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Part Of: Powerhouse Museum Collection
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Used as a MIG29 radar testbed seen at Zhukovsky in August 1992. Still in service as a VIP aircraft with Alrosa-Avia.
British Leyland had the monopoly of the rear-engined double-deck bus market in the UK during the first half of the seventies. Leyland announced that they were developing an integral double-deck bus that would replace their double-deck chassis range. A number of operators made it clear that they were not happy with Leyland's dominance of the double-deck bus market.
A number of bodybuilders and chassis manufacturers would attempt to challenge Leyland's dominance, MCW with the Metrobus, Dennis with the Dominator and finally Forden and Northern Counties would team together to build a semi-integral double-deck bus. The last mentioned came about because Greater Manchester Transport were conscious that they needed to look at developing their standard body built by Northern Counties to be built on the second generation of double-deck chassis. GMT's standard double-deck buses were both supplied by Leyland the Fleetline and Atlantean. GMT approached Northern Counties with a view to develop a new standard double-deck bus, Foden of Sandbach were predominantly a truck manufacturer but had built front-engined buses with the last built in 1956. Foden were keen to re-enter the double-deck bus market so entered a collaboration with Northern Counties to develop a semi-integral rear-engined double-deck bus which was announced in November 1975 and unveiled in 1976 as the 9.5-metre Foden-NC, the first two production examples entering service with Greater Manchester Transport in June and October 1976. In total only seven were built, the seventh was bodied by East Lancashire Bodybuilders for South Yorkshire PTE, there was also a test vehicle built which was bodied by Northern Counties as a single-deck bus and was un- registered. It was used by Foden for test purposes and looked like a double-deck bus which had gone under a low bridge. The Foden-NC proved to unreliable with the Foden transfer box being prone to failures and the Allison gearbox was inefficient. This resulted in no more orders placed, thus Foden pulled out of the bus market to concentrate on building trucks. The testbed vehicle was returned to Northern Counties and was eventually sold to R. Bullock's of Cheadle and was broken up for spares.
The following operators purchased Foden-NC buses: Greater Manchester Transport 2, West Midlands PTE 1, Derby City Transport 1, West Yorkshire PTE 1, and National Bus Company 1, plus South Yorkshire PTE who took a East Lancs bodied Foden. Out of these four were normal-height, two low-height and the East Lancs example was normal-height.
The reason that the NBC purchasing a Foden-NC was to conduct operational testing with the Foden-NC, Alexander Dennis Dominator and ECW Bristol VRT3 the standard NBC low-height decker. PMT (Potteries Motor Traction) were chosen to conduct the operational testing of these three double-deck buses. My view shows the Foden-NC (H43/31F) WVT 900S fleet number 900, which was new in July 1978 in service with PMT, the message between decks can have made little sense to the average passer-by. The date is March 1979 and the location is Ironmarket in the small market town of Newcastle under Lyme Staffordshire ST5 1RP which was a terminus for a number of services until the eighties, these days ahead of the bus it is now pedestrianised. This Foden-NC was owned by PMT for many years even when PMT became First PMT, it was sadly sold for scrap. Points of interest in the photograph: to the right of the Foden-NC is Queen's Gardens, behind to the left is the famous '' fountains roundabout '' so named because of the fountains in the middle of the roundabout, and to the right of the bus just past Queen' s Gardens is School Street where passengers would catch express coach services until the early eighties when they were transferred to Hanley bus station.
So what became of the operational testing by the NBC? they stayed loyal to the Bristol VRT3 until the arrival of the Leyland Olympian.
I will be posting a photograph of the Alexander Dennis Dominator in service with PMT.
Foden-NC rear-engined double-deck bus technical details:-
Chassis: Perimeter frame construction allowing the bodybuilder to integrate the body structure to the chassis, this construction was used by Leyland for the Olympian.
Engine: 10.45-litre Gardner 6LXB six-cylinder diesel producing 172bhp @ 1,750rpm
Gearbox: Allison MT640 with torque converter four-speed fully-automatic
Transfer gearbox: Foden comprising of a four gear train including two idler gears
Retarder: Air operated oil cooled Ferodo
Braking system: Full air pressure twin-circuit split system
Rear axle: Newage double-reduction drop-centre
Suspension: Semi-elliptic leaf springs
Steering: Burman fully-integral power assisted
Fuel tank: 45 gallons
Bodywork: Northern Counties
Sorce of information: Rear-Engined Double-Buses Gavin Booth, SELNEC Preservation Society, Bus Lists On The Web and Flickr.
Boeing C-135C Stratolifter USAF 61-2669 ``Speckled Trout`` 412th FLTS @ Edwards AFB, CA Note: Speckled Trout was the official nickname given to this modified C-135C, acquired in 1974 and retired on 13 January 2006, that was used by the Secretary and the Chief of Staff of the Air Force for executive transport requirements. Fully equipped with an array of communications equipment, data links and cryptographic sets, the aircraft served a secondary role as a testbed for proposed command and control systems and was also used to evaluate future transport aircraft design.
2/2026 - The former Erie Lackawanna SD45 testbed unit is still hanging around but hasn't been used in quite a while.
What was originally the prototype for the A310-300 in 1985, FedEx Airbus N803FD is seen in Memphis, Tennessee. The wide-body is coming out of maintenance check in January 2006. The jet was retired and stored at Victorville (VCV) in January 2018.
The battered locomotive DP2 (Diesel Prototype 2) on July 31st 1967 after an accident at Thirsk in North Yorkshire. DP2 was hauling the 1A26 12:00 King's Cross to Edinburgh service when it collided with some of the 02:50 Cliffe to Uddingston cement train wagons which had derailed moments before. 7 passengers where killed.
DP2 was deemed damaged beyond repair and was cut up in 1968. DP2 wasn't really a deltic at all.. it was a testbed for the power units in the then forthcoming Class 50.
This is the Boeing 757 prototype, first flown on 18 February 1982. It never entered commercial service with any airline; instead it was converted to the "Catfish" avionics testbed, originally for F-22 development, though I can't say what its current job is.
This year I plan on attending Brickfair Virginia and like last year, will be participating in a military collaboration themed “eXperimental military”. This is the second set of models which I plan on displaying with many more in the works. From left to right is the Heinkel 178 then, the Gloster E.28 Pioneer. Both of these models represent a milestone in aviation and served as testbeds for the early jet engine. The E.28 was the RAFs test aircraft to test Frank Whittle’s new jet engine. Technically, the British designed and patented the jet first, however the Germans got their jet airborne making its maiden flight in 1939 betting the British to the first jet. The Germans saw the potential in the jet. Hitler wanted an aircraft far superior to anything the allies had and was willing to fund more experimental projects. The British government however, did not see the jet as a viable replacement to propeller driven aircraft which delayed the development of the first British jet fighter. Both countries did end up finally making a jet fighter. Germany made the Me-262 and the British eventually came up with the Meteor.
The E.28 is not new. It’s been around for a number of years now, however, I’ve changed some parts here and there and obviously added the base. My models have functioning undercarriages and are scaled to mini figure scale. I plan on contributing more to the collab but thought that this would be a nice addition.
Gulfstream II-SP of Tempus Jet on another flight. Finally able to get it with decent light! Appeared in the February 2014 issue of Aviation Letter.
During the planning of the proposed "Express" buses and services, Park Royal bodied Daimler Fleetline (WWH 31L) was given a 3/4 repaint into the then trial colour scheme. The front and offside were painted in the 'coral' colour scheme that came to fruition but the nearside and rear were done in white as a comparison. The bus is seen here at Charles St before being dispatched for scrap.
Copyright and with thanks - A.Wyre SPS.
@ Rolls-Royce North America 🇺🇸
Boeing 747-267B - cn 21966 / 446
• ENG : 4x RR RB211-524D4
• REG : N787RR
• RMK : Named "Spirit of Excellence"
@ History Aircraft :
• 07.APR.1980 : First flight at built site Everett ( KPAE )
• 24.APR.1980 : Delivered to "Cathay Pacific" CX & CPA with reg VR-HIA
• 17.OCT.1997 : Re-registered to B-HIA
• 12.JUL.1998 : Stored to Victorville ( KVCV )
• DEC.1999 : Sold to "Air Atlanta Icelandic" CC & ABD with reg TF-ATD and lease to "Saudi Arabian Airlines" SV & SVA and later to "AirAsia" AK & AXM
• 16.JUN.2005 : Sold to "Rolls-Royce North America" based Tucson ( KTUS ) config Trend Testbed with reg N787RR and named "Spirit Excellence"
Bae-Aérospatiale Concorde: 21st January 1976 - November 26th 2003
Seen blasting off on another 3-hour Transatlantic voyage is this British Airways Bae-Aerospatiale Concorde, leaving the UK and the Bristol Channel behind with the original Severn Crossing bridging the gap before the second crossing was opened in 1996.
The routing of Concorde in the past took it over a much longer route than conventional aircraft, which would follow the Great Circle and fly to the north over the region of Aberystwyth and enter American airspace above Nova Scotia and Maine as this is the shortest distance between New York and London. Concorde on the other hand flew literally directly west over Bristol and the North coast of Devon before arriving at the United States just south of Long Island. This was done to both exploit the longest possible time it could be at Supersonic speed and so as to avoid causing sonic booms over the urban areas of the east coast of Canada and the north east United States.
