as a two-door, only four-door SuperCab and SuperCrew configurations will be sold in North America; all Rangers will be sold as "HiRiders".
Following the F-150, the Ranger will be sold in base XL trim, XLT trim, with Lariat as the top-level trim. Each trim level will also have its own set of sub-model option packages, with the XL having the STX, with the XLT and Lariat having FX4 (4x4 only) and Chrome packages. Currently, neither the Wildtrak nor the Raptor are announced models in the United States or Canada.
Vancouver International Auto Show 2018
Convention Centre, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
For a video; youtu.be/U0KH92iOrcI
A Qatar Emiri Air Force C-17 Globemaster performs an airdrop during the (QEAF) Lahoub exercise at Al-Qalael dropzone, Qatar, May 9, 2018. The QEAF recently sent one of their C-17 aircrews back to the U.S. to receive airdrop training. This is a new capability for the QEAF and the first C-17 airdrop capability in the Gulf Corporation Council. (U.S. Air Force photo by Staff Sgt. Corey Hook)
Pasted from Wikipedia: Bell-Boeing V-22 Osprey
• • • • •
The Bell-Boeing V-22 Osprey is a multi-mission, military, tiltrotor aircraft with both a vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL), and short takeoff and landing (STOL) capability. It is designed to combine the functionality of a conventional helicopter with the long-range, high-speed cruise performance of a turboprop aircraft.
The V-22 originated from the U.S. Department of Defense Joint-service Vertical take-off/landing Experimental (JVX) aircraft program started in 1981. It was developed jointly by the Bell Helicopter, and Boeing Helicopters team, known as Bell Boeing, which produce the aircraft.[4] The V-22 first flew in 1989, and began years of flight testing and design alterations.
The United States Marine Corps began crew training for the Osprey in 2000, and fielded it in 2007. The Osprey's other operator, the U.S. Air Force fielded their version of the tiltrotor in 2009. Since entering service with the U.S. Marine Corps and Air Force, the Osprey has been deployed for combat operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Contents
•• 1.2 Flight testing and design changes
• 2 Design
• 8 Notable appearances in media
Development
Early development
The failure of the Iran hostage rescue mission in 1980 demonstrated to the United States military a need[5] for "a new type of aircraft, that could not only take off and land vertically but also could carry combat troops, and do so at speed."[6] The U.S. Department of Defense began the Joint-service Vertical take-off/landing Experimental (JVX) aircraft program in 1981, under U.S. Army leadership. Later the U.S. Navy/Marine Corps took the lead.[7][8] The JVX combined requirements from the Marine Corps, Air Force, Army and Navy.[9][10] A request for proposals (RFP) was issued in December 1982 for JVX preliminary design work. Interest in the program was expressed by Aérospatiale, Bell Helicopter, Boeing Vertol, Grumman, Lockheed, and Westland. The DoD pushed for contractors to form teams. Bell partnered with Boeing Vertol. The Bell Boeing team submitted a proposal for a enlarged version of the Bell XV-15 prototype on 17 February 1983. This was the only proposal received and a preliminary design contract was awarded on 26 April 1983.[11][12]
The JVX aircraft was designated V-22 Osprey on 15 January 1985; by March that same year the first six prototypes were being produced, and Boeing Vertol was expanded to deal with the project workload.[13][14] Work has been split evenly between Bell and Boeing. Bell Helicopter manufactures and integrates the wing, nacelles, rotors, drive system, tail surfaces, and aft ramp, as well as integrates the Rolls-Royce engines and performs final assembly. Boeing Helicopters manufactures and integrates the fuselage, cockpit, avionics, and flight controls.[4][15] The USMC variant of the Osprey received the MV-22 designation and the Air Force variant received CV-22; reversed from normal procedure to prevent Marine Ospreys from having a conflicting designation with aircraft carriers (CV).[16] Full-scale development of the V-22 tilt-rotor aircraft began in 1986.[2] On 3 May 1986 the Bell-Boeing partnership was awarded a $1.714 billion contract for V-22 aircraft by the Navy, thus at this point the project had acquisition plans with all four arms of the U.S. military.[17]
The first V-22 was rolled out with significant media attention in May 1988.[18][19] However the project suffered several political blows. Firstly in the same year, the Army left the program, citing a need to focus its budget on more immediate aviation programs.[20] The project also faced considerable dialogue in the Senate, surviving two votes that both could have resulted in cancellation.[21][22] Despite the Senate's decision, the Department of Defense instructed the Navy not to spend more money on the Osprey.[23] At the same time, the Bush administration sought the cancellation of the project.[23]
Flight testing and design changes
The first of six MV-22 prototypes first flew on 19 March 1989 in the helicopter mode,[24] and on 14 September 1989 as a fixed-wing plane.[25] The third and fourth prototypes successfully completed the Osprey's first Sea Trials on the USS Wasp in December 1990.[26] However, the fourth and fifth prototypes crashed in 1991-92.[27] Flight tests were resumed in August 1993 after changes were incorporated in the prototypes.[2] From October 1992 until April 1993, Bell and Boeing redesigned the V-22 to reduce empty weight, simplify manufacture and reduce production costs. This redesigned version became the B-model.[28]
Flight testing of four full-scale development V-22s began in early 1997 when the first pre-production V-22 was delivered to the Naval Air Warfare Test Center, Naval Air Station Patuxent River, Maryland. The first EMD flight took place on 5 February 1997. The first of four low rate initial production aircraft, ordered on 28 April 1997, was delivered on 27 May 1999. Osprey number 10 completed the program's second Sea Trials, this time from the USS Saipan in January 1999.[2] During external load testing in April 1999, Boeing used a V-22 to lift and transport the M777 howitzer.[29] In 2000, Boeing announced that the V-22 would be fitted with a nose-mounted GAU-19 Gatling gun,[30] but the GAU-19 gun was later canceled.[31]
In 2000, there were two further fatal crashes, killing a total of 19 Marines, and the production was again halted while the cause of these crashes was investigated and various parts were redesigned.[32] The V-22 completed its final operational evaluation in June 2005. The evaluation was deemed successful; events included long range deployments, high altitude, desert and shipboard operations. The problems identified in various accidents had been addressed.[33]
Controversy
The V-22's development process has been long and controversial, partly due to its large cost increases.[34] When the development budget, first planned for $2.5 billion in 1986, increased to a projected $30 billion in 1988, then-Defense Secretary Dick Cheney tried to zero out its funding. He was eventually overruled by Congress.[32] As of 2008, $27 billion have been spent on the Osprey program and another $27.2 billion will be required to complete planned production numbers by the end of the program.[2]
The V-22 squadron's former commander at Marine Corps Air Station New River, Lt. Colonel Odin Lieberman, was relieved of duty in 2001 after allegations that he instructed his unit that they needed to falsify maintenance records to make the plane appear more reliable.[2][35] Three officers were later implicated in the falsification scandal.[34]
The aircraft is incapable of autorotation, and is therefore unable to land safely in helicopter mode if both engines fail. A director of the Pentagon's testing office in 2005 said that if the Osprey loses power while flying like a helicopter below 1,600 feet (490 m), emergency landings "are not likely to be survivable". But Captain Justin (Moon) McKinney, a V-22 pilot, says that this will not be a problem, "We can turn it into a plane and glide it down, just like a C-130".[31] A complete loss of power would require the failure of both engines, as a drive shaft connects the nacelles through the wing; one engine can power both proprotors.[36] While vortex ring state (VRS) contributed to a deadly V-22 accident, the aircraft is less susceptible to the condition than conventional helicopters and recovers more quickly.[5] The Marines now train new pilots in the recognition of and recovery from VRS and have instituted operational envelope limits and instrumentation to help pilots avoid VRS conditions.[32][37]
It was planned in 2000 to equip all V-22s with a nose-mounted Gatling gun, to provide "the V-22 with a strong defensive firepower capability to greatly increase the aircraft's survivability in hostile actions."[30] The nose gun project was canceled however, leading to criticism by retired Marine Corps Commandant General James L. Jones, who is not satisfied with the current V-22 armament.[31] A belly-mounted turret was later installed on some of the first V-22s sent to the War in Afghanistan in 2009.[38]
With the first combat deployment of the MV-22 in October 2007, Time Magazine ran an article condemning the aircraft as unsafe, overpriced, and completely inadequate.[31] The Marine Corps, however, responded with the assertion that much of the article's data were dated, obsolete, inaccurate, and reflected expectations that ran too high for any new field of aircraft.[39]
Recent development
On 28 September 2005, the Pentagon formally approved full-rate production for the V-22.[40] The plan is to boost production from 11 a year to between 24 and 48 a year by 2012. Of the 458 total planned, 360 are for the Marine Corps, 48 for the Navy, and 50 for the Air Force at an average cost of $110 million per aircraft, including development costs.[2] The V-22 had an incremental flyaway cost of $70 million per aircraft in 2007,[3] but the Navy hopes to shave about $10 million off that cost after a five-year production contract starts in 2008.[41]
The Bell-Boeing Joint Project Office in Amarillo, Texas will design a new integrated avionics processor to resolve electronics obsolescence issues and add new network capabilities.[42]
Design
The Osprey is the world's first production tiltrotor aircraft, with one three-bladed proprotor, turboprop engine, and transmission nacelle mounted on each wingtip. It is classified as a powered lift aircraft by the Federal Aviation Administration.[43] For takeoff and landing, it typically operates as a helicopter with the nacelles vertical (rotors horizontal). Once airborne, the nacelles rotate forward 90° in as little as 12 seconds for horizontal flight, converting the V-22 to a more fuel-efficient, higher-speed turboprop airplane. STOL rolling-takeoff and landing capability is achieved by having the nacelles tilted forward up to 45°. For compact storage and transport, the V-22's wing rotates to align, front-to-back, with the fuselage. The proprotors can also fold in a sequence taking 90 seconds.[44]
Most Osprey missions will use fixed wing flight 75 percent or more of the time, reducing wear and tear on the aircraft and reducing operational costs.[45] This fixed wing flight is higher than typical helicopter missions allowing longer range line-of-sight communications and so improved command and control.[2] Boeing has stated the V-22 design loses 10% of its vertical lift over a Tiltwing design when operating in helicopter mode because of airflow resistance due to the wings, but that the Tiltrotor design has better short takeoff and landing performance.[46]
The V-22 is equipped with a glass cockpit, which incorporates four Multi-function displays (MFDs) and one shared Central Display Unit (CDU), allowing the pilots to display a variety of images including: digimaps centered or decentered on current position, FLIR imagery, primary flight instruments, navigation (TACAN, VOR, ILS, GPS, INS), and system status. The flight director panel of the Cockpit Management System (CMS) allows for fully-coupled (aka: autopilot) functions which will take the aircraft from forward flight into a 50-foot hover with no pilot interaction other than programming the system.[47] The glass cockpit of the canceled CH-46X was derived from the V-22.[48]
The V-22 is a fly-by-wire aircraft with triple-redundant flight control systems.[49] With the nacelles pointing straight up in conversion mode at 90° the flight computers command the aircraft to fly like a helicopter, with cyclic forces being applied to a conventional swashplate at the rotor hub. With the nacelles in airplane mode (0°) the flaperons, rudder, and elevator fly the aircraft like an airplane. This is a gradual transition and occurs over the rotation range of the nacelles. The lower the nacelles, the greater effect of the airplane-mode control surfaces.[50] The nacelles can rotate past vertical to 97.5° for rearward flight.[51][52]
The Osprey can be armed with one M240 7.62x51mm NATO (.308 in caliber) or M2 .50 in caliber (12.7 mm) machine gun on the loading ramp, that can be fired rearward when the ramp is lowered. A GAU-19 three-barrel .50 in gatling gun mounted below the V-22's nose has also been studied for future upgrade.[31][53] BAE Systems developed a remotely operated turreted weapons system for the V-22,[54] which was installed on half of the first V-22s deployed to Afghanistan in 2009.[38] The 7.62 mm belly gun turret is remotely operated by a gunner inside the aircraft, who acquires targets with a separate pod using color television and forward looking infrared imagery.
U.S. Naval Air Systems Command is working on upgrades to increase the maximum speed from 250 knots (460 km/h; 290 mph) to 270 knots (500 km/h; 310 mph), increase helicopter mode altitude limit from 10,000 feet (3,000 m) to 12,000 feet (3,700 m) or 14,000 feet (4,300 m), and increase lift performance.[55]
Operational history
US Marine Corps
Marine Corps crew training on the Osprey has been conducted by VMMT-204 since March 2000. On 3 June 2005, the Marine Corps helicopter squadron Marine Medium Helicopter 263 (HMM-263), stood down to begin the process of transitioning to the MV-22 Osprey.[56] On 8 December 2005, Lieutenant General Amos, commander of the II MEF, accepted the delivery of the first fleet of MV-22s, delivered to HMM-263. The unit reactivated on 3 March 2006 as the first MV-22 squadron and was redesignated VMM-263. On 31 August 2006, VMM-162 (the former HMM-162) followed suit. On 23 March 2007, HMM-266 became Marine Medium Tiltrotor Squadron 266 (VMM-266) at Marine Corps Air Station New River, North Carolina.[57]
The Osprey has been replacing existing CH-46 Sea Knight squadrons.[58] The MV-22 reached initial operational capability (IOC) with the U.S. Marine Corps on 13 June 2007.[1] On 10 July 2007 an MV-22 Osprey landed aboard the Royal Navy aircraft carrier, HMS Illustrious in the Atlantic Ocean. This marked the first time a V-22 had landed on any non-U.S. vessel.[59]
On 13 April 2007, the U.S. Marine Corps announced that it would be sending ten V-22 aircraft to Iraq, the Osprey's first combat deployment. Marine Corps Commandant, General James Conway, indicated that over 150 Marines would accompany the Osprey set for September deployment to Al-Asad Airfield.[60][61] On 17 September 2007, ten MV-22Bs of VMM-263 left for Iraq aboard the USS Wasp. The decision to use a ship rather than use the Osprey's self-deployment capability was made because of concerns over icing during the North Atlantic portion of the trip, lack of available KC-130s for mid-air refueling, and the availability of the USS Wasp.[62]
The Osprey has provided support in Iraq, racking up some 2,000 flight hours over three months with a mission capable availability rate of 68.1% as of late-January 2008.[63] They are primarily used in Iraq's western Anbar province for routine cargo and troop movements, and also for riskier "aero-scout" missions. General David Petraeus, the top U.S. military commander in Iraq, used one to fly around Iraq on Christmas Day 2007 to visit troops.[64] Then-presidential candidate Barack Obama also flew in Ospreys during his high profile 2008 tour of Iraq.[65]
The only major problem has been obtaining the necessary spare parts to maintain the aircraft.[66] The V-22 had flown 3,000 sorties totaling 5,200 hours in Iraq as of July 2008.[67] USMC leadership expect to deploy MV-22s to Afghanistan in 2009.[66][68] General George J. Trautman, III praised the increased range of the V-22 over the legacy helicopters in Iraq and said that "it turned his battle space from the size of Texas into the size of Rhode Island."[69]
Naval Air Systems Command has devised a temporary fix for sailors to place portable heat shields under Osprey engines to prevent damage to the decks of some of the Navy's smaller amphibious ships, but they determined that a long term solution to the problem would require these decks be redesigned with heat resistant deck coatings, passive thermal barriers and changes in ship structure in order to operate V-22s and F-35Bs.[70]
A Government Accountability Office study reported that by January 2009 the Marines had 12 MV-22s operating in Iraq and they managed to successfully complete all assigned missions. The same report found that the V-22 deployments had mission capable rates averaging 57% to 68% and an overall full mission capable rate of only 6%. It also stated that the aircraft had shown weakness in situational awareness, maintenance, shipboard operations and the ability to transport troops and external cargo.[71] That study also concluded that the "deployments confirmed that the V-22’s enhanced speed and range enable personnel and internal cargo to be transported faster and farther than is possible with the legacy helicopters it is replacing".[71]
The MV-22 saw its first offensive combat mission, Operation Cobra's Anger on 4 December 2009. Ospreys assisted in inserting 1,000 Marines and 150 Afghan troops into the Now Zad Valley of Helmand Province in southern Afghanistan to disrupt communication and supply lines of the Taliban.[38] In January 2010 the MV-22 Osprey is being sent to Haiti as part of Operation Unified Response relief efforts after the earthquake there. This will be the first use the Marine V-22 in a humanitarian mission.[72]
US Air Force
The Air Force's first operational CV-22 Osprey was delivered to the 58th Special Operations Wing (58th SOW) at Kirtland Air Force Base, New Mexico on 20 March 2006. This and subsequent aircraft will become part of the 58th SOW's fleet of aircraft used for training pilots and crew members for special operations use.[73] On 16 November 2006, the Air Force officially accepted the CV-22 in a ceremony conducted at Hurlburt Field, Florida.[74]
The US Air Force's first operational deployment of the Osprey sent four CV-22s to Mali in November 2008 in support of Exercise Flintlock. The CV-22s flew nonstop from Hurlburt Field, Florida with in-flight refueling.[5] AFSOC declared that the 8th Special Operations Squadron reached Initial Operational Capability on 16 March 2009, with six of its planned nine CV-22s operational.[75]
In June 2009, CV-22s of the 8th Special Operations Squadron delivered 43,000 pounds (20,000 kg) of humanitarian supplies to remote villages in Honduras that were not accessible by conventional vehicles.[76] In November 2009, the 8th SO Squadron and its six CV-22s returned from a three-month deployment in Iraq.[77]
The first possible combat loss of an Osprey occurred on 9 April, 2010, as a CV-22 went down near Qalat, Zabul Province, Afghanistan, killing four.[78][79]
Potential operators
In 1999 the V-22 was studied for use in the United Kingdom's Royal Navy,[80] it has been raised several times as a candidate for the role of Maritime Airborne Surveillance and Control (MASC).[81]
Israel had shown interest in the purchase of MV-22s, but no order was placed.[82][83] Flightglobal reported in late 2009 that Israel has decided to wait for the CH-53K instead.[84]
The V-22 Osprey is a candidate for the Norwegian All Weather Search and Rescue Helicopter (NAWSARH) that is planned to replace the Westland Sea King Mk.43B of the Royal Norwegian Air Force in 2015.[85] The other candidates for the NAWSARH contract of 10-12 helicopters are AgustaWestland AW101 Merlin, Eurocopter EC225, NHIndustries NH90 and Sikorsky S-92.[86]
Bell Boeing has made an unsolicited offer of the V-22 for US Army medical evacuation needs.[87] However the Joint Personnel Recovery Agency issued a report that said that a common helicopter design would be needed for both combat recovery and medical evacuation and that the V-22 would not be suitable for recovery missions because of the difficulty of hoist operations and lack of self-defense capabilities.[88]
The US Navy remains a potential user of the V-22, but its role and mission with the Navy remains unclear. The latest proposal is to replace the C-2 Greyhound with the V-22 in the fleet logistics role. The V-22 would have the advantage of being able to land on and support non-carriers with rapid delivery of supplies and people between the ships of a taskforce or to ships on patrol beyond helicopter range.[89] Loren B. Thompson of the Lexington Institute has suggested V-22s for use in combat search and rescue and Marine One VIP transport, which also need replacement aircraft.[90]
Variants
• V-22A
•• Pre-production full-scale development aircraft used for flight testing. These are unofficially considered A-variants after 1993 redesign.[91]
• HV-22
•• The U.S. Navy considered an HV-22 to provide combat search and rescue, delivery and retrieval of special warfare teams along with fleet logistic support transport. However, it chose the MH-60S for this role in 1992.[92]
• SV-22
•• The proposed anti-submarine warfare Navy variant. The Navy studied the SV-22 in the 1980s to replace S-3 and SH-2 aircraft.[93]
• MV-22B
•• Basic U.S. Marine Corps transport; original requirement for 552 (now 360). The Marine Corps is the lead service in the development of the V-22 Osprey. The Marine Corps variant, the MV-22B, is an assault transport for troops, equipment and supplies, capable of operating from ships or from expeditionary airfields ashore. It is replacing the Marine Corps' CH-46E[57] and CH-53D.[94]
• CV-22B
•• Air Force variant for the U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM). It will conduct long-range, special operations missions, and is equipped with extra fuel tanks and terrain-following radar.[95][96]
Operators
•• 8th Special Operations Squadron (8 SOS) at Hurlburt Field, Florida
•• 71st Special Operations Squadron (71 SOS) at Kirtland Air Force Base, New Mexico
•• 20th Special Operations Squadron (20 SOS) at Cannon Air Force Base, New Mexico
•• VMM-161
•• VMM-162
•• VMM-261
•• VMM-263
•• VMM-264
•• VMM-266
•• VMM-365
•• VMMT-204 - Training squadron
•• VMX-22 - Marine Tiltrotor Operational Test and Evaluation Squadron
Notable accidents
Main article: Accidents and incidents involving the V-22 Osprey
From 1991 to 2000 there were four significant crashes, and a total of 30 fatalities, during testing.[32] Since becoming operational in 2007, the V-22 has had one possible combat loss due to an unknown cause, no losses due to accidents, and seven other notable, but minor, incidents.
• On 11 June 1991, a mis-wired flight control system led to two minor injuries when the left nacelle struck the ground while the aircraft was hovering 15 feet (4.6 m) in the air, causing it to bounce and catch fire.[97]
• On 20 July 1992, a leaking gearbox led to a fire in the right nacelle, causing the aircraft to drop into the Potomac River in front of an audience of Congressmen and other government officials at Quantico, killing all seven on board and grounding the aircraft for 11 months.[98]
• On 8 April 2000, a V-22 loaded with Marines to simulate a rescue, attempted to land at Marana Northwest Regional Airport in Arizona, stalled when its right rotor entered vortex ring state, rolled over, crashed, and exploded, killing all 19 on board.[37]
• On 11 December 2000, after a catastrophic hydraulic leak and subsequent software instrument failure, a V-22 fell 1,600 feet (490 m) into a forest in Jacksonville, North Carolina, killing all four aboard. This caused the Marine Corps to ground their fleet of eight V-22s, the second grounding that year.[99][100]
Specifications (MV-22B)
Data from Boeing Integrated Defense Systems,[101] Naval Air Systems Command,[102] US Air Force CV-22 fact sheet,[95] Norton,[103] and Bell[104]
General characteristics
• Crew: Four (pilot, copilot and two flight engineers)
• Capacity: 24 troops (seated), 32 troops (floor loaded) or up to 15,000 lb (6,800 kg) of cargo (dual hook)
• Length: 57 ft 4 in (17.5 m)
• Rotor diameter: 38 ft 0 in (11.6 m)
• Wingspan: 45 ft 10 in (14 m)
• Width with rotors: 84 ft 7 in (25.8 m)
• Height: 22 ft 1 in/6.73 m; overall with nacelles vertical (17 ft 11 in/5.5 m; at top of tailfins)
• Disc area: 2,268 ft² (212 m²)
• Wing area: 301.4 ft² (28 m²)
• Empty weight: 33,140 lb (15,032 kg)
• Loaded weight: 47,500 lb (21,500 kg)
• Max takeoff weight: 60,500 lb (27,400 kg)
• Powerplant: 2× Rolls-Royce Allison T406/AE 1107C-Liberty turboshafts, 6,150 hp (4,590 kW) each
Performance
• Maximum speed: 250 knots (460 km/h, 290 mph) at sea level / 305 kn (565 km/h; 351 mph) at 15,000 ft (4,600 m)[105]
• Cruise speed: 241 knots (277 mph, 446 km/h) at sea level
• Range: 879 nmi (1,011 mi, 1,627 km)
• Combat radius: 370 nmi (426 mi, 685 km)
• Ferry range: 1,940 nmi (with auxiliary internal fuel tanks)
• Service ceiling: 26,000 ft (7,925 m)
• Rate of climb: 2,320 ft/min (11.8 m/s)
• Disc loading: 20.9 lb/ft² at 47,500 lb GW (102.23 kg/m²)
• Power/mass: 0.259 hp/lb (427 W/kg)
Armament
• 1× M240 machine gun on ramp, optional
Notable appearances in media
Main article: Aircraft in fiction#V-22 Osprey
See also
• Elizabeth A. Okoreeh-Baah, USMC - first female to pilot a V-22 Osprey
Related development
Comparable aircraft
Related lists
• List of military aircraft of the United States
References
Bibliography
• Markman, Steve and Bill Holder. "Bell/Boeing V-22 Osprey Tilt-Engine VTOL Transport (U.S.A.)". Straight Up: A History of Vertical Flight. Schiffer Publishing, 2000. ISBN 0-7643-1204-9.
• Norton, Bill. Bell Boeing V-22 Osprey, Tiltrotor Tactical Transport. Midland Publishing, 2004. ISBN 1-85780-165-2.
External links
Wikimedia Commons has media related to: V-22 Osprey
• V-22 Osprey web, and www.history.navy.mil/planes/v-22.html
• CV-22 fact sheet on USAF site
• www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/aircraft/v-22.htm
• www.airforce-technology.com/projects/osprey/
• "Flight of the Osprey", US Navy video of V-22 operations
The true capability of the RDR-4000 is when the pilot's further define the threat weather by running the opposite side radar in MANUAL mode. In Manual mode the radar takes "slices" of sky (no tilt in this radar...only slices from the ground to 60,000') and displays the threat at the selected altitude. To see the height of the wet top of the cloud, simply select a higher altitude on the radar until the threat is not showing. In this case it shows the wet top of the cloud was at 44,000'. When properly used, the RDR-4000 provides far more information to the pilots than a conventional beam based radar.
The new Sony Alpha A7 full frame camera has the capability to also accept lenses designed for usage on cameras with the APS-C sensor. Thus,lenses designed for Sony’s APS-C sensor-based 'NEX’ camera line, when used on Sony's full frame A7 body, affectively will provide a 1.5x reach because of the APS-C lenses 1.5x crop factor.
The larger 28-70mm full frame lens pictured here is the kit lens which comes with the full frame Sony A7. The smaller pancake zoom 16-50mm lens is the kit lens for the NEX-6. When the pancake-zoom 16-50mm is docked to the Sony A7 full frame, that essentially provides the equivalent of 24-75mm focal length range because of the 1.5x crop factor, or roughly the same focal length range of the larger camera.
A nice aspect of the Sony Alpha A7 full frame is, one can have the best of two worlds, full frame and APS-C. When you want to use the A7 camera as designed as full frame, there is the larger 28-70mm full frame lens. If one desires a more compact, lightweight setup, and/or gain added reach for ‘free’, then docking the pancake-zoom 16-50mm provides added reach, more compactness and more compact design.
In this album, I compare both bodies without lenses. Then, I show the equivalent lens for each camera. Finally, I show what the Sony A7 looks like with it’s full frame 28-70mm lens attached to the body and then when attaching the NEX APS-C lens, 16-50mm pancake zoom lens.
The new Alpha A7 has an APS-C mode setting option to accommodate APS-C lenses. The setting can be OFF (vignetting will occur), AUTO (detects whether FF or APS-C lens is attached) or ON (forces APS-C mode to accommodate legacy manual lenses). Thus, the Alpha A7 offers both worlds, full frame and APS-C. The gains…. More compactness, lighter weight, greater reach. (i.e, a 55-210mm APS-C lens will effectively provide 82mm to 315mm) accompanied by reduction in size and weight. Of course the trade off is, you will be reduced to using the equivalent of an APS-C sensor on a full frame body. But hey, what the heck! APS-C is still mainstream for the most part.
Now that I have acquired the new Alpha A7 as it’s replacement, the Sony NEX-6 is being sold on auction.
Camera Used for Photos: iPhone 5
Croome Court is a mid 18th century Neo-Palladian mansion surrounded by an extensive landscaped parkland at Croome D'Abitot, near Pershore in south Worcestershire. The mansion and park were designed by Lancelot "Capability" Brown for George Coventry, 6th Earl of Coventry, and was Brown's first landscape design and first major architectural project. Some of the internal rooms of the mansion were designed by Robert Adam.
The mansion house is owned by Croome Heritage Trust, and is leased to the National Trust who operate it, along with the surrounding parkland, as a tourist attraction. The National Trust own the surrounding parkland, which is also open to the public.
