discussion Spitfire found in peat bog.

[AlanG]

A rather nice read. Hope it all comes together at some point.

Spitfire found in peatbog slowly being pieced back together - BBC News

 

[adt70hk]

Thanks for sharing Alan. Much appreciated.

Andrew

 

[Guest]

What a group of men, very brave indeed .Agree with Andrew, thanks Alan for posting .

 

[PaulinKendal]

Amazing story.

As an aside, I feel that perhaps when photos are colorised like this, the fact should be given greater prominence. Colorising (is that the correct term?) wonderfully brings pictures and people to life, but could easily be misinterpreted as true-to-life, rather than just an interpretation.

 

[Ian M]

An amazing feat if they pull it off. I was just a little bit shocked when I saw the photo of the sorry remains. Not much of a rebuild, more a new build with a few bits here and there from the original. If that was a car it would never be accepted as a restoration.
A thing I often wonder, and I know a lot of people would just say but its not a real spitfire, They have the skills and the tools to make a whole brand new spitfire airframe and probably the engine as well. The big question is are they (generally speaking) restoring a spitfire or restoring history...
Both worthy causes but I wonder if the people that look up at the skies to see them fly, or indeed the people that fly them do so because of the history or because it is, undeniably, a beautiful machine.

 

[Mini Me]

You make an interesting point Ian. Having an Aviation background I was amazed at the amount of new (old) stock still available for certain aircraft. I spent a few years working on P2 Neptunes and many times we would receive parts in their original packaging dated from the early 1950's. It wouldn't surprise me if there are still a lot of original parts from the mass production efforts during WW2. As far as the airframe is concerned, there were instances during the war where more than two aircraft were "married" to create a serviceable machine for the next mission. Given that background, they could hardly be looked at as classic cars ....just some thots over a cuppa.
Cheers, Rick H.

 

[flyjoe180]

It's the data plate that has the real value, any extras that can be salvaged and used add to that value of any restoration or rebuild.

 

[stillp]

W

It's the data plate that has the real value, any extras that can be salvaged and used add to that value of any restoration or rebuild.

When I was looking for a car to restore, I was offered an early Ferrari Dino at a ridiculously low price. I asked for some photos, and it looked as if it had been in a crusher. Apparently it had dropped a valve at over 200 km/hr, which caused the engine to size, so the back wheels topped rotating, which made it spin, cartwheel, leave the road and hit a tree. It then burst into flames. I couldn't see a single part that looked usable or repairable so I couldn't see it had any value except for scrap. The seller pointed out that if I could extract the ID plate from the wreckage, Ferrari would build all the parts I needed, but without that plate they wouldn't sell the parts, to avoid people making replicas. Apparently the parts would cost say £150k, and then with a few hundred hours of skilled labour I'd have a car worth £250k.
I declined.
Pete

 

[Jim R]

I hope it all goes well for those restoring the plane. A huge amount of work, time and dedication.
Jim