Marc's Public Blog - Flying

There are multiple Imperial War Museums in the UK, and Duxford is likely the biggest plane museum in the country, 7 hangars and next to an active runway used to demonstrations and flights you can rent/pay for. I was there for opening time (took an uber from cambridge as it's not convenient to go by public transport):

first impression: it's big

I had a tour booked to get a private tour of a spitfire and sit in the cockpit. I didn't know that for just 60 times more money, I could have flown in one for 30mn. A bargain :)

this was the actual aircraft, recovered on the beach in normandy

I then went to sit in it

After my tour, I went to visit the hangars:

auto gyro

I went back to hangar #1 to see the concorde that closes earlier:

They had one of the 6 concorde prototypes in the world. I had seen severals, but prototypes are always special, so it was worth seeing:

it never had passengers, it was a test airplane for multiple systems including anti-icing and engine management

the seats in the passenger versions, were much smaller

lots of test equipment

cockpit was off limits

the numbers were references to see how much icing happened

harrier engines are awesome

Next, I went to the restoration hangar, lots of planes being worked on:

Next was a small control room that re-enacted the only real air attack from Germany that was stopped:

Further down was a very nice hangar filled with US planes. Not as interesting to me since I had seem them all many times in the US, but still worth the walk through:

Last, but not least, was land warfare, this was a war museum, not just a plane museum:

And that was it for the visit, I finished just 30mn before closing time.
Also, while I was there, I got to

Those planes did inspire me to do my own flight Over Cambridge From IWM Duxford.

Getting back home was also not easy, no ubers at all, and taxis were a 45mn wait. I got lucky and shared a cab with a woman who had already called a cab herself and was also going to the train station in cambridge.

I was a bit worried about how much time I had as I wanted to see the entire museum, so in the end I settled for a 30mn scenic flight, but there were none, so I rented an old carburated C172 with CFI since I am not legal to fly in the UK and know nothing about radio work, or airspace there.
I hadn't flown a plane like that for about 10 years, but ended up remembering pretty well how to do it. After landing the CFI said he didn't have to touch or correct me on anything and all he did was the radio work.

at least it had a garmin 430, but no autopilot legal to use in the UK

taxing amongst warbirds

good view of the multiple museum hangars

weather/lighting was not great, but a typical UK day. At least, no rain

overflying cambridge airport

weird that they don't use 23L and 23R

We then made it to Cambridge. Forgive the heavy color correction, the original colors were very dull due to the poor weatherpit

Flying over the colleges was very nice.

this delta is where I went punting with Louis, very nice views from the river

We then flew away for a few other views

american cemetery

And back to the airport for an easy landing

the plane still had an ADF antenna

I was going from Liverpool to Cambridge, so I figured I'd stop at Cosford for its enticing RAF museum. I have to say right here that it is not easy to get there by public transport only, unless you have a lot of time. In order to save 1H off the trip, I took a trail to Stafford, got off there and caught a somewhat expensive cab to Cosford (public transport only requires going to Birmingham, and then changing to a once per hour slow train, plus a 10mn walk from the station to the museum).

I got there just before 10:00 as was my plan, and they nicely agreed to stash my luggage which was not a given in the UK (they are more against it as everything is now a bomb apparently). The best part though was that I was able to arrange a private guided tour with a guide called Frank who was a wealth of knowledge on the museum and gave me a 3.5h tour of everything. It was absolutely fantastic, and well worth the 50GBP donation to the otherwise free museum.

The museum is big, 4 different hangars:

this prototype plane actually had an alternate T tail made for it, but it didn't work as the elevator could stall at high angles

the english electric lightening is really a cool powerful plane

when the harrier went to a 98.5 degree angle, it could fly backwards

the brits invented ejection seats and made many different kinds

Frank giving me cool explanations like how this plane had motors to speed up the wheels to landing speed before they touched the ground, how cool is that?

brakes and motor in the same wheel

plane to test alternate pilot positions

this was uncomfortable but allowed the pilot to take more G forces (that was before G suits)

this one is a little bit black bird looking

The section on Japanese aircraft, was surprisingly good:

KI-46-III reconnaissance plane

the Yokosuka Ohka suicide powered rocket, was sobering

Spitfire Mk I

Nice german planes too:

Ju 88R-1 with advanced radar

German U-boats even had this towed autogyro, it didn't have power but would be towed by the submarine and take off high enough to see far away targets

let's not forget the first turbojet powered Me 262, so ahead of its time

and the Me163B-1a komet was liquid fuel rocket powered, super cool too (with dynamo generator in the front for electrical power)

This plane attached to a bomber turned into a bomb that work be flown to and dropped on the target, was interesting too:

A few russian planes too:

More planes in another hangar:

And a good rocket and missile collection too, the germans were way ahead during the end of WWII:

And that was it for the visit. Frank was a fantastic tour guide and really made the visit a lot better. A huge thanks to him and Cosford for putting us in touch.
Getting out timely was not trivial either, but byo sheer luck I was able to call an uber that happened to be driving by and got me 10mn after I called it. Normally it would have been a hard to get cab and a longer trip.

