Group News

In addition to receiving the regular copies of such Group Newsletters as are in regular production, we do hear from time to time from those of you who are not in a position to reproduce your own magazines and we are very grateful to you for these letters. If you are not in the habit of writing to us at present, we do urge upon you that it is a splendid habit to acquire. As an example of what we like to receive list the following:Flying activities.

Hours flown.

Problems faced in operation. Social and constructional activities. Handling or maintenance notes. Talking of Newsletters, it was a great pleasure to receive the flrst four issues of a new periodical from the Sherwood Flying Club, edited by Michael Gani, their Secretary. He is to be congratulated on turning out a well-balanced production, with articles on navigation and airmanship, qrtizzes, social news and a page on cookery.

Glamorgan Flying Club

Christmas has come and gone and left its customary trail of somewhat overtrained looking members groping their way round the Club House (notably headed by the Directors of ,Glamorgan Aviation Ltd.). However, flying has been continuing as well as the weather and other things have permitted though the monthly figures are well down on their summer equivalents.

One bit of good news is that Bob Brailey has finally completed all the necessary training and is now the proud possessor of a Private Pilot's Licence No. 50011.

CHRISTMAS PARTY

What we described as 'a small and unpretentious .' party on the Saturday before Christmas was a great success. In some mysterious manner we succeeded in squeezing at onp 18 point some 85 people into the Club room. (lt was a little like the Dark Hole of Calcutta, except that there was plenty to drink.) We welcomed most of our regular supporters and one or two not quite so regular supporters among whom we were glad to see Colin and Helena Davies from St. Nicholas making their flrst visit to the Club. Bob Brailey had dashed into Court the previous Monday to get us an extension until 11 o'clock (but of course, as usual, had forgotten to take the necessary fee payable for such a maneuvre and had to borrow it from the Clerk of Court), and the party was able to go on until rather later than normal. A special word of thanks to the lemale members of the club who provided all the food.

TRAINING

Capt. Clough-Smith has continued his navigation lectures and quite a number of our members are beginning to make sense of computors, compasses, maps, straight edges, etc., and we are very glad to say that the lectures will be continued dr-rring the coming winter months. Notiflcation " will be sent to members when the dates have been finalised. Paul Cash has been valiantly keeping film shows going every Thursday evening on Liflt, Drag, Theory of Flight and aerodynamics generally, by courtesy of Shell Mex and B.P. Ltd.

The Link Trainer is now installed in building No. 30 and as soon as the electric and vacuum systems have been overhauled and contacted we will be able to offer this new facility to members for f I per hour.

There is a reasonably good prospect of a new well-equipped Auster type aircraft being purchased by Glamorgan Aviation Ltd., during the coming season, provided the directors of the Company feel confident that they can depend on hours considerably in excess of 1,200 being achieved during the coming l2 months.

Warwickshire Aero Club

The Club has flown to date over 785 hours (this compares favourably with the top Club total of 779 hours for last year). During this time eleven first solos have been made, four private Pilots' Licences issued and night flying has recommenced for the winter months. There has also been a number of first night solos together with two pilots qualifying for night ratings.

A number of members have also successfully obtained their radio licences. One member has completed all his examinations and holds a full Instructor's rating and is, in addition, a Royal Aero Club observer.

The Club total flying time has been flown mainly on Tiger Moth and Auster aircraft, augmented by other types owned by members, namely Fairchild Argus and the recent addition of twin-engined Gemini for more advanced flying training. Two overseas flights have been made by members, one to Scandinavia, the other to France.

Wednesday evening lectures have now been resumed and these are particularly well supported and social activities have featured prominently throughout the Club year. As a result of this progress the amenities have been considerably improved within the Club House and it is hoped that this planned progress will continue.

Bustard Flying

Quite good progress has been made in that we have flown 110 hours since we took over the Tiger Moth on 2nd August, and four people have gone solo. Our mdmbership is full at 50 people, and we have just purchased an exR.A.F. Tiger Moth, to rebuild during the winter months.

