Hi to all our members, donors and supporters from the Rebuildshop in Arnprior, ONT. where I have hunkered down for 4 days working with the Knox Tech team on the rebuild of our Halifax airframe. Remember, the Halifax airframe is being rebuilt at Arnprior and the running Hercules engines and propellers are being restored at our headquarters, the Bomber Command Museum of Canada in Nanton, AB. Jim Blondeau our videographer shot all around the shop today while I gave a progress report and you will see that video program soon. But I wanted to show you photos of all that was being worked on and added to our Halifax in the last few days and weeks. Truly, the Knox Tech lads have become masters at restoring and building up components and airframe pieces to add to our heavy bomber.  Me, I find the aluminium darlings just wherever, get them to Canada, and presto-chango they become part of our Halifax miracle. —- not. Hard work, ingenuity, and innovation are getting it done. See first the shot as you enter the REBUILDSHOP, the Hercules and the wing showing formation of these major components

 

Note on far left, the rear wing box ribs are being added to the rear spar, See the nose rib above the engine, now do you see the shape of the center wing from front to back, over 12 feet of wing. Look closer below, see how the rear flap ribs from our Sweden recovery, thanks to our friends SCSC and RIVER THAMES, the ribs has been added – see RED ARROW – to show the entire shape – profile of the center wing of a Halifax. Those big tubular 3 foot ribs beside the RED ARROW,  — Knox Tech made close to half of those by hand using wood forms to hammer out the aluminium profiles and rivet them together.

 

HOW did we solve the problem with having no FLAPS for building our Halifax. ”Simple”, you just find a Halifax underwater that has been sitting there for over 80 years,   then ”look” under 2 feet of sand near the Halifax, dig it out with divers and vacuum cleaners, lift a complete flap in one piece without ripping it apart because it was FULL of sand and weighed 300 pounds. All the while buying beer and food for the Swedes and Danes, you gotta love ’em. Then find some goofball Canadian dumb enough to scoop out the sand by hand on a far way dock in Svenskie land – with him muttering something about ”now we have flaps to help us”. Then give it a fresh water bath for 6 months — Then send this 14 foot flap in a very LARGE envelope via air mail.  See the darling flaps below – RED arrows –  in all their rusted glory sitting in a shop in the colonies, they just happen to fit something we are working on. Isn’t that convenient. Amazing what lumberjacks and farmers in the colonies are capable of these days.

 

 

 

 

So then, some of you non-gearhead people will say, ”Big deal, you can’t use those flaps”. To which I must reply, ”Wrong, 100 octane breath”. For you see, my pilgrims, when you have blueprint of a Halifax flap AND an actual REAL flap ——- you can replicate- copy – make another flap that is brand new. HOW you do dat — see the next 2 photos of the best original Sweden flap rib – age 81 – from Halifax HR871, re-assembled as a template using blueprints  from which a hardwood exact form is made, then all those flap ribs can be formed – re-created in Halifax Hall – Hangar 42, by our boys.

So let us look at progress on the front edge of the wing, we have new nose ribs and the main fittings to bolt the UK outer wing panels that must be fitted — after we get the center-wing assembled. See the pic BELOW, 2 steel wing joints – fittings and an aluminium nose rib waiting patiently.

OH yeah, remember we have two giant wings cluttering up the Arnprior airport, what shall we do with those, any suggestions – see one stored next door, BELOW, in Hangar 43. Sooo big, but not a bother. We MAY find a use for them yet.

 

No. 3 son Olivier wowed by size. Also, we at BCMC – H57RC – Knox Tech received a national award for the Halifax Project, with Award plaque, including a grant cheque for 3,500 dollars, from the Canadian Womens Pilots Association – the Canadian Ninety-Nines, for the Halifax propeller fund to purchase 4 more new prop blades located in the UK. See Ninety-Nines Trustee Sharron Lutman, below,  presenting the Award plaque and funds just yesterday at the REBUILDSHOP to yours truly. Thank you Ninety- Nines of Canada.

Further to this, we have the propeller fund building up to pay for these next 4 prop blades. Total cost will be close to 10,000 dollars Canadian. Only 2,500 dollars for each blade, surely there must be 4 of you out there who could ”prop us up”, yuk-yuk. BUT remember we also have a Halifax mid-upper turret that we are dealing to buy and this will cost 16,000 Canadian in a foreign currency. The Boulton Paul turret is fairly complete with many spare parts.  We have about half this amount for the Halifax mid-upper saved up but we still need another 8,000 to purchase it and then shipping will be extra. So please think about H57RC and consider a prop or mid-upper turret donation soon, so that under that Halifax Christmas tree this year we will have these treasures to add to our Halifax rebuild. I seem to recall, so many of our Bomber boys sacrificed and gave up 60-some Christmases with their families and loved ones so we could enjoy ours in Freedom. And many of them flew Halifaxes. So hope to hear from you with your support, as we save our Halifax in their memory.