Air France Concorde's were similar, but instead flew directly west over Brittany and broke the sound barrier over the Bay of Biscay, rather than fly north over the western United Kingdom and Ireland to join the Transatlantic Highway with other flights to the USA.
The reason I love Concorde so much is the fact that it was, and still is, probably one of the most beautiful and sophisticated creations mankind has ever made, up there with the likes of the Saturn V Rocket. With smooth crisp lines and a long sweeping body, Concorde, although very much a plaything for the rich, showed the world that Supersonic travel is not just reserved for Fighter Pilots, but for the fare paying public as well, and took us to a place where I sadly feel we shan't return to, not in this day and age.
So where does Concorde's story begin? Well, our ability to break the Sound Barrier is a good start, with the early Spitfire pilots of World War II inadvertently doing so, and then a flight by the experimental Bell X-1, which was launched from the underbelly of a bomber and jetted off into a world very much of its own. Following these breakthroughs in speed, the first considerations for a passenger alternative were considered as far back as 1950, and in 1954 the first meeting of the Super Sonic Transport (SST) Committee was held.
Original intentions were to build passenger aircraft to similar principles as the X-1, but these were shelved due to impracticality. Instead, a new design known as the Delta-Wing was looked at, being used on the likes of the AVRO Vulcan. Ideas were created, and tests carried out on the similarly designed Handley Page HP.115, a purpose built aircraft for the intention of making the perfect testbed for the future SST. Eventually, the Delta design chosen was dubbed the Ogee Platform, derived from the Ogival Wing design. The most important intention of the design was to place the wing's centre of pressure as close as possible to the centre of gravity so as to lower the amount of control force required to pitch the aircraft, and the Ogee Platform came closest to this requirement.
Final design requirements came down to the design of the airframe itself outside of the wings. Essentially, the aircraft was similar in design to contemporary Delta-Wing fighter jets, with a long streamlined nose and a smooth body to reduce resistance as much as possible. Problems came with the actual operation of the aircraft's basic functions, most notably the cockpit, which had to be designed with streamlining in mind, but couldn't use conventional aircraft windows, with the strengthened window frame obscuring the view forward for takeoff and landing. In response, designers created a Drooping Nose, where the streamlined visor could be raised and lowered, with conventional aircraft windscreens behind to provide a view similar to that of a regular aircraft. Due to the length of the aircraft, the plane was fitted with a small wheel at the rear of the frame so as to absorb any potential tail-strikes during takeoff and landing.
During supersonic flight and transit through the Sound Barrier, fuel would be distributed between the forward fuel tanks and a small fuel tank in the rear whilst the aircraft was accelerating and decelerating so as to alter the centre of mass, essentially acting as an auxiliary trim control.
But one of the most endearing parts of the design was the point on the nose, which is not there for stylish flare, but for a very important reason. Without the point, aircraft attempting to transit the sound barrier would face much greater resistance as the airframe is much larger and more obtrusive, the point on the other hand breaks the sound barrier ahead of the actual aircraft itself, meaning the transit effect travels around the frame of the aircraft rather than against the hull.
Of course, the most difficult part when it came to getting the SST to go are the actual engines themselves. For the greatest efficiency, the new SST couldn't use conventional Turbofan engines as their cross-sectional area was too excessive. Instead, Rolls Royce was commissioned to build a set of Turbojet engines that could be slung in streamlined pods underneath the wings. The result was a quad set of Rolls Royce/Snecma Olympus 593 engines that had been developed from the Bristol engines used on the Vulcan bomber. In all, only 67 of these engines were ever built, and had an overall maximum thrust of 38,000lbf, pushing the SST to beyond the speed of sound.
By the mid-1960's the designs had been near enough perfected, and after signing up with Sud Aviation of France (later to become Aérospatiale), the combined efforts of British Aerospace and Aérospatiale resulted in the construction of two prototypes in 1965, these aircraft being dubbed 'Concorde', the French word for Harmony, Agreement, or Union. Concorde 001 was built in France at Aérospatiale's factory in Toulouse, whilst Concorde 002 was built at the BAC works in Filton near Bristol. The first flight of a Concorde aircraft took place on the 2nd March 1969, with Concorde 001 flying from Toulouse. On the 9th April, Concorde 002 made its first flight from Filton, and on October 1st, 001 made its first supersonic flight.
Both aircraft were presented at the Paris Airshow of June 1969, alongside one of their rivals, the Boeing 747. But Concorde was not the world's first supersonic commercial airliner, as the Soviet Union had beaten them to the punch in June of that year with the Tupolev Tu-144, an aircraft of almost exactly the same principles of Concorde that had been hastily put together between 1965 and 1968 after blueprints and designs had been obtained by Soviet Agent Sergei Fabiew. The Tu-144 made its first supersonic flight in June 1969, and made its first supersonic commercial flights with Aeroflot in May 1970.
However, the 'Concordski' (as it was known by the West), had many serious flaws, which came to bear in a series of horrendous crashes. The first major crash was at the 1973 Paris Air Show, where during a display flight, the first production Tu-144 aircraft broke apart over a suburb, killing 6 people on the aircraft and 8 on the ground. Another major incident took place in May 1978, when on a routine test flight an improved version of the aircraft known as the Tu-144D crashed on landing, resulting in the withdrawal of the 144's from commercial service after only 55 flights. They would remain cargo aircraft until 1983, after which they were used for the training of Soviet Cosmonauts for the Buran Space Shuttle project.
Concordski however did have a profound effect on Concorde, especially after its crash of 1973. Confidence in the Concorde was rumbled by the failure of the Tu-144, and thus many potential buyers pulled out. Originally, airlines such as American Airlines, Pan Am, Japan Airlines, Eastern Airlines, United Airlines, and Air Canada had all put in orders, but by 1975 only Air France and BOAC (later nationalised into British Airways) orders remained. At the same time, Boeing and Lockheed of the United States attempted to create their own SST's so as to combat Concorde, with Boeing creating the 2707, and Lockheed the L-2000, neither of which went beyond concept models.
Eventually, 14 production Concorde aircraft were handed over to their respective airlines between 1976 and 1980, with the first aircraft being delivered to British Airways on the 15th January, the first flight taking place to Bahrain on the 21st January. Simultaneously, Air France made its first flight to Rio de Janeiro via Dakar in Senegal. However, the Transatlantic routes to the United States were the main points of contention, as the fear of Sonic Booms caused protest, resulting in a ban being passed by Congress. Although permission was given to fly to Washington Dulles on the 24th May, the New York Port Authority continued to ban Concorde due to the noise. The result was a risky training program by Concorde pilots to land at JFK Airport without using any power at all, meaning that from the start of their descent over the New York area, no power could be applied so as to keep the noise levels to a minimum, doing the whole approach in one. Eventually the ban was lifted after it was found that Air Force One, a Boeing VC-137 (converted Boeing 707), was louder than Concorde, and thus commercial services to JFK began on November 22nd, 1977.
In addition to the British Airways and Air France flights to New York and Washington from Paris and London, a slew of other short lived ventures occurred at the same time. In 1977, British Airways jointly shared a Concorde for flights to Singapore via Bahrain with Singapore Airlines, painting G-BOAD in a BA/SA hybrid livery. These flights however were capped after only 3 runs due to noise complaints.
Another short lived venture was with the American airline Braniff, which leased 10 aircraft from both airlines to operate subsonic domestic services from Washington to Dallas-Fort Worth from 1978, with Braniff crews taking over from international crews after landing at Washington. These services ended in 1980 due to a lack of profitability, with only 50% bookings or less on most flights.
Over the years, Concorde also flew to a myriad of destinations off its usual Transatlantic services, including Mexico, Florida, the Caribbean, South America, Hong Kong, Australia and New Zealand, mostly on charter flights but sometimes for short demonstration flights for fun seekers. Usually, Air France would provide the charter aircraft as their Concorde fleet was used less than the BA fleet, only operating two flights a day as opposed to BA's four.
The 1980's though were the boom years of Concorde, as this was when the money makers really spread their wings. In the immortal words of Jeremy Clarkson "For the have not's, it wasn't much fun, but the have's were having a ball!" Wealth moved from the stars of stage and screen to the stock marketing men and women of Europe and America. Investments on oil shares, and other large multinational companies meant you and your house was worth more than most countries. Greed was endemic, and the super-rich had no shortage of that. They'd have Champagne for breakfast, eat nightly at the Ritz, have a fleet of chauffeur driven Rolls Royce's at their beck and call, and would make weekend trips across the Atlantic with Concorde like it was a commuter train!
It was thanks to Concorde that Phil Collins could perform two shows for the 1985 Live Aid in one night, the first at Wembley in London, the second at Philadelphia JFK stadium, picking up Cher along the way who would join him in the finale 'We are the World.' You could arrive before you departed, and probably bump into a selection of celebrities en-route. Ex-Beatles, Actors, Businessmen, Fashion Designers, you name it, they were probably there!
These years were wild, profitable, and turned Concorde from an airliner, into a rite of passage for the money makers of this world. If you could fly on Concorde, then you'd truly made it in life!
