Phil Perry

It is indeed, although the damage suffered by the 747 which had a side cargo door blow off, ripping into the passenger cabin above, and sucking out two rows of three seats was the worst I'd ever seen. . .the Pax / seats went Through the inboard No 3 engine ( horrific ) but the machine was able to maintain control and make a safe landing with a huge hole in it's right side. . . .Phenomenal. And all caused by corrosive urine from a leaking lavatory causing a short circuit in the ''C' locking system motor controlling the cargo door, Which was the only door which opened outwards and could not be retained by internal pressure as all the other doors are. Freaky accident which nobody could have predicted in fairness. . .

Routine Inspection should have picked up the cracking in the fuse skins between the flush rivets though to be fair. . .aircraft which carry out short hops all their working lives go through loads more pressure / depressure cycles than longhaul routes, , and following this incident, I gather that the inspection regime was altered to reflect the number of pressure cycles on a particular airframe.

One dead in Southwest Airlines flight horror | Daily Mail Online

It does rather seem to have disappeared down the 'Memory Hole' doesn't it ?. . . .I've been to Tatenhill loads of times since this first appeared, nobody knows 'Nuffin' about it. The hangar that it resided in now contains a Robinson R44 and a derigged Thruster TST. Perhaps they couldn't pull in enough deposits to proceed beyond the Prototype. . ? ? I've asked about it on Gyro sites and got nowhere.

Some Intelligent chargers on this site Skip. . .OK, it's in the UK but there is some useful data on batteries and charging for those who may be interested. I've known Roger and his Son for 24 years, and have used their services a number of times. Have a look. . <Strikalite - the rechargable battery specialists > . I bought my Ni MH pulse charger from them a loooong time ago, after I binned all the Ni Cd batteries I had in 5 portable rigs and switched to Ni mH cells... . .

Oh Dear,. . .the CAA have held up my 'Collection' of old, useless 25Khz rigs for export to friends in Australia, with this new exemption. This means that none of the 25Khz rigs will have to be junked by law until 31st Dec 2018. This is an extension from the original date, of 1st Jan, due to massive complaints from leisure flyers. . . SO, for the benefit of those four folks who have asked for one of these junk rigs for a naughty spare,. . .You may have to wait a little longer ! Sorry about that. . .but I won't forget. I'm going for the YAESU model shown below,. . as it's the lowest cost, and I don't need VOR nav. Icom stuff has always been well expensive. . .it's NICE to see that three YAESU rigs are now type approved for 8.33 use in the UK. . . (I REALLY DO WISH THAT THE CHINESE WOULD BRING OUT A MODEL. . .they seem to be able to make and sell useful VHF /UHF hand helds for under £20. . . .if they don't get into this market, they are missing an opportunity IMO. BEX. . .TELL 'EM BEX. . . . .They'll listen to you cuz you spik Chinese . . . .

Proud of Ya Stevo.

I had the great pleasure of flying a Bantam when they first appeared in the UK many years back. Basic, but brilliant fun. Very stable, and nice handling. Originally, The BMAA didn't like the Push = Pull aileron cables,. . . and due to my early onset dementia,. . .I cant,. . .AH YES. . .BOWDEN CABLES ! ! ! ! much concentration needed to remember that ! My friend Kev Bettington was going to be the Importer, but it all went wrong with bank financing etc,. . and he only imported two of them from the NZ manufacturer. I think,. . .( memory again ) that one had a Jabiru engine, and the other one was fitted with a Rotax 582.. . . The only thing that I thought was odd, was that it did not have a decent front windscreen, just two tiny ones. . .so that the crew were subject to the prop blast. . . .most uncomfortable. I think there is still one rotting away in a barn at a private airfield near Bewdley in Worcestershire, called Pound Green. I believe that Kev emigrated and runs a bar on some Pacific Island somewhere. . he used to be a professional DJ after all . . . .irrelevant, but thanks for sparking the memory bank.. . . The other Bantam was destroyed by my mad friend 'Sam The Scaffold' Moore. . .' who was a very low hours pilot, 70 years young ( he ran a fairly large scaffolding company employing around 50 blokes ). .. and against his better judgement, ( where have I heard that before ? ) he was badgered into taking a nice Lady friend up on a day when even the birds were grounded, ie, there was a solid, steady 35 Kt wind from the S/W. . .and he got caught in the 'Downwind Trap' where he slowed the machine down, looking at the groundspeed instead of his bloody ASI as he thought they were going too fast to turn onto base and stalled it on the Base turn ( ! ) I got there just after the air ambulance and saw them both being extricated from the wreckage. Both had very serious injuries to their lower legs when the cockpit bottom collapsed in the near vertical impact at the bottom of the spin,. . which was witnessed by two Trike pilots. . . They both recovered anyway. . .and the Insurance paid out so everyone was happy. I visited the daft Sod in hospital several times (and ate most of his grapes and chocolates) Sam married his damaged passenger and they live in Spain, Sam will now be 82 Yrs old, and his Wife ( in her forties when they married ) will be rich real soon . . .

That explains why I didn't see it Dave,. . .I didn't leave OZ until 1983 ! ! !

