De Havilland Sea Hornet to be restored to flight ...

[Zac Yates]

Speaking of updates, Pioneer Aero has posted one of their own: http://www.pioneeraero.co.nz/2017/09/18 ... net-tt193/

The announcement in Classic Wings Downunder has caused quite a stir it seems there are a lot of people out there who are as excited as us about this. We have already had a lot of questions asked about all manner of details so hopefully my bullet points below will answer most of these.

The project is currently owned by Pioneer Aero.

It is located at our hangar at Ardmore, Auckland New Zealand and at this point is not available for public viewing.

Yes the intention is to return it to flight.

It is a DH 103 Sea Hornet, it is not a Mosquito

There is still a lot of detail to be worked through so we have no firm idea of time frames at this stage.

Yes we are a little crazy.

It is appropriate at this stage to acknowledge and thank the following people.

Corin McCrae , Aerowood.

Mr Reg Field.

David Collins, Project Hornet. U.K.

Hugh Jones U.K.

[Mark Allen M]

Title edited

[avenger2504]

I've yet to see anything stating who the operator will be once complete.
Andy

Fairly sure it's actually owned by Pioneer. So perhaps sold during or after restoration or (oh if only) it stays here.....

[Chris Brame]

How much of a Hornet do they have to start with now?
From Geoff Goodall's list:

F Mk. 20
TT193 RCAF Winter Experimental Establishment, Edmonton ALTA 2.48

CF-GUO Spartan Air Services Ltd, Ottawa ONT 28.6.51

Kenting Aerial Surveys 8.51

Field Aviation Ltd 4.52
dam. in emergency landing, Terrace BC 11.7.52
broken-up, parts buried in landfill, Terrace Airport .52
(remainder of hulk stored on farm ALTA 94/97)

I seem to recall there was also an intact rear fuselage and/or a set of nacelles and main gear, but that was it?

[Dave Hadfield]

Yes, Pioneer owns it, for now.

Our P-40 was built by them. We bought it as a Project, and paid them to complete the restoration. In fact I was put in charge of the Oversight of that project.

They are good people to work with.

Dave

[OD/NG]

Exciting news for sure! FWIW, Captain Eric "Winkle" Brown, famed test pilot who flew 487 aircraft types, more than anyone else in the world, stated that the Sea Hornet was the best aircraft he ever flew. It had phenomenal performance, including an average climb rate of 5000'/min to 20,000' altitude.

If I remember correctly, somewhere in one of the museums in England, there exists the original fuselage moulds for the Hornet. Does any one know where that is and if Pioneer Aero is seeking use of it? Just like the Mosquito, having fuselage moulds is essential for building the fuselage. No moulds = no fuselage = no airworthy aircraft.

[Mike]

The concrete Hornet fuselage moulds are at the de Havilland museum at Salisbury Hall.

[OD/NG]

The concrete Hornet fuselage moulds are at the de Havilland museum at Salisbury Hall.

Thanks Mike. Do you happen to have a picture of them? Do you know what kind of shape they are in? Are they suitable for helping with this project?

[Spitty]

They look pretty bad..
https://warbirdtails.net/2014/10/29/de- ... -the-tail/

[OD/NG]

They look pretty bad..
https://warbirdtails.net/2014/10/29/de- ... -the-tail/

Ooh, not good.

Does anyone know how they intend on recreating the Hornet's fuselage? If I remember correctly, all the fuselage moulds for the Mosquito were non-existent and Glyn Powell basically had to have a boat draftsman reverse engineer a fuselage to make new moulds. Since no significant parts of the Hornet exist, apart from a rear fuselage and other non wing center sections, how are they going to do it?

Does anyone know if Hornet drawings were part of the large "cache" of DeHavilland blueprints/engineering drawings that were recently found?

[kennsmithf2g]

The concrete Hornet fuselage molds at the de Havilland Museum did not look too bad to me last week when I visited. It is in three pieces but they appear to be natural parting lines. Salisbury Hall is not part of the de Havilland Museum and contains private businesses. I took a picture of almost the same view of the mold.

[Mike]

Does anyone know if Hornet drawings were part of the large "cache" of DeHavilland blueprints/engineering drawings that were recently found?

There was no 'large cache recently found'. It was a fake news story put about by 'The Imaginary Mosquito' group to generate publicity. They were known drawings that had been used by BAe when they operated RR299 up until its sad demise in 1996, and are duplicates of drawings already in circulation. As such, I doubt there will be any Hornet drawings in TPM's possession.

[Brenden S]

At least the moulds exist. A quick scan and touch up they can be reproduced relatively easily.

[OD/NG]

Lots of my questions answered here:

http://www.warbirdsnews.com/aircraft-re ... oject.html