Location[edit]
Croome Court is located near to Croome D'Abitot, in Worcestershire,[1] near Pirton, Worcestershire.[2] The wider estate was established on lands that were once part of the royal forest of Horewell.[3] Traces of these older landscapes, such as unimproved commons and ancient woodlands, can be found across the former Croome Estate.[4]
House[edit]
Croome Court South Portico
History[edit]
The foundations and core of Croome Court, including the central chimney stack structure, date back to the early 1640s.[5] Substantial changes to this early house were made by Gilbert Coventry, 4th Earl of Coventry.[6]
In 1751, George Coventry, the 6th Earl, inherited the estate, along with the existing Jacobean house. He commissioned Lancelot "Capability" Brown, with the assistance of Sanderson Miller, to redesign the house and estate.[7][1] It was Brown's "first flight into the realms of architecture" and a "rare example of his architectural work",[8] and it is an important and seminal work.[9] It was built between 1751 and 1752, and it and Hagley Hall are considered to be the finest examples of Neo-Palladian architecture in Worcestershire. Notable Neo-Palladian features incorporated into Croome Court include the plain exterior and the corner towers with pyramidal roofs (a feature first used by Inigo Jones in the design of Wilton House in Wiltshire).[1] Robert Adam worked on the interior of the building from 1760 onwards.[10]
The house has been visited by George III,[2][11] as well as Queen Victoria[7] during summers when she was a child, and George V (then Duke of York).[11]
A jam factory was built by the 9th Earl of Coventry, near to Pershore railway station, in about 1880, to provide a market for Vale of Evesham fruit growers in times of surplus. Although the Croome connection with jam making had ceased, during the First World War, the building was leased by the Croome Estate Trust to the Huddersfield Fruit Preserving Company as a pulping station.[12]
The First World War deeply affected Croome, with many local casualties, although the house was not requisitioned for the war effort. This is possibly because it was the home of the Lord Lieutenant of the County, who needed a residence for his many official engagements.[13]
During the Second World War Croome Court was requisitioned by the Ministry of Works and leased for a year to the Dutch Government as a possible refuge for Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands; to escape the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands. However, evidence shows that they stayed two weeks at the most, perhaps because of the noise and fear created by the proximity of Defford Aerodrome. They later emigrated to Canada.[14]
In 1948 the Croome Estate Trust sold the Court, along with 38 acres (15 ha) of land, to the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Birmingham, and the mansion became St Joseph's Special School, which was run by nuns[15] from 1950[11] until 1979.[15]
The house was listed on 11 August 1952; it is currently Grade I listed.[10]
In 1979 the hall was taken over by the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (Hare Krishna movement), who used it as their UK headquarters and a training college[16] called Chaitanya College,[15] run by 25 members of the movement.[16] During their tenure they repainted the Dining Room.[17] In 1984 they had to leave the estate for financial reasons. They held a festival at the hall in 2011.[16]
From 1984 onwards various owners tried to use the property as a training centre; apartments; a restaurant and conference centre; and a hotel and golf course,[15] before once more becoming a private family home,[2][15] with outbuildings converted to private houses.[15]
The house was purchased by the Croome Heritage Trust, a registered charity,[18] in October 2007,[19] and it is now managed by the National Trust as a tourist attraction. It opened to the public in September 2009, at which point six of the rooms had restored, costing £400,000, including the Saloon. It was estimated that another £4 million[2][20] to £4.8 million would be needed to restore the entire building. Fundraising activities for the restoration included a 2011 raffle for a Morgan sports car organised by Lord and Lady Flight. After the restoration is complete, a 999-year lease on the building will be granted to the National Trust.[21] An oral history project to record recollections about Croome was funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund.[15] As of 2009, the service wing was empty and in need of substantial repair.[22]
Exterior[edit]
The mansion is faced with Bath stone,[7] limestone ashlar, and has both north and south facing fronts. It has a basement and two stories, with three stories in the end pavilions. A slate roof, with pyramid roofs over the corner towers, tops the building, along with three pair-linked chimneys along the axis of the house.[10]
Both fronts have 11 bays, split into three central sets of three each, and one additional bay each side. The north face has a pedimented centre, with two balustraded staircases leading to a Roman Doric doorcase. The south face has a projecting Ionic tetrastyle portico and Venetian windows. It has a broad staircase, with cast stone sphinxes on each side, leading to a south door topped with a cornice on consoles. The wings have modillion cornice and balustrade.[10]
A two-story L-shaped service wing is attached to the east side of the mansion. It is made of red brick and stone, with slate roofs.[10] It was designed by Capability Brown in 1751-2.[22] On the far side of the service wing, a wall connects it to a stable court.[10]
Interior[edit]
The interior of the house was designed partially by Capability Brown, with plasterwork by G. Vassalli, and partially by Robert Adam, with plasterwork by J. Rose Jr. It has a central spine corridor. A stone staircase, with iron balusters, is at the east end.[10]
The entrance hall is on the north side of the building, and has four fluted Doric columns, along with moulded doorcases. To the east of the entrance hall is the dining room, which has a plaster ceiling and cornice, while to the west is a billiard room, featuring fielded panelling, a plaster cornice, and a rococo fireplace. The three rooms were probably decorated around 1758-59 by Capability Brown.[10] The dining room was vibrantly repainted by the Hare Krishnas in the 1970s-80s.[17]
The central room on the south side is a saloon, probably by Brown and Vassalli. It has an elaborate ceiling, with three panels, deep coving, and a cornice, along with two Ionic fireplaces, and Palladian doorcases.[10] George III was entertained by George Coventry, the 6th Earl, in the house's Saloon.[2] A drawing room is to the west of the saloon, and features rococo plasterwork and a marble fireplace.[10]
To the east of the saloon is the Tapestry Room.[10] This was designed in 1763-71, based on a design by Robert Adam, and contained tapestries and furniture covers possibly designed by Jacques Germain Soufflot, and made by Manufacture Nationale des Gobelins.[23] Around 1902 the ninth Earl sold the tapestries and seating to a Parisian dealer. In 1949 the Samuel H. Kress Foundation purchased the ceiling, floor, mantlepiece, chair rails, doors and the door surrounds, which were donated to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, in 1958. In 1959 the Kress Foundation also helped the Metropolitan Museum acquire the chair and sofa frames, which they recovered using the original tapestry seats.[7][23] A copy of the ceiling was installed in place of the original.[10] As of 2016, the room is displayed as it would have looked after the tapestries had been sold, with a jug and ewer on display as the only original decoration of the room that remains in it. The adjacent library room is used to explain what happened to the tapestry room;[17] the former library was designed by Adam, and was dismantled except for the marble fireplace.[10]
At the west side of the building is a long gallery,[10] which was designed by Robert Adam and installed between 1761 and 1766. It is the best preserved of the original interior (little of the rest has survived in situ).[1] It has an octagonal panelled ceiling, and plaster reliefs of griffins. A half-hexagonal bay faces the garden. The room also contains a marble caryatid fireplace designed by J Wilton.[10] As of 2016, modern sculptures are displayed in empty niches along the Long Gallery
wikipedia
Temple Newsam (historically Temple Newsham), (grid reference SE357322) is a Tudor-Jacobean house in Leeds, West Yorkshire, England, with grounds landscaped by Capability Brown.
The estate lends its name to the Temple Newsam ward of Leeds City Council, in which it is situated, and lies to the east of the city, just south of Halton Moor, Halton, Whitkirk and Colton. It is one of nine sites in the Leeds Museums & Galleries group.
The house is a Grade I listed building, defined as a "building of outstanding or national architectural or historic interest". The stables are Grade II* listed ("particularly significant buildings of more than local interest"), and ten separate features of the estate are Grade II listed ("buildings of special architectural or historic interest"), including the Sphinx Gates and the Barn.[1] Temple Newsam House is one of Leeds Museums and Galleries sites.[2] It is also part of the research group, Yorkshire Country House Partnership.[3]
History
1066 to 1520
In the Domesday Book of 1086 the manor is listed as Neuhusam (meaning new houses) and was held by Ilbert de Lacy and his sons.[4] Before the Norman Conquest of 1066 it had been held by Dunstan and Glunier, Anglo-Saxon thanes.[4] In about 1155, Henry de Lacy gave it to the Knights Templar, who built Temple Newsam Preceptory on a site near the present house.[5] The Templars farmed the estate very efficiently, with 1100 animals.[6] In 1307 the Templars were suppressed, and Edward II granted the manor to Sir Robert Holland who held it until 1323 when he was deprived of his estates.[6] The Templars tried to retake the estate but they were forced to surrender and in 1327 it was granted to Mary de St Pol, the Countess of Pembroke, who held the manor for 50 years.[6] In 1377 by royal decree the estate reverted to Philip Darcy, 4th Baron Darcy de Knayth (1341–1398).[6] It then passed through several members of the Darcy family, until it was inherited by the 21-year old Thomas, Lord Darcy in 1488.[7] Between 1500 and 1520 a Tudor manor house, known as Temple Newsam House, was built on the site.[8] It has also been spelled "Newsham" in the past.[9]
An oil on panel painting by Hans Eworth of Henry Stuart and his brother Charles Stuart in a grand interior based on a print by Hans Vreedman de Vries
An oil on panel painting from 1563 by Hans Eworth of Henry Stuart and his brother Charles Stuart in a grand interior based on a print by Hans Vreedman de Vries which may reflect Temple Newsam's Great Chamber
1500 to 1650
In 1537 Thomas, Lord Darcy was executed for the part he played in the Pilgrimage of Grace and the property was seized by the Crown.[7] In 1544 Henry VIII gave it to his niece Lady Margaret Douglas (Countess of Lennox), and she lived there with her husband Matthew Stewart, 4th Earl of Lennox.[7] Their son Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley, who was born in the house in 1545 and educated there, married Mary, Queen of Scots, by whom he was the father of King James VI of Scotland and I of England.[10] A portrait of Henry and his brother was probably intended to represent the interior of Temple Newsam despite being based on a print of an ideal interior.[11] Following the marriage in 1565, Temple Newsam was seized by Queen Elizabeth I and was managed by an agent.[12]
In 1609 King James I, successor to Elizabeth, granted the estate to his Franco-Scottish second cousin Ludovic Stewart, 2nd Duke of Lennox (1574–1624), who was a favourite of the King and given many titles and estates, including farmland and coalmines in the local area.[13] Despite his opportunities, Ludovic was in constant debt and he mortgaged the estate in 1614 for the sum of £9,000 (around £860,000 in today's money).[14] In 1622 Lennox began the sale of the estate to Sir Arthur Ingram (c. 1565 – 1642), a Yorkshire-born London merchant, civil servant, investor in colonial ventures and arms dealer, for £12,000, which he paid in two instalments, the last in July 1624, after Lennox's death.[14] During the next 20 years the mansion was rebuilt, incorporating some of the previous house in the west wing.[8] The north and south wings were rebuilt and the east wing was demolished after a bad fire in 1635.[15] Arthur's son, also called Arthur, inherited the estate with its debts and continued the building and renovation work.[16] Six months after Charles I was beheaded in 1649, Arthur Ingram the younger was declared delinquent and he compounded his estates and retired to Temple Newsam.[17]
1650 to 1900
After the death of Arthur the younger's eldest son, Thomas, in 1660, Temple Newsam was inherited by Arthur's second son, Henry Ingram, 1st Viscount of Irvine (created a peer of Scotland as Baron Ingram and Viscount of Irvine in 1661 - although the family used the English form "Irwin").[18] In 1661, Henry married Lady Essex Montagu, daughter of Edward Montagu, 2nd Earl of Manchester, a favourite of Charles II.[18] The estate then passed through Henry's two sons and five grandsons, the last being Henry Ingram, 7th Viscount of Irvine.[18] The 4th Viscount brought back paintings from his Grand Tour of 1704-7.[19] Extant receipts from 1692 show women as well as men were employed to work the estate in haymaking.[20] In 1712, William Etty designed a new approach to the house, with a bridge and ponds.[21][22] In 1714, Temple Newsam was inherited by Rich Ingram, the 5th Viscount, and his wife Ann who spent a vast fortune furnishing the house and creating the East Avenue.[19] Between 1738 and 1746, Henry Ingram, 7th Viscount of Irvine remodelled the west and north wings of the house, creating new bedrooms and dressing rooms and the picture gallery.[23] A painting in Leeds City Art Gallery by Philippe Mercier of c. 1745 shows Henry and his wife standing in front of Temple Newsam House.[24]
A coloured engraving made in 1699 by J Kip after a drawing by Leonard Knyff showing an aerial view of the house and estate at Temple Newsam
1699 Engraving by J Kip after a drawing by Leonard Knyff
In the 1760s, Charles Ingram, 9th Viscount of Irvine, employed Capability Brown to re-landscape the park on the insistence of his wife, Frances Shepheard, daughter of Samuel Shepheard.[25] Reflecting her interest in pastoral landscape design, Frances is depicted as a shepherdess in a portrait by Benjamin Wilson at Temple Newsam.[25] Both Frances and Charles were actively involved in the design and implementation.[26] Some aspects of Brown's plan depicted in paintings by James Chapman and Michael Angelo Rooker were never completed such as a large lake near the house.[26] Extant financial records show that in 1759 women as well as men were employed as garden labourers.[20] After Charles died in 1778, Frances rebuilt the south wing in 1796; she lived at Temple Newsam until her death in 1807.[27] Charles and Frances's eldest daughter Isabella Ingram, (Marchioness of Hertford) (d.1834) who inherited Temple Newsam, was the mistress of the Prince of Wales (later King George IV) from 1806 to 1819. In 1806, George visited Temple Newsam and presented Isabella with Chinese wallpaper, which she hung in the small Drawing Room next to the Great Hall in around 1820, embellished with cut out birds from Audubon's The Birds of America (now worth £7.5 million).[28] Lady Hertford inherited the house in 1807; after her husband died in 1822 she spent the season in London, and the rest of the time at Temple Newsam where she involved herself in charitable works including distributing food and clothing to the local people.[29] She allowed the servants to hold an annual supper and ball at Temple Newsam.[29] Reports of poachers were made during 1826 and 1827.[30] During the last years of Isabella's life, the canal, railway and roads encroached on the estate as well as coal mining; and she dealt with the companies setting these up.[29] In 1820 the novelist Sir Walter Scott published Ivanhoe featuring a Templar preceptory named Temple Stowe, believed to have been modelled on Temple Newsam; the name is preserved in local road names such as Templestowe Crescent.[31] At her death in 1834, Isabella left Temple Newsam to her widowed sister, Frances Ingram Shepheard, wife of Lord William Gordon, who died in 1841.[32]
Temple Newsam House from Morris's Country Seats (1880)
In 1841 the estate was inherited by Hugo Charles Meynell Ingram (d. 1869), son of Elizabeth Ingram, sister of Frances Ingram (Lady Gordon), who made no alterations to the estate.[33] In 1868, the Prince of Wales stayed at Temple Newsam during his visit to Leeds to open the Fine Art Exhibition in the New Infirmary; temporary triumphal arches were erected on the estate.[34] Following Hugo Charles's death, his son Hugo Meynell-Ingram (d.1871) inherited Temple Newsam; two years later, at his death, his wife Emily Meynell Ingram (d.1904) inherited the estate.[33] Emily spent a large part of her widowhood at Temple Newsam; she developed it considerably by replacing the sash windows and remodelling the dining room, great staircase and Lord Darnley's room.[33] Emily bequeathed Temple Newsam to her nephew Edward Wood, 1st Earl of Halifax.[8]
20th century
In 1909, 610 acres (2.5 km2) of the estate at Knostrop were compulsorily purchased by Leeds Corporation to build a sewage plant.[35] During the First World War (1914–17) the south wing of the house was turned into a hospital by Edward Wood and his wife Dorothy. Edward Wood fought in France as part of the Yorkshire Hussars, whilst Dorothy oversaw the running of the hospital as part of the Mayors War Committee.[36] In 1922 Edward Wood sold the park and house to Leeds Corporation for a nominal sum, placing covenants over them to ensure their preservation for the future.[35]
On 19 October 1923, Temple Newsam was opened to the public along with a golf course.[37] In the Derby Daily Telegraph newspaper, Temple Newsam was compared to Hampton Court.[37] Despite many people visiting the house and using the golf course, the Corporation lost money during the first decade mostly due to poor farming practices.[37] In July 1932, the Great Yorkshire Show was held at Temple Newsam and was a great success.[37] Preparations for war were made as early as April 1939, and in August, small items were being packed up for storage.[37] In September 1939, Temple Newsam was closed to the public and items were moved there for storage from Leeds City Art Gallery.[37] It was decided that objects would be displayed, and the house was officially reopened in November 1939, when it was again likened to Hampton Court in the press.[37]
Architecture
Photograph of entrance porch of Temple Newsam House, Leeds, showing at top the word 'FATHER', below a mullioned window, below a raised portico with coat of arms above a doorway flanked by two Ionic columns on each side.
Entrance Porch 17th century
Photograph of the west front of Temple Newsam
Centre of Temple Newsam west front
Remains of the early 16th century house were retained in the new building, including the brickwork and bay windows in the centre of the west front.[38] The plan of the new house was a conservative E-shape.[38] The Long Gallery and entrance hall in the south wing followed Elizabethan and early Jacobean styles.[38] The entrance porch has Classical columns but they are of Flemish design, rather than following correct Italian design.[38] There are Tudor doorways and timberwork in the cellars, which are largely Tudor in date.[39] Tudor features have also been discovered beneath later layers of decoration, including Lord Darcy's crest scratched into the plaster in the Blue Damask room.[40] An inventory of 1565 indicates that the hall, great chamber (later the dining room), gallery and chapel (later the kitchen) were probably where they are now.[40] There is a Tudor doorway in the north wing which was probably the entrance to the original chapel.[41]
In the 17th century, the south and north wings were rebuilt and the east wing demolished, replaced by a low wall with an arched gateway, giving the house a fashionable 'half-H' appearance.[39] It is possible that the man who made plans for the alteration was Bernard Dinninghof of York.[41] There is also some resemblance to designs by Inigo Jones.[42] Round the top of the house, letters appear in a balustrade, declaring the piety and loyalty of Sir Arthur Ingram: 'ALL GLORY AND PRAISE BE GIVEN TO GOD THE FATHER THE SON AND HOLY GHOST ON HIGH PEACE ON EARTH GOOD WILL TOWARDS MEN HONOUR AND TRUE ALLEGIANCE TO OUR GRACIOUS KING LOVING AFFECTION AMONGST HIS SUBJECTS HEALTH AND PLENTY BE WITHIN THIS HOUSE.'[38] The chapel in the north wing retains some 17th century features, such as armorial stained glass, probably by Henry Gyles and a carved wooden pulpit by Thomas Ventris, made around 1636, with geometric patterns, pilasters and friezes.[38] The walls had panels of Old Testament figures, painted by John Carleton.[38] An inventory dated 1667 records that the House had 66 rooms and 11 outhouses.[39] An engraving by Kip and Knyff dated 1699 is an accurate representation of the house, showing the varying height of the house and some buildings that were later demolished, including the arched gateway flanked by two small lodges and a detached garden building dating from the mid 1670s.[23]
Photograph of stone and brick Sphinx gate piers at Temple Newsam, c. 1760 by Lancelot Brown based on designs published by Lord Burlington in 1738 and used at Chiswick
Sphinx gate piers, c. 1760
Photograph of the mid-18th century stable block at Temple Newsam showing the pediment
Stable Block at Temple Newsam, added by Henry, 7th Lord Irwin
In 1718, the steward of Temple Newsam suggested an underground service passage to link the north and south wings to the 5th Viscount, who agreed.[43] This tunnel linked the original kitchens in the south wing to the rest of the house.[44] In 1738, Henry, 7th Viscount Irwin wrote to his mother describing the neglected state of the house with windows coming away and cracked brickwork.[23] The house was almost entirely remodelled by Henry.[38] He wanted to follow Palladian design and used craftsmen from York to do so.[45] He widened the gallery, improved the ceiling and windows and created additional rooms.[23] The gallery, completed around 1746, has fine Rococo carvings with overmantle paintings of classical scenes by Antonio Joli.[19] There are also elaborate gilded Rococo ornamental candle holders.[19] The gallery ceiling has detailed stucco work including a medallion of King George I.[19] The ceilings in the new Saloon and Library, made from the old Long Gallery, were decorated by Thomas Perritt and Joseph Rose.[45] The doorcases are elaborately carved, probably by Richard Fisher.[45] Two chimney pieces in the Saloon were based on designs by William Kent.[45] The distinctive sphinx gate piers by Lancelot Brown constructed in 1768 were based on designs published by Lord Burlington in 1738 and used at Chiswick.[45][1] The main rooms in the west wing were redecorated and the windows were replaced with sliding sash windows.[45] A large pedimented stable block was built to the north of the house, in 1742 and probably designed by Daniel Garratt, also in the Palladian style.[45][46] A painting by Mercier of around 1749, also shows a planned block to the south and a low wall connecting the north and south wings which were never completed.[23][21]
In 1796, Frances Shepheard employed a Mr Johnson to alter and reface the south wing in a style which tried to copy that of Sir Arthur Ingram's original house.[45] Her approach was a departure from the designs for the wing commissioned by her dead husband from John Carr and Robert Adam, as well as the landscaping by Capability Brown who was also consulted about rebuilding the south wing.[45] The wing was made two storeys high throughout with a suite of reception rooms on the ground floor with state bedchambers above.[27] In the 1790s, the kitchens were moved to the north wing and the original kitchen became a brushing room where servants brushed down nobles returning from hunting parties.[44]
At the end of the 19th century, Emily Meynell Ingram replaced the sash windows with stone mullions and leaded lights and rebuilt the north porch adding the Meynell Ingram coat of arms over the doorway.[27] She redecorated several rooms and had the great oak staircase installed.[27] The dining room, great staircase and Lord Darnley's room were remodelled in Elizabethan style.[33] In 1877, Emily converted the library at the east end of the gallery into a chapel.[47]
Coalmining on the estate
Estate records show the existence of coal pits in and around the park in the seventeenth century and Bell Wood to the south of the house would have had bell pits for coal extraction. A colliery at Halton village was leased to a number of different individuals from 1660 through to at least the 1790s. The leases generally required the leaseholder to supply coals to Temple Newsam house.[48]
In 1815, William Fenton, one of the 'Coal Kings' of Yorkshire,[49] began the sinking of a mine shaft on the estate at Thorpe Stapleton. The colliery was named Waterloo to commemorate the famous battle of that year.[50] Waterloo Colliery was operated as a royalty concession with contracted 'rents' for coal extracted going to the Temple Newsam landowner. Fenton also had a village built for his workers on land between the River Aire and the Aire and Calder navigation. The village was initially called Newmarket but then became Irwin Square on ordnance survey maps[51] and Ingram Place on census lists, but it was commonly simply known as Waterloo. The Yorkshire, Lancashire and England cricketer Albert Ward was born here in 1865. The village had two rows of cottages and a school building. It was connected to the colliery by a wooden footbridge over the river.[52] Deep coal mining on the estate ended with the closure of the Temple Pit of Waterloo Main Colliery in 1968.
Temple Newsam House
Opencast mining on the estate began in May 1942. Seven sites were exploited to the south of the house almost entirely destroying Capability Brown's landscape. One site reached within 330 feet (100 m) of the South Terrace. It continued at the Gamblethorpe site as far as Dawson's Wood, in full view of the house, until 1987.[53] No trace of the opencast remains now as the parkland was re-landscaped.
In 2019 there was a temporary exhibition about coal mining at Temple Newsam which was called 'Blot on the Landscape'.[54]
House and estate today
The house and estate are owned by Leeds City Council and open to the public. The house has undergone substantial restoration to its exterior. There is an established programme of restoring rooms back to known previous configurations, reversing the numerous intrusive installations and modifications that took place during the building's "art museum" phase.
The wider estate is made up of woods (the second largest part of the Forest of Leeds).[55] There are sporting facilities for football, golf, running, cycling, horse-riding and orienteering. There is an innovative children's playground opened in 2011 which caters for both disabled and able-bodied children.[56] Pegasus Wood, to the south of the house, commemorates veterans of the Normandy Landing at Pegasus Bridge in 1944.[57]
Photograph of brick barn at the Home Farm, Temple Newsam
Great Barn, Home Farm, Temple Newsam
The Home Farm, open to the public, has a barn built in 1694 and is the largest working rare breeds farm in Europe, and only one of 16 nationally approved by the Rare Breeds Survival Trust. Breeds include Gloucester, Kerry, Irish Moiled, Red Poll, White Park, British White, Beef Shorthorn, Vaynol and Belted Galloway cattle; Kerry Hill; Whitefaced Woodland and Portland sheep, and Golden Guernsey goats.[58] The farm was targeted by arsonists twice in 2011 with damage caused to buildings, and some animals killed.[59]
There are extensive gardens, with a celebrated rhododendron walk and six national plant collections: Aster novi-belgii (Michaelmas daisies), Phlox paniculata, Delphinium elatum (Cultivars), Solenostemon scutellarioides (sys. Coleus blumei), Primula auricula and Chrysanthemum (Charm and Cascade cultivars).[60] Within the Walled Garden there are 800 yards of herbaceous borders.[61]
Collections
There are substantial holdings of fine and decorative art which are designated by the Department of Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) as being of national significance.[62]
Of most significant historical and cultural interest is the Chippendale Society collection of Chippendale works that are on permanent loan.[63] In his book "Britain's Best Museums and Galleries", Mark Fisher (a former DCMS minister) gave the museum an excellent review. When interviewed on Front Row, Radio 4, November 2004 Fisher placed Temple Newsam House in the top three non-national museums in the country, along with Birmingham's Barber Institute and the Dulwich Picture Gallery.[64]
+++ DISCLAIMER +++
Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based historical facts. BEWARE!
Some background
The Imperial Japanese Army Air Force's fighter force, especially the Nakajima Ki-43, had been underestimated in its capability, numbers and the strategy of its commanders. Within a few months, Japanese forces had conquered vast areas of the Pacific and South East Asia. During these campaigns, the ill-prepared Allied air forces in the Pacific suffered devastating losses.
Because of political and cultural ties between the United Kingdom and Australia, British manufacturers were the main source of RAAF aircraft. However, the British aircraft industry had long been hard-pressed to meet the needs of the RAF. Although United States companies had enormous aircraft manufacturing capacity, their output was now intended first and foremost for US air units. Even if aircraft built overseas did become available, they would be shipped long distances in wartime conditions, with consequent delays and losses. As a consequence, CAC came into its own with the development of the Boomerang fighter, which was not operational before late 1942.
Following the outbreak of war with Japan, 51 Hurricane Mk IIs were sent as a stop-gap in crates to Singapore, with 24 pilots, the nucleus of five squadrons. They arrived on 3 January 1942, by which time the Allied fighter squadrons in Singapore, flying Brewster Buffalos, had been overwhelmed in the Malayan campaign. Even though the Hurricanes were a significant progress, they suffered in performance.
Because of inadequate early warning systems, Japanese air raids were able to destroy 30 Hurricanes on the ground in Sumatra, most of them in one raid on 7 February. After Japanese landings in Singapore, on 10 February, only 18 serviceable Hurricanes remained out of the original 99. After Java was invaded, some of the pilots were evacuated by sea to Australia. 31 Hurricane airframes, which had been on the wayby ship, not been assembled and lacked Merlin engines, were directed to Australia in the wake of events.
From these unfinished machines, the Hurricane Mk. VI was quickly devised: the airframes were mated with P&W Twin Wasp engines, which were produced under license at the CAC plant in Lidcombe, Sydney, for the RAAF's Boomerang and Bristol Beaufort. It was clear from the start that these Twin Wasp-powered machines would rather be stop-gaps and no true fighters, rather fighter bombers and more suited for the ground attack role. Hence, like the latest fighters at the time, planning for the Mk. VI included automatic cannons. As no such weapons were manufactured locally, a British-made Hispano-Suiza 20 mm which an Australian airman had collected as a souvenir in the Middle East was reverse engineered – and four of them replaced the eight and partly twelve 0.303 machine guns of the original Mk. IIB machines. Additionally, the pilot received extra armor plating, and the wings were reinforced for external ordnance.
The RAAF Mk. VI Hurricanes carried A60-02 through -32 registrations. As a side note, A60-01 was a single Hurricane Mk.I serialled V-7476. This aircraft served with No.2 and 3 Communications Flights RAAF and was used on occasion for experimental work at RAAF Base Laverton on the outskirts of Melbourne. The aircraft was scrapped in 1945.
The Hurricane Mk. VIs actively took part in Pacific operations with RAAF’s No. 4 Squadron and No. 5 Squadron, being joined by Boomerangs in early 1943. They were operated in New Guinea and during the Solomon Islands Campaign as well as the Borneo Campaign, mostly in the close support role and with marked success.
Flying in pairs (one to observe the ground, the other to observe the air around them), their tasks included bombing, strafing, close infantry support and artillery spotting. When attacking larger enemy formations, the Hurricanes often operated in conjunction with the smaller and much more agile Boomerang fighter. In this role, a Boomerang would get in close to confirm the identity of the target and mark it with a 20 lb (9 kg) smoke bomb with the "cooperating" Hurricane, Beaufort or Havoc delivering the major ordnance in a quick run and from a safer distance. The partnership between RAAF planes and Royal New Zealand Air Force Corsair fighter bombers during the Bougainville Campaign was said to be particularly effective.
The Australian Hurricane Mk. VIs soldiered on until early 1945, when they were finally retired. The Twin Wasp engines were used for spares, all airframes were scrapped, no plane survived the war.
General characteristics:
Crew: 1
Length: 32 ft 3 in (9.84 m)
Wingspan: 40 ft 0 in (12.19 m)
Height: 13 ft 1½ in (4.0 m)
Wing area: 257.5 ft² (23.92 m²)
Empty weight: 5,745 lb (2,605 kg)
Loaded weight: 7,670 lb (3,480 kg)
Max. takeoff weight: 8,710 lb (3,950 kg)
Maximum speed: 331 mph (531 km/h)
Range: 650 mi (1.045 km)
Service ceiling: 36,000 ft (10,970 m)
Rate of climb: 2,303 ft/min (11.7 m/s)
Wing loading: 29.8 lb/ft² (121.9 kg/m²)
Power/mass: 0.15 hp/lb (0.25 kW/kg)
Engine: 1× Pratt & Whitney R-1830 Twin Wasp radial engine, 1,200 hp (895 kW)
Armament: 4× 20 mm (0.787 in) Hispano or CAC cannons; 2x 45-gallon (205 l) drop tanks or 2× 250 or 500 lb (110 or 230 kg) bombs
The kit and its assembly
The Hurricane Mk. VI is a whif, even though with little effort but a good story behind it. The original idea to mate a Hurricane with a radial engine came when I found a drawing of a Russian Hurricane, mated with a Schwezow ASch-82 engine. It looked… interesting. Not certain if this had been done for sure, but a great inspiration.
While browsing through the scrap heap I later found a Twin Wasp engine – that fueled the idea of a respective conversion. The Russian option was dead, but when I checked contemporary planes I came across the small Boomerang, and the historical facts were perfect for an obscure Australian Hurricane variant.
The rest was quickly done: the basic kit is a Hurricane Mk. IIC (Trop) from Hobby Boss, the Twin Wasp comes from a wrecked Matchbox PB4Y Privateer. The original Merlin was simply cut away and replaced by the "new" and relatively small radial engine. A surprisingly easy task, even though I had to widen the area in front of the cockpit by about 1mm to each side. With some putty and a new exhaust pipe with flame dampers, the surgical part was quickly done. A pilot was added, too, in order to distract from the rather bleak cockpit.
To make the plane look more interesting and suitable for a display on the ground, the flaps were lowered (scratch-built) and vertical and horizontal stabilizer were moved away from OOB neutral position. Additionally, the cooler under the fuselage was omitted, what creates together with the radial engine a very different side view. This "Aussie'cane" looks stout but disturbingly realistic, like a Boomerang’s big brother!
Only other changes/additions are a pilot figure and two wing hardpoints, holding bombs. The rest is OOB.
Painting
I have always been a fan of all-green RAAF WWII planes, so I chose such a simple livery. Inspiration came from real-life 4. Squadron Boomerangs, so I adopted the “QE” code and tried to mimic the overall look.
