Rich W

We're working harder than ever now. We found out a couple of weeks ago that WR963 is the LAST Shackleton still running.

A plan was hatched and negotiations entered into... with stunning results. We could have use of a hangar for four days. It turned into one of the best weekends working on the old plane so far. From the first e-mails 23rd March saying WR963 was in the hangar a day early, everything went nuts. Classic Flight at Coventry had very kindly let us use their Airbase hangar to progress the painting on our old Shackleton. It's something it desperately needed (you can see from previous photo's on here) and was looking a bit of a hopeless task to try and get done outdoors. I loaded up the car with as much painting materials as I could Thursday morning and set off for Coventry, eager to see what was going on there. I couldn't believe how busy the place was... it seemed as if everything was being worked on at once. If what I've seen today is anything to go by, Airbase's second season is going to be a cracker. Arriving to find everything sunny and bright I made my way over to where the Shackleton now wasn't, to drop the paint off. I'm sure this was where we left it? Best go look inside then. There she is!! Asking around the place and a figure of 17 years was arrived at since she last saw the inside of a hangar. Two of our guys were already hard at work starting to mask up the windows and cover the floor, as was requested of us. The team were all in good spirits, even when asked to unroll the plastic floor covering again (and again) for the camera.. It is all being documented. Airbase have been kind enough to kick a lot of other stuff outside for this one weekend, so we were NOT going to make a mess. I have to compliment the ground handlers though, they put 963 in the hangar bang on the centre line with barely feet to spare on the wingtips. This is how close it is: As you can see it's a snug fit. Helping out with the masking, I had to take this shot, as it was too good to miss: The DC3 was started up later in the afternoon outside, and made a really very pleasing amount of noise. Being at the west end of the hangar meant we got the sunshine for longer, which was rather nice. 963 looked that happy in there it was rather tempting to let the tires down so we don't have to move out, squat in the aircraft, or just paint a line on the floor that's Shackleton shaped with a "reserved" sign on it... During a quiet momnet I was given access to a place that I could have spent hours in (not the pub!)the 'Shackleton Design Office'. In a small room off the hangar is every drawing that exists for the Shackleton, all the mod details, and God knows what else. It's a treasure trove. Apparently we hold the design rights to the aircraft now, having all the master copies of the drawings and prints. There is a phenomenal amount of information in there. In terms of numbers this weekend, we've had around 20 people working on the Shackleton, which is kind of a record for us. Even the elder members of the group can't remember seeing that many people working on her in the 12 years that she has been in their care. Various gremlins crept into things though... While for the most part 963 has been well behaved during her hangar time, she has tried marking her spot when one of the bomb bay hydraulic rams started leaking. Even so, the hydraulics have held pressure for just over a week with the doors only just starting to creep open. This and various other small leaks caused problems with contaminating paint. Then the paint we had for the roundels/fin flashes started reacting, so they'll get redone next weekend. Luckily we noticed it after the first fin flash, so we didn't have to worry about any large areas. We overestimated the need for some colours, and underestimated others, but on the whole she's about 90% done. These last two were taken right before we left, Sunday afternoon, after 4 days at it. More good news on the horizon too regarding undercarraige servicing, propellers, and all sorts of other things that are lined up over the next few months... but you'll just have to wait and see for now. Kind regards Rich Shackleton Preservation Trust Diary dates (engine runs): .... for those that are interested! Sat 16 April - Friends of WR963 gathering Fri 22 April - Airbase re-opening

Winter came around, but work carried on. We had got quite a bit of white paint done on the Shackleton but rain and snow wrecked it as fast as we sorted it out. We abandoned our efforts there and concentrated on trying to get life into a couple of engines. The pre-oilers we had put som much work into stubbornly refused to work. Vital days were lost trying to find out why the oil was not getting into the delicate parts of the engine, finally being traced to some pipe fitting supplied with the wrong internal diameter acting as restrictors. The time lost meant we missed Coventry Airports Christmas night photgraphy event. Perseverance pays off though, and on Feb 5 we borrowed a ground power unit from Classic Flight, and plugged it in. With a crew aboard, the checks were run through, and No 3 and No 4 engines started up. No 3 was a bit grumpy, but smoothed out and ran okay after a minut or so. No 4 surprised us all and fired up like it hadn't missed a day. No 3 and 4 only, as we have a water ingress problem on the port side, and a propeller still to build; so No 1 and 2 remain silent for now.

