On 25 May 2017 at 04:29, John Coyle <jco...@iinet.net.au> wrote: > Hey Chris - Were you ever at the Kingston plant? I was an engineering > apprentice at Hawker's in > Kingston (1956-7), plated cockpit parts for the Hunter, did paint tests for > the wing and tailplane > panels, and ended up metallurgical testing of steel components in the test > lab - learned so much > there! > > > John in Brisbane
Well well! No, I visited Kingston only once. I was based at the ex Folland plant in Hamble near Southampton. This was in the Hawker Siddeley days just prior to nationalisation and the establishment of British Aerospace, so 1969 to around 1978. I think the Hunter work, by then, was for a refurbishment programme, maybe for the Swiss airforce. Hamble didn't have an airfield so only made bits and pieces. Some of them were significant including most of the Harrier fuselage and Trident wings and tailplanes. There was also a sectioned off bit making chunks of Blue Streak missiles, but I'm probably not supposed to talk about that even now! Cheers, Chris -- PDML Pentax-Discuss Mail List PDML@pdml.net http://pdml.net/mailman/listinfo/pdml_pdml.net to UNSUBSCRIBE from the PDML, please visit the link directly above and follow the directions.