Interior surfaces were kept in Humbrol 78 ('Cockpit Green', dry-painted with light grey). The plane was painted with “Foilage Green” on all outer surfaces - a tone which seems to be heavily debated. Most sources claim FS 34092 (Humbrol 149) as a nowaday's replacement, but to me, this color is just too green and blue-ish. IMHO, “Foilage Green” has a rather yellow-ish hue - Humbrol 75 ("Bronze Green") would be better, if it wasn't too dark.
After some trials I settled for Humbrol 105 ("Army Green"). I think it is a sound compromise. It resembles FS 34096, but is (much) less grey-ish and offers that yellow hue I was looking for. Heavy weathering was done, esp. at the panel lines with dry-painted FS 34096 (Testors) and some panels "bleached" with Humbrol 86 ("Light live Green"). After deacls had been applied, some dry brushing with olive drab and light grey added to the worn and faded look, as well as flaked paint around the engine and the wings' leading egdes and soot stains at exhausts and guns. I wanted to emphasize the harsh climate conditions and duties of this fictional machine.
Only other colors are typical white quick recognition markings on tail and wings, painted with a mix of Humbrol 130 and 196 for a very light grey, with some white dry painting on th eleading edges.For a final clear coat, I used a matte varnish which still has a light gloss to it - “Foilage Green” and RAAF finishes were AFAIK supposed to be semi-matte and of higher quality that USAF paintjobs.
Markings come mostly from the scrap box. The RAAF insignia were taken from a Vultee Vengeance aftermarket sheet by Kanga Decals, which also provided the mid sea grey codes. The Australian registration numbers were improvised with single white letters from TL Modellbau decal sheets.
All in all I am happy with the result - a simple measure, a good story and even a very simple livery that allows room for imagination and painting effects. A nice lil' whif, the "Aussie'cane" Mk. VI.
Temple Newsam (historically Temple Newsham), (grid reference SE357322) is a Tudor-Jacobean house in Leeds, West Yorkshire, England, with grounds landscaped by Capability Brown.
The estate lends its name to the Temple Newsam ward of Leeds City Council, in which it is situated, and lies to the east of the city, just south of Halton Moor, Halton, Whitkirk and Colton. It is one of nine sites in the Leeds Museums & Galleries group.
The house is a Grade I listed building, defined as a "building of outstanding or national architectural or historic interest". The stables are Grade II* listed ("particularly significant buildings of more than local interest"), and ten separate features of the estate are Grade II listed ("buildings of special architectural or historic interest"), including the Sphinx Gates and the Barn.[1] Temple Newsam House is one of Leeds Museums and Galleries sites.[2] It is also part of the research group, Yorkshire Country House Partnership.[3]
History
1066 to 1520
In the Domesday Book of 1086 the manor is listed as Neuhusam (meaning new houses) and was held by Ilbert de Lacy and his sons.[4] Before the Norman Conquest of 1066 it had been held by Dunstan and Glunier, Anglo-Saxon thanes.[4] In about 1155, Henry de Lacy gave it to the Knights Templar, who built Temple Newsam Preceptory on a site near the present house.[5] The Templars farmed the estate very efficiently, with 1100 animals.[6] In 1307 the Templars were suppressed, and Edward II granted the manor to Sir Robert Holland who held it until 1323 when he was deprived of his estates.[6] The Templars tried to retake the estate but they were forced to surrender and in 1327 it was granted to Mary de St Pol, the Countess of Pembroke, who held the manor for 50 years.[6] In 1377 by royal decree the estate reverted to Philip Darcy, 4th Baron Darcy de Knayth (1341–1398).[6] It then passed through several members of the Darcy family, until it was inherited by the 21-year old Thomas, Lord Darcy in 1488.[7] Between 1500 and 1520 a Tudor manor house, known as Temple Newsam House, was built on the site.[8] It has also been spelled "Newsham" in the past.[9]
An oil on panel painting by Hans Eworth of Henry Stuart and his brother Charles Stuart in a grand interior based on a print by Hans Vreedman de Vries
An oil on panel painting from 1563 by Hans Eworth of Henry Stuart and his brother Charles Stuart in a grand interior based on a print by Hans Vreedman de Vries which may reflect Temple Newsam's Great Chamber
1500 to 1650
In 1537 Thomas, Lord Darcy was executed for the part he played in the Pilgrimage of Grace and the property was seized by the Crown.[7] In 1544 Henry VIII gave it to his niece Lady Margaret Douglas (Countess of Lennox), and she lived there with her husband Matthew Stewart, 4th Earl of Lennox.[7] Their son Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley, who was born in the house in 1545 and educated there, married Mary, Queen of Scots, by whom he was the father of King James VI of Scotland and I of England.[10] A portrait of Henry and his brother was probably intended to represent the interior of Temple Newsam despite being based on a print of an ideal interior.[11] Following the marriage in 1565, Temple Newsam was seized by Queen Elizabeth I and was managed by an agent.[12]
In 1609 King James I, successor to Elizabeth, granted the estate to his Franco-Scottish second cousin Ludovic Stewart, 2nd Duke of Lennox (1574–1624), who was a favourite of the King and given many titles and estates, including farmland and coalmines in the local area.[13] Despite his opportunities, Ludovic was in constant debt and he mortgaged the estate in 1614 for the sum of £9,000 (around £860,000 in today's money).[14] In 1622 Lennox began the sale of the estate to Sir Arthur Ingram (c. 1565 – 1642), a Yorkshire-born London merchant, civil servant, investor in colonial ventures and arms dealer, for £12,000, which he paid in two instalments, the last in July 1624, after Lennox's death.[14] During the next 20 years the mansion was rebuilt, incorporating some of the previous house in the west wing.[8] The north and south wings were rebuilt and the east wing was demolished after a bad fire in 1635.[15] Arthur's son, also called Arthur, inherited the estate with its debts and continued the building and renovation work.[16] Six months after Charles I was beheaded in 1649, Arthur Ingram the younger was declared delinquent and he compounded his estates and retired to Temple Newsam.[17]
1650 to 1900
After the death of Arthur the younger's eldest son, Thomas, in 1660, Temple Newsam was inherited by Arthur's second son, Henry Ingram, 1st Viscount of Irvine (created a peer of Scotland as Baron Ingram and Viscount of Irvine in 1661 - although the family used the English form "Irwin").[18] In 1661, Henry married Lady Essex Montagu, daughter of Edward Montagu, 2nd Earl of Manchester, a favourite of Charles II.[18] The estate then passed through Henry's two sons and five grandsons, the last being Henry Ingram, 7th Viscount of Irvine.[18] The 4th Viscount brought back paintings from his Grand Tour of 1704-7.[19] Extant receipts from 1692 show women as well as men were employed to work the estate in haymaking.[20] In 1712, William Etty designed a new approach to the house, with a bridge and ponds.[21][22] In 1714, Temple Newsam was inherited by Rich Ingram, the 5th Viscount, and his wife Ann who spent a vast fortune furnishing the house and creating the East Avenue.[19] Between 1738 and 1746, Henry Ingram, 7th Viscount of Irvine remodelled the west and north wings of the house, creating new bedrooms and dressing rooms and the picture gallery.[23] A painting in Leeds City Art Gallery by Philippe Mercier of c. 1745 shows Henry and his wife standing in front of Temple Newsam House.[24]
A coloured engraving made in 1699 by J Kip after a drawing by Leonard Knyff showing an aerial view of the house and estate at Temple Newsam
1699 Engraving by J Kip after a drawing by Leonard Knyff
In the 1760s, Charles Ingram, 9th Viscount of Irvine, employed Capability Brown to re-landscape the park on the insistence of his wife, Frances Shepheard, daughter of Samuel Shepheard.[25] Reflecting her interest in pastoral landscape design, Frances is depicted as a shepherdess in a portrait by Benjamin Wilson at Temple Newsam.[25] Both Frances and Charles were actively involved in the design and implementation.[26] Some aspects of Brown's plan depicted in paintings by James Chapman and Michael Angelo Rooker were never completed such as a large lake near the house.[26] Extant financial records show that in 1759 women as well as men were employed as garden labourers.[20] After Charles died in 1778, Frances rebuilt the south wing in 1796; she lived at Temple Newsam until her death in 1807.[27] Charles and Frances's eldest daughter Isabella Ingram, (Marchioness of Hertford) (d.1834) who inherited Temple Newsam, was the mistress of the Prince of Wales (later King George IV) from 1806 to 1819. In 1806, George visited Temple Newsam and presented Isabella with Chinese wallpaper, which she hung in the small Drawing Room next to the Great Hall in around 1820, embellished with cut out birds from Audubon's The Birds of America (now worth £7.5 million).[28] Lady Hertford inherited the house in 1807; after her husband died in 1822 she spent the season in London, and the rest of the time at Temple Newsam where she involved herself in charitable works including distributing food and clothing to the local people.[29] She allowed the servants to hold an annual supper and ball at Temple Newsam.[29] Reports of poachers were made during 1826 and 1827.[30] During the last years of Isabella's life, the canal, railway and roads encroached on the estate as well as coal mining; and she dealt with the companies setting these up.[29] In 1820 the novelist Sir Walter Scott published Ivanhoe featuring a Templar preceptory named Temple Stowe, believed to have been modelled on Temple Newsam; the name is preserved in local road names such as Templestowe Crescent.[31] At her death in 1834, Isabella left Temple Newsam to her widowed sister, Frances Ingram Shepheard, wife of Lord William Gordon, who died in 1841.[32]
Temple Newsam House from Morris's Country Seats (1880)
In 1841 the estate was inherited by Hugo Charles Meynell Ingram (d. 1869), son of Elizabeth Ingram, sister of Frances Ingram (Lady Gordon), who made no alterations to the estate.[33] In 1868, the Prince of Wales stayed at Temple Newsam during his visit to Leeds to open the Fine Art Exhibition in the New Infirmary; temporary triumphal arches were erected on the estate.[34] Following Hugo Charles's death, his son Hugo Meynell-Ingram (d.1871) inherited Temple Newsam; two years later, at his death, his wife Emily Meynell Ingram (d.1904) inherited the estate.[33] Emily spent a large part of her widowhood at Temple Newsam; she developed it considerably by replacing the sash windows and remodelling the dining room, great staircase and Lord Darnley's room.[33] Emily bequeathed Temple Newsam to her nephew Edward Wood, 1st Earl of Halifax.[8]
20th century
In 1909, 610 acres (2.5 km2) of the estate at Knostrop were compulsorily purchased by Leeds Corporation to build a sewage plant.[35] During the First World War (1914–17) the south wing of the house was turned into a hospital by Edward Wood and his wife Dorothy. Edward Wood fought in France as part of the Yorkshire Hussars, whilst Dorothy oversaw the running of the hospital as part of the Mayors War Committee.[36] In 1922 Edward Wood sold the park and house to Leeds Corporation for a nominal sum, placing covenants over them to ensure their preservation for the future.[35]
On 19 October 1923, Temple Newsam was opened to the public along with a golf course.[37] In the Derby Daily Telegraph newspaper, Temple Newsam was compared to Hampton Court.[37] Despite many people visiting the house and using the golf course, the Corporation lost money during the first decade mostly due to poor farming practices.[37] In July 1932, the Great Yorkshire Show was held at Temple Newsam and was a great success.[37] Preparations for war were made as early as April 1939, and in August, small items were being packed up for storage.[37] In September 1939, Temple Newsam was closed to the public and items were moved there for storage from Leeds City Art Gallery.[37] It was decided that objects would be displayed, and the house was officially reopened in November 1939, when it was again likened to Hampton Court in the press.[37]
Architecture
Photograph of entrance porch of Temple Newsam House, Leeds, showing at top the word 'FATHER', below a mullioned window, below a raised portico with coat of arms above a doorway flanked by two Ionic columns on each side.
Entrance Porch 17th century
Photograph of the west front of Temple Newsam
Centre of Temple Newsam west front
Remains of the early 16th century house were retained in the new building, including the brickwork and bay windows in the centre of the west front.[38] The plan of the new house was a conservative E-shape.[38] The Long Gallery and entrance hall in the south wing followed Elizabethan and early Jacobean styles.[38] The entrance porch has Classical columns but they are of Flemish design, rather than following correct Italian design.[38] There are Tudor doorways and timberwork in the cellars, which are largely Tudor in date.[39] Tudor features have also been discovered beneath later layers of decoration, including Lord Darcy's crest scratched into the plaster in the Blue Damask room.[40] An inventory of 1565 indicates that the hall, great chamber (later the dining room), gallery and chapel (later the kitchen) were probably where they are now.[40] There is a Tudor doorway in the north wing which was probably the entrance to the original chapel.[41]
In the 17th century, the south and north wings were rebuilt and the east wing demolished, replaced by a low wall with an arched gateway, giving the house a fashionable 'half-H' appearance.[39] It is possible that the man who made plans for the alteration was Bernard Dinninghof of York.[41] There is also some resemblance to designs by Inigo Jones.[42] Round the top of the house, letters appear in a balustrade, declaring the piety and loyalty of Sir Arthur Ingram: 'ALL GLORY AND PRAISE BE GIVEN TO GOD THE FATHER THE SON AND HOLY GHOST ON HIGH PEACE ON EARTH GOOD WILL TOWARDS MEN HONOUR AND TRUE ALLEGIANCE TO OUR GRACIOUS KING LOVING AFFECTION AMONGST HIS SUBJECTS HEALTH AND PLENTY BE WITHIN THIS HOUSE.'[38] The chapel in the north wing retains some 17th century features, such as armorial stained glass, probably by Henry Gyles and a carved wooden pulpit by Thomas Ventris, made around 1636, with geometric patterns, pilasters and friezes.[38] The walls had panels of Old Testament figures, painted by John Carleton.[38] An inventory dated 1667 records that the House had 66 rooms and 11 outhouses.[39] An engraving by Kip and Knyff dated 1699 is an accurate representation of the house, showing the varying height of the house and some buildings that were later demolished, including the arched gateway flanked by two small lodges and a detached garden building dating from the mid 1670s.[23]
Photograph of stone and brick Sphinx gate piers at Temple Newsam, c. 1760 by Lancelot Brown based on designs published by Lord Burlington in 1738 and used at Chiswick
Sphinx gate piers, c. 1760
Photograph of the mid-18th century stable block at Temple Newsam showing the pediment
Stable Block at Temple Newsam, added by Henry, 7th Lord Irwin
In 1718, the steward of Temple Newsam suggested an underground service passage to link the north and south wings to the 5th Viscount, who agreed.[43] This tunnel linked the original kitchens in the south wing to the rest of the house.[44] In 1738, Henry, 7th Viscount Irwin wrote to his mother describing the neglected state of the house with windows coming away and cracked brickwork.[23] The house was almost entirely remodelled by Henry.[38] He wanted to follow Palladian design and used craftsmen from York to do so.[45] He widened the gallery, improved the ceiling and windows and created additional rooms.[23] The gallery, completed around 1746, has fine Rococo carvings with overmantle paintings of classical scenes by Antonio Joli.[19] There are also elaborate gilded Rococo ornamental candle holders.[19] The gallery ceiling has detailed stucco work including a medallion of King George I.[19] The ceilings in the new Saloon and Library, made from the old Long Gallery, were decorated by Thomas Perritt and Joseph Rose.[45] The doorcases are elaborately carved, probably by Richard Fisher.[45] Two chimney pieces in the Saloon were based on designs by William Kent.[45] The distinctive sphinx gate piers by Lancelot Brown constructed in 1768 were based on designs published by Lord Burlington in 1738 and used at Chiswick.[45][1] The main rooms in the west wing were redecorated and the windows were replaced with sliding sash windows.[45] A large pedimented stable block was built to the north of the house, in 1742 and probably designed by Daniel Garratt, also in the Palladian style.[45][46] A painting by Mercier of around 1749, also shows a planned block to the south and a low wall connecting the north and south wings which were never completed.[23][21]
In 1796, Frances Shepheard employed a Mr Johnson to alter and reface the south wing in a style which tried to copy that of Sir Arthur Ingram's original house.[45] Her approach was a departure from the designs for the wing commissioned by her dead husband from John Carr and Robert Adam, as well as the landscaping by Capability Brown who was also consulted about rebuilding the south wing.[45] The wing was made two storeys high throughout with a suite of reception rooms on the ground floor with state bedchambers above.[27] In the 1790s, the kitchens were moved to the north wing and the original kitchen became a brushing room where servants brushed down nobles returning from hunting parties.[44]
At the end of the 19th century, Emily Meynell Ingram replaced the sash windows with stone mullions and leaded lights and rebuilt the north porch adding the Meynell Ingram coat of arms over the doorway.[27] She redecorated several rooms and had the great oak staircase installed.[27] The dining room, great staircase and Lord Darnley's room were remodelled in Elizabethan style.[33] In 1877, Emily converted the library at the east end of the gallery into a chapel.[47]
Coalmining on the estate
Estate records show the existence of coal pits in and around the park in the seventeenth century and Bell Wood to the south of the house would have had bell pits for coal extraction. A colliery at Halton village was leased to a number of different individuals from 1660 through to at least the 1790s. The leases generally required the leaseholder to supply coals to Temple Newsam house.[48]
In 1815, William Fenton, one of the 'Coal Kings' of Yorkshire,[49] began the sinking of a mine shaft on the estate at Thorpe Stapleton. The colliery was named Waterloo to commemorate the famous battle of that year.[50] Waterloo Colliery was operated as a royalty concession with contracted 'rents' for coal extracted going to the Temple Newsam landowner. Fenton also had a village built for his workers on land between the River Aire and the Aire and Calder navigation. The village was initially called Newmarket but then became Irwin Square on ordnance survey maps[51] and Ingram Place on census lists, but it was commonly simply known as Waterloo. The Yorkshire, Lancashire and England cricketer Albert Ward was born here in 1865. The village had two rows of cottages and a school building. It was connected to the colliery by a wooden footbridge over the river.[52] Deep coal mining on the estate ended with the closure of the Temple Pit of Waterloo Main Colliery in 1968.
Temple Newsam House
Opencast mining on the estate began in May 1942. Seven sites were exploited to the south of the house almost entirely destroying Capability Brown's landscape. One site reached within 330 feet (100 m) of the South Terrace. It continued at the Gamblethorpe site as far as Dawson's Wood, in full view of the house, until 1987.[53] No trace of the opencast remains now as the parkland was re-landscaped.
In 2019 there was a temporary exhibition about coal mining at Temple Newsam which was called 'Blot on the Landscape'.[54]
House and estate today
The house and estate are owned by Leeds City Council and open to the public. The house has undergone substantial restoration to its exterior. There is an established programme of restoring rooms back to known previous configurations, reversing the numerous intrusive installations and modifications that took place during the building's "art museum" phase.
The wider estate is made up of woods (the second largest part of the Forest of Leeds).[55] There are sporting facilities for football, golf, running, cycling, horse-riding and orienteering. There is an innovative children's playground opened in 2011 which caters for both disabled and able-bodied children.[56] Pegasus Wood, to the south of the house, commemorates veterans of the Normandy Landing at Pegasus Bridge in 1944.[57]
Photograph of brick barn at the Home Farm, Temple Newsam
Great Barn, Home Farm, Temple Newsam
The Home Farm, open to the public, has a barn built in 1694 and is the largest working rare breeds farm in Europe, and only one of 16 nationally approved by the Rare Breeds Survival Trust. Breeds include Gloucester, Kerry, Irish Moiled, Red Poll, White Park, British White, Beef Shorthorn, Vaynol and Belted Galloway cattle; Kerry Hill; Whitefaced Woodland and Portland sheep, and Golden Guernsey goats.[58] The farm was targeted by arsonists twice in 2011 with damage caused to buildings, and some animals killed.[59]
There are extensive gardens, with a celebrated rhododendron walk and six national plant collections: Aster novi-belgii (Michaelmas daisies), Phlox paniculata, Delphinium elatum (Cultivars), Solenostemon scutellarioides (sys. Coleus blumei), Primula auricula and Chrysanthemum (Charm and Cascade cultivars).[60] Within the Walled Garden there are 800 yards of herbaceous borders.[61]
Collections
There are substantial holdings of fine and decorative art which are designated by the Department of Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) as being of national significance.[62]
Of most significant historical and cultural interest is the Chippendale Society collection of Chippendale works that are on permanent loan.[63] In his book "Britain's Best Museums and Galleries", Mark Fisher (a former DCMS minister) gave the museum an excellent review. When interviewed on Front Row, Radio 4, November 2004 Fisher placed Temple Newsam House in the top three non-national museums in the country, along with Birmingham's Barber Institute and the Dulwich Picture Gallery.[64]
Amphibious Capability demonstration during Albanian Lion. Picture: LA(Phot) Arron Hoare
The ships company of HMS Illustrious have hosted the President of Albania, His Excellency Mr Bujar Nishani, as exercise Albanian Lion draws to an end.
Albanian Lion was the first major workout for the Royal Navy’s Response Force Task Group (RFTG) as part of Cougar 13 – a long planned deployment that left the UK in mid August.
Carried out in the waters and mountains around the coastal city of Vlore, this bilateral exercise provided the perfect training ground for amphibious assaults, deterring adversaries, supporting land forces, reassuring allies and the mass evacuation of British and EU citizens.
President Nishani said: “I believe that the biggest benefit of this joint exercise is indeed the establishment and consolidation of friendship and cooperation between our two armed forces.”
During his time aboard Illustrious, President Nishani reviewed a Ceremonial Guard, watched an aviation demonstration, discussed surveillance reconnaissance with Royal Marines and talked with the ships boarding party before being shown an amphibious capability demonstration.
President Nishani said: “I am aware of the fact that this is the biggest exercise of this magnitude that the British forces have conducted recently in the Mediterranean region.
Cougar 13 will now move into the red Sea, Arabian Gulf and Horn of Africa for further exercises.
This image shows the Amphibious Capability demonstration in full swing. Offshore Raiding Craft (ORC's) from the Royal Marines are operating alongside a vessel from the Albanian Navy. HMS Bulwark is in the background and is docked down inthe water to allow landing craft access.
+++ DISCLAIMER +++
Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based historical facts. BEWARE!
Some background:
The Israel Aircraft Industries Nesher (Hebrew: נשר, "Vulture" - often mistranslated as "Eagle") is the Israeli version of the Dassault Mirage 5 multi-role fighter aircraft. Most were later sold to the Argentine Air Force as Daggers, and later upgraded as Fingers.
Israel had to replace more than 60 aircraft lost during the Six Day War and the War of Attrition which followed. Before the war, Israel began co-development with Dassault to build the Mirage 5 and it was eventually built by Israel and named Raam in Hebrew (thunder).
Dassault Aviation had developed the Mirage 5 at the request of the Israelis, who were the main foreign customers of the Mirage III. The Israeli Air Force (IAF) wanted the next version to have less all-weather capability in exchange for improved ordnance carrying capacity and range as the weather in the Middle East is mostly clear.
In January 1969, the French government arms embargo on Israel (in response to the 1968 Israeli raid on Lebanon) prevented the first 30 Mirage 5 aircraft (which were already paid for by Israel) plus optional 20 from being delivered and cut off support for the existing Mirage IIICJ fleet.
This was a setback for the Israeli Air Force, who needed the new Mirage to compensate for the losses of the Six Day War and was still using the Mirage IIIC. Israel then decided to produce the (Raam A and B project)[1] airframes as it had the necessary plans, although Israel did not officially obtain a manufacturing license.
Officially, Israel built the aircraft after obtaining a complete set of drawings. However, some sources claim Israel received 50 Mirage 5s in crates from the French Air Force (AdA), while the AdA took over the 50 aircraft originally intended for Israel.
Production began in 1969[5] with the first empty airframes with no weapons, electronics, seat, or engine included, delivered directly from Dassault Aviation. The first Raam A was delivered in May, 1971. In November, 1971 the plane was renamed Nesher.
The Neshers' airframe was identical to the Mirage 5, but there was an extensive refitting of Israeli avionics, a Martin-Baker zero-zero ejection seat, and improved provisions for a wider range of AAMs (Air-to-Air Missiles), including the Israeli Shafrir heat-seeking missile.The Nesher had simpler avionics than the Mirage IIIC but was slightly less maneuverable. However, it had longer range and bigger payload. The reduced maneuverability did not prevent the Nesher from performing well in air combat during the Yom Kippur war (see below).
The first Nesher prototype flew in September 1969, with production deliveries to the IAF beginning in May 1971 at Hatzor in May of 1971, with veteran test pilot Danny Shapira at the controls. In the months that followed, additional Nesher planes equipped this squadron, making up for the insufficient number of Mirage IIIs and raising the number of serviceable planes in the squadron. When the rate of production picked up at the Nesher assembly line at IAI, two new squadrons could be established, based solely on the Neshers. The first new squadron inaugurated 'Etzion Airbase at 'Bik'at Hayareakh' ('Valley of the Moon') near Eilat, in September of 1972, and the second was founded in March of 1973 at Hatzor.
When the Yom Kippur War broke out, in October of 1973, the IAF had 40 Nesher planes in its ranks, serving in the First Combat Squadron and in the two new squadrons.
Although they were originally intended for attack missions, in the course of the war the Neshers were primarily used in air-to-air combat. The IAF command decided to use the Phantoms, Skyhawks and Sa'ars against ground targets, and assigned the Mirages and Neshers the task of fighting enemy aircraft and establishing air superiority over the battle zones.
The Neshers proved to be good fighters and overcame their adversaries (MiGs and Sukhois) with relative ease. The first aerial victory of a Nesher took place on January 8, 1973, when 4 Neshers from the "First Fighter" squadron escorted F-4 Phantoms into Syria to attack a terrorist base. In an engagement with Syrian MiG-21s, 6 MiGs were shot down, two by the Neshers.
Neshers also took part in the Yom Kippur conflict later that year. One of the first air victoriy of the war was not an aircraft but an AS-5 Kelt air to ground missile launched against Tel-Aviv by an Egyptian Tu-16 Badger on the first day of the war, October 6th, 1973.
When Libyan Mirage 5s entered the fighting all Israeli Mirages and Neshers were marked with large yellow triangles bordered by a thick black frame to prevent a case of mistaken identity. At least two Mirage 5s were shot down by Neshers, as well as an Israeli Phantom shot down by mistake, the navigator and the pilot, a former Nesher squadron commander, parachuting to safety.
According to the statistics published after the war, there were 117 dogfights in the course of the Yom Kippur War (65 over Syria and 52 over Egypt). 227 enemy planes were shot down in these confrontations, and only six Israeli planes were shot down (they had been on interception missions, and were either hit by cannon fire or by sirface-to-air missiles). The Nesher squadron from Etzion was one of the leading squadrons, tallying 42 kills without a single plane lost.
The Neshers did not just go out on interception missions: they also carried out several attack sorties in the Golan Heights and on the southern front. The action was intense, with every pilot carrying out numerous sorties every day.
The war proved just how vital the Nesher's reinforcement of the IAF's order of battle had been, and convinced the defense community of the importance of continuing to develop fighters in the IAI. In 1975 the first Kfirs entered service, and the Nesher was gradually relegated to a less central role. All the Neshers were concentrated in two squadrons, and were transferred - in late 1976 - to Eitam Airbase, whicch had been newly dedicated in the northern Sinai.
Nesher production ended in February 1974 after fifty-one fighters (Nesher S) and ten Nesher two-seat trainers (Nesher T), and the type did not serve long with the IAF. In the late 70's there were already enough Kfirs in the IAF for completely replacing the Mirages and Neshers.
The Kfir was a significantly more advanced plane than the Nesher, boasting better performance as well as more sophisticated systems, and upgrading the Neshers was not deemed to be a worthwhile investment.
In 1981, the Kfir had supplanted the Nesher in Heyl Ha'avir, and the Neshers were renovated, for sale overseas. Neshers were sold to the Argentine Air Force in two batches, 26 in 1978 and 13 in 1980, under the name Dagger, comprising 35 Dagger A single-seat fighters and four Dagger B two-seat trainers. The Daggers then saw much action against the British in the Falklands War.
General characteristics:
Crew: one
Length incl. pitot: 15.65m (51 ft 3 in)
Wingspan: 8.22m (26 ft 11 in)
Height: 4.25m (13 ft 11 in)
Wing area: 34.8m² (373 sq. ft)
Empty weight: 6,600kg (14,535 lb)
Max. takeoff weight: 13,500kg (29,735 lb)
Powerplant:
SNECMA Atar 09 engine with 4,280 kg (9,430 lbf)dry thrust
and 6,200 kg (13,660 lbf) with afterburner
Performance:
Maximum speed: mach 2.1 (39,370ft)
Range: 1,300km (810 ml), clean and with internal fuel only
1,186km (736 ml) with 4700 litres of auxiliary fuel in drop tanks
plus 2 Air to Air missiles and 2600 lb of bombs
Service ceiling: 17,680 (55,775ft)
Rate of climb: 16,400ft/min (83.5 m/s)
Armament:
2× 30 mm (1.18 in) DEFA 552 cannons with 125 rounds per gun under the air intakes
Five pylons for a wide range of up to 4.200kg (9,250 lb) of disposable stores
The kit and its assembly:
This short notice build towards the end of the 2016 "Cold War GB" at whatifmodelers.com was inspired by a CG rendition of an IAF F-4 in the unique brown/blue paint scheme, posted by fellow user SPINNERS a couple of days before. Seeing that design variant I wondered how a Kfir in this livery would look like...?
I had a C-2 Kfir in the stash, but also stumbled across a Heller Mirage IIIE/R/5BA kit without a real purpose in the stash and remembered the Kfir's predecessor, the Nesher, which was more or less a bluntly copied Mirage 5. Since the type was earlier and more appropriate for the brown/blue livery, I decided to convert the Heller Mirage into a Nesher, since it comes pretty close.
The Heller kit is old and rather basic by today's standards. You get fine but raised panel lines, only a rough interior, mediocre fit and a brittle plastic that catches scratches and dents when you only look at it.
Anyway, creating a Nesher from the Heller kit is not really complicated. Two major mods have to be made: the fin has to be enlarged or replaced, and the nose needs a special pitot installation.