More on WR963... Visitors to Coventry during summer 2010 would have noticed the scaffolding that went up around the starboard wing.. the rumours were quite interesting to hear! (we've been breaking her up, we've taken the undercarraige off.. ) The truth was far more mundane. WR963 was finally getting a much needed repaint. The scaffolding was put up to help us work on the wing in safety. The paint scheme is to be her old 224sqn colours from back in 1954, so she will be white overall. She will be carrying her own former code letters of "B" on the fuselage, and "M" on the nose. All the old paint has been taken back on the top surfaces, areas of corrosion addressed, and we've used hundreds of yards of ceconite sealing tapes and dope to make it all weatherproof, all done as per the original AP's. We've had to go round all the drain holes (hundreds of 1/8" holes) and found some were quite blocked despite looking clear. Water ingress is our biggest enemy what with being outdoors! The top surface of the starboard wing got its first coat of paint on Saturday 21st Aug, and it looked really well for it. More of the same went on in following weeks, butr we eventually got stopped by the weather. To keep momentum going, the engine guys got busy finishing the pre-oiling system off, the pipes and pumps being fitted over the space of a few weeks. It's something that's never been done on a Shackleton before, but should prolong the life of the Griffons quite a bit. The pumps will be activated off the old oil dilution system, which was made redundant years ago, but the wiring and switchgear is still intact. This means there are no visible alterations inside or on the engineers panel other than a couple of little labels now marked "Oil priming" instead of "Oil dilution". We've also had to send our air bottles for pressure testing so we can get the pneumatic services back in good order. We want to taxi WR963 in the near future, so we need brakes; and the brakes need lots of air pressure.The dates of the bottles in the pneumatic crate state "Date of next insp 7.61"... so they're a little overdue.

CRIKEY!! Those are awesome. How did your friend get up that close to the Paphos pair? We've been trying to get the airport to talk to us for ages. Rich

It sounds like you're a similar distance away as me. We all meet on a Saturday to work on the aircraft. Regards, Rich

My favourite story heard to date has to be this one: In the 1980's Shackleton's were used for crew training for the BBMF Lancaster, due to similarities and to avoid stressing the Lancaster to much doing repeated take offs, landings and using valuable flying hours. After the training was over, the Shackleton had to return to Lossiemouth, and set off north, battling against a headwind. A while after takeoff they were asked for an ETA. This they gave. "1600hrs". More time passed with the old grey lady growling sedately on. Another request for an ETA. Again they reply "1600hrs." After a short pause another request is heard. "Is that 1600hrs today, or tomorrow?" The longest recorded endurance flight for a Shackleton was 24hrs 21 minutes. Regards, Rich

radiomike7; Thanks! We hope to have her taxying by the end of the year. We'll have to agree to disagree on whether she is a bomber or not. It's a well debated topic... while the Shackleton was designed and built to be a maritime reconnaissance aircraft, it was also specified that it had to be capable of carrying the 12,000lb "Tallboy". It seems that was succesful as one point in the bomb bay is rated at that load. It was also used as a bomber for a while during its colonial policing years. I too have heard stories regarding the "Lulu". Apparently some crews were a little worried as to whether the Shackleton could outrun the blast to a safe distance after it went off! Lewis; If you're local to Coventry (or not too fussed about travelling) come help us with this one. Regards, Rich

Hi all, 963 is part of 'Airbase' at Coventry airport, she shares with DC3's, DC6's, Canberra's and loads of other 1950's aircraft. It's open to the public from Easter (been closed for the winter) but if you get all eager and can't wait that long let me know and you can visit the Shackleton in the meantime. We're there every Saturday. I've started a thread over in the Aviation section, and I'll keep updating it for the next few days to bring it up to present day. Regards, Rich