However, as the 90's began to blossom and boom, the end of the decade brought its headaches for Concorde, and when things went wrong, they really went wrong quickly!
The recession of 1992 damaged Concorde's sales as money became much harder to come by, and the explosive era of greed began to fade away in the face of austerity. Environmental considerations began to crop up, and Concorde was singled out by environmentalists as one of the biggest culprits for noise and air pollution.
But on July 25th, 2000, disaster struck when Air France Concorde F-BTSC, crashed upon take-off from Paris Charles de Gaulle, smashing into a nearby hotel and killing all 109 passengers, plus 4 people on the ground. The cause was later determined to have been debris left by a preceding Continental Airlines DC-10, which punctured the tyres of Concorde and ruptured the fuel tanks on the port-side wing. However, the crash resulted in the grounding of all Concorde aircraft for over a year. Although test flights were carried out, and some private charters, revenue earning service was intended to return in the summer of 2001.
G-BOAF made the first service flight of a Concorde aircraft across the Atlantic from London to New York on September 11th, 2001, landing at JFK airport 30 minutes before American Airlines Flight 11, hijacked by terrorists, was flown deliberately into the North Tower of the World Trade Center in Lower Manhattan, in what would turn out to be one of the darkest days in modern history. In the ensuing chaos, flights across America were grounded immediately, and Transatlantic services diverted, but this was just the beginning. Global markets collapsed and the aviation industry went into meltdown. Airlines such as TWA, Swissair, Sabena and Ansett Australia were just a few of the victims of this aviation downturn, and Concorde's return to service was delayed until November 7th, 2001.
Concorde may have stuttered back into life, but time had really caught up with this supersonic machine of the past. The maintenance costs of the aircraft were now much higher, with fuel prices rising and passenger levels dropping due to stagnation in the post-9/11 market. British Airways was making a loss on every single flight they made, and both this, with a mixture of discontinued support from Aérospatiale's successors, Airbus, meant that Concorde's fate was very much sealed.
On the 10th April, 2003, Air France and British Airways simultaneously announced the retirement of Concorde. Although the day after Virgin Atlantic and its founder Sir Richard Branson intended to purchase British Airways' Concorde fleet for a nominal fee of £1 each, citing a clause in the original agreement to operate the aircraft, the Government and British Airways denied allowing him to buy the aircraft for such a small price, demanding at least £1 million for every aircraft. This was further hampered by Airbus' refusal to continue maintenance support.
The end slowly came throughout 2003, with Air France's last Concorde flight taking place on 27th June, whilst British Airways conducted a series of farewell tours to a selection of destinations, including Toronto, Boston, Washington, Belfast, Manchester, Cardiff and Edinburgh. Concorde was officially retired from British Airways service on the 24th October, 2003, but continued to operate a small number of farewell charters until November 26th, when G-BOAF, the last Concorde to be built in 1979, flew to its home base of Filton, ending the supersonic age of passenger air travel.
In all, every one of these £125 million aircraft still exist apart from two. Aircraft 203, F-BTSC, was lost in the type's only ever fatal crash in 2000, whilst Aircraft 211, F-BVFD, was withdrawn in 1982 after only 5 years of service and used as a spares donor, being cut up for scrap in 1994. The 6 prototype and 12 remaining production aircraft are now scattered across the world in museums, including Barbados, Seattle, New York, Brooklands near London, Manchester, Le Bourget, Toulouse and Chantilly in Virginia.
So, what killed Concorde and can we ever go there again? Many things killed Concorde, and when they came, they came fast. The economic downturn of the 90's and the rising environmental considerations started to damage its image, but the Paris Crash, the September 11th attacks and the ensuing stagnation of the aviation market, an outdated design becoming more and more expensive to maintain, the discontinuation of maintenance by Airbus and the fact that they were making a loss on every single flight is truly what ended Concorde's reign.
As for returning to the world of supersonic travel for the fare paying customer, in this world of austerity and environmentally bound agendas, I highly doubt it. Although Boeing considered the idea with the Sonic Cruiser, the amount of fuel required to operate these aircraft and the overall lack of interest or money to fund a project solely aimed at the 1%, means that chances are we won't see the likes of Concorde ever again.
But either way, we can be glad to say that we did it, we built Concorde, we flew it, operated it for 27 glorious years, and in doing so brought nations and continents closer together. Concorde truly lived up to its name, an everlasting symbol of peace, prosperity, speed, design and human endeavour.
FIVE Contrails!
The 44 year old Rolls Royce 747-200 Series testbed doing an initial flyover of KTUS at flight level 450 about 45 minutes before its arrival home to Tucson after a 1+ year assignment in Waco, TX.
The Trent 1000 Dreamliner engine is in the number 2 position and the new Pearl 10X engine for the Dassault Falcon 10X has been added to its right wing.
The BAE Systems/Cranfield University UAV testbed has had a new coat of paint since I last saw her - looking very secretive in an all black scheme now!
The Big Ass Racing Special is an old experimental one-off, testbed for technologies that eventually allowed performance parity with such bikes as the Blacktron Stormbringer.
The Los Angeles Dodgers were the first team in Major League Baseball to not only own a team airplane (a DC-3 won in a craps game), but also the first club to buy its aircraft, a Convair 440, in 1957. After using a DC-6 during the 1961 season, the club bought this Lockheed L-188A Electra (company number 1006, civil registered with the Dodgers as N5501V). This Electra was originally delivered to General Motors, which used it as a testbed and demonstrator for Allison Engine Company, in 1958. It was sold to the Dodgers in November 1961 and was refitted with four bunks, six card tables, wide seats, and special Dodger Blue carpet with a bat and ball pattern. The L-188 took the team to two World Series titles (1963 and 1965) and three National League titles (1963, ’65, and ’66). Named Kay-O for team owner Walter O’Malley’s wife, the Dodgers flew on it until 1970 when it was sold to American Airlines and then to freight haulers Intermountain Aviation and Evergreen International. The aircraft no longer carries ballplayers, but forest fire retardant. It’s owned and flown by Air Spray, the Alberta, Canada, based aerial firefighting company.
Looking remarkably intact is the prototype Brown Boveri Gas Turbine locomotive 18000 which spent its working life hauling express passenger trains from Paddington before being withdrawn in late 1960. The machine, as is perhaps inevitable with prototypes, proved neither reliable nor cheap to run. After withdrawal the locomotive was kept at Swindon Works for four years before being repatriated to mainland europe where the gas turbine was removed and the locomotive used as a testbed for experiments on rail-wheel interaction. Once these experiments were concluded the locomotive was put on display in Vienna in 1975 and was eventually secured for preservation in the UK in the early 1990s initially being stored at Crewe.
Although there is no realistic possibility of re-instating the original type of power unit, it is still good to see that the locomotive is safely in preservation. Externally, some repairs are needed, to be followed by a repaint to the original livery of black and silver. Internally, there is a good deal of conservation to be undertaken. The intention is to use 18000 as the focal point of a display relating to the post WW2 business plan for the 1950s, published by the GWR under the title 'NEXT STATION', of which the new gas turbine electric locomotive was an important part. (With thanks to the Didcot Railway Centre website for the above information).
Farnborough Air Show, September 1986.
Originally F-WUAD and later F-ODCX, F-BUAD was the 3rd Prototype A300 first flown in Jun-73. The aircraft was converted to A300B2-103 standard before being leased to General Electric in Jan-89 as an engine testbed. Sold to SOGERMA in May-96 it was leased to Novespace and operated for 11 years giving 'weightless' training to astronauts and others.
It was given a new coat of paint and appeared in the static display at the Paris Air Show in Jun-07. After that it was retired and stored at Bordeaux, France in mid 2007. It was noted still stored at BOD in Dec-12.
The aircraft made its final flight when it was ferried to Cologne, Germany in Nov-14 where it was preserved and put on display. The registration was cancelled in Feb-15. Sadly, fifty three years after it first flew it was broken up at Cologne in Jun/Jul-26. Updated 20-Jul-26.
A 1:1 scale replica of ESA’s ExoMars 2020 rover in the ‘Mars Yard’ of its ESTEC technical centre, inspected by members of the public during Sunday’s ESA Open Day in the Netherlands.
More than 7 500 visitors attended the ESA Open Day on 7 October, coming from all across Europe and beyond, as far away as Indonesia, Japan and South Korea.
ESA’s ExoMars rover, together with a Russian stationary surface science platform, is scheduled for launch in July 2020, arriving on Mars in March 2021. It will investigate how Mars has evolved and whether there may be conditions for life there.
It will travel across the martian surface and drill down to determine if evidence of life is buried underground, protected from the Sun’s radiation that bombards the surface of the 'Red Planet'. The rover will collect samples and analyse them with next-generation instruments – a fully fledged automated laboratory on Mars.
The competition to name the ExoMars rover closes at 23:59 BST (00:59 CEST) on Wednesday, 10 October.
Another testbed rover can be seen to the right of the ExoMars rover, in the 8 x 8 m terrain Mars Yard filled with different sizes of sand, gravel and rock, part of ESA’s Planetary Robotics Laboratory.
See more pictures from the ESA Open Day here.