The Nesher carried the bigger Mirage III/5 fin, and the Heller kit only bears the short version. Since I had a donation PM Model Nesher/Dagger kit in store (horrible kit, it rather resembles a mutated Mirage III but neither the israeli nor the Argentinian aircraft!) I just transplanted the fin. This appeared easier than adding a fin fillet, and having just the right donation part at hand made the decision even easier. :D
The nose is the Mirage 5's, but the tip was slightly modified and the pitot needed a separate fairing/attachment under the nose tip. The latter was created from a piece of round styrene and blended with the lower front fuselage.
After the major body work was done, some antennae/sensors were replaced or added, a Panzer IV’s sprocket wheel as an afterburner interior (just to have something inside the gaping exhaust hole) as well as launch rails under the outer wings for a pair of Shafrir-2s. The sleek drop tanks come OOB from the Heller kit – it only offers a pair of bigger tanks with fins, but no offensive ordnance at all.
In the cockpit I used a Martin Baker ejection seat from an Italeri Kfir, a slightly better option than the OOB part.
Painting and markings:
This is the actual whif aspect about this build, which is just the fictional application of a real world IAF scheme that was in use about 10 years before the Yom Kippur War. In real life the Nesher just came too late to carry the murky brown/blue pattern, because it was phased out in 1967, after the Six Days War. But putting it onto a more modern aircraft creates interesting results!
The scheme is based upon the original grey/green French pattern, just with the colors replaced with RAL 8000 (Grüngrau) or Field Drab (FS 30215) and RAL 5008 (Graublau), the authentic upper surface tones for this strange camouflage.
I’ve already built a (real world) IAF Ouragan in this style, so I had some practice and good references at hand. Model Master 1702 (alternatively: Humbrol 142) is a good option for the brown/tan tone, even though it is a bit too dark for my taste. "Israeli Armor Grey" from ModelMaster is a more approriate tone - it's lighter and actually an equivalent for RAL 8000, which is also used on Israeli tanks!
For the greyish-green dark blue I used Humbrol 77 (Navy Blue) which comes IMHO close. The undersides were painted in a pale grey, I used FS 36440 (Light Gull Grey, Humbrol 129 in this case). Some sources claim it to be RAL 7044 (Seidengrau), but the FS tone is practically identical.
All Neshers (even in later Argentinian service) had their nose painted black. There was no radar oder radome fitted, it was rather a deception in order to make enemies confuse the simple ground attack Neshers with the more potent (and radar-equipped) Mirage IIIs.
The kit received a light black ink wash and some dry-brushing for panel emphasis. The decals come mostly from the PM Model Nesher, including the large, yellow Yom Kippur War ID triangles which create a powerful contrast on the dark underground. Interesting result!
Anyway, while the decals might be the best thing about the PM kit, they have thier drawbacks, too. While they are 100% opaque the carrier film is thick, stiff and brittle, and they do not adhere well to the underground, despite decals softener and other tricks. :(
As a small detail I put the aircraft's tactical code on a silver background, as if the aircraft had originally been bare metal with the camouflage rather hastily applied. Since I had no IAF squadron markings left I added a yellow/black checkerboard pattern to the fin's rudder - the marking of the 113 Tayaset "Ha'Tsira'a (The Wasps), which actually operated the Nesher in the Yom Kippur conflict, just with a different camouflage.
Finally, the kit received some smoke/exhaust marks with graphite and was sealed with a coat of matt acrylic varnish. To make matters worse, the Revell varnish turned white, so I had to repair that damage as good as I could, and the finish now is far from what I had originally hoped for, despite the general troubles with the PM Model kit's decals.
A rather subtle whif, and even the aircraft itself is real (or at least a "realistic" model replica). Anyway, the paint scheme application changes things considerably, and the model ended - with the ID trinagles and the other bright markings - more colorful than expected. But the finish ended up rather poor, so that I am a bit disappointed.
Besides, a highly recommended source for this aircraft is Amos Dor's "IAI Nesher (From Mirage to Kfir, pt. 2 of 3)" book from "The IAI Aircraft Series", AD Graphics/Milano, 2000. All the other publications from this series of books are also generally recommended for any IAF builds.
+++ DISCLAIMER +++
Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based historical facts. BEWARE!
Some background:
The Panavia Tornado was a family of twin-engine, variable-sweep wing multirole combat aircraft, which was jointly developed and manufactured by Italy, the United Kingdom, and West Germany. There were three primary Tornado variants: the Tornado IDS (interdictor/strike) fighter-bomber, the suppression of enemy air defences Tornado ECR (electronic combat/reconnaissance) and the Tornado ADV (air defence variant) interceptor aircraft.
The Tornado underwent a long and protracted design phase with many international stakeholders and potential partners. Eventually, it was developed and built by Panavia Aircraft GmbH, a tri-national consortium consisting of British Aerospace (previously British Aircraft Corporation), MBB of West Germany, and Aeritalia of Italy. This dedicated joint venture was later integrated into the DASA consortium, which became in 2000 the European Aeronautic Defence and Space Company (EADS) and since 2014 part of the Airbus SE.
The Tornado IDS fighter bomber first flew on 14 August 1974 and was introduced into service in 1979–1980. Due to its multirole design, it was able to replace several different fleets of aircraft in the adopting air forces, but because the Tornado was designed primarily for the European theatre of operations and a complex aircraft, export sales and foreign operators were few.
The first customer outside of the designers' countries became the Royal Saudi Air Force (RSAF), with orders for 48 IDS and 24 ADV model Tornados in 1985. Another export customer became Canada a couple of years later – despite the fact that Canada had been part of the initial multi-national MRCA design team in the Sixties and retreated from the Tornado project due to escalating costs and contradictive. With the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, the political situation in Western Europe had changed dramatically and Canada decided to retire its air force contingent (at that time primarily CF-188/F-18 Hornet fighters, which had been introduced in 1982) from Western-Germany, a move that resulted in the disbandment of several oversea units until 1993. In the course of the resulting re-organization of the homeland defense the CF-188s were to operate as interceptors, defending Canadian airspace, while maritime defense and reconnaissance was to be taken over by a new, dedicated strike aircraft type. Among the contenders were the Lockheed F-15E Strike Eagle, the Dassault Mirage 2000 as well as the Rafale (still at project stage at that time), and the Panavia Tornado IDS.
After a lengthy evaluation process, the Tornado IDS came out as the winner, even though rumors persist that the decision was not fully rational. Nevertheless, Canada signed in late 1994 a procurement paper for a total of 56 Tornado attack aircraft, including eight trainers with dual controls but full attack capability. Under the pressure of exploding costs and due to operational requirements from the Canadian Air Force, the Canadian government demanded several detail changes that turned the CAF aircraft into a breed of its own, even though these differences to the European Tornado IDS were not visible at first sight.
The most significant change was the replacement of the original Turbo-Union RB199-34R Mk 103 afterburning turbofans with General Electric F414-GE-400 turbofans. With these more modern and more powerful engines (formerly dry thrust of 43.8 kN (9,850 lbf) and 76.8 kN (17,270 lbf) with afterburner each versus 62.3 kN (13,000 lbf) dry and 97.9 kN (22,000 lbf) with afterburner through the F414s) the aircraft’s performance was improved, especially its range and rate of climb, but the Tornado's original and very effective thrust reversers to decrease the distance required to safely land had to be deleted. Instead, a protruding brake parachute compartment was added under the fin's base and the aircraft's tail section was modified accordingly.
The aircraft's primary weapon against maritime targets was the AGM-84 "Harpoon" with an operational range of 67 nmi (124 km) and more, using active radar homing and a low-level, sea-skimming cruise trajectory to improve survivability and lethality. Up to four of these missiles could be carried and launched at different targets at the same time, even though normally only a pair of AGM-84s were carried under the fuselage, the inner wing pylons occupied with drop tanks in order to extend range and endurance. Additional precision weapons with shorter range were the AGM-65 "Maverick" and laser-guided bombs of various calibers, including the laser and GPS-guided GBU-54 LJDAM. Additionally, the AGM-88 "HARM" could be deployed against targets with radar emissions like ships or aerial defense positions. Furthermore, the CAF procured ten refueling pods for the Tornado fleet, so that single aircraft could act as buddy-buddy tankers and extend the potential strike range. For the secondary recce role the CA-182 could, beyond the internal IIS suite, be outfitted with various camera, SLAR and air sampling pods.
The internal armament was also changed – the original pair of Mauser 27mm revolver cannon was replaced by a single, lightweight 20 mm (0.787 in) General Dynamics A-50 3-barrel rotary cannon, which fired linkless 20 mm ammunition – another compromise in order to unify logistics with the similar M61 cannon on board of the CAF’s CF-188 Hornets. In order to fit the bigger weapon into the Tornado’s lower front fuselage, a characteristic bulging had to be added to the weapon bay’s cover.
Other, outwardly invisible changes included the cockpit instruments and avionics systems procured from the USA, in order to improve the technical commonality with the CF-188 fleet and the corresponding training procedures. Special Canadian features included a combined FLIR/laser designator sensor in a fairing under the starboard side, which replaced one of the original gun bays, and an infrared recording system (IIS) in an additional ventral fairing behind the front landing gear well. Further special Canadian features included a wide-angle HUD (Head-up display), improved cockpit displays, night vision devices (NVG) capabilities and a Global Positioning System receiver.
The Canadian Tornados underwent a quick but thorough 2-year development program and were introduced into CAF service in late 1996 with CAF 425 and 433 Squadrons, receiving the official designation "CA-182" with the suffix "A" for the standard fighter bombers and "B" for the dual control variant.
General characteristics:
Crew: 2
Length: 16.72 m (54 ft 10 in)
Wingspan: 13.91 m at 25° wing sweep, 8.60 m at 67° wing sweep (45.6 ft / 28.2 ft)
Height: 5.95 m (19.5 ft)
Wing area: 26.6 m2 (286 ft2)
Empty weight: 13,890 kg (30,620 lb)
Loaded weight: 20,240 kg (44,620 lb)
Max. takeoff weight: 28,000 kg (61,700 lb)
Powerplant:
2× General Electric F414-GE-400 afterburning turbofans with
a dry thrust of 62.3 kN (13,000 lbf) and 97.9 kN (22,000 lbf) at full afterburner each
Performance:
Maximum speed: Mach 2.3 (2,500 km/h, 1,550 mph) at 9,000 m (30,000 ft) altitude;
800 knots, 1,482 km/h, 921 mph indicated airspeed near sea level
Range: 1,550 km (962 mi) for typical combat mission
Ferry range: 4,200 km (2,600 mi) with four external drop tanks
Service ceiling: 15,240 m (50,000 ft)
Rate of climb: 90.5 m/s (17,785 ft/min)
Thrust/weight: 0.85
Armament:
1× 20 mm (0.787 in) A-50 3-barrel rotary cannon with 420 rounds
3× heavy duty under-fuselage hardpoints plus 4× swiveling under-wing
pylon stations with a total payload capacity of 9,000 kg (19,800 lb);
the two inner wing pylons have shoulder launch rails for 2× Short-Range AAM (SRAAM),
typically IR-guided AIM-9 Sidewinder
The kit and its assembly:
This whiffy Tornado is a submission to a spontaneous and rather informal "RAF Tornado Farewell" group build at whatifmodelers.com. I had a surplus Tornado kit in the stash from a lot purchase a while ago and used the opportunity to tackle it. The kit is Revell's own Tornado IDS mold from 1998 (the kit with the separate, vertically split cockpit section), in my case it’s a Tornado ECR which comes with some extra parts for the cockpit and HARM missiles.
Even though I considered the kit at first to be a good offering, with many detail improvements over the older Italeri kit (which has been reboxed many times, also under the labels of Tamiya, Revell, Bilek and Alanger), I have come to hate it because I found it – like other more recent Revell kits like the Me 262 – to be somewhat über-engineered, to a point that the potential progress or benefit becomes detrimental. Signs of decadence, I guess?
For instance, the construction for the stabilizers is very similar to the Italeri kit: the fins are connected with a bar, and moveable. And while Italeri’s construction was already not the most stable one (stabilizers would frequently break off), the Revell “solution” is even more flimsy! Why?
The same goes for the swiveling wing pylons: on the old Italeri kit you were ordered to heat a screwdriver and flatten the attachment pins from the wings’ inside – this sound a little outdated, but works better than expected. The new Revell kit offers small, round clips that hold the pylons in place. Well, while mounting them is a fiddly affair, the arrangement works quite well …until you work on. First of all, the pylons sit so tightly under the wing that I wonder how you are expected to paint them? And it gets worse: you better not touch a pylon, because the pins that hold them are so thin that they easily break. I lost two(!) pylons during the building and painting process, and did not find it amusing...
The clear parts are thin but brittle, and canopy and windscreen do not seem to belong to the same model. Their fit with the fuselage is rather corny, and the way they are attached to the sprues is dubious, too.
The four part ejection seats did not go together, either, as if none of the parts was intended for any other. The instructions are also flawed: in areas like the air intakes the graphics do not clearly show well how parts are supposed to be mounted to each other. I am really not pleased with the kit, despite the good looks of the parts.
But back to the group build; I initially considered something more fictional than a Simple Tornado IDS, e. g. a mod with twin fins and in Russian markings, but, eventually, I settled upon a rather simple, mostly cosmetic whif build. Ideas included an Omani aircraft or a Greek maritime strike Tonka in the pretty "Ghost" scheme, but a Canadian strike aircraft finally made it.
In fact, the kit was built almost OOB, I just changed the jet nozzles (donors from an F-18), modified the base of the fin with a scratched brake parachute fairing and added details like the FLIR pod under the nose. From the Tornado ECR extra parts I used the ventral IIS fairing and the HARM launch rails.
The AGM-84s as well as the AN/ALQ-184 jamming pod (I know that Canada does not use the latter, but I wanted something different from the German Kerberos pod) came from Hasegawa aircraft weapon sets. The OOB drop tanks (which have IMHO a doubtful shape and come with anachronistic raised panel details!?), the BOZ-101 and the AIM-9s were retained from the original kit.
Painting and markings:
Well, there are not many realistic schemes to choose from. The most obvious option would have been an all-grey aircraft, in the CF-188 style (FS 35237 upper and FS 26375 lower surfaces with low-viz markings in grey). But for a low level attack aircraft I rather considered more classic colors to be appropriate.
The next real life option was the late CF-104G scheme for Europe in NATO standard RAF Dark Green/Dark Sea Grey with low-viz markings (w/o white, to be exact), or an all-green livery. Not convincing, at least to me, and the Tonka would be operated much later. Then I came across a late CT-133 trainer, in the so-called “FIS” scheme: a wraparound pattern in RAF Dark Green/Dark Sea Grey with all-black national markings and stencils, but the paint was quite faded and esp. the grey looked rather light, almost like USAF Neutral Grey, and the black markings stood out well. I found this look quite convincing and unique, and so I adapted the early RAF Tornado GR.1s wraparound scheme for my CAF Tonka and just used different colors, in order to emphasize the different continent – even though the effect is rather subtle. Instead of RAF Dark Green I used the very similar FS 34079 (it is a tad less reddish and dull), and the Dark Sea Grey was replaced by FS 36176, “Dark Grey”, the tone that is used all-over on the USAF’s F-15Es. It is markedly more bluish than Dark Sea Grey – but when the whole kit was painted it still looked more like the standard NATO scheme than expected. Nevertheless, it looked good, and with some post-shading things gained the weathered/bleached look I had been hoping for – also as a lighter base for the almost all-black stencils and markings.
The rest became pretty standard, with a shiny black radome, a matt black anti-glare panel in front of the windscreen, a white landing gear interior and a dark gull grey (FS 36231) cockpit.
Stencils and national markings come from a Leading Edge CF-116/CF-5A decal sheet, which features an aircraft in the right FIS livery; where possible/available I exchanged the original, colored Tornado markings (e.g. the walking area borders) with black decals, either from the scrap box or from generic decal material sheets. The tactical codes were improvised with Leading Egde material, too, also taken from a CF-188/F-18 sheet.
Finally, after the ordnance had been painted, too (white AGM-84s, drop tanks in standard camouflage, the BOZ-101 dispenser in FS 34079 and the ALQ-184 in FS 36375, just like all missile launch rails), the kit received an overall matt acrylic varnish coat, just the black radome became shiny.
In the end the CAF Tonka looks better than expected, and quite plausible, but the kit was a fight to build. I am not convinced of the Revell kit. While its has nice details and is, from that perspective, a certain step up from the Italeri kit, I am amazed how many technical flaws and weaknesses it has – and some of these were even taken over from older molds or even made worse! WTF? I am really uncertain if I’d give this kit another chance, somehow I am rather inclined to choose the older Italeri mold.
Temple Newsam (historically Temple Newsham), (grid reference SE357322) is a Tudor-Jacobean house in Leeds, West Yorkshire, England, with grounds landscaped by Capability Brown.
The estate lends its name to the Temple Newsam ward of Leeds City Council, in which it is situated, and lies to the east of the city, just south of Halton Moor, Halton, Whitkirk and Colton. It is one of nine sites in the Leeds Museums & Galleries group.
The house is a Grade I listed building, defined as a "building of outstanding or national architectural or historic interest". The stables are Grade II* listed ("particularly significant buildings of more than local interest"), and ten separate features of the estate are Grade II listed ("buildings of special architectural or historic interest"), including the Sphinx Gates and the Barn.[1] Temple Newsam House is one of Leeds Museums and Galleries sites.[2] It is also part of the research group, Yorkshire Country House Partnership.[3]
History
1066 to 1520
In the Domesday Book of 1086 the manor is listed as Neuhusam (meaning new houses) and was held by Ilbert de Lacy and his sons.[4] Before the Norman Conquest of 1066 it had been held by Dunstan and Glunier, Anglo-Saxon thanes.[4] In about 1155, Henry de Lacy gave it to the Knights Templar, who built Temple Newsam Preceptory on a site near the present house.[5] The Templars farmed the estate very efficiently, with 1100 animals.[6] In 1307 the Templars were suppressed, and Edward II granted the manor to Sir Robert Holland who held it until 1323 when he was deprived of his estates.[6] The Templars tried to retake the estate but they were forced to surrender and in 1327 it was granted to Mary de St Pol, the Countess of Pembroke, who held the manor for 50 years.[6] In 1377 by royal decree the estate reverted to Philip Darcy, 4th Baron Darcy de Knayth (1341–1398).[6] It then passed through several members of the Darcy family, until it was inherited by the 21-year old Thomas, Lord Darcy in 1488.[7] Between 1500 and 1520 a Tudor manor house, known as Temple Newsam House, was built on the site.[8] It has also been spelled "Newsham" in the past.[9]
An oil on panel painting by Hans Eworth of Henry Stuart and his brother Charles Stuart in a grand interior based on a print by Hans Vreedman de Vries
An oil on panel painting from 1563 by Hans Eworth of Henry Stuart and his brother Charles Stuart in a grand interior based on a print by Hans Vreedman de Vries which may reflect Temple Newsam's Great Chamber
1500 to 1650
In 1537 Thomas, Lord Darcy was executed for the part he played in the Pilgrimage of Grace and the property was seized by the Crown.[7] In 1544 Henry VIII gave it to his niece Lady Margaret Douglas (Countess of Lennox), and she lived there with her husband Matthew Stewart, 4th Earl of Lennox.[7] Their son Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley, who was born in the house in 1545 and educated there, married Mary, Queen of Scots, by whom he was the father of King James VI of Scotland and I of England.[10] A portrait of Henry and his brother was probably intended to represent the interior of Temple Newsam despite being based on a print of an ideal interior.[11] Following the marriage in 1565, Temple Newsam was seized by Queen Elizabeth I and was managed by an agent.[12]
In 1609 King James I, successor to Elizabeth, granted the estate to his Franco-Scottish second cousin Ludovic Stewart, 2nd Duke of Lennox (1574–1624), who was a favourite of the King and given many titles and estates, including farmland and coalmines in the local area.[13] Despite his opportunities, Ludovic was in constant debt and he mortgaged the estate in 1614 for the sum of £9,000 (around £860,000 in today's money).[14] In 1622 Lennox began the sale of the estate to Sir Arthur Ingram (c. 1565 – 1642), a Yorkshire-born London merchant, civil servant, investor in colonial ventures and arms dealer, for £12,000, which he paid in two instalments, the last in July 1624, after Lennox's death.[14] During the next 20 years the mansion was rebuilt, incorporating some of the previous house in the west wing.[8] The north and south wings were rebuilt and the east wing was demolished after a bad fire in 1635.[15] Arthur's son, also called Arthur, inherited the estate with its debts and continued the building and renovation work.[16] Six months after Charles I was beheaded in 1649, Arthur Ingram the younger was declared delinquent and he compounded his estates and retired to Temple Newsam.[17]
1650 to 1900
After the death of Arthur the younger's eldest son, Thomas, in 1660, Temple Newsam was inherited by Arthur's second son, Henry Ingram, 1st Viscount of Irvine (created a peer of Scotland as Baron Ingram and Viscount of Irvine in 1661 - although the family used the English form "Irwin").[18] In 1661, Henry married Lady Essex Montagu, daughter of Edward Montagu, 2nd Earl of Manchester, a favourite of Charles II.[18] The estate then passed through Henry's two sons and five grandsons, the last being Henry Ingram, 7th Viscount of Irvine.[18] The 4th Viscount brought back paintings from his Grand Tour of 1704-7.[19] Extant receipts from 1692 show women as well as men were employed to work the estate in haymaking.[20] In 1712, William Etty designed a new approach to the house, with a bridge and ponds.[21][22] In 1714, Temple Newsam was inherited by Rich Ingram, the 5th Viscount, and his wife Ann who spent a vast fortune furnishing the house and creating the East Avenue.[19] Between 1738 and 1746, Henry Ingram, 7th Viscount of Irvine remodelled the west and north wings of the house, creating new bedrooms and dressing rooms and the picture gallery.[23] A painting in Leeds City Art Gallery by Philippe Mercier of c. 1745 shows Henry and his wife standing in front of Temple Newsam House.[24]
A coloured engraving made in 1699 by J Kip after a drawing by Leonard Knyff showing an aerial view of the house and estate at Temple Newsam
1699 Engraving by J Kip after a drawing by Leonard Knyff
In the 1760s, Charles Ingram, 9th Viscount of Irvine, employed Capability Brown to re-landscape the park on the insistence of his wife, Frances Shepheard, daughter of Samuel Shepheard.[25] Reflecting her interest in pastoral landscape design, Frances is depicted as a shepherdess in a portrait by Benjamin Wilson at Temple Newsam.[25] Both Frances and Charles were actively involved in the design and implementation.[26] Some aspects of Brown's plan depicted in paintings by James Chapman and Michael Angelo Rooker were never completed such as a large lake near the house.[26] Extant financial records show that in 1759 women as well as men were employed as garden labourers.[20] After Charles died in 1778, Frances rebuilt the south wing in 1796; she lived at Temple Newsam until her death in 1807.[27] Charles and Frances's eldest daughter Isabella Ingram, (Marchioness of Hertford) (d.1834) who inherited Temple Newsam, was the mistress of the Prince of Wales (later King George IV) from 1806 to 1819. In 1806, George visited Temple Newsam and presented Isabella with Chinese wallpaper, which she hung in the small Drawing Room next to the Great Hall in around 1820, embellished with cut out birds from Audubon's The Birds of America (now worth £7.5 million).[28] Lady Hertford inherited the house in 1807; after her husband died in 1822 she spent the season in London, and the rest of the time at Temple Newsam where she involved herself in charitable works including distributing food and clothing to the local people.[29] She allowed the servants to hold an annual supper and ball at Temple Newsam.[29] Reports of poachers were made during 1826 and 1827.[30] During the last years of Isabella's life, the canal, railway and roads encroached on the estate as well as coal mining; and she dealt with the companies setting these up.[29] In 1820 the novelist Sir Walter Scott published Ivanhoe featuring a Templar preceptory named Temple Stowe, believed to have been modelled on Temple Newsam; the name is preserved in local road names such as Templestowe Crescent.[31] At her death in 1834, Isabella left Temple Newsam to her widowed sister, Frances Ingram Shepheard, wife of Lord William Gordon, who died in 1841.[32]
Temple Newsam House from Morris's Country Seats (1880)
In 1841 the estate was inherited by Hugo Charles Meynell Ingram (d. 1869), son of Elizabeth Ingram, sister of Frances Ingram (Lady Gordon), who made no alterations to the estate.[33] In 1868, the Prince of Wales stayed at Temple Newsam during his visit to Leeds to open the Fine Art Exhibition in the New Infirmary; temporary triumphal arches were erected on the estate.[34] Following Hugo Charles's death, his son Hugo Meynell-Ingram (d.1871) inherited Temple Newsam; two years later, at his death, his wife Emily Meynell Ingram (d.1904) inherited the estate.[33] Emily spent a large part of her widowhood at Temple Newsam; she developed it considerably by replacing the sash windows and remodelling the dining room, great staircase and Lord Darnley's room.[33] Emily bequeathed Temple Newsam to her nephew Edward Wood, 1st Earl of Halifax.[8]
20th century
In 1909, 610 acres (2.5 km2) of the estate at Knostrop were compulsorily purchased by Leeds Corporation to build a sewage plant.[35] During the First World War (1914–17) the south wing of the house was turned into a hospital by Edward Wood and his wife Dorothy. Edward Wood fought in France as part of the Yorkshire Hussars, whilst Dorothy oversaw the running of the hospital as part of the Mayors War Committee.[36] In 1922 Edward Wood sold the park and house to Leeds Corporation for a nominal sum, placing covenants over them to ensure their preservation for the future.[35]
On 19 October 1923, Temple Newsam was opened to the public along with a golf course.[37] In the Derby Daily Telegraph newspaper, Temple Newsam was compared to Hampton Court.[37] Despite many people visiting the house and using the golf course, the Corporation lost money during the first decade mostly due to poor farming practices.[37] In July 1932, the Great Yorkshire Show was held at Temple Newsam and was a great success.[37] Preparations for war were made as early as April 1939, and in August, small items were being packed up for storage.[37] In September 1939, Temple Newsam was closed to the public and items were moved there for storage from Leeds City Art Gallery.[37] It was decided that objects would be displayed, and the house was officially reopened in November 1939, when it was again likened to Hampton Court in the press.[37]
Architecture
Photograph of entrance porch of Temple Newsam House, Leeds, showing at top the word 'FATHER', below a mullioned window, below a raised portico with coat of arms above a doorway flanked by two Ionic columns on each side.
Entrance Porch 17th century
Photograph of the west front of Temple Newsam
Centre of Temple Newsam west front
Remains of the early 16th century house were retained in the new building, including the brickwork and bay windows in the centre of the west front.[38] The plan of the new house was a conservative E-shape.[38] The Long Gallery and entrance hall in the south wing followed Elizabethan and early Jacobean styles.[38] The entrance porch has Classical columns but they are of Flemish design, rather than following correct Italian design.[38] There are Tudor doorways and timberwork in the cellars, which are largely Tudor in date.[39] Tudor features have also been discovered beneath later layers of decoration, including Lord Darcy's crest scratched into the plaster in the Blue Damask room.[40] An inventory of 1565 indicates that the hall, great chamber (later the dining room), gallery and chapel (later the kitchen) were probably where they are now.[40] There is a Tudor doorway in the north wing which was probably the entrance to the original chapel.[41]
In the 17th century, the south and north wings were rebuilt and the east wing demolished, replaced by a low wall with an arched gateway, giving the house a fashionable 'half-H' appearance.[39] It is possible that the man who made plans for the alteration was Bernard Dinninghof of York.[41] There is also some resemblance to designs by Inigo Jones.[42] Round the top of the house, letters appear in a balustrade, declaring the piety and loyalty of Sir Arthur Ingram: 'ALL GLORY AND PRAISE BE GIVEN TO GOD THE FATHER THE SON AND HOLY GHOST ON HIGH PEACE ON EARTH GOOD WILL TOWARDS MEN HONOUR AND TRUE ALLEGIANCE TO OUR GRACIOUS KING LOVING AFFECTION AMONGST HIS SUBJECTS HEALTH AND PLENTY BE WITHIN THIS HOUSE.'[38] The chapel in the north wing retains some 17th century features, such as armorial stained glass, probably by Henry Gyles and a carved wooden pulpit by Thomas Ventris, made around 1636, with geometric patterns, pilasters and friezes.[38] The walls had panels of Old Testament figures, painted by John Carleton.[38] An inventory dated 1667 records that the House had 66 rooms and 11 outhouses.[39] An engraving by Kip and Knyff dated 1699 is an accurate representation of the house, showing the varying height of the house and some buildings that were later demolished, including the arched gateway flanked by two small lodges and a detached garden building dating from the mid 1670s.[23]
Photograph of stone and brick Sphinx gate piers at Temple Newsam, c. 1760 by Lancelot Brown based on designs published by Lord Burlington in 1738 and used at Chiswick
Sphinx gate piers, c. 1760
Photograph of the mid-18th century stable block at Temple Newsam showing the pediment
Stable Block at Temple Newsam, added by Henry, 7th Lord Irwin
In 1718, the steward of Temple Newsam suggested an underground service passage to link the north and south wings to the 5th Viscount, who agreed.[43] This tunnel linked the original kitchens in the south wing to the rest of the house.[44] In 1738, Henry, 7th Viscount Irwin wrote to his mother describing the neglected state of the house with windows coming away and cracked brickwork.[23] The house was almost entirely remodelled by Henry.[38] He wanted to follow Palladian design and used craftsmen from York to do so.[45] He widened the gallery, improved the ceiling and windows and created additional rooms.[23] The gallery, completed around 1746, has fine Rococo carvings with overmantle paintings of classical scenes by Antonio Joli.[19] There are also elaborate gilded Rococo ornamental candle holders.[19] The gallery ceiling has detailed stucco work including a medallion of King George I.[19] The ceilings in the new Saloon and Library, made from the old Long Gallery, were decorated by Thomas Perritt and Joseph Rose.[45] The doorcases are elaborately carved, probably by Richard Fisher.[45] Two chimney pieces in the Saloon were based on designs by William Kent.[45] The distinctive sphinx gate piers by Lancelot Brown constructed in 1768 were based on designs published by Lord Burlington in 1738 and used at Chiswick.[45][1] The main rooms in the west wing were redecorated and the windows were replaced with sliding sash windows.[45] A large pedimented stable block was built to the north of the house, in 1742 and probably designed by Daniel Garratt, also in the Palladian style.[45][46] A painting by Mercier of around 1749, also shows a planned block to the south and a low wall connecting the north and south wings which were never completed.[23][21]
In 1796, Frances Shepheard employed a Mr Johnson to alter and reface the south wing in a style which tried to copy that of Sir Arthur Ingram's original house.[45] Her approach was a departure from the designs for the wing commissioned by her dead husband from John Carr and Robert Adam, as well as the landscaping by Capability Brown who was also consulted about rebuilding the south wing.[45] The wing was made two storeys high throughout with a suite of reception rooms on the ground floor with state bedchambers above.[27] In the 1790s, the kitchens were moved to the north wing and the original kitchen became a brushing room where servants brushed down nobles returning from hunting parties.[44]
At the end of the 19th century, Emily Meynell Ingram replaced the sash windows with stone mullions and leaded lights and rebuilt the north porch adding the Meynell Ingram coat of arms over the doorway.[27] She redecorated several rooms and had the great oak staircase installed.[27] The dining room, great staircase and Lord Darnley's room were remodelled in Elizabethan style.[33] In 1877, Emily converted the library at the east end of the gallery into a chapel.[47]
Coalmining on the estate
Estate records show the existence of coal pits in and around the park in the seventeenth century and Bell Wood to the south of the house would have had bell pits for coal extraction. A colliery at Halton village was leased to a number of different individuals from 1660 through to at least the 1790s. The leases generally required the leaseholder to supply coals to Temple Newsam house.[48]
In 1815, William Fenton, one of the 'Coal Kings' of Yorkshire,[49] began the sinking of a mine shaft on the estate at Thorpe Stapleton. The colliery was named Waterloo to commemorate the famous battle of that year.[50] Waterloo Colliery was operated as a royalty concession with contracted 'rents' for coal extracted going to the Temple Newsam landowner. Fenton also had a village built for his workers on land between the River Aire and the Aire and Calder navigation. The village was initially called Newmarket but then became Irwin Square on ordnance survey maps[51] and Ingram Place on census lists, but it was commonly simply known as Waterloo. The Yorkshire, Lancashire and England cricketer Albert Ward was born here in 1865. The village had two rows of cottages and a school building. It was connected to the colliery by a wooden footbridge over the river.[52] Deep coal mining on the estate ended with the closure of the Temple Pit of Waterloo Main Colliery in 1968.