During my last visit, I got to see the airplane section of the science museum in london, and that was quite good already. This was obviously bigger though; a very decent collection which is easily worth 4H at least:

the harrier engines were amazing

that was a close parking job :)

it is a beautiful plane, reminds me of the US B1 bombers a bit

really cool twin boom

the British invented a lot of things, including ejection seats, including 0/0 rocket powered ones

these missiles had rotating gears to stabilize them in flight

no elevator needed when you have a full moving tail

rear view mirror

it's been weird to see all those UK planes with what looks like french flags on them

And that was it for the overview, definitely a nice museum worth visiting and easy to access via public transport from London

By the time I reached SF, it was all fogged in, nothing to see, not even a hint of the golden gate:

at least angel island was visible

new google building

there was an RC swap meet

it used to be a bit naval airbase

really cool picture

Nice beach nearby:

I have 3 big picture galleries here:

While in Tucson, and after vistiing the Tucson Titan Missile Museum the previous afternoon, I was there bright and early, 30mn before they opened at 09:00 :)

A good portions of the displays are in 5 different hangars:

Some hangars had a mix of things:

Interesting pieces were japanese planes and a pilot guided cruise missile trainer:

I had never seen this portable helicopter. For some reason, it never became popular, I wonder why :)

More planes and helis:

a D21 drone, meant to be launched from the A12, the first version of the SR21

interestingly, there were severals warthogs flying outside that day

Of course, a sizeable portion of the collection is outdoors, which most of the year, is in somewhat unberable heat, but thankfully in november, it was only mid 80's. Normally you can get a narrated tour in a tram, but during covid, they were cancelled, so I just went on foot. Unfortunately a lot of description plaques were missing, or pointed to unreachable web pages :-(

unconventional propellor bomber that was improved with small jet engines

super gumpy

even some french planes

english electric

multiple migs

There were a few airliners, that felt a bit out of place:

They did have some really cool plane paintings:

Normally, the museum also has a tour of the graveyard in a bus, the huge amount of planes that are sitting around the airport, some decomissioned and dismantled, while others are technically ready to be re-used if needed. Unfortunately, again, with covid, that tour has been cancelled, and I heard it might not come back.
So, I hired an uber to drive me close to some of the fences around the area, and I jumped out in a few places to take some pictures:

This is a better idea of what it looks like from the sky:

So that was it. It wasn't a complete visit since I wasn't really able to see the graveyard from inside, or get a good description of the outdoor planes in the museum (they were missing plaques and had non working QR codes), but it was the best that could be done during covid times, and it was still quite enjoyable :) It's definitely a unique collection.

It was great that we were able to visit after arriving in Tucson:

this is the actual size of the warhead

they also have a very nice short RF antenna

Outside is unassuming:

but if you look through the right window, you see the titan missile, impressive view

a few side displays

But after a set of stairs, we got down, and it was really cool:

the whole room is kept completely level

I won mission commander

the launch key was actually pretty simple

ready to launch

missile launched

we gave the key to Jennifer for a second launch

From there, we had a look at the missile launch room across the corridor:

Definitely a special experience, really happy we got to see this.

I didn't know the planes left from Tinian by Guam and there was a plan for them to land at Iwo Jima, and have a 2nd plane take the bomb and try again if the weather didn't allow for the first plane to reach the targets:

mission #1

mission #2

It was so an artillary range:

We had a look around the rest of the base, not much left:

Most of the planes were at the main location, a few were in another location around 1km walk away (not super convenient). The collection had a nice mixture of planes, including the most soviet planes I've seen in a single museum:

Most of the planes were in hangars:

for a change, that was a museum with proper warnings :)

very early airliner with only 6 person capacity

interesting, this plane had radiator cooling lines on its wing

The secondary location looked close on the map, but was actually a fair walk away on city streets:

And with just a few minutes to spare before they closed he hangars 30mn earlier than then expected closing time, I barely finished the museum. It was well worth the visit.