Pair of Bristols

gorby
Nice pair of Bristols you have there Russ. Ops – had a 'Carry On film' moment there. I take it that you are proud of (the city of) Bristol's aircraft heritage?

Russ Haines
I was hoping someone would get the innuendo 🙂
Bristol's my adopted home town, so I like to "big it up", especially as the Spit and Lanc (love them too!) get all the fame and fortune.

wilky
What about the Beaufort

Russ Haines
Maybe one day! And the Bolingbroke 🙂

wilky
Didn't know of that one. Had to Google it and was a bit disappointed as it's just a Blenheim with a funny name

gorby
Yes Wilky, I had check to see what the differences were as they look almost identical.
Russ: Incidentally, most of the parts for those 'nasty Rolls Royce' engines were built in my home city (Coventry) during the war. We even built some Bristol engines at the Massey Ferguson shadow factory on the outskirts of Cov. It's probably the main reason we had the crap bombed out of us.
My favourite pair of Bristols (no sniggering at the back) are the Beaufighter and the Brabazon. When I went to Cosworth, the Bristol Type 188 they have on display there is absolutely amazing.

Russ Haines
I've nothing against RR, there's a fair bit of RR heritage in Bristol too, only joking. And trying to get Bristol engines as well known as the Merlin (or American Wasp et al.)

Russ Haines
They're rebuilding a Bolingbroke at the Bristol Aero Centre (due to open this summer, also has Concorde 216, Bloodhound, Brisfit, SHAR etc.)

gorby
Only a couple of weeks ago I was only saying to my other half that we should visit Bristol sometime. Whether I'll be able to get her to agree to going to an aircraft museum is another matter. Have you been to Cosworth? If not, it's fantastic and well worth a visit.

Russ Haines
Went a couple of years back. Built a 1:144 TSR/2 as a result, and organised a brilliant lecture about the development of the TSR/2 through the local chapters of the RAeS and IET (I'm an engineer so our professional institutions give us money to put on cool lectures like that 🙂)