Temple Newsam House
Opencast mining on the estate began in May 1942. Seven sites were exploited to the south of the house almost entirely destroying Capability Brown's landscape. One site reached within 330 feet (100 m) of the South Terrace. It continued at the Gamblethorpe site as far as Dawson's Wood, in full view of the house, until 1987.[53] No trace of the opencast remains now as the parkland was re-landscaped.
In 2019 there was a temporary exhibition about coal mining at Temple Newsam which was called 'Blot on the Landscape'.[54]
House and estate today
The house and estate are owned by Leeds City Council and open to the public. The house has undergone substantial restoration to its exterior. There is an established programme of restoring rooms back to known previous configurations, reversing the numerous intrusive installations and modifications that took place during the building's "art museum" phase.
The wider estate is made up of woods (the second largest part of the Forest of Leeds).[55] There are sporting facilities for football, golf, running, cycling, horse-riding and orienteering. There is an innovative children's playground opened in 2011 which caters for both disabled and able-bodied children.[56] Pegasus Wood, to the south of the house, commemorates veterans of the Normandy Landing at Pegasus Bridge in 1944.[57]
Photograph of brick barn at the Home Farm, Temple Newsam
Great Barn, Home Farm, Temple Newsam
The Home Farm, open to the public, has a barn built in 1694 and is the largest working rare breeds farm in Europe, and only one of 16 nationally approved by the Rare Breeds Survival Trust. Breeds include Gloucester, Kerry, Irish Moiled, Red Poll, White Park, British White, Beef Shorthorn, Vaynol and Belted Galloway cattle; Kerry Hill; Whitefaced Woodland and Portland sheep, and Golden Guernsey goats.[58] The farm was targeted by arsonists twice in 2011 with damage caused to buildings, and some animals killed.[59]
There are extensive gardens, with a celebrated rhododendron walk and six national plant collections: Aster novi-belgii (Michaelmas daisies), Phlox paniculata, Delphinium elatum (Cultivars), Solenostemon scutellarioides (sys. Coleus blumei), Primula auricula and Chrysanthemum (Charm and Cascade cultivars).[60] Within the Walled Garden there are 800 yards of herbaceous borders.[61]
Collections
There are substantial holdings of fine and decorative art which are designated by the Department of Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) as being of national significance.[62]
Of most significant historical and cultural interest is the Chippendale Society collection of Chippendale works that are on permanent loan.[63] In his book "Britain's Best Museums and Galleries", Mark Fisher (a former DCMS minister) gave the museum an excellent review. When interviewed on Front Row, Radio 4, November 2004 Fisher placed Temple Newsam House in the top three non-national museums in the country, along with Birmingham's Barber Institute and the Dulwich Picture Gallery.[64]
Temple Newsam (historically Temple Newsham), (grid reference SE357322) is a Tudor-Jacobean house in Leeds, West Yorkshire, England, with grounds landscaped by Capability Brown.
The estate lends its name to the Temple Newsam ward of Leeds City Council, in which it is situated, and lies to the east of the city, just south of Halton Moor, Halton, Whitkirk and Colton. It is one of nine sites in the Leeds Museums & Galleries group.
The house is a Grade I listed building, defined as a "building of outstanding or national architectural or historic interest". The stables are Grade II* listed ("particularly significant buildings of more than local interest"), and ten separate features of the estate are Grade II listed ("buildings of special architectural or historic interest"), including the Sphinx Gates and the Barn.[1] Temple Newsam House is one of Leeds Museums and Galleries sites.[2] It is also part of the research group, Yorkshire Country House Partnership.[3]
History
1066 to 1520
In the Domesday Book of 1086 the manor is listed as Neuhusam (meaning new houses) and was held by Ilbert de Lacy and his sons.[4] Before the Norman Conquest of 1066 it had been held by Dunstan and Glunier, Anglo-Saxon thanes.[4] In about 1155, Henry de Lacy gave it to the Knights Templar, who built Temple Newsam Preceptory on a site near the present house.[5] The Templars farmed the estate very efficiently, with 1100 animals.[6] In 1307 the Templars were suppressed, and Edward II granted the manor to Sir Robert Holland who held it until 1323 when he was deprived of his estates.[6] The Templars tried to retake the estate but they were forced to surrender and in 1327 it was granted to Mary de St Pol, the Countess of Pembroke, who held the manor for 50 years.[6] In 1377 by royal decree the estate reverted to Philip Darcy, 4th Baron Darcy de Knayth (1341–1398).[6] It then passed through several members of the Darcy family, until it was inherited by the 21-year old Thomas, Lord Darcy in 1488.[7] Between 1500 and 1520 a Tudor manor house, known as Temple Newsam House, was built on the site.[8] It has also been spelled "Newsham" in the past.[9]
An oil on panel painting by Hans Eworth of Henry Stuart and his brother Charles Stuart in a grand interior based on a print by Hans Vreedman de Vries
An oil on panel painting from 1563 by Hans Eworth of Henry Stuart and his brother Charles Stuart in a grand interior based on a print by Hans Vreedman de Vries which may reflect Temple Newsam's Great Chamber
1500 to 1650
In 1537 Thomas, Lord Darcy was executed for the part he played in the Pilgrimage of Grace and the property was seized by the Crown.[7] In 1544 Henry VIII gave it to his niece Lady Margaret Douglas (Countess of Lennox), and she lived there with her husband Matthew Stewart, 4th Earl of Lennox.[7] Their son Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley, who was born in the house in 1545 and educated there, married Mary, Queen of Scots, by whom he was the father of King James VI of Scotland and I of England.[10] A portrait of Henry and his brother was probably intended to represent the interior of Temple Newsam despite being based on a print of an ideal interior.[11] Following the marriage in 1565, Temple Newsam was seized by Queen Elizabeth I and was managed by an agent.[12]
In 1609 King James I, successor to Elizabeth, granted the estate to his Franco-Scottish second cousin Ludovic Stewart, 2nd Duke of Lennox (1574–1624), who was a favourite of the King and given many titles and estates, including farmland and coalmines in the local area.[13] Despite his opportunities, Ludovic was in constant debt and he mortgaged the estate in 1614 for the sum of £9,000 (around £860,000 in today's money).[14] In 1622 Lennox began the sale of the estate to Sir Arthur Ingram (c. 1565 – 1642), a Yorkshire-born London merchant, civil servant, investor in colonial ventures and arms dealer, for £12,000, which he paid in two instalments, the last in July 1624, after Lennox's death.[14] During the next 20 years the mansion was rebuilt, incorporating some of the previous house in the west wing.[8] The north and south wings were rebuilt and the east wing was demolished after a bad fire in 1635.[15] Arthur's son, also called Arthur, inherited the estate with its debts and continued the building and renovation work.[16] Six months after Charles I was beheaded in 1649, Arthur Ingram the younger was declared delinquent and he compounded his estates and retired to Temple Newsam.[17]
1650 to 1900
After the death of Arthur the younger's eldest son, Thomas, in 1660, Temple Newsam was inherited by Arthur's second son, Henry Ingram, 1st Viscount of Irvine (created a peer of Scotland as Baron Ingram and Viscount of Irvine in 1661 - although the family used the English form "Irwin").[18] In 1661, Henry married Lady Essex Montagu, daughter of Edward Montagu, 2nd Earl of Manchester, a favourite of Charles II.[18] The estate then passed through Henry's two sons and five grandsons, the last being Henry Ingram, 7th Viscount of Irvine.[18] The 4th Viscount brought back paintings from his Grand Tour of 1704-7.[19] Extant receipts from 1692 show women as well as men were employed to work the estate in haymaking.[20] In 1712, William Etty designed a new approach to the house, with a bridge and ponds.[21][22] In 1714, Temple Newsam was inherited by Rich Ingram, the 5th Viscount, and his wife Ann who spent a vast fortune furnishing the house and creating the East Avenue.[19] Between 1738 and 1746, Henry Ingram, 7th Viscount of Irvine remodelled the west and north wings of the house, creating new bedrooms and dressing rooms and the picture gallery.[23] A painting in Leeds City Art Gallery by Philippe Mercier of c. 1745 shows Henry and his wife standing in front of Temple Newsam House.[24]
A coloured engraving made in 1699 by J Kip after a drawing by Leonard Knyff showing an aerial view of the house and estate at Temple Newsam
1699 Engraving by J Kip after a drawing by Leonard Knyff
In the 1760s, Charles Ingram, 9th Viscount of Irvine, employed Capability Brown to re-landscape the park on the insistence of his wife, Frances Shepheard, daughter of Samuel Shepheard.[25] Reflecting her interest in pastoral landscape design, Frances is depicted as a shepherdess in a portrait by Benjamin Wilson at Temple Newsam.[25] Both Frances and Charles were actively involved in the design and implementation.[26] Some aspects of Brown's plan depicted in paintings by James Chapman and Michael Angelo Rooker were never completed such as a large lake near the house.[26] Extant financial records show that in 1759 women as well as men were employed as garden labourers.[20] After Charles died in 1778, Frances rebuilt the south wing in 1796; she lived at Temple Newsam until her death in 1807.[27] Charles and Frances's eldest daughter Isabella Ingram, (Marchioness of Hertford) (d.1834) who inherited Temple Newsam, was the mistress of the Prince of Wales (later King George IV) from 1806 to 1819. In 1806, George visited Temple Newsam and presented Isabella with Chinese wallpaper, which she hung in the small Drawing Room next to the Great Hall in around 1820, embellished with cut out birds from Audubon's The Birds of America (now worth £7.5 million).[28] Lady Hertford inherited the house in 1807; after her husband died in 1822 she spent the season in London, and the rest of the time at Temple Newsam where she involved herself in charitable works including distributing food and clothing to the local people.[29] She allowed the servants to hold an annual supper and ball at Temple Newsam.[29] Reports of poachers were made during 1826 and 1827.[30] During the last years of Isabella's life, the canal, railway and roads encroached on the estate as well as coal mining; and she dealt with the companies setting these up.[29] In 1820 the novelist Sir Walter Scott published Ivanhoe featuring a Templar preceptory named Temple Stowe, believed to have been modelled on Temple Newsam; the name is preserved in local road names such as Templestowe Crescent.[31] At her death in 1834, Isabella left Temple Newsam to her widowed sister, Frances Ingram Shepheard, wife of Lord William Gordon, who died in 1841.[32]
Temple Newsam House from Morris's Country Seats (1880)
In 1841 the estate was inherited by Hugo Charles Meynell Ingram (d. 1869), son of Elizabeth Ingram, sister of Frances Ingram (Lady Gordon), who made no alterations to the estate.[33] In 1868, the Prince of Wales stayed at Temple Newsam during his visit to Leeds to open the Fine Art Exhibition in the New Infirmary; temporary triumphal arches were erected on the estate.[34] Following Hugo Charles's death, his son Hugo Meynell-Ingram (d.1871) inherited Temple Newsam; two years later, at his death, his wife Emily Meynell Ingram (d.1904) inherited the estate.[33] Emily spent a large part of her widowhood at Temple Newsam; she developed it considerably by replacing the sash windows and remodelling the dining room, great staircase and Lord Darnley's room.[33] Emily bequeathed Temple Newsam to her nephew Edward Wood, 1st Earl of Halifax.[8]
20th century
In 1909, 610 acres (2.5 km2) of the estate at Knostrop were compulsorily purchased by Leeds Corporation to build a sewage plant.[35] During the First World War (1914–17) the south wing of the house was turned into a hospital by Edward Wood and his wife Dorothy. Edward Wood fought in France as part of the Yorkshire Hussars, whilst Dorothy oversaw the running of the hospital as part of the Mayors War Committee.[36] In 1922 Edward Wood sold the park and house to Leeds Corporation for a nominal sum, placing covenants over them to ensure their preservation for the future.[35]
On 19 October 1923, Temple Newsam was opened to the public along with a golf course.[37] In the Derby Daily Telegraph newspaper, Temple Newsam was compared to Hampton Court.[37] Despite many people visiting the house and using the golf course, the Corporation lost money during the first decade mostly due to poor farming practices.[37] In July 1932, the Great Yorkshire Show was held at Temple Newsam and was a great success.[37] Preparations for war were made as early as April 1939, and in August, small items were being packed up for storage.[37] In September 1939, Temple Newsam was closed to the public and items were moved there for storage from Leeds City Art Gallery.[37] It was decided that objects would be displayed, and the house was officially reopened in November 1939, when it was again likened to Hampton Court in the press.[37]
Architecture
Photograph of entrance porch of Temple Newsam House, Leeds, showing at top the word 'FATHER', below a mullioned window, below a raised portico with coat of arms above a doorway flanked by two Ionic columns on each side.
Entrance Porch 17th century
Photograph of the west front of Temple Newsam
Centre of Temple Newsam west front
Remains of the early 16th century house were retained in the new building, including the brickwork and bay windows in the centre of the west front.[38] The plan of the new house was a conservative E-shape.[38] The Long Gallery and entrance hall in the south wing followed Elizabethan and early Jacobean styles.[38] The entrance porch has Classical columns but they are of Flemish design, rather than following correct Italian design.[38] There are Tudor doorways and timberwork in the cellars, which are largely Tudor in date.[39] Tudor features have also been discovered beneath later layers of decoration, including Lord Darcy's crest scratched into the plaster in the Blue Damask room.[40] An inventory of 1565 indicates that the hall, great chamber (later the dining room), gallery and chapel (later the kitchen) were probably where they are now.[40] There is a Tudor doorway in the north wing which was probably the entrance to the original chapel.[41]
In the 17th century, the south and north wings were rebuilt and the east wing demolished, replaced by a low wall with an arched gateway, giving the house a fashionable 'half-H' appearance.[39] It is possible that the man who made plans for the alteration was Bernard Dinninghof of York.[41] There is also some resemblance to designs by Inigo Jones.[42] Round the top of the house, letters appear in a balustrade, declaring the piety and loyalty of Sir Arthur Ingram: 'ALL GLORY AND PRAISE BE GIVEN TO GOD THE FATHER THE SON AND HOLY GHOST ON HIGH PEACE ON EARTH GOOD WILL TOWARDS MEN HONOUR AND TRUE ALLEGIANCE TO OUR GRACIOUS KING LOVING AFFECTION AMONGST HIS SUBJECTS HEALTH AND PLENTY BE WITHIN THIS HOUSE.'[38] The chapel in the north wing retains some 17th century features, such as armorial stained glass, probably by Henry Gyles and a carved wooden pulpit by Thomas Ventris, made around 1636, with geometric patterns, pilasters and friezes.[38] The walls had panels of Old Testament figures, painted by John Carleton.[38] An inventory dated 1667 records that the House had 66 rooms and 11 outhouses.[39] An engraving by Kip and Knyff dated 1699 is an accurate representation of the house, showing the varying height of the house and some buildings that were later demolished, including the arched gateway flanked by two small lodges and a detached garden building dating from the mid 1670s.[23]
Photograph of stone and brick Sphinx gate piers at Temple Newsam, c. 1760 by Lancelot Brown based on designs published by Lord Burlington in 1738 and used at Chiswick
Sphinx gate piers, c. 1760
Photograph of the mid-18th century stable block at Temple Newsam showing the pediment
Stable Block at Temple Newsam, added by Henry, 7th Lord Irwin
In 1718, the steward of Temple Newsam suggested an underground service passage to link the north and south wings to the 5th Viscount, who agreed.[43] This tunnel linked the original kitchens in the south wing to the rest of the house.[44] In 1738, Henry, 7th Viscount Irwin wrote to his mother describing the neglected state of the house with windows coming away and cracked brickwork.[23] The house was almost entirely remodelled by Henry.[38] He wanted to follow Palladian design and used craftsmen from York to do so.[45] He widened the gallery, improved the ceiling and windows and created additional rooms.[23] The gallery, completed around 1746, has fine Rococo carvings with overmantle paintings of classical scenes by Antonio Joli.[19] There are also elaborate gilded Rococo ornamental candle holders.[19] The gallery ceiling has detailed stucco work including a medallion of King George I.[19] The ceilings in the new Saloon and Library, made from the old Long Gallery, were decorated by Thomas Perritt and Joseph Rose.[45] The doorcases are elaborately carved, probably by Richard Fisher.[45] Two chimney pieces in the Saloon were based on designs by William Kent.[45] The distinctive sphinx gate piers by Lancelot Brown constructed in 1768 were based on designs published by Lord Burlington in 1738 and used at Chiswick.[45][1] The main rooms in the west wing were redecorated and the windows were replaced with sliding sash windows.[45] A large pedimented stable block was built to the north of the house, in 1742 and probably designed by Daniel Garratt, also in the Palladian style.[45][46] A painting by Mercier of around 1749, also shows a planned block to the south and a low wall connecting the north and south wings which were never completed.[23][21]
In 1796, Frances Shepheard employed a Mr Johnson to alter and reface the south wing in a style which tried to copy that of Sir Arthur Ingram's original house.[45] Her approach was a departure from the designs for the wing commissioned by her dead husband from John Carr and Robert Adam, as well as the landscaping by Capability Brown who was also consulted about rebuilding the south wing.[45] The wing was made two storeys high throughout with a suite of reception rooms on the ground floor with state bedchambers above.[27] In the 1790s, the kitchens were moved to the north wing and the original kitchen became a brushing room where servants brushed down nobles returning from hunting parties.[44]
At the end of the 19th century, Emily Meynell Ingram replaced the sash windows with stone mullions and leaded lights and rebuilt the north porch adding the Meynell Ingram coat of arms over the doorway.[27] She redecorated several rooms and had the great oak staircase installed.[27] The dining room, great staircase and Lord Darnley's room were remodelled in Elizabethan style.[33] In 1877, Emily converted the library at the east end of the gallery into a chapel.[47]
Coalmining on the estate
Estate records show the existence of coal pits in and around the park in the seventeenth century and Bell Wood to the south of the house would have had bell pits for coal extraction. A colliery at Halton village was leased to a number of different individuals from 1660 through to at least the 1790s. The leases generally required the leaseholder to supply coals to Temple Newsam house.[48]
In 1815, William Fenton, one of the 'Coal Kings' of Yorkshire,[49] began the sinking of a mine shaft on the estate at Thorpe Stapleton. The colliery was named Waterloo to commemorate the famous battle of that year.[50] Waterloo Colliery was operated as a royalty concession with contracted 'rents' for coal extracted going to the Temple Newsam landowner. Fenton also had a village built for his workers on land between the River Aire and the Aire and Calder navigation. The village was initially called Newmarket but then became Irwin Square on ordnance survey maps[51] and Ingram Place on census lists, but it was commonly simply known as Waterloo. The Yorkshire, Lancashire and England cricketer Albert Ward was born here in 1865. The village had two rows of cottages and a school building. It was connected to the colliery by a wooden footbridge over the river.[52] Deep coal mining on the estate ended with the closure of the Temple Pit of Waterloo Main Colliery in 1968.
Temple Newsam House
Opencast mining on the estate began in May 1942. Seven sites were exploited to the south of the house almost entirely destroying Capability Brown's landscape. One site reached within 330 feet (100 m) of the South Terrace. It continued at the Gamblethorpe site as far as Dawson's Wood, in full view of the house, until 1987.[53] No trace of the opencast remains now as the parkland was re-landscaped.
In 2019 there was a temporary exhibition about coal mining at Temple Newsam which was called 'Blot on the Landscape'.[54]
House and estate today
The house and estate are owned by Leeds City Council and open to the public. The house has undergone substantial restoration to its exterior. There is an established programme of restoring rooms back to known previous configurations, reversing the numerous intrusive installations and modifications that took place during the building's "art museum" phase.
The wider estate is made up of woods (the second largest part of the Forest of Leeds).[55] There are sporting facilities for football, golf, running, cycling, horse-riding and orienteering. There is an innovative children's playground opened in 2011 which caters for both disabled and able-bodied children.[56] Pegasus Wood, to the south of the house, commemorates veterans of the Normandy Landing at Pegasus Bridge in 1944.[57]
Photograph of brick barn at the Home Farm, Temple Newsam
Great Barn, Home Farm, Temple Newsam
The Home Farm, open to the public, has a barn built in 1694 and is the largest working rare breeds farm in Europe, and only one of 16 nationally approved by the Rare Breeds Survival Trust. Breeds include Gloucester, Kerry, Irish Moiled, Red Poll, White Park, British White, Beef Shorthorn, Vaynol and Belted Galloway cattle; Kerry Hill; Whitefaced Woodland and Portland sheep, and Golden Guernsey goats.[58] The farm was targeted by arsonists twice in 2011 with damage caused to buildings, and some animals killed.[59]
There are extensive gardens, with a celebrated rhododendron walk and six national plant collections: Aster novi-belgii (Michaelmas daisies), Phlox paniculata, Delphinium elatum (Cultivars), Solenostemon scutellarioides (sys. Coleus blumei), Primula auricula and Chrysanthemum (Charm and Cascade cultivars).[60] Within the Walled Garden there are 800 yards of herbaceous borders.[61]
Collections
There are substantial holdings of fine and decorative art which are designated by the Department of Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) as being of national significance.[62]
Of most significant historical and cultural interest is the Chippendale Society collection of Chippendale works that are on permanent loan.[63] In his book "Britain's Best Museums and Galleries", Mark Fisher (a former DCMS minister) gave the museum an excellent review. When interviewed on Front Row, Radio 4, November 2004 Fisher placed Temple Newsam House in the top three non-national museums in the country, along with Birmingham's Barber Institute and the Dulwich Picture Gallery.[64]
02 Boeing C-17A Globemaster III
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Croome Court is a mid 18th century Neo-Palladian mansion surrounded by an extensive landscaped parkland at Croome D'Abitot, near Pershore in south Worcestershire. The mansion and park were designed by Lancelot "Capability" Brown for George Coventry, 6th Earl of Coventry, and was Brown's first landscape design and first major architectural project. Some of the internal rooms of the mansion were designed by Robert Adam.
The mansion house is owned by Croome Heritage Trust, and is leased to the National Trust who operate it, along with the surrounding parkland, as a tourist attraction. The National Trust own the surrounding parkland, which is also open to the public.
Location[edit]
Croome Court is located near to Croome D'Abitot, in Worcestershire,[1] near Pirton, Worcestershire.[2] The wider estate was established on lands that were once part of the royal forest of Horewell.[3] Traces of these older landscapes, such as unimproved commons and ancient woodlands, can be found across the former Croome Estate.[4]
House[edit]
Croome Court South Portico
History[edit]
The foundations and core of Croome Court, including the central chimney stack structure, date back to the early 1640s.[5] Substantial changes to this early house were made by Gilbert Coventry, 4th Earl of Coventry.[6]
In 1751, George Coventry, the 6th Earl, inherited the estate, along with the existing Jacobean house. He commissioned Lancelot "Capability" Brown, with the assistance of Sanderson Miller, to redesign the house and estate.[7][1] It was Brown's "first flight into the realms of architecture" and a "rare example of his architectural work",[8] and it is an important and seminal work.[9] It was built between 1751 and 1752, and it and Hagley Hall are considered to be the finest examples of Neo-Palladian architecture in Worcestershire. Notable Neo-Palladian features incorporated into Croome Court include the plain exterior and the corner towers with pyramidal roofs (a feature first used by Inigo Jones in the design of Wilton House in Wiltshire).[1] Robert Adam worked on the interior of the building from 1760 onwards.[10]
The house has been visited by George III,[2][11] as well as Queen Victoria[7] during summers when she was a child, and George V (then Duke of York).[11]
A jam factory was built by the 9th Earl of Coventry, near to Pershore railway station, in about 1880, to provide a market for Vale of Evesham fruit growers in times of surplus. Although the Croome connection with jam making had ceased, during the First World War, the building was leased by the Croome Estate Trust to the Huddersfield Fruit Preserving Company as a pulping station.[12]
The First World War deeply affected Croome, with many local casualties, although the house was not requisitioned for the war effort. This is possibly because it was the home of the Lord Lieutenant of the County, who needed a residence for his many official engagements.[13]
During the Second World War Croome Court was requisitioned by the Ministry of Works and leased for a year to the Dutch Government as a possible refuge for Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands; to escape the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands. However, evidence shows that they stayed two weeks at the most, perhaps because of the noise and fear created by the proximity of Defford Aerodrome. They later emigrated to Canada.[14]
In 1948 the Croome Estate Trust sold the Court, along with 38 acres (15 ha) of land, to the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Birmingham, and the mansion became St Joseph's Special School, which was run by nuns[15] from 1950[11] until 1979.[15]
The house was listed on 11 August 1952; it is currently Grade I listed.[10]
In 1979 the hall was taken over by the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (Hare Krishna movement), who used it as their UK headquarters and a training college[16] called Chaitanya College,[15] run by 25 members of the movement.[16] During their tenure they repainted the Dining Room.[17] In 1984 they had to leave the estate for financial reasons. They held a festival at the hall in 2011.[16]
From 1984 onwards various owners tried to use the property as a training centre; apartments; a restaurant and conference centre; and a hotel and golf course,[15] before once more becoming a private family home,[2][15] with outbuildings converted to private houses.[15]
The house was purchased by the Croome Heritage Trust, a registered charity,[18] in October 2007,[19] and it is now managed by the National Trust as a tourist attraction. It opened to the public in September 2009, at which point six of the rooms had restored, costing £400,000, including the Saloon. It was estimated that another £4 million[2][20] to £4.8 million would be needed to restore the entire building. Fundraising activities for the restoration included a 2011 raffle for a Morgan sports car organised by Lord and Lady Flight. After the restoration is complete, a 999-year lease on the building will be granted to the National Trust.[21] An oral history project to record recollections about Croome was funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund.[15] As of 2009, the service wing was empty and in need of substantial repair.[22]
Exterior[edit]
The mansion is faced with Bath stone,[7] limestone ashlar, and has both north and south facing fronts. It has a basement and two stories, with three stories in the end pavilions. A slate roof, with pyramid roofs over the corner towers, tops the building, along with three pair-linked chimneys along the axis of the house.[10]
Both fronts have 11 bays, split into three central sets of three each, and one additional bay each side. The north face has a pedimented centre, with two balustraded staircases leading to a Roman Doric doorcase. The south face has a projecting Ionic tetrastyle portico and Venetian windows. It has a broad staircase, with cast stone sphinxes on each side, leading to a south door topped with a cornice on consoles. The wings have modillion cornice and balustrade.[10]
A two-story L-shaped service wing is attached to the east side of the mansion. It is made of red brick and stone, with slate roofs.[10] It was designed by Capability Brown in 1751-2.[22] On the far side of the service wing, a wall connects it to a stable court.[10]
Interior[edit]
The interior of the house was designed partially by Capability Brown, with plasterwork by G. Vassalli, and partially by Robert Adam, with plasterwork by J. Rose Jr. It has a central spine corridor. A stone staircase, with iron balusters, is at the east end.[10]
The entrance hall is on the north side of the building, and has four fluted Doric columns, along with moulded doorcases. To the east of the entrance hall is the dining room, which has a plaster ceiling and cornice, while to the west is a billiard room, featuring fielded panelling, a plaster cornice, and a rococo fireplace. The three rooms were probably decorated around 1758-59 by Capability Brown.[10] The dining room was vibrantly repainted by the Hare Krishnas in the 1970s-80s.[17]
The central room on the south side is a saloon, probably by Brown and Vassalli. It has an elaborate ceiling, with three panels, deep coving, and a cornice, along with two Ionic fireplaces, and Palladian doorcases.[10] George III was entertained by George Coventry, the 6th Earl, in the house's Saloon.[2] A drawing room is to the west of the saloon, and features rococo plasterwork and a marble fireplace.[10]
To the east of the saloon is the Tapestry Room.[10] This was designed in 1763-71, based on a design by Robert Adam, and contained tapestries and furniture covers possibly designed by Jacques Germain Soufflot, and made by Manufacture Nationale des Gobelins.[23] Around 1902 the ninth Earl sold the tapestries and seating to a Parisian dealer. In 1949 the Samuel H. Kress Foundation purchased the ceiling, floor, mantlepiece, chair rails, doors and the door surrounds, which were donated to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, in 1958. In 1959 the Kress Foundation also helped the Metropolitan Museum acquire the chair and sofa frames, which they recovered using the original tapestry seats.[7][23] A copy of the ceiling was installed in place of the original.[10] As of 2016, the room is displayed as it would have looked after the tapestries had been sold, with a jug and ewer on display as the only original decoration of the room that remains in it. The adjacent library room is used to explain what happened to the tapestry room;[17] the former library was designed by Adam, and was dismantled except for the marble fireplace.[10]
At the west side of the building is a long gallery,[10] which was designed by Robert Adam and installed between 1761 and 1766. It is the best preserved of the original interior (little of the rest has survived in situ).[1] It has an octagonal panelled ceiling, and plaster reliefs of griffins. A half-hexagonal bay faces the garden. The room also contains a marble caryatid fireplace designed by J Wilton.[10] As of 2016, modern sculptures are displayed in empty niches along the Long Gallery
wikipedia
68008, one of two DRS liveried Class 68 locomotives that has been fitted with the capability to work with Chiltern Railways coaching stock and DVT's, is seen at Birmingham Moor Street after arriving on 1R55 the 16.47 from London Marylebone on Wednesday 3rd June 2015.
