Summer opening - Easter 2009
This Easter we switch to summer opening hours, with the display hangar at Kemble open on Sundays and Mondays throughout the summer, from 10am to 4pm. For 2009 we have increased our entry charges, but this is the first change to our pricing for many many years. Members of the Bristol Aero Collection still get free entry all year round. Among our changes this year is our childrens' activity area, which has been expanded and improved.
Bolingbroke Restoration Project - July 2008 Update
The latest six-monthly progress report on our Bolingbroke restoration has now been posted on the website.
Click here to read the report.
Labels: bolingbroke
Blenheim Mark I components donated to BAC
The Bristol Aero Collection has recently received a number of components from a Mark I Blenheim. Shortly after World War 2, a Filton employee, Ralph Nelson acquired the nose from an ex-RAF Blenheim Mark I, later identified as L6739. He converted the nose into an electric car, on an Austin 7 chassis, and drove it around Bristol until 1953. In 1990 the car was donated to the Aircraft Restoration Company at Duxford, who are now in the process of fitting the nose to their airworthy Bolingbroke airframe, which will result in the first flying Blenheim Mark I in over 60 years.
Ralph Nelson with his electric car
In June 2008, David Bradley, the project manager for the Bristol Aero Collections own Bolingbroke restoration, received a phone call from a lady who had recently become the owner of the house where Ralph Nelson had lived. She discovered some aircraft parts in outbuildings and wondered if they would be of use to the BAC. David investigated and between BAC and Duxford they will be able to use all the parts in their respective rebuilds of Bristol aircraft.
links:
Bristol Aero Collections Bolingbroke Restoration
The Blenheim Society - Blenheim Mk I Restoration
Labels: blenheim, bolingbroke
Bristol Centaurus goes on display
The hangar at Kemble has a new exhibit in the form of an 18 Cylinder Centaurus engine – the ultimate piston engine produced by the Bristol Aeroplane Company. The engine has been partially sectioned for display purposes, giving an excellent view of its internal workings. It is on loan from the RAF Museum, and replaces an example that had been difficult to display properly.
This Centaurus is one of only 523 Bristol engines built in the shadow factory at Spring Quarry near Corsham in Wiltshire. Also known as Beaverbrook, it was the largest underground factory in the world at the time, and is still owned by the MoD. The display also includes many photographs and documents on the factory, including photos of the famous murals painted by Olga Lehmann. She was employed by Sir Reginald Verdon Smith to brighten up the canteen and other areas, and her murals still survive to this day.
Blenheim parts go on display
The Bristol Aero Collection is putting on display several components recovered from the crash site of a Bristol Blenheim. The aircraft, R3912, of Bicester-based No.13 OTU (Operational Training Unit) was on a training sortie over Somerset on 5th July 1942, when it crashed in a field at Pawlett near North Petherton. The crew (Sgt. James Anderson, Sgt. Gilbert McBoyle and Sgt. Adam Hogg) were killed in the crash, which has never been fully explained, although it is thought it may have collided with a barrage balloon cable. After ten years of negotiations, local aviation archaeologist Tike Hake received permission from the MoD to recover any wreckage, and conducted a dig in July 2007. Shortly after the crash in 1942, the bodies were recovered, and the crew were buried in Scotland and Bridgwater.
Several items were recovered during the dig including propeller blades, engine and airframe parts, and personal items such as coins and a mug. Some of these items will shortly be going on display in the BAC hangar at Kemble, as a memorial to the crew.
Components from R3912 shortly after arrival at Kemble - these include an undercarriage oleo, propeller hub, and engine parts.
Labels: blenheim
