UKVAC flying in the Vulcan :)

[trm]

http://www.vulcantotheskystore.co.uk/

Not sure if anybody else here is interested in this, but this is a project to keep the last remaining Vulcan bomber in an airworthy state. I've been donating for a while (the most awesome plane ever, followed by the SR-71/A12 and Concorde IMO

).

Anyway, the latest donation drive allows you to have a personalised message carried in the bomb bay during this years flight show season so I've paid to have www.ukvac.com painted in there. The first person who gets a photo of our site in the bomb bay can have a non-rude custom title picked for them

.

Given that this site is about keeping bits of history alive, I figured it was quite appropriate

.

 

[darthbob1425]

Where do they hanger this? Is it on display at COSFORD as we were talking about taking the lad during half term.

I remember years ago my mums boss had brought the entire front end of a Vulcan and had it up on bricks on the drive. It was a bit of a sight when you drove through the village. During the summer he used to let us go in and play - best den ever..... I only ever saw one fly once and it was a beast.

 

[trm]

The one at Cosford is a different airframe but is still an awesome example, especially when you see the Yellow Sun bombs underneath it and realise that the airframe used to be on +15 standby with those buckets of sunshine in the belly for large parts of our youth.

If you've not been to Cosford in the past couple of years then I'd definitely recommend it as they've done some awesome work building an excellent Cold War timeline exhibition. It covers the full period, it's got interactive sections you walk through which are full of memorabilia of the relevant periods and is a pretty unbiased view of the period. And there's a Vulcan you can get up close to

.

This Vulcan (XH558) is currently down south I believe as it's being re-certified for this season's shows by contractors on behalf of the CAA. They have a pretty good FB group which has plenty of info about the project at: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Vulcan-xh558/170427449654925

And more about the V Bombers in general at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V-bomber (but everybody knows the Victors and Valiants are only really good for converting to tankers

).

 

[Alpha1]

That's cool Tim

 

[Macro]

I went to Duxford recently, well worth a visit, lots of interesting planes there

I'll keep my eyes peeled for the UKVAC Vulcan as we have a lot of airshows around here, and I saw the vulcan a few years back at one of those - was really surreal, as it flew towards us it looked just like a space ship from HHGTTH - a big slab in the air, and absolutely silent. Once it went past us however, then the engine noise kicked in!!

 

[DanP]

Great job Tim. I only saw a Vulcan flying once, it must have been during a Biggin Hill airshow as I was playing in a football match in Kent. It was totally surreal and the game actually stopped dead in it's tracks, 22 players all just staring into the sky watching this fantastic plane going through some serious moves. The noise was fantastic, that thing didn't need bombs, just the sound alone would have been enough I reckon...

Dan

 

[dannyboy]

Cool idea Tim.

I saw it flying last year, was amazing to see one in the air again. From what I hear of the team who keep that Vulcan flying, they always seem to be on the verge of running out of money, which is a shame. I hope they can find a wealthy benefactor to help them keep it flying...

 

[Dan_k]

A good idea Tim, Ive seen this aircraft fly quite a few times since its rebuild and although they can no longer fly it at its full potential (for various reasons) it is still the most impressive aircraft i have seen.

 

[Danscu]

Its great how dedicated people strive to keep this amazing aircraft flying and are given the support by many such as Tim. To see the Vulcan flying at the Bournemouth Airshow was a pretty surreal experience as it seems so graceful despite its huge size. By far my favourite in the line-up and I hope it will be here again flying in August 2011. Hopefully the weather will be better this year though!

 

[Jodo]

Beautiful plane. My other half is plane crazy and wets herself (in a good way) when she sees an SR-71. Another one of her many plus points!

 

[trm]

Beautiful plane. My other half is plane crazy and wets herself (in a good way) when she sees an SR-71. Another one of her many plus points!

I've got about 6GB of pics of various parts of the SR-71 at Cambridge, including some particularly cheesy pics of me standing around the engine nacelles. A truly awesome plane, and if it wasn't for the fact that nobody would sell me one or train me up, I'd work my arse off to acquire the funds to buy one

 

[dannyboy]

What amazed me most was the fact that it leaks fuel when it's on the ground, as the fuselage and wings are designed to cope with insane amounts of thermal expansion when it's flying at Mach 3 - so the fuel tanks only seal properly when it's in flight.

It's a bit like having a £30m car that leaks oil when it's on your driveway

(slightly unfair comparison, I know).

 

[Guests]

found a pic of her flying over my house

 

[trm]

Nice pic Andy. The Vulcan project confirmed today that the sponsors list has gone off for printing to be installed in the bomb bay so hopefully one of us will make it to the Vulcan on this season's airshows so we can get a pic

 

[DanP]

Great pic Andy, very nice quality shot. Notice the bomb bay doors are open, had it just unloaded over Sussex?

Dan

 

[Guests]

I have more pic's if anyone's interested

 

[tb lilley]

Used to see the Vulcans flying over my house on an almost daily basis back in the late '70s. Awesome aircraft. This was when I was living in remote rural deepest darkest Wales, so used to see a lot of military aircraft out and about.

Several times I've looked down on Tornados flying by - you'd be up on a hill and they'd come screaming down the valley, usually in pairs. Impressive stuff. Once looked down on a sodding Hercules too .... Bloody big old things they are up close .....

 

[Bensonrad]

My sister works at Shoreham airport, I will see if she can see if its down there at the mo...and get a picture of the slogan

 

[JohnBud]

when i was posted to cyprus, we had 1 of these landed at akrotiri airfield. they put netting up at the end of the landing strip just in case it over ran it. although i was a soldier i was posted to a couple of raf bases. i used to love parking up at the end of the run way to catch the hurricanes taking of. man i love the sound of fighters with the afterburners fired up. when i was coming back from belize we stopped at pope airfield in the good old US of A. i was totally blown away by the amount of hercules planes parked up, had to be at least 100. whilst in cyprus i worked in cahoots with the americans. they has 2 big black planes, 1 was real the other a dummy. the real 1 took of at 6.30 in the morning and spent the day circling the middle east. the other 1 sat waiting to get sabotaged. but for air travel its got to be helicopters. just so much fun.

cheers.

john bud

 

[trm]

That's pretty cool JB - got any amusing stories of your time in the forces? I'd love to know what the big black planes were. My first thought was SR-71s or A-12s but then I wouldn't really describe them as big having seen them up close now. Still want one for my soon-to-be-started collection though, along with a few Main Battle Tanks

Once I get my nerd theme park up and running people will be free to come round and drive tanks and other tracked vehicles through a large field I'm going to build an obstacle course on

. And maybe I'll get round to re-activating the gun so I can fab some sabot rounds and we can see how a Challenger II would fare against a T-72 or T-90 (just need to obtain the export licenses for those

).