Dunno any suppliers in OZ Skip. . . I use RS Components online in the UK, I have no idea if they have an outlet in Australia. but I'm sure you'll find someone on here who will know. . You could message Kyle Communications ( on this forum ) Mark will know. . . since he's in the radio tecchie business.

One nice thing about the ICA20 Skippy,. .. due to it's size and weight, if it doesn't work as a radio, it makes a Superb Door Stop. :-) If you're determined to do this,. . .ignore the 'Q316' bit, that just identifies the position of the device in the circuit diagram. Don't worry about the class of operation either. . .you only need the '2SC1947' bit. Fitting the base, collector and emitter legs into the correct holes in the board would be a very smart move too ( ! ). . . :-)

Thanks Birdy. . .that would have been the second guess ( Two Throttles - two Prop levers )

I can't conform or deny that mate,. . . if it happened,. . .somehow,. . .I didn't hear about it !. . . . .must've bin out of the bloody country to miss that. . . this is quite possible however,. . . i'm always flitting about in europe as 'Semi-useful ballast' with somebody or other. . . (Tryna keep them out of the white puffy stuff )

I checked the records,. . .we have 2 blokes named Mark based at the site,. . but none with your mate's surname. . .sorry. . . .

Our Airfield director has a superb hangar for his SE5A replica. It has two leather lounge suites, a fully fitted kitchen, a fold-out bed, is fully insulated, well lit and carpeted throughout. Eeh bah gum, it must be great to have money. . . . .( AND Style to go with it. . .)

Thanks Guys ( Ruff + Jet ) I lent out my own service manual some years ago. ( Fatal ! )

That's a power transistor, part of the PA circuit. Either a driver or final, have not looked up the specs, ( busy at the mo ) to see if it has the capability of delivering 5 watts RF output. . . .I don't normally feck about with circuits / components without a service circuit diagram. Which I lent out ( fatal ) some time ago. . .If you are interested, look up the spec on the device, and see if it delivers 5W at 50% duty cycle, class 'A' or more likely 'AB1' ( more efficiency) on VHF / AM. Midband. ( You already know the frequency area )

You're right, a Jfet it isn't. But I no longer have a service manual for the A20, if I had to guess, that is ether the pre-driver or final output transistor. . whether it could deliver 5 watts even at 50% duty cycle, I dunno / can't recall..I used to rebuild IC A2s ( previous model ) many years ago at an Icom agent repair centre, but it was just a job. . . I rebuilt the A20 I use years back, from bits. . .being a fiddler and hating to spend money on stuff if it was fixable. . . MOST things are fixable, if you want to spend the time. . .but after having £5K worth of uninsured test gear stolen from my workshop in 1993, I never replaced most of it. I still have a selection of tools, a super quality VSWR / Power meter ( Bird Thruline ) with lots of slugs. . .and a selection of other meters, but without a decent spec-analyser and other associated gear,. . . it's mostly informed guesswork mate.

Here's one for you eagle eyed cockpit spotters,. . NOW, I don't recognise this one myself. Looking at the shoulder flash on the pilot's suit, it looks like a Commonwealth style badge, poss RAF. I DID think, looking at the type of very early throttle quadrant that it could be an Avro Shackleton. . .I have actually flown in one of these at the tender age of 14 yrs, out of RAF Kinloss in Scotland.on air cadets annual camp. I was on board for five hours, and was allowed to sit in the Right hand seat for half an hour. . .On closer examination of the throttle quad, it might have two engines, which would rule out the Shack. . .and the overhead panel looks a bit modernish too . . . ..My Shack flight was a night sortie in 1964 and my memory is,. . .er, where was I going with this. . .hello. . do I know you ?. . .

Jurca Tempete.

I do know a few guys called Mark Rick,. . .any idea about what part of the country he flies from ? after all, we are only about half the size of Victoria here !. . .we get hundreds of flying visits from people all over the country, as we're centrally located and handy for a rest stop. . .Most signatures in the visitors log are impossible to read ! In fact, so much so that the Manager has put up a notice in the control office to this effect. We need clearer details of aircraft type, Origin, Destination, Commander and, where applicable, Passenger names, Clearly Written in the event of an emergency / missing aircraft etc.

Oh I dunno planey, there are some body and luggage scanners listed, could always use one of those to make sure departing pilots have not nicked any of his Tinnies on the way out of the BBQ ?

Don't know if I can offer solution Skippy, but it would be useful to know which Model you have. Is it a Mk 1 or 2 ? The Mk 2 has a frequency adjust knob on the top panel, next tp the Vol / Squelch controls.. . .the Mk 1 doesn't. If worst comes to worst, in the next few months there will be a few tons of useless 25Khz Icoms going begging in the UK when the 8.33 Khz voice channel spacing regs are fully implemented. I realise that these rigs will NOT be type approved for use in Australia, this was discussed on this site a couple of years back, BUT I don't think there would be a problem if you changed a chassis like for like ?. . There are still plenty of those models around, being ( Almost ) Bombproof and very reliable.. I am already sending Three Icoms to the states, to a Gent on this site actually. . . for shipping cost only as they have no value in the UK since they will be illegal to use. Ping my email if you want me to look around for a freebie for you ! <[email protected]>

Loads of useful tat here, to improve your local airfield or private strip ?. . . . Heathrow Airport - Terminal 1