Your earliest logged aircraft

[dave]

hi Dave,

    Thanks for the photo's, I used a Brownie 127, cheap but a reasonable postcard sized print, and one of my firm memories back then are those seats and that fence, also the tea bar...
        I was in contact with a man working as a civilian at Gaydon, and he said 278,285,290,292,299,312,314,316,and 319, passed his office window departing on the Monday after the show,
I did have a e-mail but cannot find it now, saying that 244,271,285,294,316,and 317, were flying at the show, these from 2 spotters notes...
244,294, are noted in Brummie ians log pictured on flickr, if you've got a account, search Coventry Air Day 1962-08-18
there's 3 pages of what he saw civil & military including the USAF re-fueling demo aircraft...

still a "bit" confusing but...

stay safe, regards,
dave...

[rj]

Thanks for the Islander photo Dave, interesting to see. I think they may have been stored for a while, possibly awaiting payment or for more political reasons?

[davebasing]

May 11, 2020 13:43:09 GMT dave said:

hi Dave,

    Thanks for the photo's, I used a Brownie 127, cheap but a reasonable postcard sized print, and one of my firm memories back then are those seats and that fence, also the tea bar...
        I was in contact with a man working as a civilian at Gaydon, and he said 278,285,290,292,299,312,314,316,and 319, passed his office window departing on the Monday after the show,
I did have a e-mail but cannot find it now, saying that 244,271,285,294,316,and 317, were flying at the show, these from 2 spotters notes...
244,294, are noted in Brummie ians log pictured on flickr, if you've got a account, search Coventry Air Day 1962-08-18
there's 3 pages of what he saw civil & military including the USAF re-fueling demo aircraft...

still a "bit" confusing but...

stay safe, regards,
dave...

Thanks Dave. The two lists are I think the same ones I had way back, but of course do not tie up at all well, only 2 being common to both. 244 was an Israeli DF aircraft and was not French after 1956 so must be among those that are clearly wrong. Plus 271 was I think never French but Indian. All those listed at Gaydon were genuine French AF aircraft at the time, but did of course include the spares that never made it to Coventry. We will see if Graham's FC request bears any fruit.

[davebasing]

Dave - Thanks for the Flikr link re Coventry 1962. You may already have these, but the F100 he lists as 43018? was 56-3018 the other two being 56-2967 & 56-2979 all from the 20th TFW; the KB50 he lists as 90389? was 49-0379 from the 420ARS at Sculthorpe (which was annoying as it was in the static at the Wethersfield show I went to the previous year) and the F101s were 54-1459 and 54-1471 from the 81TFW plus one which I didn't need but can look up in my original notes if you haven't already got a note of what it was. Let me know if there's anything else you're short of from that day. There is a list on the Scramble database but its not very comprehensive.

[dave]

hi Dave,
thanks for confirmation of the KB-50, and I've got 54-1444 for the remaining F.101A, all the rest i'm safe with thanks...

stay safe, regards,
dave...

[graham]

Morning Dave, no joy so far from anyone on the FCG I'm afraid regarding the P de F Mysteres but someone might come along, fingers crossed.

[davebasing]

Morning Graham. No worries, thanks for your efforts. Still digitalising a few hundred black and white negatives, will post some later to show how I'm doing.

[graham]

I shall look forward to seeing some Dave, thank you