Credits: ESA–G. Porter
Interesting history after its time with Uni Air ended in 2016. The MD-90 went on to become a non-airworthy engine testbed aircraft for Delta Air Lines between 2016 and 2020.
Something a little different. This is a reverse engineered B-29, based on USAF examples that crashed on Soviet soil. Tupelov design bureau built them. This one went to China where it was upgraded with turboprops and converted to an AWACS testbed! It’s now at the amazing PLAF Museum near Beijing.
Raytheon company | N580HH | Convair Cv-580 Testbed | Based and shot at Tucson International Airport (KTUS/TUS)
Farnborough 04 September 1961. Scanned from my father's original slide. Copyright Jim Cain.
XA552 was retained by the Ministry of Supply and used as the Javelin testbed for the de Havilland Gyron Junior turbojet engine hence the titles on the nose.
This was actually a testbed shot for 639, but really liked it and it was required, it's making the cut!!
277 passes Eugene Gardens in The Meadows with a 3 to Clifton via Trent Bridge, Wilford Green and Ruddington.
This Sabreliner 50 was donated by Rockwell-Collins to the Evergreen Aviation and Space Museum, Oregon in 2013.
She had been used as a radar and avionics testbed. N50CR was the last of only two of the type produced, being uprated and enhanced Sabre 40s, she has a unique interchangeable nose cone dependent on the mission of the day.
N50CR has been removed to outside storage in late 2019.
See more car pics on my facebook page!
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The XK120 was launched in roadster form at the 1948 London Motor Show as a testbed and show car for the new Jaguar XK engine. It caused a sensation, which persuaded Jaguar founder and design boss William Lyons to put it into production.
The "120" in its name referred to its 120 mph (193 km/h) top speed (faster with the windscreen removed), which made the XK120 the world's fastest standard production car at the time of its launch.
It was available in two open versions, first as the roadster (designated OTS, for open two-seater, in America), then also as a drophead coupé (DHC) from 1953 – and also as a closed, or "fixed-head" coupé (FHC) from 1951. The DHC was a more deluxe open model, with wind-up windows, and wood-veneer dashboard and interior door caps, as on the FHC.
The roadster was successful in racing.
(Wikipedia)
EMC5 LK15FKE seen at the east of Croydon Flyover working on route 312 towards South Croydon Bus Garage.
These are one of the first batches of Electric buses in London, these dating 5 years back. The 312 has notably been a testbed of some electric buses which included YT1 and PDL120. Haven't got into photographing one during my Croydon visits so whilst the 'old' WVL was on its way here, I got the time to finally tick these off.
N889CM Eclipse 500 on short finals for runway 23 at Glasgow on 13th July 2023, arriving from Keflavik.
The Eclipse 500 is based on the Williams V-Jet II, which was designed and built by Burt Rutan's Scaled Composites in 1997 for Williams International as a testbed and demonstrator for their new FJX-2 turbofan engine. The aircraft and engine debuted at the 1997 Oshkosh Airshow.
The engines were replaced by Pratt & Whitney Canada PW610Fs in 2004 and Eclipse Aviation won the Collier Trophy in February 2006 for the design. A provisional FAA type certification was received on 27 July 2006 and the first delivery occurred on 31 December 2006.
The six-seat aircraft has an all-metal airframe with a T-tail and straight wings. It is powered by two turbofan engines in aft fuselage-mounted nacelles.
Production of the Eclipse 500 was halted in October 2008 due to lack of funding, after 260 aircraft had been delivered. Eclipse Aerospace bought Eclipse Aviation, and announced the Eclipse 550 update in October 2011. Eclipse Aerospace was merged into One Aviation in April 2015, which entered Chapter 7 bankruptcy liquidation in February 2021.
This 777 is painted in the "One World Alliance" livery. It also used to be the 777-300ER testbed/prototype! Here is JAL15 from LAX-HND.
154002 was one of two prototype BR Sprinters built in 1984 and originally numbered 150001/150002. 150002 was experimentally modified as a "testbed" for future Class 158 sets and renumbered 154002. It is seen here running with this number at Burton on 21st. August 1989. It subsequently reverted to being 150002. 150001 & 150002 are still extant today; they are the only Class 150s built as 3 car units.
Used at Edwards AFB as a testbed for several new ventral/rear fuselage strake designs. Sadly, they were removed before it was returned to McChord
Bae-Aérospatiale Concorde: 21st January 1976 - November 26th 2003
Yep, I'm on another one of my Concorde bouts again, but I don't consider that a bad thing if I'm honest because I've never known anyone who really doesn't like this aircraft. The thing about Concorde is the fact that it was, and still is, probably one of the most beautiful and sophisticated creations mankind has ever made, up there with the likes of the Saturn V Rocket. With smooth crisp lines and a long sweeping body, Concorde, although very much a plaything for the rich, showed the world that Supersonic travel is not just reserved for Fighter Pilots, but for the fare paying public as well, and took us to a place where I sadly feel we shan't return to, not in this day and age.
So where does Concorde's story begin? Well, our ability to break the Sound Barrier is a good start, with the early Spitfire pilots of World War II inadvertently doing so, and then a flight by the experimental Bell X-1, which was launched from the underbelly of a bomber and jetted off into a world very much of its own. Following these breakthroughs in speed, the first considerations for a passenger alternative were considered as far back as 1950, and in 1954 the first meeting of the Super Sonic Transport (SST) Committee was held.
Original intentions were to build passenger aircraft to similar principles as the X-1, but these were shelved due to impracticality. Instead, a new design known as the Delta-Wing was looked at, being used on the likes of the AVRO Vulcan. Ideas were created, and tests carried out on the similarly designed Handley Page HP.115, a purpose built aircraft for the intention of making the perfect testbed for the future SST. Eventually, the Delta design chosen was dubbed the Ogee Platform, derived from the Ogival Wing design. The most important intention of the design was to place the wing's centre of pressure as close as possible to the centre of gravity so as to lower the amount of control force required to pitch the aircraft, and the Ogee Platform came closest to this requirement.
Final design requirements came down to the design of the airframe itself outside of the wings. Essentially, the aircraft was similar in design to contemporary Delta-Wing fighter jets, with a long streamlined nose and a smooth body to reduce resistance as much as possible. Problems came with the actual operation of the aircraft's basic functions, most notably the cockpit, which had to be designed with streamlining in mind, but couldn't use conventional aircraft windows, with the strengthened window frame obscuring the view forward for takeoff and landing. In response, designers created a Drooping Nose, where the streamlined visor could be raised and lowered, with conventional aircraft windscreens behind to provide a view similar to that of a regular aircraft. Due to the length of the aircraft, the plane was fitted with a small wheel at the rear of the frame so as to absorb any potential tail-strikes during takeoff and landing.
During supersonic flight and transit through the Sound Barrier, fuel would be distributed between the forward fuel tanks and a small fuel tank in the rear whilst the aircraft was accelerating and decelerating so as to alter the centre of mass, essentially acting as an auxiliary trim control.
But one of the most endearing parts of the design was the point on the nose, which is not there for stylish flare, but for a very important reason. Without the point, aircraft attempting to transit the sound barrier would face much greater resistance as the airframe is much larger and more obtrusive, the point on the other hand breaks the sound barrier ahead of the actual aircraft itself, meaning the transit effect travels around the frame of the aircraft rather than against the hull.
Of course, the most difficult part when it came to getting the SST to go are the actual engines themselves. For the greatest efficiency, the new SST couldn't use conventional Turbofan engines as their cross-sectional area was too excessive. Instead, Rolls Royce was commissioned to build a set of Turbojet engines that could be slung in streamlined pods underneath the wings. The result was a quad set of Rolls Royce/Snecma Olympus 593 engines that had been developed from the Bristol engines used on the Vulcan bomber. In all, only 67 of these engines were ever built, and had an overall maximum thrust of 38,000lbf, pushing the SST to beyond the speed of sound.
By the mid-1960's the designs had been near enough perfected, and after signing up with Sud Aviation of France (later to become Aérospatiale), the combined efforts of British Aerospace and Aérospatiale resulted in the construction of two prototypes in 1965, these aircraft being dubbed 'Concorde', the French word for Harmony, Agreement, or Union. Concorde 001 was built in France at Aérospatiale's factory in Toulouse, whilst Concorde 002 was built at the BAC works in Filton near Bristol. The first flight of a Concorde aircraft took place on the 2nd March 1969, with Concorde 001 flying from Toulouse. On the 9th April, Concorde 002 made its first flight from Filton, and on October 1st, 001 made its first supersonic flight.
Both aircraft were presented at the Paris Airshow of June 1969, alongside one of their rivals, the Boeing 747. But Concorde was not the world's first supersonic commercial airliner, as the Soviet Union had beaten them to the punch in June of that year with the Tupolev Tu-144, an aircraft of almost exactly the same principles of Concorde that had been hastily put together between 1965 and 1968 after blueprints and designs had been obtained by Soviet Agent Sergei Fabiew. The Tu-144 made its first supersonic flight in June 1969, and made its first supersonic commercial flights with Aeroflot in May 1970.