Correspondence

To the Editor. Sir, In the December issue of popuLAR FLvTNG I was very interested to read of the revival of the Luton Minor. In the historical data th-ere i,s one point, however, which is not quite accurate and I draw your attention io this as I know how keen collectors of aviation history are to have things as right as possible. your contributoi states that the undercarriage of the prototype was a straight tube similar to th-e Flying FlEa. In^ fact, the underc?rriage consisted of two short cantilever ixles pivoted at the base of the lift struts and bearing on rubbei blocks in a box inside the cockpit. No doubt also you have noted that the rate of climb quoted in popuraR FLvTNG rather suggests that Luton Aircraft Ltd. made the first Sputnik and not the Russians. The prototype Minor G-AEPD was eventually modified to _have production type undercarriage and wai sold to i private owner in Scotland. Since then I have lost touch with it and possibly one of our readers could offer some light on its eventual end. H. Best-Devereux.

Book Beviews

The Review of Helicopter Development contains a brief description of various power units, five pages of tables ol data on helicopters of the world, with corresponding pages of silhouettes, six pages of photographs and "riu*Ly drawings of the Sycamore, Skeeter and Whirlwind. Altogether this is a compact, wellJaid out and exceedingly useful reference work.

Aeroplanes and Aero-Engines is the fourth edition of the series of cutaway drawings (by J. H. Clark, J. Crawley" B. A. J. Hatton, R. J. Way and R. Wood in this casey andfeatures 14 aircraft and ten power plants, including such interesting items as the Armstrong Siddeley Snarler, the Percival E.P.9 and the ill-fated Vickers V.1,000. No other method of presentation could pack so much informative detail into the space of these pages.

Britain's Aircraft is a survey of current aeroplanes and engines at the end of 1956 and contains three_view drawings, photographs and descriptions of 30 aircraft, photographs and descriptions of 24 engines and lengthy tables of performance and other figures that fo.m u ve.y useful reference section of current and projected types.

Those of our readers who are interested in collecting facts about the aviation industry's products will be weli advised to acquire these three publications; for a very small sum you will obtain a rear storehouse of aviation facts.

Review of Helicopter Development, 3s. 6d.; Aeroplanes and Aero-Engines (4th edition),5s.; and Britatin,s Aircraft,. 2s.; all reprinted from the ', Aeroplane,, and published by Temple Press.

Renault, by Saint Loup; published by the Bodley Head, at 25s.

Ask anyone what the name of Renault conveys to them,. and you will probably receive one of a few stock replies. To young men of today, the famous .750', the .quatre chevaux' car; to his father, perhaps the immortal copper and cast-iron V-8 aero engine; to many, the nostalgia of pre-war taxis in Paris. Not until you have read this book will you realise the full stature of this French industrial giant, who created a huge industry at Billancourt out of the shrewd skill of his hands and the intelligent forethought of his mind. M. Saint Loup has assembled a monumental quantity of material in this book, and he presents it skilfully so that the image of this forceful genius rises clearly before us, driving his cars flat out in the choking dust of the great pre-1914 town-to-town races, or strug_ gling with that curious flgure of World War One politici,

Albert Thomas, French Minister of Munitions over an alltoo familiar wrangle on tank design; the great flow of .aero-engines, during and after the war revealed a side .of his character of greater interest to us, perhaps, than the part of him devoted to the motor car. In one interestpassage we see him ordering a Gipsy engine from England to copy and, if possible, improve it, quite openly. The result of this episode was the famous Bengali motor. In the SecondWorldWar he wasworrying overhisfactory, separated from it by the boundary between the free and occupied zones; fighting Petain, the Germans, his son-inlaw and anyone who looked like taking it away from him. The prototype of the famous post-war baby Renault was built in secret during the war. His factories, all the same, worked for the Germans and were bombed by the R.A.F. After hostilities ceased, Renault, like many of his countrymen, was open to attack on the score of collaboration.

The author of this work has amassed a great number of facts and figures about one of the most important of French industrial undertakings with, as far as one can judge a high degree of accuracy. Here and there it may be suspected that the translator has been at a loss for just the right technical word, but on the whole the book reads extremely well in English and none of the atmosphere of the original has been lost.

