Dick Ransome / pre-crash damage to K7

[sheppane]

Louis Goosens bunging up the hole...

Note how distorted the top right quarter of the jet pipe aperture is!

Mike, That's actually Tony James on the 5th of November, just before the static test. Same sort of bobble hat though....

[Renegadenemo]

Mike, That's actually Tony James on the 5th of November, just before the static test. Same sort of bobble hat though....

Neil, I hope you ceremoniously shoved your glasses up the bridge of your nose as you said that. Mike has demonstrated on countless occasions the appropriate gesture when you out-anorak someone...

[f1steveuk]

Glad it wasn't me that pointed out it was Tony!!

As for the "duck dents", well if you replicate them, they are not THE "duck dents" so I wouldn't bother. When I'm involved in car restorations, we don't include the damage, even though we try to be sympathetic and not over restore. I've worked on cars drivers were killed in (racing cars) and have never included any damage. I understand this damage is part of the story, and when setting a time/date for what your aiming at, that IS what you should do, but everyone is right, you'll just be accused of not doing it all.

I did do some work on a P51D, and you couldn't leave dents in the wings for obvious reasons, but for display we had some very clever transparent vinyl "dents", painted b some theatrical chappy, and when on the polished ali', you couldn't tell. Always a laugh to see people's faces as you peeled off a dent!!

[sheppane]

I blame the bobble hat!

I'm glad my comment was taken in the spirit intended.
Not trying to out-anorack anyone. By the way, the guy behind Tony is John Pett who did 'Price Of A Record'
He is talking to Leo who is on the otherside of the boat. That interview is included in the documentary.
Still can't think of any reason why the jet pipe colling duct on that side was blanked off.

Regarding the duck dent, for what its worth, I would say don't replicate it.
Its unsightly, and if DC had had more time, and the facilities to hand, I''m sure he would have fixed it.
Can't really figure out why they didn't, except the fear that midway through the repair, the lake would turn into a mill pond, and they would miss their chance!

They could have fixed it in the evening, though by then, I guess everyone was really rather tired.

[Renegadenemo]

Not trying to out-anorack anyone. By the way, the guy behind Tony is John Pett who did 'Price Of A Record'
He is talking to Leo who is on the otherside of the boat. That interview is included in the documentary.
Still can't think of any reason why the jet pipe cooling duct on that side was blanked off.

There you go again, out-anoraking yourself this time!

The reason the hole was closed in the side...

On the Orph' jetpipe cooling is effected by having an inner jetpipe made of Nimonic stainless surrounded by an outer, aluminium shroud with a bright (316-probably) stainless tailpipe for heat resistance that is a smidge longer than the inner pipe and a couple of inches larger in diameter. The efflux hurtling out of the inner pipe causes a negative pressure at the annulus where it ends and ambient pressure air then flows through a pair of inlets on either side at the other end of the shroud to flow down the gap between shroud and jetpipe cooling the jetpipe as it goes.
On the aircraft installation there's two inlets to the duct. One is for ram-air when the aircraft is moving and the other, on the opposite side, has a spring loaded, one-way flap so it will open on the ground purely due to the pressure gradient between ambient and the negative pressure in the shroud then, when the ram-air pressure overcomes ambient the flap closes to stop ram-air leaking out through that inlet and down goes the ram-air to cool the jetpipe. Simple but effective.

But on the boat they left both inlets open then cut a hole in the side directly opposite them in the side of the engine cover. We know they had trouble getting rid of heat at the back because of the lashed-up heat shields held in with finest string so the theory was good - in theory.

Now remember when the Tribute Act sank? They'd imploded their inlet trunk so they took its upper half off and allowed the engine to vacuum the inside of the hull - then a panel came adrift and the lake was Hoovered in until it sank.

K7 running with a hole in the side and the jetpipe cooling arrangement slurping straight from the volume inside the hull would create exactly the same effect (though not as pronounced) so I suspect that the reason it was blanked is because a thousand zillion gallons of water went through it because a gale of wind was blowing inwards through that square cutout.

The final configuration was with that cutout blanked (that's the ram-air side, by the way) and the other inlet to the shroud was ducted to the outside to another opening in the hull so at least if it sucked water in the water would go straight into the jetpipe shroud. The ram-air inlet could suck for all it was worth but it couldn't suck water into the hull and that, in my opinion, is why it was blanked off.

[Pegasus]

I understand the desire to rebuild K7 to as she was just prior to the accident but for what it's worth I personally wouldn't recreate the bird strike damage. Had the attempt been successful and DC had sufficient time and resources how would he have wanted the craft to have been seen at the '67 boat show, presumably looking her fantastic best? Can't we give him that now?

Phil

[Terminator]

I 2nd that Phil. I think it would be a total waist of time re creating that damage. I'm sure somebody would have been tasked with either making a temp repair or filling it on route to the boat show.
Novie

[malcolm uk]

Whilst I have sympathy with the views expressed already, could this project, by returning the crafts appearance to a condition earlier in the '66 campaign, be accused of "airbrushing history" by not having the damage visible? After all, that damage was present on the morning of the 4th. January and K7 was still deemed safe to take on to the water.

If a cosmetic repair had been made during the journey from Cumbria to London for the Boat Show then that would have meant no crash and K7 might have been donated to the Country in a better condition. As history tells, us, that damaged part was mashed some more during the fateful crash, but the part tells an important element of the story of the last campaign - which the public visiting the Ruskin sh/would want to hear - and the interpretation of how DC managed his last record campaign.

Question: Will the BBP be asking Vicki to have any/all the photographs taken during the campaign airbrushed to remove sight of the damage?

A 'date' has been chosen for the condition in which K7 should be presented and all of the effort needs to be continued to be directed to that end.

My view is the damage has to be present, even if it has to be created in what might otherwise be new metal.

[Renegadenemo]

My view is the damage has to be present, even if it has to be created in what might otherwise be new metal.

I reckon the answer to this one is simple. We make a new fairing and we make a mashed one then the boat can be displayed either way.
How's that?

[Renegadenemo]

Nah- the majority view has been that it would be daft to fake up damage in a new part, and I'd stick with that. Maybe make a side display with a dented fairing mounted on a mocked-up front spar with the attendant history explained alongside, but that's it.

Stop spoiling my fun, Bullfrog. I just want to see if I can make that shape. It may have been created in a nanosecond by a mallard nutting the tinware but it would be intriguing to try and reproduce it on the bench. Getting rid of unwanted shape has become routine but the converse - creating crash damage from scratch - hasn't been tried yet, apart from the 5th scale spar we used to prove that the duck damage created more lift than drag and that looked pretty good.