Ickworth House, Horringer, Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk
The House was built between the years of 1795 and 1829 to the designs of the Italian Architect Mario Asprucci, his most noted work being the Villa Borghese. It was this work that Frederick Hervey, the then 4th Earl of Bristol and Bishop of Derry had seen.
Asprucci’s plans were then taken up by the brothers Francis & Joseph Sandys, English architects.
The Parkland, of which there is 1,800 acres in total, was designed by Capability Brown and was Italianate in style. This style much loved by the 4th Earl.
Most of the friezes running around the rotunda were based upon John Flaxman’s illustrations of The Iliad and The Odyssey although, within the entrance portico there are some panels designed by Lady Caroline, the Earl’s Granddaughter and are based upon the Roman Olympic Games.
There are many works of art inside the house and very much well worth the visit.
A very hot and dry day at English Heritage, Audley End near Saffron Walden. This is one of the finest Jacobean Houses in England, although it is only a third of its original size today. It was the family seat of the Baybrooke family with grounds laid out by Capability Brown.
SAC-01: NATO Strategic Airlift Capability, Boeing C-17 Globemaster III, brengt equipment voor Noorse F-35's die gaan deelnamen aan de Weapons Instructor Course (WIC)
Broadway Tower is a folly on Broadway Hill, near the village of Broadway, in the English county of Worcestershire, at the second-highest point of the Cotswolds (after Cleeve Hill). Broadway Tower's base is 1,024 feet (312 metres) above sea level. The tower itself stands 65 feet (20 metres) high.
The "Saxon" tower was the brainchild of Capability Brown and designed by James Wyatt in 1794 in the form of a castle, and built for Lady Coventry in 1798–99. The tower was built on a "beacon" hill, where beacons were lit on special occasions. Lady Coventry wondered whether a beacon on this hill could be seen from her house in Worcester — about 22 miles (35 km) away — and sponsored the construction of the folly to find out. Indeed, the beacon could be seen clearly.
Over the years, the tower was home to the printing press of Sir Thomas Phillipps, and served as a country retreat for artists including William Morris and Edward Burne-Jones who rented it together in the 1880s. William Morris was so inspired by Broadway Tower and other ancient buildings that he founded the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings in 1877.
Today, the tower is a tourist attraction and the centre of a country park with various exhibitions open to the public at a fee, as well as a gift shop and restaurant. The place is on the Cotswold Way and can be reached by following the Cotswold Way from the A44 road at Fish Hill, or by a steep climb out of Broadway village.
Near the tower is a memorial to the crew of an A.W.38 Whitley bomber that crashed there during a training mission in June 1943.
Berrington Hall, Leominster, Herefordshire (NT) (Grade 1)
NATIONAL TRUST + ENGLISH HERITAGE ALBUM
www.flickr.com/photos/45676495@N05/albums/72157701116949872
Berrington Hall is a neoclassical country house located about 3 miles North of Leominster. Berrington had been in the possession of the Cornewall family since 1386, but was sold in 1775 to Thomas Harley, a banker and government contractor who in 1767 had been Lord Mayor of London. He commissioned the rebuilding in 1778-1781 of the present Berrington Hall as a replacement for the earlier house. The Hall is designed as a neo-classical building and was designed by Henry Holland n 1778-8. Thomas Harley made it available to his daughter Anne and her new husband George Rodney, the son of Admiral Rodney. After Harley's death the house descended in the Rodney family for 95 years. The Hall and Estate were purchased by Frederick Cawley MP, later Baron Cawley, in 1901, In 1957 the 3rd Lord Cawley transferred it to the Treasury, which passed in on to the National Trust. Lady Cawley was allowed to remain in occupation until her death in 1978.
The Hall is the home to the Elmar Digby furniture collection, paintings by, among others, Thomas Luny (1759–1837), and the Charles Paget Wade costume collection from Snowshill, which can be viewed by appointment The 'below stairs' areas and servants' quarters that are open to the public include a Victorian laundry and Georgian dairy.
The Estates landscape was the last landscape to be designed by Capability Brown's its pool and lake are a Site of Special Scientific Interest.
Thankyou for a massive 57,560,943 views
Shot 11.03.2017 at Berrington Hall, (NT) Leominster, Herefordshire REF 125-014
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Brief On HDR: This image has been intentionally produced as Hyper-real HDR for a being a survey conducted by mavenimagery in association with Photomatix Pro 4 Beta. The result of the survey and gathered data will be published in UK's and US's major Photography magazines. We believe HDRI Technology has become a trend (HDR almost became synonymous with with particular style of tone mapping which is mostly used to produce images with a candy-like garrish colors and 'cartoonish' or more like impressionistic paintings), rather than what it initially was meant to be...it was meant to capture, at least, 14 EVs (Exposure Values) as opposed to the conventional high-end cameras' capability of capturing only a miserable 5-9EV's. Hello? The eye sees, on any given day, 24EV's (1.000.000.000:1 contrast ratio). All the HDR images at mavenimagery are not really HDR images. So are yours, my Flickr-HDR Groups-on-a-High Saturated-horse, sometimes with missing an ear or a tree yonder assailed by "Enemy Photons" that strike your sensor without you being aware...not that would matter if you were aware. You'd still be enslaved to your ignorance (not to be ashamed of) of tone mapping provided you by numerous HDR softwares who themselves are students of HDRI, learning, ripping you off along the way as they're trying to fund their experiments with your money. Think! Harry Potter and George Lucas' Star Trek were the only ones to be produced in HDRI Technology....Now! Do you see any resemblance to the "tone mapping" by current HDR imagine soft wares? I know you don’t! If I only point out excessive obliterated pixels and candy-like saturated colors, I'd make my points. Now, there's nothing with trends or fashion and that 'gritty, garrish HDR look' can be very appealing since we're so accustomed to the glossy images in the media. But they're here for limited time only...Just like break-dance. Fact: as of today, there is no market for HDR images (OK, mavenimagery sold a few for commercial use, but a few doesn't count)...you can't view it, you can print. HDR technology is still in its infancy and may take 10-15 years to be supported by all formats, conventional prints and displays etc. Remember. We're still in transition from DVD to Blu-Ray. It’s been more than 7 seven years and it will take perhaps another 5 years or more to acquire Blu-Ray supported devices. Yes, the current Blu-Ray technology is not real HD either, but this not a concern of this subject, although relatively connected to each other via display devices.
Finally, the image you and I can display or print is not a 32-bit HDR image, but a 32-bit image converted (tone mapped) to 16-bit TIFF (MDR, Medium Dynamic Range)...Aha! (Houston We've got Problem. We can’t post you the Heavenly Colors of the moon in 16-bit TIFF’s either, BUT ONLY in 8-bit jpeg’s. More data loss. We apologize for the inconvenience), and then to 8-bit jpeg for display and prints...an image has to always end in a print. Tip: Save your HDR Images as hdr.<Radiance RGBE until the day comes...and, mean while, enjoy trending and funking, but do not insult our intelligence. Get off your miserable Pony horses, smell the stimulus of coffee and label your work like "Unrealistic HDR. This is not how I saw this image, sorry. This is my interpretation of an artistic image" or "This is sur-realistic....” Whatever the Devil's Horn, it may be!" do not call it HDRI! I cannot stop you from kidding yourself...but the genuine quality and the naked truth will stop you! As it did stop all the trends and fashions...
The Citroën 2CV (French: "deux chevaux" i.e. "deux chevaux-vapeur" (lit. "two steam horses", "two tax horsepower") is an air-cooled front-engine, front-wheel-drive economy car introduced at the 1948 Paris Mondial de l'Automobile and manufactured by Citroën for model years 1948–1990.
Conceived by Citroën Vice-President Pierre Boulanger to help motorise the large number of farmers still using horses and carts in 1930s France, the 2CV has a combination of innovative engineering and utilitarian, straightforward metal bodywork — initially corrugated for added strength without added weight. The 2CV featured low cost; simplicity of overall maintenance; an easily serviced air-cooled engine (originally offering 9 hp); low fuel consumption; and an extremely long-travel suspension offering a soft ride and light off-road capability. Often called "an umbrella on wheels", the fixed-profile convertible bodywork featured a full-width, canvas, roll-back sunroof, which accommodated oversized loads and until 1955 reached almost to the car's rear bumper.
Manufactured in France between 1948 and 1989 (and in Portugal from 1989 to 1990), over 3.8 million 2CVs were produced, along with over 1.2 million small 2CV-based delivery vans known as Fourgonnettes. Citroën ultimately offered several mechanically identical variants including the Ami (over 1.8 million); the Dyane (over 1.4 million); the Acadiane (over 250,000); and the Mehari (over 140,000). In total, Citroën manufactured almost 7 million 2CV variants.
A 1953 technical review in Autocar described "the extraordinary ingenuity of this design, which is undoubtedly the most original since the Model T Ford". In 2011, The Globe and Mail called it a "car like no other". The motoring writer L. J. K. Setright described the 2CV as "the most intelligent application of minimalism ever to succeed as a car", and a car of "remorseless rationality".]
HISTORY
DEVELOPMENT
In 1934, family-owned Michelin, being the largest creditor, took over the bankrupt Citroën company. The new management ordered a new market survey, conducted by Jacques Duclos. France at that time had a large rural population which could not yet afford cars; Citroën used the survey results to prepare a design brief for a low-priced, rugged "umbrella on four wheels" that would enable four people to transport 50 kg of farm goods to market at 50 km/h, if necessary across muddy, unpaved roads. In fuel economy, the car would use no more than 3 l/100 km (95 mpg-imp). One design requirement was that the customer be able to drive eggs across a freshly ploughed field without breaking them.
In 1936, Pierre-Jules Boulanger, vice-president of Citroën and chief of engineering and design, sent the brief to his design team at the engineering department. The TPV (Toute Petite Voiture — "Very Small Car") was to be developed in secrecy at Michelin facilities at Clermont-Ferrand and at Citroën in Paris, by the design team who had created the Traction Avant.
Boulanger was closely involved with all decisions relating to the TPV, and was determined to reduce the weight to targets that his engineers thought impossible. He set up a department to weigh every component and then redesign it, to make it lighter while still doing its job.
Boulanger placed engineer André Lefèbvre in charge of the TPV project. Lefèbvre had designed and raced Grand Prix cars; his speciality was chassis design and he was particularly interested in maintaining contact between tyres and the road surface.
The first prototypes were bare chassis with rudimentary controls, seating and roof; test drivers wore leather flying suits, of the type used in contemporary open biplanes. By the end of 1937 20 TPV experimental prototypes had been built and tested. The prototypes had only one headlight, all that was required by French law at the time. At the end of 1937 Pierre Michelin was killed in a car crash; Boulanger became president of Citroën.
By 1939 the TPV was deemed ready, after 47 technically different and incrementally improved experimental prototypes had been built and tested. These prototypes used aluminium and magnesium parts and had water-cooled flat twin engines with front-wheel drive. The seats were hammocks hung from the roof by wires. The suspension system, designed by Alphonse Forceau, used front leading arms and rear trailing arms, connected to eight torsion bars beneath the rear seat: a bar for the front axle, one for the rear axle, an intermediate bar for each side, and an overload bar for each side. The front axle was connected to its torsion bars by cable. The overload bar came into play when the car had three people on board, two in the front and one in the rear, to support the extra load of a fourth passenger and fifty kilograms of luggage.
In mid-1939 a pilot run of 250 cars was produced and on 28 August 1939 the car received approval for the French market. Brochures were printed and preparations made to present the car, renamed the Citroën 2CV, at the forthcoming Paris Motor Show in October 1939.
WORLD WAR II
On 3 September 1939, France declared war on Germany following that country's invasion of Poland. An atmosphere of impending disaster led to the cancellation of the 1939 motor show less than a month before it was scheduled to open. The launch of the 2CV was abandoned.
During the German occupation of France in World War II Boulanger personally refused to collaborate with German authorities to the point where the Gestapo listed him as an "enemy of the Reich", under constant threat of arrest and deportation to Germany.
Michelin (Citroën's main shareholder) and Citroën managers decided to hide the TPV project from the Nazis, fearing some military application as in the case of the future Volkswagen Beetle, manufactured during the war as the military Kübelwagen. Several TPVs were buried at secret locations; one was disguised as a pickup, the others were destroyed, and Boulanger spent the next six years thinking about further improvements. Until 1994, when three TPVs were discovered in a barn, it was believed that only two prototypes had survived. As of 2003 there were five known TPVs.
By 1941, after an increase in aluminium prices of forty percent, an internal report at Citroën showed that producing the TPV post-war would not be economically viable, given the projected further increasing cost of aluminium. Boulanger decided to redesign the car to use mostly steel with flat panels, instead of aluminium. The Nazis had attempted to loot Citroën's press tools; this was frustrated after Boulanger got the French Resistance to re-label the rail cars containing them in the Paris marshalling yard. They ended up all over Europe, and Citroën was by no means sure they would all be returned after the war. In early 1944 Boulanger made the decision to abandon the water-cooled two-cylinder engine developed for the car and installed in the 1939 versions. Walter Becchia was now briefed to design an air-cooled unit, still of two cylinders, and still of 375 cc. Becchia was also supposed to design a three-speed gearbox, but managed to design a four-speed for the same space at little extra cost. At this time small French cars like the Renault Juvaquatre and Peugeot 202 usually featured three-speed transmissions, as did Citroën's own mid-size Traction Avant - but the 1936 Italian Fiat 500 "Topolino" "people's car" did have a four-speed gearbox. Becchia persuaded Boulanger that the fourth gear was an overdrive. The increased number of gear ratios also helped to pull the extra weight of changing from light alloys to steel for the body and chassis. Other changes included seats with tubular steel frames with rubber band springing and a restyling of the body by the Italian Flaminio Bertoni. Also, in 1944 the first studies of the Citroën hydro-pneumatic suspension were conducted using the TPV/2CV.
The development and production of what was to become the 2CV was also delayed by the incoming 1944 Socialist French government, after the liberation by the Allies from the Germans. The five-year "Plan Pons" to rationalise car production and husband scarce resources, named after economist and former French motor industry executive Paul-Marie Pons, only allowed Citroën the upper middle range of the car market, with the Traction Avant. The French government allocated the economy car market, US Marshall Plan aid, US production equipment and supplies of steel, to newly nationalised Renault to produce their Renault 4CV. The "Plan Pons" came to an end in 1949. Postwar French roads were very different from pre-war ones. Horse-drawn vehicles had re-appeared in large numbers. The few internal combustion-engined vehicles present often ran on town gas stored in gasbags on roofs or wood/charcoal gas from gasifiers on trailers. Only one hundred thousand of the two million pre-war cars were still on the road. The time was known as "Les années grises" or "the grey years" in France.
PRODUCTION
Citroën unveiled the car at the Paris Salon on 7 October 1948. The car on display was nearly identical to the 2CV type A that would be sold the next year, but it lacked an electric starter, the addition of which was decided the day before the opening of the Salon, replacing the pull cord starter. The canvas roof could be rolled completely open. The Type A had one stop light, and was only available in grey. The fuel level was checked with a dip stick/measuring rod, and the speedometer was attached to the windscreen pillar. The only other instrument was an ammeter.In 1949 the first delivered 2CV type A was 375 cc, 9 hp, with a 65 km/h top speed, only one tail light and windscreen wiper with speed shaft drive; the wiper speed was dependent on the driving speed. The car was heavily criticised by the motoring press and became the butt of French comedians for a short while. One American motoring journalist quipped, "Does it come with a can opener?" The British Autocar correspondent wrote that the 2CV "is the work of a designer who has kissed the lash of austerity with almost masochistic fervour".
Despite critics, Citroën was flooded with customer orders at the show. The car had a great impact on the lives of the low-income segment of the population in France. The 2CV was a commercial success: within months of it going on sale, there was a three-year waiting list, which soon increased to five years. At the time a second-hand 2CV was more expensive than a new one because the buyer did not have to wait. Production was increased from 876 units in 1949 to 6,196 units in 1950.
Grudging respect began to emanate from the international press: towards the end of 1951 the opinion appeared in Germany's recently launched Auto, Motor und Sport magazine that, despite its "ugliness and primitiveness" ("Häßlichkeit und Primitivität"), the 2CV was a "highly interesting" ("hochinteressantes") car.
In 1950, Pierre-Jules Boulanger was killed in a car crash on the main road from Clermont-Ferrand (the home of Michelin) to Paris.
In 1951 the 2CV received an ignition lock and a lockable driver's door. Production reached 100 cars a week. By the end of 1951 production totalled 16,288. Citroën introduced the 2CV Fourgonnette van. The "Weekend" version of the van had collapsible, removable rear seating and rear side windows, enabling a tradesman to use it as a family vehicle on the weekend as well as for business in the week.
By 1952, production had reached more than 21,000 with export markets earning foreign currency taking precedence. Boulanger's policy, which continued after his death, was: "Priority is given to those who have to travel by car because of their work, and for whom ordinary cars are too expensive to buy." Cars were sold preferentially to country vets, doctors, midwives, priests and small farmers. In 1954 the speedometer got a light for night driving. In 1955 the 2CV side repeaters were added above and behind the rear doors. It was now also available with 425 cc (AZ), 12.5 hp and a top speed of 80 km/h. In 1957 a heating and ventilation system was installed. The colour of the steering wheel changed from black to grey. The mirrors and the rear window were enlarged. The bonnet was decorated with a longitudinal strip of aluminium (AZL). In September 1957, the model AZLP (P for porte de malle, "boot lid"), appeared with a boot lid panel; previously the soft top had to be opened at the bottom to get to the boot. In 1958 a Belgian Citroën plant produced a higher quality version of the car (AZL3). It had a third side window, not available in the normal version, and improved details.
In 1960 the production of the 375 cc engine ended. The corrugated metal bonnet was replaced by a 5-rib glossy cover.
The 2 CV 4 × 4 2CV Sahara appeared in December 1960. This had an additional engine-transmission unit in the rear, mounted the other way around and driving the rear wheels. For the second engine there was a separate push-button starter and choke. With a gear stick between the front seats, both transmissions were operated simultaneously. For the two engines, there were separate petrol tanks under the front seats. The filler neck sat in the front doors. Both engines (and hence axles) could be operated independently. The spare wheel was mounted on the bonnet. 693 were produced until 1968 and one more in 1971. Many were used by the Swiss Post as a delivery vehicle. Today they are highly collectable.
From the mid-1950s economy car competition had increased — internationally in the form of the 1957 Fiat 500 and 1955 Fiat 600, and 1959 Austin Mini. By 1952, Germany produced a price-competitive car - the Messerschmitt KR175, followed in 1955 by the Isetta - these were microcars, not complete four-door cars like the 2CV. On the French home market, from 1961, the small Simca 1000 using licensed Fiat technology, and the larger Renault 4 hatchback had become available. The R4 was the biggest threat to the 2CV, eventually outselling it.
1960s
In 1960 the corrugated Citroën H Van style "ripple bonnet" of convex swages was replaced (except for the Sahara), with one using six larger concave swages and looked similar until the end of production. The 2CV had suicide doors in front from 1948 to 1964, replaced with front hinged doors from 1965 to 1990.
In 1961 Citroën launched a new model based on the 2CV chassis, with a 4-door sedan body, and a reverse rake rear window: the Citroën Ami. In 1962 the engine power was increased to 14 hp and top speed to 85 km/h. A sun roof was installed. In 1963 the engine power was increased to 16 hp. An electric wiper motor replaced the drive on the speedo. The ammeter was replaced by a charging indicator light. The speedometer was moved from the window frame into the dash. Instead of a dip stick/measuring rod, a fuel gauge was introduced.
Director of publicity Claude Puech came up with humorous and inventive marketing campaigns. Robert Delpire of the Delpire Agency was responsible for the brochures. Ad copy came from Jacques Wolgensinger Director of PR at Citroën. Wolgensinger was responsible for the youth orientated "Raids", 2CV Cross, rallies, the use of "Tin-Tin", and the slogan "More than just a car — a way of life". A range of colours was introduced, starting with Glacier Blue in 1959, then yellow in 1960. In the 1960s 2CV production caught up with demand. In 1966 the 2CV got a third side window. From September 1966 a Belgian-produced variant was sold in Germany with the 602 cc engine and 21 hp Ami6, the 3 CV (AZAM6). This version was only sold until 1968 in some export markets.
In 1967 Citroën launched a new model based on the 2CV chassis, with an updated but still utilitarian body, with a hatchback (a hatchback kit was available from Citroën dealers for the 2CV, and aftermarket kits are available) that boosted practicality: the Citroën Dyane. The exterior is more modern and distinguished by the recessed lights in the fenders and bodywork. Between 1967 and 1983 about 1.4 million were built. This was in response to competition by the Renault 4. The Dyane was originally planned as an upmarket version of the 2CV and was supposed to supersede it, but ultimately the 2CV outlived the Dyane by seven years. Citroën also developed the Méhari off-roader.
From 1961, the car was offered, at extra cost, with the flat-2 engine size increased to 602 cc, although for many years the smaller 425 cc engine continued to be available in France and export markets where engine size determined car tax levels. This was replaced by an updated 435 cc engine in 1968.
1970s
In 1970 the car gained rear light units from the Citroën Ami 6, and also standardised a third side window in the rear pillar on 2CV6 (602 cc) models. From 1970, only two series were produced: the 2CV 4 (AZKB) with 435 cc and the 2CV 6 (Azka) with 602 cc displacement. All 2CVs from this date can run on unleaded fuel. 1970s cars featured rectangular headlights, except the Spécial model. In 1971 the front bench seat was replaced with two individual seats. In 1972 2CVs were fitted with standard three-point seat belts. In 1973 new seat covers, a padded single-spoke steering wheel and ashtrays were introduced.
The highest annual production was in 1974. Sales of the 2CV were reinvigorated by the 1974 oil crisis. The 2CV after this time became as much a youth lifestyle statement as a basic functional form of transport. This renewed popularity was encouraged by the Citroën "Raid" intercontinental endurance rallies of the 1970s where customers could participate by buying a new 2CV, fitted with a "P.O." kit (Pays d'Outre-mer — overseas countries), to cope with thousands of miles of very poor or off-road routes.
1970: Paris–Kabul: 1,300 young people, 500 2CVs, 16,500 km to Afghanistan and back.
1971: Paris–Persepolis: 500 2CVs 13,500 km to Iran and back.
1973: Raid Afrique, 60 2CVs 8000 km from Abidjan to Tunis, the Atlantic capital of Ivory Coast through the Sahara, (the Ténéré desert section was unmapped and had previously been barred to cars), to the Mediterranean capital of Tunisia.
The Paris to Persepolis rally was the most famous. The Citroën "2CV Cross" circuit/off-road races were very popular in Europe.
Because of new emission standards, in 1975 power was reduced from 28 hp to 25 hp. The round headlights were replaced by square ones, adjustable in height. A new plastic grille was fitted.
In July 1975, a base model called the 2CV Spécial was introduced with the 435 cc engine. Between 1975 and 1990 under the name of AZKB "2CV Spécial" a drastically reduced trim basic version was sold, at first only in yellow. The small, square speedometer (which dates back to the Traction Avant), and the narrow rear bumper was installed. Citroën removed the third side window, the ashtray, and virtually all trim from the car. It also had the earlier round headlights. From the 1978 Paris Motor Show the Spécial regained third side windows, and was available in red and white; beginning in mid-1979 the 602 cc engine was installed. In June 1981 the Spécial E arrived; this model had a standard centrifugal clutch and particularly low urban fuel consumption.
1980s
In 1981 a yellow 2CV6 was driven by James Bond (Roger Moore) in the 1981 film For Your Eyes Only. The car in the film was fitted with the flat-4 engine from a Citroën GS which more than doubled the power. In one scene the ultra light 2CV tips over and is quickly righted by hand. Citroën launched a special edition 2CV "007" to coincide with the film; it was fitted with the standard engine and painted yellow with "007" on the front doors and fake bullet hole stickers.
In 1982 all 2CV models got inboard front disc brakes.
In 1988, production ended in France after 40 years but continued at the Mangualde plant in Portugal. This lasted until 1990, when production of the 2CV ended. The 2CV outlasted the Visa, another of the cars which might have been expected to replace it, and was produced for four years after the start of Citroën AX production.
Portuguese-built cars, especially those from when production was winding down, have a reputation in the UK for being much less well made and more prone to corrosion than those made in France. According to Citroën, the Portuguese plant was more up-to-date than the one in Levallois near Paris, and Portuguese 2CV manufacturing was to higher quality standards.
As of October 2016, 3,025 remained in service in the UK.
SPECIAL EDITION SALOON MODELS
The special edition models began with the 1976 SPOT model and continued in the with the 1980 Charleston, inspired by Art-Deco two colour styles 1920s Citroën model colour schemes. In 1981 the 007 arrived. In 1983 the 2CV Beachcomber arrived in the United Kingdom; it was known as "France 3" in France or "Transat" in other continental European markets — Citroën sponsored the French America's Cup yacht entry of that year. In 1985 the two-coloured Dolly appeared, using the "Spécial" model's basic trim rather than the slightly better-appointed "Club" as was the case with the other special editions. In 1986 there was the Cocorico. This means "cock-a-doodle-doo" and tied in with France's entry in the 1986 World Cup. "Le Coq Gaulois" or Gallic rooster is an unofficial national symbol of France. In 1987 came the Bamboo, followed by the 1988 Perrier in association with the mineral water company.
The Charleston, having been presented in October 1980 as a one-season "special edition" was incorporated into the regular range in July 1981 in response to its "extraordinary success". By changing the carburetor to achieve 29 hp a top speed of 115 km/h was achieved. Other changes were a new rear-view mirror and inboard disc brakes at the front wheels. In the 1980s there was a range of four full models:
Spécial
Dolly (an improved version of the Spécial)
Club (discontinued in the early 1980s)
Charleston (an improved version of the Club)
In Germany and Switzerland a special edition called, "I Fly Bleifrei" — "I Fly Lead Free" was launched in 1986, that could use unleaded, instead of then normal leaded petrol and super unleaded. It was introduced mainly because of stricter emissions standards. In 1987 it was replaced by the "Sausss-duck" special edition.
EXPORT MARKETS
The 2CV was originally sold in France and some European markets, and went on to enjoy strong sales in Asia, South America, and Africa. During the post-war years Citroën was very focused on the home market, which had some unusual quirks, like puissance fiscale. The management of Michelin was supportive of Citroën up to a point, and with a suspension designed to use Michelin's new radial tyres the Citroën cars clearly demonstrated their superiority over their competitors' tyres. But they were not prepared to initiate the investment needed for the 2CV (or the Citroën DS for that matter) to truly compete on the global stage. Citroën was always under-capitalised until the 1970s Peugeot takeover. The 2CV sold 8,830,679 vehicles; the Volkswagen Beetle, which was available worldwide, sold 21 million units.
CONSTRUCTION
The level of technology in the 1948 2CV was remarkable for the era. While colours and detail specifications were modified in the ensuing 42 years, the biggest mechanical change was the addition of front disc brakes (by then already fitted for several years in the mechanically similar Citroën Dyane 6), in October 1981 (for the 1982 model year). The reliability of the car was enhanced by the minimalist simplification of the designers, being air-cooled (with an oil cooler), it had no coolant, radiator, water pump or thermostat. It had no distributor either, just a contact breaker system. Except for the brakes, there were no hydraulic parts on original models; damping was by tuned mass dampers and friction dampers.
The 1948 car featured radial tyres, which had just been commercialised; front-wheel drive; rack and pinion steering mounted inside the front suspension cross-tube, away from a frontal impact; rear fender skirts (the suspension design allowed wheel changes without removing the skirts); bolt-on detachable front and rear wings; detachable doors, bonnet (and boot lid after 1960), by "slide out" P-profile sheet metal hinges; flap-up windows, as roll up windows were considered too heavy and expensive.; and detachable full length fabric sunroof and boot lid, for almost pickup-like load-carrying versatility. Ventilation in addition to the sunroof and front flap windows was provided by an opening flap under the windscreen. The car had load adjustable headlights and a heater (heaters were standardised on British economy cars in the 1960s).
BODY
The body was constructed of a dual H-frame platform chassis and aircraft-style tube framework, and a very thin steel shell that was bolted to the chassis. Because the original design brief called for a low speed car, little or no attention was paid to aerodynamics; the body had a drag coefficient of Cd=0.51, high by today's standards but typical for the era.
The 2CV used the fixed-profile convertible, where the doors and upper side elements of its bodywork remain fixed, while its fabric soft top can be opened. This reduces weight and lowers the centre of gravity, and allows the carrying of long or irregularly shaped items, but the key reason was that fabric was cheaper than steel which was in short supply and expensive after the war. The fixed-profile concept was quite popular in this period.
