Primarily for general aviation discussion, but other aviation topics are also welcome.
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By PeteSpencer
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1837602
Anybody notice the ‘crack’ of the starter cartridge when the Chipmunk in the video started?

How did they work? A how much trauma to the engine did the sudden explosion because?
#1837625
PeteSpencer wrote:Anybody notice the ‘crack’ of the starter cartridge when the Chipmunk in the video started?

How did they work? A how much trauma to the engine did the sudden explosion because?


That was the Coffman starter, essentially a shotgun type cartridge but with no pellets in it!

Didn’t cause the engine any issues as I remember, bar there were certain procedures to follow if it either fired but failed to start the engine, or misfired and didn’t fire at all.

Every Chipmunk I’ve ever come across post Air Cadet days has been converted to electric starter.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coffman_engine_starter
PeteSpencer, JAFO, Rob L liked this
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By BobD
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1837648
Rob P wrote:
Eventually the ATC with an Air Experience flight from Woodvale and gliding from Sealand

Rob P


Me too. I was with 611 Squadron barracks on Everton Rd. Liverpool. Happy Days :D
#1837652
Rob P wrote:I started flying with a 2/6d trip over the Mersey from Speke in a Fox Moth.

Then there was a Vickers Viking to Perpignan

Eventually the ATC with an Air Experience flight from Woodvale and gliding from Sealand

Rob P


That would have been with 10 AEF at Woodvale.
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#1837662
Yes:

CCF RAF Section '65-'68, AEF White Waltham on Chipmunks, also Argosies at Benson, Canberra and Wessex at Laarbruch, RAF Test in Advance at Biggin Hill 1968, awarded Flying Scholarship at WLAC White Waltham 1968, 1st solo Aircoupe G-ATWP age 17yrs 1 month.

I would like to think that I was awarded the Flying Scholarship because I answered these 2 questions correctly:

Who is the United States Secretary of State? (Dean Rusk.)

How many RAF aircraft can you name that are powered by the RR Avon? (I got all 6.)

Or maybe it was because my Grandfather was RFC and RAF, and my Father ATA and RAFVR....
#1837695
PeteSpencer wrote:Anybody notice the ‘crack’ of the starter cartridge when the Chipmunk in the video started?

How did they work? A how much trauma to the engine did the sudden explosion because?

I witnessed one occasion at Abingdon when instead of going 'bang', the cartridge went 'phut' and smoke billowed from the exhaust followed by the pilot leaping out and frantically unstrapping the cadet from the back seat.
#1837753
BobD wrote:
Me too. I was with 611 Squadron barracks on Everton Rd. Liverpool. Happy Days :D


90 (Speke) Squadron me :)
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By foxmoth
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1837842
Highland Park wrote:
Rob P wrote:
BobD wrote:
Me too. I was with 611 Squadron barracks on Everton Rd. Liverpool. Happy Days :D


90 (Speke) Squadron me :)

Shirley when you were in it, it was the pre-war Air Defence Cadet Corps... :lol:


Dont call me Shirley
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By Rob L
#1837862
CCF: Chipmunk at age circa 14 from Midlands somewhere; winched out of Wessex helicopter about the same time; Gliding course (to solo) at South Cerney in motor Ventura aged 15 ("what d'you mean you're not 16 yet you 'orrible scruff? I dinna care care about the rules, get in there and do your solo!") My first solo ever, and I had to turn the engine off.

VC10s to Rome & back from Brize; a week at Gutersloh (5p pieces the same size & weight as Marks for the slot machines); a week at Brawdy in 1978 or 9 where flying in everything was so routine that a trip in a Lightning was just only slightly better than the one last year in the Buccaneer.

Halcyon days.

I pity the Cadets nowadays...what's the point for them?
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By kanga
#1837949
Rob L wrote:..Gliding course (to solo) at South Cerney in motor Ventura ..


then there's a good chance that one or more of your Instructors would have been former Air Cadets of mine (3 went from Staff Cadet to QGI there) :)

My first Chippie flights: RAF White Waltham [sic] when HQsAC was still there. AOC would sometimes come out from his office to fly Cadets. Last (as adult Instructor) RAF Woodvale during Camp at Sealand. Last Bulldog: Newton, during Camp. Last Tutor: Colerne, routine local AEF day.

[At WW in '60s most AEF pilots were still WW2 or National Service generation. Pilot was required to do first take-off and last landing, but some acceded to my request to do circuits, and allowed me to handle T&Gs (stick, throttle and flaps) from rear seat despite having no view forward :roll: ISTR that by the time Chippie left AEFs rule was that Cadets must have hand and feet off controls when below 1000' QFE. Anyway, when I started my PPL (C140s, so also tailwheel) in Canada, with Chippie-trained former or still current RCAF pilots who were also civilian FIs, one remarked to me on my first flight that I 'seemed to have done this before' :) ]

First Air Cadet Gliding: VGS at (IIRC) Dunstable Downs, Kirkby Cadet Mk III. Later (as adult Instructor): basic course to solo, South Cerney, Kirkby IIIs. Last during AEG visits with Cadets: Venture, South Cerney; Vigilant, Little Rissington. However, as a long-standing Cadet Instructor, I was invited with others (and with some surviving former ex-ADCC Cadets) to a day with the 'Vintage Flight' then at Hullavington, and had one trip in a Sedbergh. I was allowed to fly myself down there, and took with me one of the former South Cerney QGIs.

Happy times, and definitely got me hooked. There was no prior flying connexion in my immediate family, who all thought this a further reason to reckon I was a bit weird :?
Last edited by kanga on Sun Apr 04, 2021 11:49 am, edited 1 time in total.
#1837976
Highland Park wrote: preceded by two glider trips in a Sedbergh at 611 VGS based at Swanton Morley.Ian


Hello HP, in those days it was 611GS, Ventures as you know came a bit later.

Mike

I started in '64 @ 611 retiring in '77
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