However, the 'Concordski' (as it was known by the West), had many serious flaws, which came to bear in a series of horrendous crashes. The first major crash was at the 1973 Paris Air Show, where during a display flight, the first production Tu-144 aircraft broke apart over a suburb, killing 6 people on the aircraft and 8 on the ground. Another major incident took place in May 1978, when on a routine test flight an improved version of the aircraft known as the Tu-144D crashed on landing, resulting in the withdrawal of the 144's from commercial service after only 55 flights. They would remain cargo aircraft until 1983, after which they were used for the training of Soviet Cosmonauts for the Buran Space Shuttle project.
Concordski however did have a profound effect on Concorde, especially after its crash of 1973. Confidence in the Concorde was rumbled by the failure of the Tu-144, and thus many potential buyers pulled out. Originally, airlines such as American Airlines, Pan Am, Japan Airlines, Eastern Airlines, United Airlines, and Air Canada had all put in orders, but by 1975 only Air France and BOAC (later nationalised into British Airways) orders remained. At the same time, Boeing and Lockheed of the United States attempted to create their own SST's so as to combat Concorde, with Boeing creating the 2707, and Lockheed the L-2000, neither of which went beyond concept models.
Eventually, 14 production Concorde aircraft were handed over to their respective airlines between 1976 and 1980, with the first aircraft being delivered to British Airways on the 15th January, the first flight taking place to Bahrain on the 21st January. Simultaneously, Air France made its first flight to Rio de Janeiro via Dakar in Senegal. However, the Transatlantic routes to the United States were the main points of contention, as the fear of Sonic Booms caused protest, resulting in a ban being passed by Congress. Although permission was given to fly to Washington Dulles on the 24th May, the New York Port Authority continued to ban Concorde due to the noise. The result was a risky training program by Concorde pilots to land at JFK Airport without using any power at all, meaning that from the start of their descent over the New York area, no power could be applied so as to keep the noise levels to a minimum, doing the whole approach in one. Eventually the ban was lifted after it was found that Air Force One, a Boeing VC-137 (converted Boeing 707), was louder than Concorde, and thus commercial services to JFK began on November 22nd, 1977.
In addition to the British Airways and Air France flights to New York and Washington from Paris and London, a slew of other short lived ventures occurred at the same time. In 1977, British Airways jointly shared a Concorde for flights to Singapore via Bahrain with Singapore Airlines, painting G-BOAD in a BA/SA hybrid livery. These flights however were capped after only 3 runs due to noise complaints.
Another short lived venture was with the American airline Braniff, which leased 10 aircraft from both airlines to operate subsonic domestic services from Washington to Dallas-Fort Worth from 1978, with Braniff crews taking over from international crews after landing at Washington. These services ended in 1980 due to a lack of profitability, with only 50% bookings or less on most flights.
Over the years, Concorde also flew to a myriad of destinations off its usual Transatlantic services, including Mexico, Florida, the Caribbean, South America, Hong Kong, Australia and New Zealand, mostly on charter flights but sometimes for short demonstration flights for fun seekers. Usually, Air France would provide the charter aircraft as their Concorde fleet was used less than the BA fleet, only operating two flights a day as opposed to BA's four.
The 1980's though were the boom years of Concorde, as this was when the money makers really spread their wings. In the immortal words of Jeremy Clarkson "For the have not's, it wasn't much fun, but the have's were having a ball!" Wealth moved from the stars of stage and screen to the stock marketing men and women of Europe and America. Investments on oil shares, and other large multinational companies meant you and your house was worth more than most countries. Greed was endemic, and the super-rich had no shortage of that. They'd have Champagne for breakfast, eat nightly at the Ritz, have a fleet of chauffeur driven Rolls Royce's at their beck and call, and would make weekend trips across the Atlantic with Concorde like it was a commuter train!
It was thanks to Concorde that Phil Collins could perform two shows for the 1985 Live Aid in one night, the first at Wembley in London, the second at Philadelphia JFK stadium, picking up Cher along the way who would join him in the finale 'We are the World.' You could arrive before you departed, and probably bump into a selection of celebrities en-route. Ex-Beatles, Actors, Businessmen, Fashion Designers, you name it, they were probably there!
These years were wild, profitable, and turned Concorde from an airliner, into a rite of passage for the money makers of this world. If you could fly on Concorde, then you'd truly made it in life!
However, as the 90's began to blossom and boom, the end of the decade brought its headaches for Concorde, and when things went wrong, they really went wrong quickly!
The recession of 1992 damaged Concorde's sales as money became much harder to come by, and the explosive era of greed began to fade away in the face of austerity. Environmental considerations began to crop up, and Concorde was singled out by environmentalists as one of the biggest culprits for noise and air pollution.
But on July 25th, 2000, disaster struck when Air France Concorde F-BTSC, crashed upon take-off from Paris Charles de Gaulle, smashing into a nearby hotel and killing all 109 passengers, plus 4 people on the ground. The cause was later determined to have been debris left by a preceding Continental Airlines DC-10, which punctured the tyres of Concorde and ruptured the fuel tanks on the port-side wing. However, the crash resulted in the grounding of all Concorde aircraft for over a year. Although test flights were carried out, and some private charters, revenue earning service was intended to return in the summer of 2001.
G-BOAF made the first service flight of a Concorde aircraft across the Atlantic from London to New York on September 11th, 2001, landing at JFK airport 30 minutes before American Airlines Flight 11, hijacked by terrorists, was flown deliberately into the North Tower of the World Trade Center in Lower Manhattan, in what would turn out to be one of the darkest days in modern history. In the ensuing chaos, flights across America were grounded immediately, and Transatlantic services diverted, but this was just the beginning. Global markets collapsed and the aviation industry went into meltdown. Airlines such as TWA, Swissair, Sabena and Ansett Australia were just a few of the victims of this aviation downturn, and Concorde's return to service was delayed until November 7th, 2001.
Concorde may have stuttered back into life, but time had really caught up with this supersonic machine of the past. The maintenance costs of the aircraft were now much higher, with fuel prices rising and passenger levels dropping due to stagnation in the post-9/11 market. British Airways was making a loss on every single flight they made, and both this, with a mixture of discontinued support from Aérospatiale's successors, Airbus, meant that Concorde's fate was very much sealed.
On the 10th April, 2003, Air France and British Airways simultaneously announced the retirement of Concorde. Although the day after Virgin Atlantic and its founder Sir Richard Branson intended to purchase British Airways' Concorde fleet for a nominal fee of £1 each, citing a clause in the original agreement to operate the aircraft, the Government and British Airways denied allowing him to buy the aircraft for such a small price, demanding at least £1 million for every aircraft. This was further hampered by Airbus' refusal to continue maintenance support.
The end slowly came throughout 2003, with Air France's last Concorde flight taking place on 27th June, whilst British Airways conducted a series of farewell tours to a selection of destinations, including Toronto, Boston, Washington, Belfast, Manchester, Cardiff and Edinburgh. Concorde was officially retired from British Airways service on the 24th October, 2003, but continued to operate a small number of farewell charters until November 26th, when G-BOAF, the last Concorde to be built in 1979, flew to its home base of Filton, ending the supersonic age of passenger air travel.
In all, every one of these £125 million aircraft still exist apart from two. Aircraft 203, F-BTSC, was lost in the type's only ever fatal crash in 2000, whilst Aircraft 211, F-BVFD, was withdrawn in 1982 after only 5 years of service and used as a spares donor, being cut up for scrap in 1994. The 6 prototype and 12 remaining production aircraft are now scattered across the world in museums, including Barbados, Seattle, New York, Brooklands near London, Manchester, Le Bourget, Toulouse and Chantilly in Virginia.
So, what killed Concorde and can we ever go there again? Many things killed Concorde, and when they came, they came fast. The economic downturn of the 90's and the rising environmental considerations started to damage its image, but the Paris Crash, the September 11th attacks and the ensuing stagnation of the aviation market, an outdated design becoming more and more expensive to maintain, the discontinuation of maintenance by Airbus and the fact that they were making a loss on every single flight is truly what ended Concorde's reign.
As for returning to the world of supersonic travel for the fare paying customer, in this world of austerity and environmentally bound agendas, I highly doubt it. Although Boeing considered the idea with the Sonic Cruiser, the amount of fuel required to operate these aircraft and the overall lack of interest or money to fund a project solely aimed at the 1%, means that chances are we won't see the likes of Concorde ever again.
But either way, we can be glad to say that we did it, we built Concorde, we flew it, operated it for 27 glorious years, and in doing so brought nations and continents closer together. Concorde truly lived up to its name, an everlasting symbol of peace, prosperity, speed, design and human endeavour.
Nearly 50 years since it was left in the desert, the #1 engine on this YB-58A at Edwards AFB "Photo Resolution Range" still has a little something left in it...
After it's career as a prototype and testbed for weapons systems that would eventually find their way into other subsequent aircraft, this airframe was placed on static display out in the desert in the 1960s for use as an aerial reconnaissance test target. For more information on this specific aircraft, click here.
Night, full moon, red-gelled X-2000 flashlight from behind the nacelle frame.