SUSPENSION
The suspension of the 2CV was very soft; a person could easily rock the car side to side dramatically. The swinging arm, fore-aft linked suspension system with inboard front brakes had a much smaller unsprung mass than existing coil spring or leaf spring designs. The design was modified by Marcel Chinon.
The system comprises two suspension cylinders mounted horizontally on each side of the platform chassis. Inside the cylinders are two springs, one for each wheel, mounted at each end of the cylinder. The springs are connected to the front leading swinging arm and rear trailing swinging arm, that act like bellcranks by pull rods (tie rods). These are connected to spring seating cups in the middle of the cylinder, each spring being compressed independently, against the ends of the cylinder. Each cylinder is mounted using an additional set of springs, originally made from steel, called "volute" springs, on later models made from rubber. These allow the front and rear suspension to interconnect. When the front wheel is deflected up over a bump, the front pull rod compresses the front spring inside the cylinder, against the front of the cylinder. This also compresses the front "volute" spring pulling the whole cylinder forwards. That action pulls the rear wheel down on the same side via the rear spring assembly and pull rod. When the rear wheel meets that bump a moment later, it does the same in reverse, keeping the car level front to rear. When both springs are compressed on one side when travelling around a bend, or front and rear wheels hit bumps simultaneously, the equal and opposite forces applied to the front and rear spring assemblies reduce the interconnection. It reduces pitching, which is a particular problem of soft car suspension.
The swinging arms are mounted with large bearings to "cross tubes" that run side to side across the chassis; combined with the effects of all-independent soft springing and excellent damping, keeps the road wheels in contact with the road surface and parallel to each other across the axles at high angles of body roll. A larger than conventional steering castor angle, ensures that the front wheels are closer to vertical than the rears, when cornering hard with a lot of body roll. The soft springing, long suspension travel and the use of leading and trailing arms means that as the body rolls during cornering the wheelbase on the inside of the corner increases while the wheelbase on the outside of the corner decreases. As the corning forces put more of the car's weight on the inside pair of wheels the wheelbase extends in proportion, keeping the car's weight balance and centre of grip constant. promoting excellent road holding. The other key factor in the quality of its road holding is the very low and forward centre of gravity, provided by the position of the engine and transmission.
The suspension also automatically accommodates differing payloads in the car- with four people and cargo on board the wheelbase increases by around 4 cm as the suspension deflects, and the castor angle of the front wheels increases by as much as 8 degrees thus ensuring that ride quality, handling and road holding are almost unaffected by the additional weight. On early cars friction dampers (like a dry version of a multi-plate clutch design) were fitted at the mountings of the front and rear swinging arms to the cross-tubes. Because the rear brakes were outboard, they had extra tuned mass dampers to damp wheel bounce from the extra unsprung mass. Later models had tuned mass dampers ("batteurs") at the front (because the leading arm had more inertia and "bump/thump" than the trailing arm), with hydraulic telescopic dampers / shock absorbers front and rear. The uprated hydraulic damping obviated the need for the rear inertia dampers. It was designed to be a comfortable ride by matching the frequencies encountered in human bipedal motion.
This suspension design ensured the road wheels followed ground contours underneath them closely, while insulating the vehicle from shocks, enabling the 2CV to be driven over a ploughed field without breaking any eggs, as its design brief required. More importantly it could comfortably and safely drive at reasonable speed, along the ill-maintained and war-damaged post-war French Routes Nationales. It was commonly driven "Pied au Plancher" — "foot to the floor" by their peasant owners.
FRONT-WHEEL DRIVE AND GEARBOX
Citroën had developed expertise with front-wheel drive due to the pioneering Traction Avant, which was the first mass-produced steel monocoque front-wheel-drive car in the world. The 2CV was originally equipped with a sliding splined joint, and twin Hookes type universal joints on its driveshafts; later models used constant velocity joints and a sliding splined joint.
The gearbox was a four-speed manual transmission, an advanced feature on an inexpensive car at the time. The gear stick came horizontally out of the dashboard with the handle curved upwards. It had a strange shift pattern: the first was back on the left, the second and third were inline, and the fourth (or the S) could be engaged only by turning the lever to the right from the third. Reverse was opposite first. The idea was to put the most used gears opposite each other — for parking, first and reverse; for normal driving, second and third. This layout was adopted from the H-van's three-speed gearbox.
OTHER
The windscreen wipers were powered by a purely mechanical system: a cable connected to the transmission; to reduce cost, this cable also powered the speedometer. The wipers' speed was therefore dependent on car speed. When the car was waiting at a crossroad, the wipers were not powered; thus, a handle under the speedometer allowed them to be operated by hand. From 1962, the wipers were powered by a single-speed electric motor. The car came with only a speedometer and an ammeter.
The 2CV design predates the invention of disc brake, so 1948–1981 cars have drum brakes on all four wheels. In October 1981, front disc brakes were fitted. Disc brake cars use green LHM fluid – a mineral oil – which is not compatible with standard glycol brake fluid.
ENGINES
The engine was designed by Walter Becchia and Lucien Gerard, with a nod to the classic BMW boxer motorcycle engine. It was an air-cooled, flat-twin, four-stroke, 375 cc engine with pushrod operated overhead valves and a hemispherical combustion chamber. The earliest model developed 9 PS (6.6 kW) DIN (6.5 kW). A 425 cc engine was introduced in 1955, followed in 1968 by a 602 cc one giving 28 bhp (21 kW) at 7000 rpm. With the 602 cc engine, the tax classification of the car changed so that it became a 3CV, but the name remained unchanged. A 435 cc engine was introduced at the same time to replace the 425 cc; the 435 cc engine car was named 2CV 4 while the 602 cc took the name 2CV 6 (a variant in Argentina took the name 3CV). The 602 cc engine evolved to the M28 33 bhp (25 kW) in 1970; this was the most powerful engine fitted to the 2CV. A new 602 cc giving 29 bhp (22 kW) at a slower 5,750 rpm was introduced in 1979. This engine was less powerful, and more efficient, allowing lower fuel consumption and better top speed, but decreased acceleration. All 2CVs with the M28 engine can run on unleaded petrol.
The 2CV used the wasted spark ignition system for simplicity and reliability and had only speed-controlled ignition timing, no vacuum advance taking account of engine load.
Unlike other air-cooled cars (such as the Volkswagen Beetle and the Fiat 500) the 2CV's engine had no thermostat valve in its oil system. The engine needed more time for oil to reach normal operating temperature in cold weather. All the oil passed through an oil cooler behind the fan and received the full cooling effect regardless of the ambient temperature. This removes the risk of overheating from a jammed thermostat that can afflict water- and air-cooled engines and the engine can withstand many hours of running under heavy load at high engine speeds even in hot weather. To prevent the engine running cool in cold weather (and to improve the output of the cabin heater) all 2CVs were supplied with a grille blind (canvas on early cars and a clip-on plastic item called a "muff" in the owner's handbook, on later ones) which blocked around half the aperture to reduce the flow of air to the engine.
The engine's design concentrated on the reduction of moving parts. The cooling fan and dynamo were built integrally with the one-piece crankshaft, removing the need for drive belts. The use of gaskets, seen as another potential weak point for failure and leaks, was also kept to a minimum. The cylinder heads are mated to the cylinder barrels by lapped joints with extremely fine tolerances, as are the two halves of the crankcase and other surface-to-surface joints.
As well as the close tolerances between parts, the engine's lack of gaskets was made possible by a unique crankcase ventilation system. On any 2-cylinder boxer engine such as the 2CV's, the volume of the crankcase reduces by the cubic capacity of the engine when the pistons move together. This, combined with the inevitable small amount of "leakage" of combustion gases past the pistons leads to a positive pressure in the crankcase which must be removed in the interests of engine efficiency and to prevent oil and gas leaks. The 2CV's engine has a combined engine "breather" and oil filler assembly which contains a series of rubber reed valves. These allow positive pressure to escape the crankcase (to the engine air intake to be recirculated) but close when the pressure in the crankcase drops as the pistons move apart. Because gases are expelled but not admitted this creates a slight vacuum in the crankcase so that any weak joint or failed seal causes air to be sucked in rather than allowing oil to leak out.
These design features made the 2CV engine highly reliable; test engines were run at full speed for 1000 hours at a time, equivalent to driving 80,000 km at full throttle. They also meant that the engine was "sealed for life" — for example, replacing the big-end bearings required specialised equipment to dismantle and reassemble the built-up crankshaft, and as this was often not available the entire crankshaft had to be replaced. The engine is very under-stressed and long-lived, so this is not a major issue.
If the starter motor or battery failed, the 2CV had the option of hand-cranking, the jack handle serving as starting handle through dogs on the front of the crankshaft at the centre of the fan. This feature, once universal on cars and still common in 1948 when the 2CV was introduced, was kept until the end of production in 1990.
PERFORMANCE
In relation to the 2CV's performance and acceleration, it was joked that it went "from 0–60 km/h in one day". The original 1948 model that produced 9 hp had a 0–40 time of 42.4 seconds and a top speed of 64 km/h, far below the speeds necessary for North American highways or the German Autobahns of the day. The top speed increased with engine size to 80 km/h in 1955, 84 km/h in 1962, 100 km/h in 1970, and 115 km/h in 1981.
The last evolution of the 2CV engine was the Citroën Visa flat-2, a 652 cc featuring electronic ignition. Citroën never sold this engine in the 2CV, but some enthusiasts have converted their 2CVs to 652 engines, or even transplanted Citroën GS or GSA flat-four engines and gearboxes.
In the mid-1980s Car magazine editor Steve Cropley ran and reported on a turbocharged 602 cc 2CV that was developed by engineer Richard Wilsher.
END OF PRODUCTION
The 2CV was produced for 42 years, the model finally succumbing to customer demands for speed, in which this ancient design had fallen significantly behind modern cars, and safety. Although the front of the chassis was designed to fold up, to form a crumple zone according to a 1984 Citroën brochure, in common with other small cars of its era its crashworhiness was very poor by modern standards. (The drive for improved safety in Europe happened from the 1990s onwards, and accelerated with the 1997 advent of Euro NCAP.) Its advanced underlying engineering was ignored or misunderstood by the public, being clothed in an anachronistic body. It was the butt of many a joke, especially by Jasper Carrott in the UK.
Citroën had attempted to replace the ultra-utilitarian 2CV several times (with the Dyane, Visa, and the AX). Its comically antiquated appearance became an advantage to the car, and it became a niche product which sold because it was different from anything else on sale. Because of its down-to-earth economy car style, it became popular with people who wanted to distance themselves from mainstream consumerism — "hippies" — and also with environmentalists.
Although not a replacement for the 2CV, the AX supermini, a conventional urban runabout, unremarkable apart from its exceptional lightness, seemed to address the car makers' requirements at the entry level in the early 1990s. Officially, the last 2CV, a Charleston, which was reserved for Mangualde's plant manager, rolled off the Portuguese production line on 27 July 1990, although five additional 2CV Spécials were produced afterwards.[citation needed]
In all a total of 3,867,932 2CVs were produced. Including the commercial versions of the 2CV, Dyane, Méhari, FAF, and Ami variants, the 2CV's underpinnings spawned 8,830,679 vehicles.
The 2CV was outlived by contemporaries such as the Mini (out of production in 2000), Volkswagen Beetle (2003), Renault 4 (1992), Volkswagen Type 2 (2013) and Hindustan Ambassador (originally a 1950s Morris Oxford), (2014).
CONTINUED POPULARITY
The Chrysler CCV or Composite Concept Vehicle developed in the mid-1990s is a concept car designed to illustrate new manufacturing methods suitable for developing countries. The car is a tall, roomy four-door sedan of small dimensions. The designers at Chrysler said they were inspired to create a modernised 2CV.
The company Sorevie of Lodève was building 2CVs until 2002. The cars were built from scratch using mostly new parts. But as the 2CV no longer complied with safety regulations, the cars were sold as second-hand cars using chassis and engine numbers from old 2CVs.
The long-running 2CV circuit racing series organized by The Classic 2CV Racing Club continues to be popular in the UK.
English nicknames include "Flying Dustbin", "Tin Snail", "Dolly", "Tortoise"
WIKIPEDIA
A Toyota Global Icon for Nearly 70 Years
10 Million Land Cruisers Sold … and Counting
Today: A Leader in Luxury and Capability
2020 Heritage Edition Marks Continuous Presence in U.S. Since 1958
PLANO, Texas (November 14, 2019) – Can a vehicle really be in a class of one? In America in 1958, the Toyota Land Cruiser was. That’s because Toyota sold just a single Land Cruiser in the United States in its first year here. Just one. But then, legends sometimes get off to a slow start.
That legend had global impact, as reflected in Toyota selling its 10 millionth Land Cruiser in summer 2019 in Australia, Land Cruiser’s largest market. (The total includes some Land Cruiser models that were not imported to the U.S.)
As one of today’s most luxurious full-capability SUVs, the 2020 Land Cruiser might seem to have little in common with the bare-bones Land Cruiser models built through the late 1970s. Yet, Land Cruisers new and classic are connected through the decades by world-renowned capability, an adventurous streak, and the shared Toyota core values of quality, dependability and reliability.
For 2020, a limited-availability Land Cruiser Heritage Edition honors this vehicle’s constant presence in Toyota’s U.S. lineup since 1958. The choice of Midnight Black Metallic or Blizzard Pearl exterior color, plus bronze-colored BBS® forged aluminum wheels, heritage badges and other exclusive exterior design and interior appointments, commemorate this milestone in a characteristically understated way.
The Beginning: 75 Horsepower and Climbing Mt. Fuji
Land Cruiser heritage stretches back to 1950 and a vehicle originally developed for military use. Japan’s National Police Reserve Forces had called for a rugged, locally built all-terrain four-wheel drive vehicle, and Toyota demonstrated a highly capable little truck known as the Toyota BJ. Its 3.4-liter inline six-cylinder engine made 75 horsepower with plenty of low-speed torque, just what such a vehicle needed.
The Toyota BJ proved its mettle in July 1951, when Toyota test driver Ichiro Taira drove one up the trail on Japan’s 12,388-foot-high Mt. Fuji, making it to the sixth checkpoint (there were, and still are, 10 checkpoints). That was further up the mountain than any motor vehicle had ever gone before. Although the National Police Reserve Forces passed on Toyota’s plucky BJ, Japan’s National Police Agency ordered a fleet, as did government forestry and utility agencies.
In 1954, Toyota gave the BJ a new name: Land Cruiser was suggested by Toyota Director of Technology Hanji Umehara, who observed that the vehicle seemed to easily cruise over the roughest terrain.
Land Cruiser 20 Series
For 1955, Toyota introduced the Land Cruiser 20 Series, now with a more powerful 3.9-liter inline-six. It was still a Spartan machine, but with some suspension changes to improve the ride. Toyota’s all-terrain workhorse found early markets in South America and the Middle East, and an upgraded model in 1955 had doors and a metal top.
Toyota added more body styles for the 20 Series, including a pickup truck, station wagon, and a cab/chassis fire truck version. The Land Cruiser became the basis of Toyota’s export strategy, using the vehicle to establish a reputation of toughness.
On October 31, 1957, Toyota Motor Sales, U.S.A., Inc. opened in a former Rambler dealership in Hollywood, California. Vehicle sales began in 1958, with the aforementioned single Land Cruiser, along with 287 Toyopet Crown sedans. It was a start.
Birth of a Legend: Land Cruiser FJ40
The Land Cruiser 20 Series continued for a few more years before a major change came in 1960. The 40 Series, a.k.a FJ40, looked evolutionary, but there was more to it than met the eye. The chassis with solid front and rear axles on leaf springs continued, as did the fold-down windshield. But angular styling, a flat, white roof, wraparound rear windows and short overhangs established a new look, soon to become iconic. Improved assembly processes raised quality and finish.
The inline-six produced 125 horsepower and 200 lb-ft of torque, more than other utility vehicles offered at the time. The FJ40 was the first Land Cruiser with a two-speed transfer case, which improved off-road capability and greatly contributed to the Land Cruiser legend. (The 20 Series had relied on a super-low 5.53:1 first-gear ratio for handling steep inclines.)
The FJ40 came to the U.S. in 1960 and was Toyota’s best-selling vehicle here through 1965, when the Corona passenger car arrived and took over that mantle.
Featured image: 1977 Toyota Land Cruiser FJ40
Family Matters
By the mid-1960s, many customers were seeking larger 4-wheel drive vehicles, for businesses such as ranching and surveying, as well as for sportsman and family outdoors activities. Toyota responded with the Land Cruiser 55 Series wagon model in 1967, built on a 16-inch longer wheelbase and featuring its own, modern styling and an improved version of the 3.9-liter inline-six. Toyota became the third-best-selling import brand in the United States that year.
As global demand for these mountain goats on wheels steadily increased, Toyota expanded Land Cruiser production to additional countries. Toyota built its 100,000th Land Cruiser model in 1968, and the 300,000th in 1973.
While Land Cruisers were not high-volume vehicles, an intensely loyal global following had made them icons of Toyota’s global family. There was no doubt that the Land Cruiser’s reputation for durability had positively impacted the Toyota passenger car line in all markets. This minimalist, trail-conquering machine had become a sort of brand halo vehicle.
Both the 40-series and 55-series Land Cruisers gained a new 4.2-liter inline-six in 1975, and a 4-speed transmission replaced the 3-speed. In 1979, the FJ40 retailed for about $6,000 in the U.S., and, with neither air conditioning nor power steering, was still a back-to-basics SUV. By then, however, it was clear that another evolutionary step was needed.
Featured image: 1977 Toyota Land Cruiser 55 Series
One Era Ends, Another Begins
For 1980, Toyota replaced the Land Cruiser 55 Series with the all-new 60 Series (FJ60), which offered greater comfort while still retaining the rugged capability. The one millionth Land Cruiser was built that year.
Toyota ended FJ40 sales in the U.S. in 1983 and stopped building the landmark vehicle the following year. (A new model, the Land Cruiser 70 Series, replaced the FJ40 in many markets, though not in the U.S.) In 2007, Toyota introduced the FJ Cruiser, a rugged though comfortable SUV inspired by the FJ40’s design and built using some components from a Land Cruiser model called the Prado (J120). The FJ40, meanwhile, has today become a collectible vehicle, with some selling at major auctions for $50,000+.
Featured image: 1984 Toyota Land Cruiser FJ60
Land Cruiser Muscles Up
The Land Cruiser 60 Series evolved slowly through the 1980s, a decade that would see significant growth in the SUV market. The 1988 Land Cruiser was updated with a new dash and upgraded interior, and a new 155-horsepower 3F 4.0-liter engine replaced the old 4.2 liter. Rectangular headlamps immediately identify the 1988 model.
More evolution was needed, especially in the U.S. market, where the SUV market was rapidly expanding. Introduced in spring 1990 as a 1991 model, the Land Cruiser 80 Series represented a major leap forward for the vehicle. Coil springs for the front suspension improved ride quality, and for the first time in a Land Cruiser, a full-time 4-wheel drive system could be used in all conditions, including dry roads. A locking center differential ensured off-road capability, something many Land Cruiser owners used.
By 1991, leather-trim seats, air conditioning, upgraded audio and other amenities were pushing the Land Cruiser into luxury territory. Safety evolved, too, with airbags and ABS braking. For 1993, Toyota endowed the Land Cruiser with an all-new, 24-valve, DOHC 4.5-liter inline-six engine producing 212 horsepower and 275 pound-feet of torque, the added power making the Land Cruiser an even better tow vehicle than before.
Featured image: 1991 Toyota Land Cruiser 80 Series
Despite its plusher appointments, the Land Cruiser 80 Series remained a highly capable trail warrior, now also equipped with front and rear locking differentials. The 80 Series also became the basis for the Lexus LX 450, the luxury brand’s first-ever SUV.
Toyota Land Cruiser 100 Series: Power and Luxury on the Rise
Land Cruiser evolved more quickly in the 1990s, becoming a versatile, rugged and comfortable everyday family vehicle for many customers. Then came a major leap: The Land Cruiser 100 Series introduced for 1998 was sleeker, but still with a shape defined by function. The new chassis was 50 percent stiffer, and the ride was more comfortable thanks to Land Cruiser’s first independent front suspension. For the first time, the Land Cruiser’s engine was not an inline six, but rather a 4.7-liter V8 with 230-horsepower. For 2006, output increased to 275 hp.
As plush as the Land Cruiser had become, it was as capable as ever, with steep approach and departure angles for trail driving, along with automatic height adjustment suspension. The V8 delivered 80 percent of its peak torque at just 1,100 rpm, burnishing Land Cruiser’s towing performance and off-road chops. This was a vehicle that could conquer the trail while coddling its passengers. The more luxurious Lexus version was the LX 470.
The somewhat smaller Land Cruiser Prado (J120), meanwhile, became the basis for the Lexus GX 470 SUV in 2003, and the basic chassis also underpinned the fourth generation Toyota 4Runner. This 120 Series evolved into the 150 Series, achieving its best-equipped and most luxurious form as the Lexus GX 460 with a 301-hp 4.6-liter V8.
Featured image: 2004 Toyota Land Cruiser 100 Series
Toyota Land Cruiser 200 Series
If the 100 Series Land Cruiser had been blazing a trail to premium luxury, the 200 Series certainly reached that destination when introduced in 2008. The current-generation Land Cruiser created a benchmark for combining no-compromise capability with premium luxury.
The Land Cruiser’s brawny yet refined 381-horsepower 5.7-liter DOHC V8 engine produces 401 lb.-ft. of torque, channeled through an 8-speed Electronically Controlled Automatic Transmission with intelligence (ECT-i). The versatile full-time 4WD system uses a TORSEN limited-slip locking center differential and a 2-speed transfer case with selectable low-range.
The modern Land Cruiser’s roots show in its tough-as-nails body-on-frame construction. Its sophisticated chassis with Kinetic Dynamic Suspension System (KDSS) provides exceptional ride comfort, while a full array of advanced chassis technologies, including Downhill Assist Control, Hill Start Assist, CRAWL Control, and Off-Road Turn Assist, make Land Cruiser adept at handling difficult trails.
Beneath the polished, elegant exterior, the Land Cruiser is all business, with skid plates to help protect the front suspension, radiator, fuel tank, and transfer case. With its standard Trailer Towing Package, the Land Cruiser can pull a trailer up to 8,100 pounds.
Using the Multi-Terrain Select system, the driver can tailor the Land Cruiser’s wheel slip control to the surface and driving conditions. The Multi-Terrain Monitor provides nearly 360-degree visibility on tight trails, displaying potential obstacles on the 9-inch touchscreen.
Featured image: 2020 Toyota Land Cruiser Heritage Edition
Roughing It Doesn’t Have to be Rough
No matter how difficult the road or trail gets, the 2020 Toyota Land Cruiser indulges its occupants in comfort. Among the premium luxury features are leather-trimmed seating for up to eight, ventilated front seats, heated steering wheel with power tilt and telescoping and memory, power moonroof, four-zone automatic climate control with 28 cabin air vents, a refrigerated compartment inside the center console, and much more.
Musically speaking, the Land Cruiser is lightyears beyond the AM/FM stereo offered in the 1980s FJ60 model. The 2020 Land Cruiser’s standard Toyota Premium Audio with JBL® and Integrated Navigation features 14 JBL speakers, split-screen capability, advanced voice recognition, Siri® Eyes Free mode, SiriusXM® Satellite Radio, Bluetooth® connectivity and music streaming, and Qi wireless phone charging with compatible phones.
All 2020 Land Cruiser models come standard with Toyota Safety Sense P (TSS-P), which includes Pre-Collision System with Pedestrian Detection, Lane Departure Alert with Sway Warning System, Automatic High Beams and High-Speed Dynamic Radar Cruise Control (DRCC). In addition, Blind Spot Monitor and Rear Cross Traffic Alert are also standard.
Featured image: 2020 Toyota Land Cruiser
Brand Cornerstone
In 2018, Toyota sold 318,000 Land Cruiser models worldwide (all versions included), with Australia the largest market. The U.S. takes a few thousand per year, and while that’s a huge leap over the single Land Cruiser sold here in 1958, Toyota’s flagship SUV remains a proud cornerstone on which the brand’s success was built.
The first two Galileo Full Operational Capability satellites (SAT 5-6) during preparations inside the S5A building, before fuelling operations, on 30 July 2014.
The launch of the two Galileo satellites, aboard a Soyuz rocket, is set for August 2014, from Europe's Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana.
The definition, development and in-orbit validation phases of the Galileo programme were carried out by ESA and co-funded by ESA and the EU. The Full Operational Capability phase is managed and fully funded by the European Commission. The Commission and ESA have signed a delegation agreement by which ESA acts as design and procurement agent on behalf of the Commission.
Credit: ESA–S. Corvaja, 2014
In the parkland at Bleheim Palace, Capability Brown's Grand Cascade, the Swiss Bridge, and the Victorian pumphouse.
The Château de Châteauneuf-sur-Loire is a French castle, built in the 17th and 18th centuries, located in Châteauneuf-sur-Loire in the department of Loiret in the Centre-Val de Loire region.
The Loire Navy Museum (French: Musée de la Marine de Loire) is located in the old stables of the castle.
Geography
Originally, the castle was built in the former province of Orléanais of the Kingdom of France.
The building is located in the natural region of the Loire Valley, at the corner of the Douves and Aristide-Briand squares, in the town center of the commune, near the north bank of the Loire.
History
The construction of the castle began in the 17th century. Certain parts and structures of the seigneurial residence are made using a yellow calcareous stone from the quarries of the town of Apremont-sur-Allier. The blocks of stone were then transported by waterway via the course of the Allier, then that of the Loire using flat-bottomed boats.
It was bought between 1792 and 1794 by the Orléans architect Benoît Lebrun who had a large part of the building destroyed. It retained only the rotunda, a gallery, the orangery, the outbuildings and the entrance pavilions. He died there on September 29, 1819.
The commune of Châteauneuf-sur-Loire bought the castle in 1926 and set up schools and the town hall there.
Park
The organization of the park, dating from the 17th century, first followed the influence of André Le Nôtre, gardener to the King of France in the 17th century. In 1821, the space was remodeled into an English-style park under the impetus of René Charles Huillard d'Hérou.
The park extends over twenty hectares and includes a river that connects the castle moat to the banks of the Loire.
In 1934, the General Council of Loiret became the owner of the park and managed its development.
Notable flora include the alley of arborescent rhododendrons and azaleas, giant magnolias and tulip trees. The park is home to around 30 remarkable trees, including a Japanese pagoda tree and a Virginia tulip tree registered since June 2009 in the directory of remarkable trees in France.
The reconstruction of the Temple of Love originally built in the park in the 18th century was carried out by students from the Lycée Gaudier-Brzeska in Saint-Jean-de-Braye and inaugurated on February 14, 2009.
In 2010-2011, the General Council of Loiret developed 7 hectares of the park in order to clean up the park's wetlands and connect the promenade to the Loire.
Châteauneuf-sur-Loire is a commune in the Loiret department in north-central France.
Population
Historical population
YearPop.±% p.a.
19684,850—
19755,528+1.89%
19825,998+1.17%
19906,558+1.12%
19997,032+0.78%
20077,801+1.31%
20127,926+0.32%
20178,126+0.50%
Twin towns
Portugal Amarante, Portugal
Germany Bad Laasphe, Germany
André Le Nôtre (French pronunciation; 12 March 1613 – 15 September 1700), originally rendered as André Le Nostre, was a French landscape architect and the principal gardener of King Louis XIV of France. He was the landscape architect who designed the gardens of the Palace of Versailles; his work represents the height of the French formal garden style, or jardin à la française.
Prior to working on Versailles, Le Nôtre collaborated with Louis Le Vau and Charles Le Brun on the park at Vaux-le-Vicomte. His other works include the design of gardens and parks at Bicton Park Botanical Gardens, Chantilly, Fontainebleau, Saint-Cloud and Saint-Germain. His contribution to planning was also significant: at the Tuileries he extended the westward vista, which later became the avenue of the Champs-Élysées and comprise the Axe historique.
Biography
Early life
André Le Nôtre was born in Paris, into a family of gardeners. Pierre Le Nôtre, who was in charge of the Tuileries Garden in 1572, may have been his grandfather. André's father Jean Le Nôtre was also responsible for sections of the Tuileries gardens, initially under Claude Mollet, and later as head gardener, during the reign of Louis XIII. André was born on 12 March 1613, and was baptised at the Église Saint-Roch. His godfather at the ceremony was an administrator of the royal gardens, and his godmother was the wife of Claude Mollet.
The family lived in a house within the Tuilieries, and André thus grew up surrounded by gardening, and quickly acquired both practical and theoretical knowledge. The location also allowed him to study in the nearby Palais du Louvre, part of which was then used as an academy of the arts. He learned mathematics, painting and architecture, and entered the atelier of Simon Vouet, painter to Louis XIII, where he met and befriended the painter Charles Le Brun. He learned classical art and perspective, and studied for several years under the architect François Mansart, a friend of Le Brun.
Career
In 1635, Le Nôtre was named the principal gardener of the king's brother Gaston, Duke of Orléans. On 26 June 1637, Le Nôtre was appointed head gardener at the Tuileries, taking over his father's position. He had primary responsibility for the areas of the garden closest to the palace, including the orangery built by Simon Bouchard. In 1643 he was appointed "draughtsman of plants and terraces" for Anne of Austria, the queen mother, and from 1645 to 1646 he worked on the modernisation of the gardens of the Palace of Fontainebleau.
He was later put in charge of all the royal gardens of France, and in 1657 he was further appointed Controller-General of the Royal Buildings. There are few direct references to Le Nôtre in the royal accounts, and Le Nôtre himself seldom wrote down his ideas or approach to gardening. He expressed himself purely through his gardens. He became a trusted advisor to Louis XIV, and in 1675 he was ennobled by the King. He and Le Brun even accompanied the court at the Siege of Cambrai (1677).
In 1640, he married Françoise Langlois. They had three children, although none survived to adulthood.
