Nicola_M

Microsoft strikes again....

How's my flying??

Leen's done some fantastic liveries, also utilising the bare-metal. No reflection is not 100% perfect, but he's got it down to a fine art.

You did what you felt was right. No one can blame you for that.

Strewth. That snake got busy....

At least the self-dismantlement makes the repair a bit easier.

Steel and iron will still rust in water, even in the lack of oxygen. Consider the iron block engines gone. Control columns gone. Engine mounts gone. Props gone. Landing gear and landing gear mounts gone. Cockpit canopy surround and mountings gone. About the only things to survive will be the aluminium frame, and aluminium wings. If they didn't use aluminium rivets, then consider the wings warped possibly beyond repair. When they buried them, they were burying them to keep them out of the enemy's hands. I don't think 70 years of preservation was in their minds. I will be very surprised if they have enough to salvage to make one flyable.

Burma Spitfire hunters discover crate http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-20957162 "British experts looking for a cache of World War II Spitfire planes believed to be buried in Burma say they have discovered a crate. The team has lowered a camera into the crate in the Kachin state capital Myitkyina, but says muddy water has stopped them identifying the contents. Project leader David Cundall described the development as "very encouraging". The team believes that more than 120 unused Spitfires could be buried in sites across Burma. "We've gone into a box, but we have hit this water problem. It's murky water and we can't really see very far," Mr Cundall told reporters in Rangoon, Burma's main city. "It will take some time to pump the water out... but I do expect all aircraft to be in very good condition," he added. Mr Cundall said a survey was being carried out at the site to locate any modern-day obstacles like electricity cables. He said they hoped to begin excavating within days. The team hopes to find about 18 Spitfires in Myitkyina, where it has been digging since last month. It is planning further excavations at Rangoon international airport, where it believes 36 planes are buried, and in the central city of Meiktila. Research suggests the planes were buried in near-pristine condition by US engineers as the war drew to a close. Finding out where they were buried has taken 17 years of research by Mr Cundall and his fellow enthusiasts. Among the team is 91-year-old war veteran Stanley Coombe, who says he witnessed the burial of the aircraft. "I never thought I would be allowed to come back and see where Spitfires have been buried," he said. "It's been a long time since anybody believed what I said until David Cundall came along." Only an estimated 40 to 50 Spitfires are believed to be airworthy today. Mr Cundall said the practice of burying surplus military equipment was common at the end of the war." I hope they're being realistic about this. Burma's a hot, damp and humid country. Whatever parts of those Spitfires that isn't aluminium is going to be scrap. Certainly I think they're going to need sh*tloads of new engines at the very least. Personally I think the most they'll find of any use will be wings and airframes. All the interior parts will be gone.

Maybe just old. I'm on Photoshop 7 and I thought that was old.

What, the one on top of the bird?

Vladimir Putin trying to look like a hard man again....

You just know the next time he shows up at the arrivals desk, they'll be ready to giftwrap him again....

He looks wrapped up like a late Christmas present.... or should I say, turkey.

I like that phrase....

I wasn't sure. It came right after my comment saying eric knew he was in the wrong, yet still kept posting. Oh well. Sorry Niebieski. I shall remove my foot from my mouth....

No, it wasn't.

deleted

deleted

Well, it's looking like two similar incidents, with conveniently similar causes. But brakes are usually hydraulic, and I would imagine in the absence of a great long length of cable, the thrust reversers would be hydraulic too. Who knows how the Tu-204 is wired?

Faulty brakes may be the reason for the crash, investigators believe. Faulty brakes may be to blame for a Russian airliner sliding off the runway and crashing into a motorway, an investigator has said, as the death toll rose to five. "After landing the pilot uses all the available brake systems on the plane, but for some reason the machine did not stop," a member of the investigation team told Russia's Interfax news agency. "Most likely it was faulty reverse engines or brakes." http://news.sky.com/story/1031417/russia-air-crash-faulty-brakes-likely-cause Interestingly, this has happened to another Tu-204: (same link) "But the state news agency RIA Novosti cited an unidentified official at the Russian Aviation Agency as saying another Tu-204 had gone off the runway at the international airport in Novosibirsk, Siberia, on December 20. The agency said that incident, in which no one was injured, was due to the failure of the plane's engines to go into reverse upon landing and that its brake system malfunctioned." Same scenario, same symptoms, same cause?

That's a no. Luis's link took me to the search manager, where I typed in Maui. Three files came up, but all for xp10.

That's not apparent to me. You hear the flapping of loose metal similar to the sound you used to get with Mike Wilson's L-1011 if you did a hard landing. But at the point you hear it you see the aircraft launch off the end of the runway. Doesn't sound like landing gear scraping along to me. Also, had there been anything causing drag, it wouldn't have come off the runway at the speed it did, plus it would probably have come off the runway sideways had anything been digging in. It should have been a lot slower than that by the end of the runway, snow or no snow. The place has two intersecting runways of 9,800 ft and10,040 ft. Should've been plenty of length to bring a plane to a halt, no matter what emergency. I still say for some reason they didn't get the speed down properly, either mechanical failure, distraction of pilots due to mechanical issue or something else. I can't blame the snow, because in the video there is no snow. Could be ice, who knows, but I would've still expected it to have been a lot slower than it was doing by the end of the runway. It wasn't skidding, as it would've gone sideways, and it clearly was travelling forward nose-first. Plenty of reverse thrust would've brought its speed down to a controllable rate. I still think whatever the cause for the aborted first landing holds the explanation.

It looked a lot more than 50 knots. Watch that video and see it launch itself off the runway and plunge down just before impact. No way is that 50 knots. Halfway down the runway it should have been having thrust reversers applied and speed significantly reduced from the speed it came off the runway at. For some reason the pilots either didn't, or couldn't, get the speed down. I can't even blame the snow for that - by the video the snow wasn't bad. Interesting point was that it was a second attempt at landing. I wonder what the cause for that was.

When you watch that video, the plane came off the runway really bloody fast. Looked to me to be about 80-100mph. Bit more than a skid.