Launching for another Trans-Atlantic voyage, British Airways Bae-Aerospatiale Concorde flagship G-BOAC let's loose the Afterburners to depart Runway 27R at Heathrow. Concorde was the world's first and only commercial airliner to be fitted with military style Afterburners, and were used to provide that extra bit of power to get this warhead with leather seats on the go!
The reason I love Concorde so much is the fact that it was, and still is, probably one of the most beautiful and sophisticated creations mankind has ever made, up there with the likes of the Saturn V Rocket. With smooth crisp lines and a long sweeping body, Concorde, although very much a plaything for the rich, showed the world that Supersonic travel is not just reserved for Fighter Pilots, but for the fare paying public as well, and took us to a place where I sadly feel we shan't return to, not in this day and age.
So where does Concorde's story begin? Well, our ability to break the Sound Barrier is a good start, with the early Spitfire pilots of World War II inadvertently doing so, and then a flight by the experimental Bell X-1, which was launched from the underbelly of a bomber and jetted off into a world very much of its own. Following these breakthroughs in speed, the first considerations for a passenger alternative were considered as far back as 1950, and in 1954 the first meeting of the Super Sonic Transport (SST) Committee was held.
Original intentions were to build passenger aircraft to similar principles as the X-1, but these were shelved due to impracticality. Instead, a new design known as the Delta-Wing was looked at, being used on the likes of the AVRO Vulcan. Ideas were created, and tests carried out on the similarly designed Handley Page HP.115, a purpose built aircraft for the intention of making the perfect testbed for the future SST. Eventually, the Delta design chosen was dubbed the Ogee Platform, derived from the Ogival Wing design. The most important intention of the design was to place the wing's centre of pressure as close as possible to the centre of gravity so as to lower the amount of control force required to pitch the aircraft, and the Ogee Platform came closest to this requirement.
Final design requirements came down to the design of the airframe itself outside of the wings. Essentially, the aircraft was similar in design to contemporary Delta-Wing fighter jets, with a long streamlined nose and a smooth body to reduce resistance as much as possible. Problems came with the actual operation of the aircraft's basic functions, most notably the cockpit, which had to be designed with streamlining in mind, but couldn't use conventional aircraft windows, with the strengthened window frame obscuring the view forward for takeoff and landing. In response, designers created a Drooping Nose, where the streamlined visor could be raised and lowered, with conventional aircraft windscreens behind to provide a view similar to that of a regular aircraft. Due to the length of the aircraft, the plane was fitted with a small wheel at the rear of the frame so as to absorb any potential tail-strikes during takeoff and landing.
During supersonic flight and transit through the Sound Barrier, fuel would be distributed between the forward fuel tanks and a small fuel tank in the rear whilst the aircraft was accelerating and decelerating so as to alter the centre of mass, essentially acting as an auxiliary trim control.
But one of the most endearing parts of the design was the point on the nose, which is not there for stylish flare, but for a very important reason. Without the point, aircraft attempting to transit the sound barrier would face much greater resistance as the airframe is much larger and more obtrusive, the point on the other hand breaks the sound barrier ahead of the actual aircraft itself, meaning the transit effect travels around the frame of the aircraft rather than against the hull.
Of course, the most difficult part when it came to getting the SST to go are the actual engines themselves. For the greatest efficiency, the new SST couldn't use conventional Turbofan engines as their cross-sectional area was too excessive. Instead, Rolls Royce was commissioned to build a set of Turbojet engines that could be slung in streamlined pods underneath the wings. The result was a quad set of Rolls Royce/Snecma Olympus 593 engines that had been developed from the Bristol engines used on the Vulcan bomber. In all, only 67 of these engines were ever built, and had an overall maximum thrust of 38,000lbf, pushing the SST to beyond the speed of sound.
By the mid-1960's the designs had been near enough perfected, and after signing up with Sud Aviation of France (later to become Aérospatiale), the combined efforts of British Aerospace and Aérospatiale resulted in the construction of two prototypes in 1965, these aircraft being dubbed 'Concorde', the French word for Harmony, Agreement, or Union. Concorde 001 was built in France at Aérospatiale's factory in Toulouse, whilst Concorde 002 was built at the BAC works in Filton near Bristol. The first flight of a Concorde aircraft took place on the 2nd March 1969, with Concorde 001 flying from Toulouse. On the 9th April, Concorde 002 made its first flight from Filton, and on October 1st, 001 made its first supersonic flight.
Both aircraft were presented at the Paris Airshow of June 1969, alongside one of their rivals, the Boeing 747. But Concorde was not the world's first supersonic commercial airliner, as the Soviet Union had beaten them to the punch in June of that year with the Tupolev Tu-144, an aircraft of almost exactly the same principles of Concorde that had been hastily put together between 1965 and 1968 after blueprints and designs had been obtained by Soviet Agent Sergei Fabiew. The Tu-144 made its first supersonic flight in June 1969, and made its first supersonic commercial flights with Aeroflot in May 1970.
However, the 'Concordski' (as it was known by the West), had many serious flaws, which came to bear in a series of horrendous crashes. The first major crash was at the 1973 Paris Air Show, where during a display flight, the first production Tu-144 aircraft broke apart over a suburb, killing 6 people on the aircraft and 8 on the ground. Another major incident took place in May 1978, when on a routine test flight an improved version of the aircraft known as the Tu-144D crashed on landing, resulting in the withdrawal of the 144's from commercial service after only 55 flights. They would remain cargo aircraft until 1983, after which they were used for the training of Soviet Cosmonauts for the Buran Space Shuttle project.
Concordski however did have a profound effect on Concorde, especially after its crash of 1973. Confidence in the Concorde was rumbled by the failure of the Tu-144, and thus many potential buyers pulled out. Originally, airlines such as American Airlines, Pan Am, Japan Airlines, Eastern Airlines, United Airlines, and Air Canada had all put in orders, but by 1975 only Air France and BOAC (later nationalised into British Airways) orders remained. At the same time, Boeing and Lockheed of the United States attempted to create their own SST's so as to combat Concorde, with Boeing creating the 2707, and Lockheed the L-2000, neither of which went beyond concept models.
Eventually, 14 production Concorde aircraft were handed over to their respective airlines between 1976 and 1980, with the first aircraft being delivered to British Airways on the 15th January, the first flight taking place to Bahrain on the 21st January. Simultaneously, Air France made its first flight to Rio de Janeiro via Dakar in Senegal. However, the Transatlantic routes to the United States were the main points of contention, as the fear of Sonic Booms caused protest, resulting in a ban being passed by Congress. Although permission was given to fly to Washington Dulles on the 24th May, the New York Port Authority continued to ban Concorde due to the noise. The result was a risky training program by Concorde pilots to land at JFK Airport without using any power at all, meaning that from the start of their descent over the New York area, no power could be applied so as to keep the noise levels to a minimum, doing the whole approach in one. Eventually the ban was lifted after it was found that Air Force One, a Boeing VC-137 (converted Boeing 707), was louder than Concorde, and thus commercial services to JFK began on November 22nd, 1977.
In addition to the British Airways and Air France flights to New York and Washington from Paris and London, a slew of other short lived ventures occurred at the same time. In 1977, British Airways jointly shared a Concorde for flights to Singapore via Bahrain with Singapore Airlines, painting G-BOAD in a BA/SA hybrid livery. These flights however were capped after only 3 runs due to noise complaints.
Another short lived venture was with the American airline Braniff, which leased 10 aircraft from both airlines to operate subsonic domestic services from Washington to Dallas-Fort Worth from 1978, with Braniff crews taking over from international crews after landing at Washington. These services ended in 1980 due to a lack of profitability, with only 50% bookings or less on most flights.
Over the years, Concorde also flew to a myriad of destinations off its usual Transatlantic services, including Mexico, Florida, the Caribbean, South America, Hong Kong, Australia and New Zealand, mostly on charter flights but sometimes for short demonstration flights for fun seekers. Usually, Air France would provide the charter aircraft as their Concorde fleet was used less than the BA fleet, only operating two flights a day as opposed to BA's four.
The 1980's though were the boom years of Concorde, as this was when the money makers really spread their wings. In the immortal words of Jeremy Clarkson "For the have not's, it wasn't much fun, but the have's were having a ball!" Wealth moved from the stars of stage and screen to the stock marketing men and women of Europe and America. Investments on oil shares, and other large multinational companies meant you and your house was worth more than most countries. Greed was endemic, and the super-rich had no shortage of that. They'd have Champagne for breakfast, eat nightly at the Ritz, have a fleet of chauffeur driven Rolls Royce's at their beck and call, and would make weekend trips across the Atlantic with Concorde like it was a commuter train!
It was thanks to Concorde that Phil Collins could perform two shows for the 1985 Live Aid in one night, the first at Wembley in London, the second at Philadelphia JFK stadium, picking up Cher along the way who would join him in the finale 'We are the World.' You could arrive before you departed, and probably bump into a selection of celebrities en-route. Ex-Beatles, Actors, Businessmen, Fashion Designers, you name it, they were probably there!
These years were wild, profitable, and turned Concorde from an airliner, into a rite of passage for the money makers of this world. If you could fly on Concorde, then you'd truly made it in life!
However, as the 90's began to blossom and boom, the end of the decade brought its headaches for Concorde, and when things went wrong, they really went wrong quickly!