Vaux-le-Vicomte
André Le Nôtre's first major garden design was undertaken for Nicolas Fouquet, Louis XIV's Superintendent of Finances. Fouquet began work on the Château de Vaux-le-Vicomte in 1657, employing the architect Louis Le Vau, the painter Charles Le Brun, and Le Nôtre. The three designers worked in partnership, with Le Nôtre laying out a grand, symmetrical arrangement of parterres, pools and gravel walks. Le Vau and Le Nôtre exploited the changing levels across the site, so that the canal is invisible from the house, and employed forced perspective to make the grotto appear closer than it really is. The gardens were complete by 1661, when Fouquet held a grand entertainment for the king. But only three weeks later, on 10 September 1661, Fouquet was arrested for embezzling state funds, and his artists and craftsmen were taken into the king's service.
Versailles
From 1661, Le Nôtre worked for Louis XIV to build and enhance the garden and parks of the Palace of Versailles. Louis extended the existing hunting lodge, eventually making it his primary residence and seat of power. Le Nôtre also laid out the radiating city plan of Versailles, which included the largest avenue yet seen in Europe, the Avenue de Paris.
In the following century, the Versailles design influenced Pierre Charles L'Enfant's master plan for Washington, D.C. See, L'Enfant Plan.
Other gardens
France
In 1661, Le Nôtre was also working on the gardens at the Palace of Fontainebleau. In 1663 he was engaged at the Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye, and the Château de Saint-Cloud, residence of Philippe I, Duke of Orléans, where he would oversee works for many years. Also from 1663, Le Nôtre was engaged at the Château de Chantilly, the property of the Prince de Condé, where he worked with his brother-in-law Pierre Desgots until the 1680s. From 1664 he was rebuilding the gardens of the Tuileries, at the behest of Colbert, Louis's chief minister, who still hoped the king would remain in Paris. In 1667 Le Nôtre extended the main axis of the gardens westward, creating the avenue which would become the Champs-Élysées. Colbert commissioned Le Nôtre in 1670, to alter the gardens of his own Château de Sceaux, which was ongoing until 1683.
Abroad
Le Nôtre's most impressive design other than Versailles is the gardens of Bicton Park Botanical Gardens in Devon, England which can still be visited today. In 1662, he provided designs for Greenwich Park in London, for Charles II of England. In 1670 Le Nôtre conceived a project for the Castle of Racconigi in Italy, and between 1674 and 1698 he remodelled the gardens of the Palace of Venaria, and the Royal Palace of Turin. In 1679, he visited Italy.
Final works
Between 1679 and 1682, he was involved in the planning of the gardens of Château de Meudon for François-Michel le Tellier, Marquis de Louvois, and in 1691 redid the garden of the Hôtel de Saint-Aignan in Paris.
His work has often been favorably compared and contrasted ("the antithesis") to the œuvre of Capability Brown, the English landscape architect.
List of principal gardens by Le Nôtre
17th-century engraving of the gardens of the Château de Chantilly
Plan of the Château de Braine and its gardens
Gardens of Versailles, city plan of Versailles
Gardens of Bicton Park Botanical Gardens
Gardens of Vaux-le-Vicomte
Gardens of the Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye
Gardens of the Château de Saint-Cloud (the château no longer stands but the gardens still exist)
Gardens of the Palais des Tuileries
Gardens of the Château de Sceaux
Gardens of the Château de Fontainebleau
Gardens of the Château de Chantilly
Gardens of the Château de Bercy (demolished), Charenton-le-Pont
Gardens of the Château de Braine (demolished, Braine, Aisne)
Gardens of the Château de Chambonas
Gardens of the Château d'Issy (demolished)
Gardens of the Château de Chenailles
In popular culture
André Le Nôtre was played by Matthias Schoenaerts in the 2014 film A Little Chaos.
The A400M "Atlas" is the most advanced, proven and certified airlifter available, combining 21st century state-of-the-art technologies to fulfil the current and upcoming armed forces’ needs.
The A400M combines the capability to carry strategic loads with the ability to deliver even into tactical locations with small and unprepared airstrips and can act as a frontline-tanker. One aircraft that can do the work of three – the A400M
+++ DISCLAIMER +++
Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based historical facts. BEWARE!
Some background
The Imperial Japanese Army Air Force's fighter force, especially the Nakajima Ki-43, had been underestimated in its capability, numbers and the strategy of its commanders. Within a few months, Japanese forces had conquered vast areas of the Pacific and South East Asia. During these campaigns, the ill-prepared Allied air forces in the Pacific suffered devastating losses.
Because of political and cultural ties between the United Kingdom and Australia, British manufacturers were the main source of RAAF aircraft. However, the British aircraft industry had long been hard-pressed to meet the needs of the RAF. Although United States companies had enormous aircraft manufacturing capacity, their output was now intended first and foremost for US air units. Even if aircraft built overseas did become available, they would be shipped long distances in wartime conditions, with consequent delays and losses. As a consequence, CAC came into its own with the development of the Boomerang fighter, which was not operational before late 1942.
Following the outbreak of war with Japan, 51 Hurricane Mk IIs were sent as a stop-gap in crates to Singapore, with 24 pilots, the nucleus of five squadrons. They arrived on 3 January 1942, by which time the Allied fighter squadrons in Singapore, flying Brewster Buffalos, had been overwhelmed in the Malayan campaign. Even though the Hurricanes were a significant progress, they suffered in performance.
Because of inadequate early warning systems, Japanese air raids were able to destroy 30 Hurricanes on the ground in Sumatra, most of them in one raid on 7 February. After Japanese landings in Singapore, on 10 February, only 18 serviceable Hurricanes remained out of the original 99. After Java was invaded, some of the pilots were evacuated by sea to Australia. 31 Hurricane airframes, which had been on the wayby ship, not been assembled and lacked Merlin engines, were directed to Australia in the wake of events.
From these unfinished machines, the Hurricane Mk. VI was quickly devised: the airframes were mated with P&W Twin Wasp engines, which were produced under license at the CAC plant in Lidcombe, Sydney, for the RAAF's Boomerang and Bristol Beaufort. It was clear from the start that these Twin Wasp-powered machines would rather be stop-gaps and no true fighters, rather fighter bombers and more suited for the ground attack role. Hence, like the latest fighters at the time, planning for the Mk. VI included automatic cannons. As no such weapons were manufactured locally, a British-made Hispano-Suiza 20 mm which an Australian airman had collected as a souvenir in the Middle East was reverse engineered – and four of them replaced the eight and partly twelve 0.303 machine guns of the original Mk. IIB machines. Additionally, the pilot received extra armor plating, and the wings were reinforced for external ordnance.
The RAAF Mk. VI Hurricanes carried A60-02 through -32 registrations. As a side note, A60-01 was a single Hurricane Mk.I serialled V-7476. This aircraft served with No.2 and 3 Communications Flights RAAF and was used on occasion for experimental work at RAAF Base Laverton on the outskirts of Melbourne. The aircraft was scrapped in 1945.
The Hurricane Mk. VIs actively took part in Pacific operations with RAAF’s No. 4 Squadron and No. 5 Squadron, being joined by Boomerangs in early 1943. They were operated in New Guinea and during the Solomon Islands Campaign as well as the Borneo Campaign, mostly in the close support role and with marked success.
Flying in pairs (one to observe the ground, the other to observe the air around them), their tasks included bombing, strafing, close infantry support and artillery spotting. When attacking larger enemy formations, the Hurricanes often operated in conjunction with the smaller and much more agile Boomerang fighter. In this role, a Boomerang would get in close to confirm the identity of the target and mark it with a 20 lb (9 kg) smoke bomb with the "cooperating" Hurricane, Beaufort or Havoc delivering the major ordnance in a quick run and from a safer distance. The partnership between RAAF planes and Royal New Zealand Air Force Corsair fighter bombers during the Bougainville Campaign was said to be particularly effective.
The Australian Hurricane Mk. VIs soldiered on until early 1945, when they were finally retired. The Twin Wasp engines were used for spares, all airframes were scrapped, no plane survived the war.
General characteristics:
Crew: 1
Length: 32 ft 3 in (9.84 m)
Wingspan: 40 ft 0 in (12.19 m)
Height: 13 ft 1½ in (4.0 m)
Wing area: 257.5 ft² (23.92 m²)
Empty weight: 5,745 lb (2,605 kg)
Loaded weight: 7,670 lb (3,480 kg)
Max. takeoff weight: 8,710 lb (3,950 kg)
Maximum speed: 331 mph (531 km/h)
Range: 650 mi (1.045 km)
Service ceiling: 36,000 ft (10,970 m)
Rate of climb: 2,303 ft/min (11.7 m/s)
Wing loading: 29.8 lb/ft² (121.9 kg/m²)
Power/mass: 0.15 hp/lb (0.25 kW/kg)
Engine: 1× Pratt & Whitney R-1830 Twin Wasp radial engine, 1,200 hp (895 kW)
Armament: 4× 20 mm (0.787 in) Hispano or CAC cannons; 2x 45-gallon (205 l) drop tanks or 2× 250 or 500 lb (110 or 230 kg) bombs
The kit and its assembly
The Hurricane Mk. VI is a whif, even though with little effort but a good story behind it. The original idea to mate a Hurricane with a radial engine came when I found a drawing of a Russian Hurricane, mated with a Schwezow ASch-82 engine. It looked… interesting. Not certain if this had been done for sure, but a great inspiration.
While browsing through the scrap heap I later found a Twin Wasp engine – that fueled the idea of a respective conversion. The Russian option was dead, but when I checked contemporary planes I came across the small Boomerang, and the historical facts were perfect for an obscure Australian Hurricane variant.
The rest was quickly done: the basic kit is a Hurricane Mk. IIC (Trop) from Hobby Boss, the Twin Wasp comes from a wrecked Matchbox PB4Y Privateer. The original Merlin was simply cut away and replaced by the "new" and relatively small radial engine. A surprisingly easy task, even though I had to widen the area in front of the cockpit by about 1mm to each side. With some putty and a new exhaust pipe with flame dampers, the surgical part was quickly done. A pilot was added, too, in order to distract from the rather bleak cockpit.
To make the plane look more interesting and suitable for a display on the ground, the flaps were lowered (scratch-built) and vertical and horizontal stabilizer were moved away from OOB neutral position. Additionally, the cooler under the fuselage was omitted, what creates together with the radial engine a very different side view. This "Aussie'cane" looks stout but disturbingly realistic, like a Boomerang’s big brother!
Only other changes/additions are a pilot figure and two wing hardpoints, holding bombs. The rest is OOB.
Painting
I have always been a fan of all-green RAAF WWII planes, so I chose such a simple livery. Inspiration came from real-life 4. Squadron Boomerangs, so I adopted the “QE” code and tried to mimic the overall look.
Interior surfaces were kept in Humbrol 78 ('Cockpit Green', dry-painted with light grey). The plane was painted with “Foilage Green” on all outer surfaces - a tone which seems to be heavily debated. Most sources claim FS 34092 (Humbrol 149) as a nowaday's replacement, but to me, this color is just too green and blue-ish. IMHO, “Foilage Green” has a rather yellow-ish hue - Humbrol 75 ("Bronze Green") would be better, if it wasn't too dark.
After some trials I settled for Humbrol 105 ("Army Green"). I think it is a sound compromise. It resembles FS 34096, but is (much) less grey-ish and offers that yellow hue I was looking for. Heavy weathering was done, esp. at the panel lines with dry-painted FS 34096 (Testors) and some panels "bleached" with Humbrol 86 ("Light live Green"). After deacls had been applied, some dry brushing with olive drab and light grey added to the worn and faded look, as well as flaked paint around the engine and the wings' leading egdes and soot stains at exhausts and guns. I wanted to emphasize the harsh climate conditions and duties of this fictional machine.
Only other colors are typical white quick recognition markings on tail and wings, painted with a mix of Humbrol 130 and 196 for a very light grey, with some white dry painting on th eleading edges.For a final clear coat, I used a matte varnish which still has a light gloss to it - “Foilage Green” and RAAF finishes were AFAIK supposed to be semi-matte and of higher quality that USAF paintjobs.
Markings come mostly from the scrap box. The RAAF insignia were taken from a Vultee Vengeance aftermarket sheet by Kanga Decals, which also provided the mid sea grey codes. The Australian registration numbers were improvised with single white letters from TL Modellbau decal sheets.
All in all I am happy with the result - a simple measure, a good story and even a very simple livery that allows room for imagination and painting effects. A nice lil' whif, the "Aussie'cane" Mk. VI.
The Strategic Airlift Capability (SAC) was a new concept for NATO when initiated a few years ago. The successful SAC, with its three Boeing C-17 Globemaster III large transport aircraft, is one of two complementary initiatives aimed at providing NATO member nations and Partners with strategic airlift capabilities. The other one is Strategic Airlift Interim Solution (SALIS). By comparison, the countries that signed the SAC MoU have committed themselves to SAC for 30 years and purchased the aircraft together; they did not just contract flight hours from a commercial enterprise. Based on their initial contribution to the programme the SAC participants are entitled to a corresponding percentage of the available flight hours and therefore provides assured access to strategic airlift capability.establishment of SAC can be largely explained by its concept, consisting of pooling resources in order to acquire maximum airlift capability for many nations, in a restrictive budgetary environment. The sound concept on which our programme has been founded matches perfectly the new NATO strategy, investing in more flexible and mobile armed forces, while capitalizing on collaborative defense projects and avoiding capabilities duplication.
In 2008, ten NATO member countries (Bulgaria, Estonia, Hungary, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Romania, Slovenia, and the United States) and two Partnership for Peace nations (Finland and Sweden) established SAC by signing the SAC Memorandum of Understanding (MoU). Over little than one year, in July 2009, the first aircraft was delivered and strategic airlift operations were started. SAC aircraft fly only at the direction of SAC nations. Participating nations can decide to use their flight hours in support of third parties. Therefore, a third party wishing to use the capability shall seek a SAC nation to "sponsor" the third party’s airlift requirement and to accept the mission as one of its own.Each participating nation owns a share of the available flight hours that can be used for missions without the prerequisite to consult with the other SAC Participants. The personnel contributed to the Heavy Airlift Wing, the operational arm of the Strategic Airlift Capability, correspond to the participating nation’s share of flight hours and are assigned to various missions, not only those requested by their nation. Nevertheless, a country can withdraw its airmen from a particular mission for national limitationsAs the programme evolves, more nations are likely to express interest in joining SAC and/or contracting flight hours on SAC aircraft. Potential new joiners can address all their requests for specific information to the NAM Programme. We are honored to enter into direct communication with all interested parties and deliver comprehensive presentations of our programme, as well as of the various options and conditions for joining.
+++ DISCLAIMER +++
Nothing you see here is real, even though the conversion or the presented background story might be based on historical facts. BEWARE!
Some background:
The Saab 35 Draken ('The Kite' or 'The Dragon') was a Swedish fighter-interceptor developed and manufactured by Svenska Aeroplan Aktiebolaget (SAAB) between 1955 and 1974. Development of the Saab 35 Draken started in 1948 as the Swedish air force future replacement for the then also in development Saab 29 Tunnan dayfighter and Saab 32B Lansen night fighter. It featured an innovative but unproven double delta wing, which led to the creation of a sub-scale test aircraft, the Saab 210, which was produced and flown to test this previously unexplored aerodynamic feature. The full-scale production version entered service with frontline squadrons of the Swedish Air Force on 8 March 1960. It received the designation Flygplan 35 (Fpl 35; 'Aeroplane 35') and was produced in several variants and types, most commonly as a fighter type with the prefix J (J 35), standing for Jaktflygplan (Pursuit-aircraft), the Swedish term for fighter aircraft.
The Saab 35 Draken was known for, among other things, its many "firsts" within aviation. It was the first Western European-built combat aircraft with true supersonic capability to enter service and the first fully supersonic aircraft to be deployed in Western Europe. Design-wise it was one of, if not the first, combat aircraft designed with double delta wings, being drawn up by early 1950. The unconventional wing design also had the side effect of making it the first known aircraft to perform and be capable of the Cobra maneuver. It was also one of the first Western-European-built aircraft to exceed Mach 2 in level flight, reaching it on 14 January 1960.
The Draken functioned as an effective supersonic fighter aircraft of the Cold War period. Even though the type was designed and intended as an interceptor, the Draken was considered to be a very capable dogfighter for the era, and its large wing area allowed the compact Saab 35 to carry a relatively high payload, too. In Swedish service, it underwent several upgrades, the ultimate of these being the J 35 J model which served until 1999. The Draken was also exported to several countries and remained operational in Austria until 2005.
In Swedish service, the Saab 35 was replaced by the Saab 37 “Viggen”. Development work on the new type was already initiated at Saab in 1952 and, following the selection of a radical canard delta wing configuration, the resulting aircraft performed its first flight on 8 February 1967 and entered service on 21 June 1971. However, being a radical and new design, the service introduction of the Viggen – esp. of its initial version, the AJ 37 fighter-bomber – was not without teething troubles, and in the late Sixties the Swedish Air Force expected an attack aircraft gap in its line-up. The former A 32 A Lansen attack aircraft were reaching the end of their airframe lifetime and were simply outdated, even though it was still needed as an anti-ship attack platform for the indigenous Rb 04 guided missile, so that Saab suggested an interim solution: the conversion of seventy of the 120 produced J 35 D fighters into dedicated attack aircraft, with the designation A 35 G (Gustav).
The Saab A 35 G was heavily modified to make it into a fighter bomber aircraft. Compared to the fighter versions the outer wings where completely redesigned and the aircraft featured 9 hardpoints in total. Airframe and landing gear were strengthened to cope with an increased payload of 10,000 lb (4,540 kg) vs. the fighters’ usual 6,393 lb (2,900 kg). Several airframe components were restored or replaced to extend the life of the aircraft, and the landing gear featured low-pressure tires for a better field performance on improvised/dispersed airfields.
A wide array of ordnance could be carried, such as bombs of up to 1.000 lb (454 kg) caliber, MERs with up to six 100 kg (220 lb) bombs each, pods with unguided 75 mm or 135 mm rockets, single 14.5 cm psrak m49/56 high-explosive anti-tank rockets and, as a new weapon, the indigenous guided Rb 05 air-to-ground missile. This had been developed for the AJ 37 "Viggen in 1967 and was roughly comparable with the American AGM-12 Bullpup, but had some unique features. The Rb 05’s supersonic speed was deemed necessary to reduce the threat of surface-to-air missiles, and it allowed the missile to be deployed against slow/large aerial targets, too, making it a dual-purpose weapon. Consequently, the Rb 05’s fuze could be set by the pilot to impact mode for ground targets, or proximity mode for attacking air targets such as bombers.
The missile had a maximum range of 9 km (5.6 ml) and would usually be launched after a high-speed attack run on very low altitude and a climb to 400m for launch. Since the RB 05 was roll-stabilized, the aircraft did not need to be aimed straight at the target when launching and could immediately descend into terrain cover again, and this also made it possible to attack aerial targets from unusual angles and flight paths. Tracking the flares on the missile, the pilot would then visually guide the missile (the missile's engine was smokeless as to not obscure the view) with a small manual joystick towards the target. Guidance commands were transmitted to the missile via a jam-proof radio transmission link.
The A 35 G kept the J 35 D’s two 30 mm ADEN cannons, and a limited air defense capability was retained, too: the Gustav could carry up to four IR-guided Rb 24 (AIM-9B Sidewinder) AAMs, in addition to the Rb 05 in air-to-air mode. However, the aircraft lacked any air intercept radar, and had instead a Ferranti LRMTS (laser rangefinder and marked target seeker) and a counterweight installed in the nose, which resembled the S 35 E photo reconnaissance version’s nose, just without the windows for the side-looking cameras. For its attack role, the A 35 G received a new inertial navigation system, new altimeters and a ballistic computer from Saab called BT-9Rm, which worked with both bombs and rockets and even allowed for toss bombing. The Gustav Draken was furthermore fitted with electronic countermeasure (ECM) systems, a RHAWS and chaff and flare dispensers in their tail cones to improve its survivability over the battlefield.
The Gustav conversion program was accepted by the Swedish government in 1968. Work started in early 1969, the first revamped aircraft reached the operational units in late 1971. However, since production of the AJ 37 was starting at the same time, only 61 aircraft were eventually re-built from existing J 35 D airframes (one prototype and sixty production aircraft). Västgöta Wing (F 6) at Karlsborg was the first squadron to receive the A 35 G, replacing its A 32 A fighter bombers, the other unit to operate the type was Skaraborg Wing (F 7) at Såtenäs.
Among Sweden’s Draken fleet the Gustav was easy to recognize because it was the only version that carried the new “Fields & Meadows” splinter camouflage as standard livery. Service of the A 35 G lasted only until the early Eighties, though: as more and more AJ 37 all-weather fighter bombers reached the Swedish frontline units during the Seventies, the interim attack Draken, which was only effective under daylight and more or less good weather conditions, was withdrawn and either used for spares in the running J 35 J modernization program or directly scrapped, because many airframes had, suffering from the special stress of low-level flight operations, reached the end of their lifespan.
Another factor for the quick withdrawal was the disappointing performance of the type’s primary weapon, the Rb 05 missile: Its manual joystick steering in the cramped Draken cockpit (to be operated while the pilot was expected to fly at low altitude and evade enemy fire!) presented a number of problems, and the Rb 05’s ultimate accuracy was, even under ideal conditions, on the order of just 10 meters (33 ft), greater than desired. Targets like tanks or even ships were hard to hit with this level of scattering, combined with imminent danger for the pilot, and the air-to-air mode was even less effective. On the more modern Saab 37 the Rb 05 was therefore replaced by the Rb 75, a license-produced version of the American TV-guided AGM-65 Maverick “fire and forget” weapon. TV and laser seeker heads for the Rb 05 to improve the weapon’s accuracy and handling had been planned since the early Seventies, but were never realized.
General characteristics:
Crew: 1
Length: 15.35 m (50 ft 4 in)
Wingspan: 9.42 m (30 ft 11 in)
Height: 3.89 m (12 ft 9 in)
Wing area: 49.2 m² (530 ft²)
Airfoil: 5%
Empty weight: 8,175 kg (18,006 lb)
Gross weight: 11,500 kg (25,330 lb)
Max takeoff weight: 13,554 kg (29,845 lb)
Powerplant:
1× Svenska Flygmotor RM6C (license-built Rolls Royce Avon with Swedish EBK67 afterburner)
turbojet engine, 56.5 kN (12,700 lbf) thrust dry, 77.3 kN (17,240 lbf) with afterburner
Performance:
Maximum speed: 2,150 km/h (1,335 mph, 1,168 kn) at 11,000 m (36,089 ft), clean
1,430 km/h (888 mph, 777 kn) w. two dop tanks and two 454 kg (1.00 lb) bombs
Range: 1.120 km (605 nmi; 696 mi); clean, internal fuel only
Ferry range: 2,750 km (1,480 nmi; 1,710 mi) with four external 500 l drop tanks
Service ceiling: 20,000 m (66,000 ft)
Rate of climb: 199 m/s (39,200 ft/min)
Wing loading: 231.6 kg/m² (47.4 lb/ft²)
Thrust/weight: 0.7
Takeoff roll: 800 m (2,625 ft)
Armament:
2× 30 mm akan m/55 ADEN cannon with 100 rounds per gun
9× hardpoints with a total capacity of 4,500 kg (10.000 lb)
The kit and its assembly:
Even though the model depicts a what-if aircraft, the Draken’s proposed “Gustav” attack variant based on the J 35 D interceptor was real – even though I could not find much detail information about it. So, I took some inspiration from the contemporary Danish Saab 35XD export version, which probably had similar features to the Gustav? Another inspiring factor was a pair of Rb 05 missiles (from an Airfix Viggen) that I had bought with a spare parts lot some time ago – and an attack Draken would be the perfect carrier for these exotic (and unsuccessful) missiles.
For a low-budget build I used one of Mistercraft’s many recent re-boxings of the vintage Revell Draken from 1957(!), and this kit is nothing for those who are faint at heart. It is horrible.
The kit probably depicts a late J 35 A (already with a long tail section), but even for this variant it lacks details like the air scoops for the afterburner or a proper landing gear. The Draken’s characteristic tail wheel is also missing completely. Worst pitfall, however: there is NO interior at all, not even a lumpy seat! The canopy, the early model with struts, is disturbingly clean and crisp, though. The overall fit is mediocre at best, too – there are only a few visible seams, but any of them calls for filling and PSR. It’s a very toyish kit, even though the general outlines are O.K.
And the Mistercraft instructions are really audacious: they show all the parts that are actually NOT there at all. Suddenly a seat appears in the cockpit, a fin fairing from a J 35 D or later, or the tail wheel… And the decal sheets only roughly meet the aircraft you see in the painting instructions - there are three sheets, totally puzzled together, including material for aircraft not mentioned in the instructions, but that’s a common feature of most Mistercraft kits. But: how much can you taunt your disappointed customers?
So, this leaves lots of room for improvements, and calls for a lot of scratching and improvisation, too. First measure was to open both the air intakes (which end after 2mm in vertical walls) and the exhaust, which received an afterburner dummy deep inside to create depth. Next, I implanted a complete cockpit, consisting of s scratched dashboard (styrene sheet), the tub from an Italeri Bae Hawk trainer’s rear cockpit (which comes with neat side consoles and fits quite well) plus a shallow vintage ejection seat, probably left over from an early MiG from a KP kit or one of its many later reincarnations. As an alternative, there’s a Quickboost resin aftermarket set with a complete cockpit interior (even including side walls, IIRC intended to be used with the Hasegawa Draken) available but using it on this crappy kit would have been a waste of resources – it’s more expensive than the kit itself, and even with a fine cockpit the exterior would still remain sh!t.
Since I could not find any detail about the Gustav Draken’s equipment I gave it a laser rangefinder in a poor-fitting S 35 E (or is it a Danish export F-35?) nose that comes as an optional part with the vintage Revell mold – which is weird, because the recce Draken was built between 1963 and 1968 in 2 series, several years after the kit’s launch? Maybe the Mistercraft kit is based on the 1989 Revell re-boxing? But that kit also features an all-in-one pilot/seat part and a two-piece canopy… Weird!
Once the hull was closed many surface details had to be added. The afterburner air scoops were created from plastic profiles, which are aftermarket roof rails in H0 scale. Styrene profile material was also used to create the intakes behind the cockpit, better than nothing. The OOB pitot on the fin was very robust, and since it would be wrong on a J 35 D I cut it off and added a fairing to the fin tip, a shortened/modified ACMI pod, which bears a better pitot alternative at its tip. The pitot on the nose was scratched from heated styrene, since the kit offers no part at all.
Under the rear fuselage the whole tail wheel arrangement had to be scratched. The shallow fairing consists of a section from a Matchbox EA-6B drop tank, the wheel and its strut were tinkered together with bits from the scrap box and profile material. Not stellar, but better than OOB (= nothing!).
The landing gear struts were taken from the kit but beefed up with some details. The main wheels had to be replaced, the new ones come from a KP MiG-21, IIRC.
The ordnance consists of a pair of Rb 05’s from an Airfix Viggen, a pair of OOB drop tanks and MERs from a Matchbox A-7D, together with fourteen streamlined bombs from the same kit – twelve on the MERs and single bombs on the outer pylons. AFAIK, Sweden never used MERs on their aircraft, but the bombs come pretty close to some small bombs that I have seen as AJ 37 ordnance. Most pylons are OOB, I just added a single ventral station and two outer hardpoints under the wings. The Rb 05s received a prominent place under the air intakes on Sidewinder launch rails.
Painting and markings:
Finally a good excuse to apply the famous and complex “Fields & Meadows” paint scheme to a Draken model! However, this “combo” actually existed in real life, but only on a single aircraft: around 1980 a J 35 B (s/n 35520), aircraft “20” of F18, was painted in this fashion, but AFAIK it was only an instructional airframe. You find some pictures of this aircraft online but getting a clear three-side view (esp. from above!) as a reliable painting benchmark is impossible. However, a complete paint scheme of this aircraft is provided with one of Mistercraft’s Revell Draken re-boxings (not the one I bought, though), even though it is mismarked as a J 35 F of F10 in the instructions. One of the common Mistercraft errors, err, “surprises” (*sigh*).
Finding suitable model paints for the elaborate scheme is not easy, either, and after having applied it several times I stuck to my favorites: Humbrol 150 (Forest Green, FS 34127), 75 (Bronze Green), 118 (US Light Tan, FS 30219, a bit light but RAF Dark Earth is too somber) and Revell 06 (Tar Black, RAL 9021) on the upper surfaces and Humbrol 247 (RLM76) underneath.
A large ventral section was, typical for the J 35, left in bare metal, since leaking fuel and oil would frequently eat away any paint there. The section was painted with Revell 91 (Iron) and later treated with Matt Aluminum Metallizer (Humbrol). As per usual, the model received an overall light black ink washing and some post-shading in order to emphasize the panels, correct the splinter camouflage and dramatize the surface. Some extra weathering was done around the gun ports and the jet nozzle with graphite.
Internal details like the cockpit and the landing gear were painted with the help of Swedish Saab 35 reference pictures. The cockpit tub was painted in a dark, bluish green (Humbrol 76) with grey-green (Revell 67) side walls.
The landing gear and its respective wells were painted in a bluish grey (Revell 57), parts of the struts were painted in a bright turquoise (a mix of Humbrol 89 and 80; looks quite weird, but I like such details!). The wheel hubs became medium grey (Revell 47). The Rb 05 missiles were painted in white as live weapons, so that they stand out well from the airframe. The drop tanks received the same blue-grey as the underside (Humbrol 247). MERs and launch rails were painted in a neutral grey (RAL 7001) and the bombs became olive drab (RAL 6014, Gelboliv) with yellow rings and golden fuzes.
Decals/markings were puzzled together from a Moose Republic Saab 32 sheet (unit code number and emblem) and the spares box, including the red tactical tail code from an Italeri 1:72 Gripen and roundels from a Hasegawa Draken. Stencils were taken from the kit’s OOB sheet and also from the Hasegawa Draken sheet. Finally, the model was sealed with matt acrylic varnish (Italeri).
What a horror trip! The paint scheme itself was/is challenging enough, but modding the crappy vintage Revell kit into something more presentable was already a fight in itself. However, I like the outcome. “Fields & Meadows” suits the Draken with its huge and flat upper surface well, and while the Gustav conversion did not take much effort the “mud mover” ordnance under this Mach 2 fighter really looks strange and makes you wonder what this is. A nice what-if model, despite its blurriness!