Just arrived from Barry Friend, the ultimate reference work on the HP7 Herald, highly recommended for any aviation enthusiast

My latest print, the Fokker 27, Toby Dixon somehow captured the way we used to fly the aircraft, visual approaches whenever possible with flap and gear at just the right time.

Tales of a club instructor I arrived early that morning and joined Pick who was pulling the fleet out of the hangar. In those days the club hangar housed club aircraft. We both checked the oils and then taxied all five club aircraft up on to the grass beside the club taxiway. My aircraft G-BCPE was brand new with only a few hrs flown, it sounds grand but we had a system where each of the five full-time instructors had “their own aircraft” it was our responsibility to keep it clean, fly it and keep the logbooks completed and the aircraft booked in for maintenance, PE was a Cessna 150M that was built by Fenwick Aviation in Reims France. The booking sheets for the day were full, one-hour slots starting at 0900 and on to the airport closing time, my first four slots that day were local residents at various stages of their PPL training, but all on circuits so no problem keeping to time, at least up to lunchtime. The afternoon had a change as all six slots were for RAF ca...

The Beaver, into the Wild The first you hear is a slight growl that disturbs the calm air over the lake as it approaches, the sound grew louder and quickly went from an aural hallucination to something real, the tell-tale roar of the De Havilland Beaver’s radial engine imposing upon the wilderness calm of Moose Lake. Anyone who has spent time in the Alaska wilderness is intimately familiar with the sound of the Beaver. It came into sight low over the Sitka spruce trees of the temperate rain forest surrounding the lake the familiar shape of the Mk1 Beaver, 9 cylinders and 450hp making that unmistakable sound. I pondered this legendary aircraft as it roared above Moose Lake circled at the far end then touched down on the water as gently as a feather falling on snow. They call the Beaver the Massey Ferguson farm tractor of the sky and was instrumental in opening up remote areas of the Alaskan wilderness. The cockpit is fitting for a post-World War II vintage airc...

Flying the Brittan Norman Trislander Climb on board by the front starboard door and settle into the left seat, the cockpit is an ergonomic nightmare, identical switches randomly placed all over the place. You would expect the flight instruments to be behind the control column and in front of the pilot, no this is the Trislander, the basic six instruments are three inches offset to the left, you get used to it but it takes some time. Engine starting was neat, and if sitting behind the pilot you had to pay attention, as it seemed just a blur of the left hand over a row of identical switches. After pushing in the green mixture levers at the top of the flight panel, unusual as they are nowhere near the other engine controls, and priming all three engines together by the throttle levers, no priming pumps, and after a thumbs up to the ground crew outside it start all three in about 15 seconds, no starting each in turn followed by checks just all three as quickly as possible....