The recession of 1992 damaged Concorde's sales as money became much harder to come by, and the explosive era of greed began to fade away in the face of austerity. Environmental considerations began to crop up, and Concorde was singled out by environmentalists as one of the biggest culprits for noise and air pollution.
But on July 25th, 2000, disaster struck when Air France Concorde F-BTSC, crashed upon take-off from Paris Charles de Gaulle, smashing into a nearby hotel and killing all 109 passengers, plus 4 people on the ground. The cause was later determined to have been debris left by a preceding Continental Airlines DC-10, which punctured the tyres of Concorde and ruptured the fuel tanks on the port-side wing. However, the crash resulted in the grounding of all Concorde aircraft for over a year. Although test flights were carried out, and some private charters, revenue earning service was intended to return in the summer of 2001.
G-BOAF made the first service flight of a Concorde aircraft across the Atlantic from London to New York on September 11th, 2001, landing at JFK airport 30 minutes before American Airlines Flight 11, hijacked by terrorists, was flown deliberately into the North Tower of the World Trade Center in Lower Manhattan, in what would turn out to be one of the darkest days in modern history. In the ensuing chaos, flights across America were grounded immediately, and Transatlantic services diverted, but this was just the beginning. Global markets collapsed and the aviation industry went into meltdown. Airlines such as TWA, Swissair, Sabena and Ansett Australia were just a few of the victims of this aviation downturn, and Concorde's return to service was delayed until November 7th, 2001.
Concorde may have stuttered back into life, but time had really caught up with this supersonic machine of the past. The maintenance costs of the aircraft were now much higher, with fuel prices rising and passenger levels dropping due to stagnation in the post-9/11 market. British Airways was making a loss on every single flight they made, and both this, with a mixture of discontinued support from Aérospatiale's successors, Airbus, meant that Concorde's fate was very much sealed.
On the 10th April, 2003, Air France and British Airways simultaneously announced the retirement of Concorde. Although the day after Virgin Atlantic and its founder Sir Richard Branson intended to purchase British Airways' Concorde fleet for a nominal fee of £1 each, citing a clause in the original agreement to operate the aircraft, the Government and British Airways denied allowing him to buy the aircraft for such a small price, demanding at least £1 million for every aircraft. This was further hampered by Airbus' refusal to continue maintenance support.
The end slowly came throughout 2003, with Air France's last Concorde flight taking place on 27th June, whilst British Airways conducted a series of farewell tours to a selection of destinations, including Toronto, Boston, Washington, Belfast, Manchester, Cardiff and Edinburgh. Concorde was officially retired from British Airways service on the 24th October, 2003, but continued to operate a small number of farewell charters until November 26th, when G-BOAF, the last Concorde to be built in 1979, flew to its home base of Filton, ending the supersonic age of passenger air travel.
In all, every one of these £125 million aircraft still exist apart from two. Aircraft 203, F-BTSC, was lost in the type's only ever fatal crash in 2000, whilst Aircraft 211, F-BVFD, was withdrawn in 1982 after only 5 years of service and used as a spares donor, being cut up for scrap in 1994. The 6 prototype and 12 remaining production aircraft are now scattered across the world in museums, including Barbados, Seattle, New York, Brooklands near London, Manchester, Le Bourget, Toulouse and Chantilly in Virginia.
So, what killed Concorde and can we ever go there again? Many things killed Concorde, and when they came, they came fast. The economic downturn of the 90's and the rising environmental considerations started to damage its image, but the Paris Crash, the September 11th attacks and the ensuing stagnation of the aviation market, an outdated design becoming more and more expensive to maintain, the discontinuation of maintenance by Airbus and the fact that they were making a loss on every single flight is truly what ended Concorde's reign.
As for returning to the world of supersonic travel for the fare paying customer, in this world of austerity and environmentally bound agendas, I highly doubt it. Although Boeing considered the idea with the Sonic Cruiser, the amount of fuel required to operate these aircraft and the overall lack of interest or money to fund a project solely aimed at the 1%, means that chances are we won't see the likes of Concorde ever again.
But either way, we can be glad to say that we did it, we built Concorde, we flew it, operated it for 27 glorious years, and in doing so brought nations and continents closer together. Concorde truly lived up to its name, an everlasting symbol of peace, prosperity, speed, design and human endeavour.
See more car pics on my facebook page!
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The XK120 was launched in roadster form at the 1948 London Motor Show as a testbed and show car for the new Jaguar XK engine. It caused a sensation, which persuaded Jaguar founder and design boss William Lyons to put it into production.
The "120" in its name referred to its 120 mph (193 km/h) top speed (faster with the windscreen removed), which made the XK120 the world's fastest standard production car at the time of its launch.
It was available in two open versions, first as the roadster (designated OTS, for open two-seater, in America), then also as a drophead coupé (DHC) from 1953 – and also as a closed, or "fixed-head" coupé (FHC) from 1951. The DHC was a more deluxe open model, with wind-up windows, and wood-veneer dashboard and interior door caps, as on the FHC.
The roadster was successful in racing.
(Wikipedia)
As part of my on-going experiments into alternative Lego train chassis and drive-train arrangements, I totally stripped down and rebuilt my GO Transit F59PH locomotive as a "technology testbed". The body was completely redesigned to be separate from the chassis and to mount to its chassis "clam-shell" style like scale model trains. This allows me to develop and iterate the chassis design independent of the locomotive. I intend to use this configuration for all my locomotives in future because I like the idea of being able to perform maintenance and tuning without a traumatic disassembly and rebuild of the entire locomotive. In fact, I hope to be able to interchange chassis among some locomotives with similar wheelbase for flexibility. I hope to be able to keep all of the mechanical and electrical infrastructure (controller, battery, motor, lights, etc.) mounted to the chassis with minimal connection to the body shell.
Illustrated above is some of the progress made to date. I have rebuilt the F59PH body shell--its still not finished, but very close. The chassis is my 3rd version built to date. It is powered from a centrally under-mounted PF L-motor. This keeps the centre of gravity lower and allows for more room inside the body shell. The motor drives a central drive shaft connected to gear driven 2-axle bogies. The tractive effort of this arrangement is impressive, especially with the L-motor vs. the M-motor.
The next steps will be to develop a power pickup from the metal wheels and to fabricate and develop my hybrid DCC + PF electronic control module. Lots to do, but its great fun!
Memories from the railways as we knew them - the 1970s
This was the scene at Scarborough in August 1974. We had gone up on our 2 week annual holiday, and I was always torn between my love of the beach and my love of the trains :)
Although aged just 12, I was happy to roam around the station on my own, and in this shot I managed to capture a lined-up pair of the stylish Class 101 Met-Cam units, both with first class compartments leading. In the sidings in the distance one of the regular visiting Class 40s awaiting its next turn and a Mark 1 coach.
Class 101 Metro-Cammell units - One of the most numerous and widely used types, built for the ScR, NER/ER and LMR, later also based in WR with access to the SR. They updated version of the earlier Yellow Diamond Met-Camm Lightweights with the blue square control system. Including these early types and the more powerful Rolls-Royce engined variants later (Class 111s) a total of 760 Met-Camm vehicles were built.
When class numbers were introduced the vehicles were initially divided into Class 101s (the vehicles with AEC engines) and Class 102s (those with Leyland engines). Later the classes were rationalised with all becoming Class 101s.
The type was used as the testbed for refurbishment scheme in the 1970s, which led to many types being given a life-extension at a time when BR had no replacements for the ageing vehicles.
Many sets were given an additional "facelift" to see them become one of the last types to be phased out of traffic in the early years of the 2000s, only surpassed by some bubble cars returned to traffic. Many vehicles saw further use as parcels, sandite and route learning units, and many entered preservation.
Information courtesy of: railcar.co.uk/type/class-101/orders
Taken with my basic Kodak Brownie using 120 roll film.
You can see a random selection of my railway photos here on Flickriver: www.flickriver.com/photos/themightyhood/random/
Crewless, CN SD40-2W 5258- a former LNG testbed unit- and a mate sit with a transfer at Bridgeport, Chicago, while Amtrak train 21, the southbound 'Texas Eagle' passes on its way out of the city.
ESA’s technical heart will be serving as a testbed for this driverless shuttle in the coming months.
The Agency’s ESTEC establishment in Noordwijk, the Netherlands, is working with vehicle owner Dutch Automated Mobility, provincial and municipal governments and bus company Arriva to assess its viability as a ‘last mile’ solution for public transport.
The fully autonomous vehicle calculates its position using a fusion of satellite navigation, lidar ‘laser radar’, visible cameras and motion sensors. Once it enters service in October it will be used to transport employees from one side of the ESTEC complex to the other.
The fully-electric, zero-emission shuttle will respect the on-site speed limit of 15 km/h, and for its first six months of service will carry a steward to observe its operation along its preprogrammed 10-minute-long roundtrip.
Come visit ESTEC during our annual ESA Open Day on Sunday 6 October. Find out more here.
Credits: ESA–B. Smith
Half an hour later, and racing north through Lichfield Trent Valley with an intermodal freight from Felixstowe to Trafford Park is veteran AC electric Class 86, 86632 and an unidentified classmate.