Air Dates, by Air Commodore L. G. S. Payne, C.B.E., M.C., A.F.C.; published by Heinemann at 42s. This volume contains, in its 565 pages, a vast amount of assorted information, most of it concerned with the Second World War and much of it only indirectly con.cerned with aviation. If one has any criticism to offer of this monumental work, it is on these points alone, that there is only a token coverage of the important betweenthe-wars years and that some of the items in later years are of doubtful value. It would be of more interest, one feels, to have given in one or two cases the date of an actual event rather than the date of the communique announcing the event, and the statement that 'many 'German fighters were destroyed' in 8th U.S. Air Force battles has no real value; here, however, it has proved, perhaps, impossible to set a truthful figure between German and U.S. claims in this respect. These are not important criticisms, though, beside the certain and lasting value of a work containing a wealth of r"rseful information that it would be otherwise difficult or impossible to obtain for most people. If you have a section of your bookshelf devoted to aeronautical reference books, you must certainly include this one.

Rescue! by Elliott Arnold; published by Victor Gollancz at l8s.

The content of this work is fascinating, concerned as it is with the activities all over the world of the helicopter rescue units of the U.S.A.F. Air Rescue Service-and not only helicopters, in fact, but fixed wing aircraft too, of every size. To our ears, or rather, eyes, the some- what fulsome journalese of certain sections is distracting, but the style is trans-Atlantic, so one must expect differences. [t is always tempting to be suspicious of the 'human-interest' type of reporting, particularly where accuracy is concerned, though as far as the actual facts of each case are involved, Mr. Arnold seems to have taken great care to get them right. (Although one would scarcely agree with him that to fly a Sunderland into a hill on a flight over Scotland is to ' die a hero's death'.)

Little if any publicity has come the way of these rescue pilots; most of the incidents related here were new to us and all are interesting. British readers will recognise one episode, though; the rescue attempts when the South Goodwin lightship sank in 1954.

Ark Royal, 1939-1941, by William Jameson; published by Rupert Hart-Davis at 3Os.

Thanks largely to the considerable degree of publicity accorded her by friend and enemy alike, the career of few ships has been followed with such tense interest in its time as that of the Ark Royal, third of her name in the Royal Navy. (The first sailed against the 'Grand Armada', the second was an aircraft carrier in tl-re first world-war, but was re-named Pegasus.)

Mr. Jameson has given us a detailed history of one of the war's most important ships, and very welI he has done it, too; after the loss of Glorious and Courageous in the North Sea, one to submarine attack, the other to the guns of a German battleship, Ark Royal was the only actively employed aircraft carrier whose exploits have been-or at this late date are likely to be-chrgnicled.

Small Advertisements

Members of the Popular Flying Association may have the use of this column for advertising articles wanted, exchange or disposal for ONE INSERTION up to 24 words FREE. [.f more than one insertion it must be paid cash in advance at the rate of 4d. per word (min. 12 words). Box No. ls. 6d. exfia. Non-members chargeable at the rate of 6d. per word(min. 12 words\. Box No. ls.6d. extra.

Cheques and Postal Orders should be crossed and sent to Fryers Advertising Servi ce, lO Mitcham Lane, S. W.l 6.

FOR SALE New and unused Slingsby Motor Tutor Fuselage, any reasonable offer. Pottinger, " Creg-Ny-Baa ", Oatlands Road, Shinfield. Nr. Reading, Berks.

WANTED

For Carden-Ford Engine, Water Pump, Propeller and Exhaust Stacks. J. H. Pickrell, 82, Queen's Road, Southend-on-Sea, Essex.

AN OPPORTUNITY

An opportunity for a Licensed Pilot to become a member of the Swallow Flying Group (established owner group) operating B.A. Swallow 11. (2 seater canopy), at Elstree Airfield. Quarter share now available-inclusive flying costs less than f2 per hour. Details: A. Howell, 70, Shelgate Road, S.W.1l. Battersea 7110.

AIRCRAFT FOR SALE

Belfair Tipsy, 2 seater, full dual. Recent conversion to cabin included new C. of A. work, embracing engine overhaul and respray white and blue. Cruise 100 m.p.h., rate of climb 700 f.p.m. Fuel 3 g.p.h. Whole aircraft only 200 hours from new. At present on new permit. f.800. Barton Flying Group, Barton Airport, Manchester. BLL 7407: business hours.

Popular Flying, Junuaryl February, 1958