How it all started. In 1954 Avro's at Woodford, built Shackleton WR963. Nobody building it knew that it would turn out to be one of the last of the RAF's multi-engined piston bombers, the last front line descendent of the mighty Lancaster, and have a service career that lasted some 37 years. In 1971 when most of the Shackleton fleet was looking at being retired, WR963 was selected with around a dozen others to be a stopgap, until the arrival of the Nimrod AEW. This stopgap lasted until the arrival of the Boeing E3 Sentry in 1991. Some people still reckoned that in certain conditions the old Shackleton still had the edge oover the E3, during workup there being at least once when the Shackleton saw something on its radar scope the E3 didn't. The last four flying Shackleton's were sold at auction by the MOD in July 1991. WR963 and WL790 were bought for £42,000 each by the Shackleton Preservation Trust, and flown to Coventry airport, the other two were flown out to Paphos, Cyprus, where they still sit corroding in the sun. In 1996 it was decided that a Shackleton would be returned to flight. WL790 was chosen, and WR963 became the parts 'christmas tree' to achieve this. Instruments, pumps, valves, all went to the other aircraft. In 1997 WL790 flew across the Atlantic where it was flown for another 10 years on the US airshow circuit. It was then retired to Pima Air Museum in Arizona. WR963 sat for a year or so, and this was when I had my first encounter with her. I got left to my own devices with the old bomber one afternoon on a visit to the airport. By the time I had to leave I wanted to do anything I could to help. I found there was a group preparing to attempt a restoration and contacted them; unfortunately losing contact as shortly after that college, beer, and girls (though not necessarily in that order) took my attention. A decade later and a chance conversation with a friend caused me to contact the group again, and on a cold grey November day I went to Coventry to join in the fun. I had a good mechanical background restoring old cars for fun, and felt I could transfer my skills. The group looking after her was down to five men, and welcomed me enthusiastically. Wr963 was now wearing different colours having been painted in 2001, but that was starting to fade. At the height of the groups strength they had managed to get all four engines working, becoming a regular feature at airshows held at the airport, and in late 2008 had actually had WR963 out on the runway for a fast taxi run. It was hoped that a return to the air would happen but a feasibility study had found that while it could be done the costs were prohibitive. Think of how much cash the Vulcan takes in order to fly and that's the same kind of figure. The no 2 engine had just been replaced with a new engine, the old one having gone to Dubai for use in a wind tunnel, the work involved being immense for a small group of retired aorcrew and engineers. One guy actually went out to Dubai with the old engine and set it up on a rig for them. Shortly after getting reacquainted and I was straight in at the deep end, starting with some heavy graft to get flushing oil into the tanks. The wing was slippy, at an awfully steep angle, and there was no pump so everything went up on top using a jerry can. I despaired at the sight of the wing with all the paint and sealing tapes peeling. Things weren't such a sad sight everywhere though. Inspections by the group showed that 963 looked a lot worse than she actually was. Inside she was a time capsule, being exactly as the RAF left her on delivery. The maps, charts, diaries, all were left in place. All the interior equipment still worked on demand. It was obvious the important job was to keep the water out, so that was where we started. The learning curve was going to be a very steep one. Rich

Tony, Some marks of Halifax had Merlin engines (for example the one in the RAFM at Hendon.) Pictures of any of the wreckage would help. You say you found remains of a tyre... if there was any undercarraige remains attached to it that would quickly identify whether it was a Lanc or a Halifax. The reason I ask, is the Halifax had two dinghy stowages on the wing, the Lanc had one. Not much to go on, but maybe a pointer for the aircraft type? Regards, Rich

Well this is where we've got to so far: But I'll save the rest for starting a topic in the Aviation section. Rich

Hi all, I'm Richard Woods, from Chesterfield, Derbyshire. I've often wandered around your forum and found myself at the variety of different military vehicles, and the information you have on here. I'm an enthusiast, never an owner yet(though I do keep looking at Stalwarts rather jealously..) About 18 months or so I decided to get involved in something ex-military, so with me being a bit of an aircraft nut I volunteered with a group rebuilding a 1954 Avro Shackleton MR2 at Coventry airport. Very shortly after I was deep into it and wading through tons of manuals for it, wielding my spanners, helping to bring it back to life. If you're interested I'll start a topic on the beastie and start getting some pictures up. Kind Regards, Rich