For a time it was the flagship of those early days of Electric traction on the Midland Region, but today few remain in nocturnal freight operations. The 100mph Class 86's were by far the most numerous of the original electric traction for British Rail, but their decline has been pronounced as many now languish in silent storage or have met their end at the cutter's torch.
The Class 86 was a culmination of developments pioneered by the original AC electric locomotives that formed the backbone of British Rail's Modernisation Plan in the late 1950's and early 60's. As part of the electrification of the West Coast Mainline, a new fleet of electric locomotives were commissioned to various manufacturers, these being the Class 81, 82, 83, 84 and 85. While the Class 81 and 85 were quite successful, and would see active service in the 1980's and 1990's, the Class 82, 83 and 84 were noted for their unreliability, largely due to their manufacturer's inexperience at building electric locomotives.
The Class 86, originally dubbed the AL6, took elements from each to create the perfect flagship locomotive, including the bodyshape and wheel design. The AL6 however also brought to the table its own innovative design features, including quieter cooling fans, the lack of a second pantograph and the fitting of four AEI 282AZ 900hp Traction Motors, with an overall power output of 3,600hp on the original locomotives.
The Class 86's made their first official appearance on the West Coast in August 1965, and eventually all 100 locomotives would be in service with BR after a 24 month construction run, making it the most numerous class of electric locomotive in the UK, an unbeaten record. However, initial problems came with regard to the AL6, largely due to the position of the axle-hung traction motors, which would cause damage to the tracks due to the additional unsprung mass. To solve this, new flexicoil springs were added in 1969 to help support the traction motors, this eventually being placed onto all members of the class.
By 1970, several variants of the class had been created for various purposes. 86/0 locomotives were unmodified members without flexicoil springs, and were restricted to 80mph; while 86/2 were modified with flexicoil springs, and could operate at the locomotive's top speed of 100mph, putting them in good stead for passenger services. A later variant was the Class 86/1, modified with 5,000hp traction motors as a testbed for the upcoming Class 87's, which would be the flagship electric locomotives for passenger trains out of London Euston.
Even following the introduction of the Class 87's in 1974, the Class 86's still held a prominent role on the West Coast Mainline for both passenger and freight operations. Their influence was widened in time thanks to the electrification of routes out of London Liverpool Street towards Cambridge, Harwich, Norwich and Ipswich. Class 86's began operations there during the mid to late 1980's, and became the prime motive power for express services along the Great Eastern route towards Anglia. This coincided with the addition of TDM or Time-Division Multiplexing, which allowed the locomotives to be controlled by cab-control cars. On the West Coast Mainline, streamlined Class 82 Driving Van Trailers made an appearance after 1988, while on the Great Eastern, converted MkII carriages called DBSO's, or Driving Brake Standard Only, were brought in from Scotland after they were displaced from Edinburgh to Glasgow expresses by Class 158 DMU's.
By the 1990's, a majority of the Class 86's were still in service on freight and passenger workings. Class 86/2's worked express passenger services, whilst Class 86/4's were reclassified into 86/6's for use on freight as part of the new Freightliner and Railfreight Distribution services. For a brief time, several 86/2's were allocated to freight, and these were renumbered 86/5's, but were quickly returned to InterCity. By the mid-1990's, the Class 86's were truly at the peak of their powers, operating InterCity services out of two major London terminals, and being the backbone of both freight and parcels services on the West Coast Mainline north of London, as well as on the Great Eastern to the east.
However, as privatisation began in the late 1990's, new operators were quick to outline their new plan for replacing the nearly 40 year old locomotives with newer stock. The Class 86's were split into several companies, with passenger 86/2's being divided amongst Anglia Railways, Virgin West Coast and Virgin Cross Country. Freight operator EWS inherited 15 locomotives from the Parcels sector, whilst 30 locomotives went to the newly formed Freightliner company.
As mentioned however, commitments to the new franchising system meant that old stock had to be replaced in order to improve service reliability, and the Class 86's were singled out for retirement more than the other classes. Virgin Cross Country were the first to retire the locomotives, their fleet of 19 locomotives used between Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool and Scotland being retired in September 2002 along with all loco-hauled Cross-Country services. Some Class 86's would continue to find service with Virgin's West Coast Mainline arm, but the end was nigh for these locomotives as well, the last being retired in September 2003.
Anglia's Class 86's held on for another year, but as Virgin replaced its loco-hauled stock with new Class 390 Pendolino units, displaced Class 90's, which were much younger and more reliable, began working on Anglia's services out of London Liverpool Street. Coupled with the change in franchise from Anglia to National Express' 'One', and by September 2005 nothing remained of the Class 86, the very last Class 86 hauled intercity train taking place on September 17th, 2005, with 86235 doing the honours.
EWS also quickly retired the Class 86's, due largely to the removal of the Mail Train contract in 2003, but also due to the introduction of Class 66's to operate most freight diagrams.
Freightliner however continue to maintain a sizable fleet of locomotives for their freight operations on the West Coast and Great Eastern Mainlines, with 14 of these 52 year old locomotives still in active service with the company. Today they're quite hard to find in the daytime, but in rare instances you may be lucky enough to catch one running very late or very early.
Other Class 86's include ones exported to Bulgaria, of which 6 have currently been so far together with several Class 87's. Many Class 86's however continue to languish in storage, mostly at Long Marston base in Worcestershire, as well as many having been scrapped or stripped for spares donors.
Class 86's have also had their fair share of accidents, perhaps more so than other UK locomotive classes. The first such accident was in January 1975, when 86209 collided head-on with Class 83, 83003, killing one, though the 86 was eventually recovered and returned to work. Also in 1975, 86006 and 86242 suffered a devastating crash at Nuneaton, when the two electric locomotives entered a temporary speed restriction at high speed causing a derailment that killed 6 and injured 38.
Another very serious incident was the Colwich rail crash of September 19th, 1986, when 86211 and 86429 collided head-on, resulting in the death of one of the drivers and the destruction of both locomotives.
In 1996, 86239, hauling a Mail Train, collided with the rear of a freight train near Stafford and ended up in a back garden, writing off the locomotive and killing two Royal Mail staff aboard the mail train.
The last major crash of the Class 86 was in 2003, when 86631 and 86611 crashed into a stationary freight train at Norton Bridge, the force of the impact snapping the leading locomotive in half. Thankfully there were no fatalities, but both locomotives were written off.
Officially, three locomotives have been preserved here in the UK, but even these still see regular revenue earning work. 86259 'Les Ross' was purchased by the eponymous owner in 2008, and is a regular operator on the mainline working railtours for Vintage Trains. Two other Class 86's, 86101 and 86401, have been returned from preservation to help operate the Caledonian Sleeper service from London to Scotland. Though mostly used for Empty Carriage workings, they do sometimes operate the full route between London and Glasgow/Edinburgh.
Today, the Class 86's, though over 50 years old, still prove themselves reliable and charming electric locomotives, and true pioneers in their own right. A design that may date back to the late 1950's, the flexible nature of these engines has helped them stand the test of time, and one hopes they see continued use well into the future.
During the late 1940s and early 1950s, turboprop engines were still considered a viable option for long-range bombers, and the USAF was interested in determining the feasibility of producing a high-speed, long-range turboprop-powered bomber. In support of this goal, the Air Force requested that a pair of B-47Bs be converted as flying testbeds to test a jet engine-propeller combination and provide data on installing turboprops in swept-wing aircraft.
In April 1951, Boeing was contracted to modify two B-47Bs (Serial Numbers 51-2103 and 51-2046) as flying turboprop testbeds under the designation XB-47D and assigned company numbers Model 450-162-48 and 450-162-49, respectively. They retained the outboard J47-GE-23 jet engines of the B-47B, but a single Curtiss-Wright YT49-W-1 turboprop of 9,710 equivalent shaft horsepower (eshp) occupied each of the inboard underwing nacelles in place of the paired J-47s. The T49 was a turboprop version of the Wright J65, which was, in turn, an American version of the British-designed Armstrong Siddeley Sapphire turbojet. The turboprops drove four-bladed propellers 15 feet in diameter, having paddle-type blades, each 24 inches wide. The wing flaps had to be modified to accommodate the T49s, and changes had to be made in instrumentation and controls for four engines rather than the usual six.
The program was delayed by problems with the T49 engine, which failed to pass its 50-hour qualification run. Additional problems with the engine-propeller combination and government-furnished equipment shortages delayed progress. It was not until late 1955 that the aircraft were ready for their first flights.
XB-47D 51-2103 flew for the first time on 26 August 1955, with 51-2046 following on 15 February 1956. Surprisingly, the performance of the XB-47D was fairly similar to that of the conventionally-powered B-47, and landing performance was improved with the addition of the fully-reversible propellers of the XB-47D.
In this image, the first XB-47D (450-162-49, Serial Number: 51-2103) conducts a test flight using the new T49 turboprop engines. Although numerous test flights were made without mishap, no further conversions were ordered, and the Air Force did not pursue its idea of a turboprop-powered bomber any further. The maximum speed achieved by the XB-47D during these tests was 597 mph (960 km/h) at 13,500 ft (4,129 m), the fastest yet achieved in level flight by a propeller-driven aircraft.