Old & Rusty 
Electric Locos – The Wendover, Barrow-in-Furness, Baker Street connection
I always treat travel, by whatever means, as an adventure (unless it is driving in the UK) and the less straightforward the merrier, as far as I’m concerned. I reckon a lot of this adventure thing came courtesy of the old man. When we were kids we would go and visit all sorts of obscure… Read More ›
Finishing what Len Bartram started – RAF 100 Group Airfields of Norfolk
The first batch of short booklets on the World War II airfields of Norfolk, especially those relating to the RAF 100 Group written by Len Bartram have become extremely popular so discussions abounded about the rest of the ‘missing’ airfields from the RAF 100 Bomber Group. Although there are already seven little gems already out… Read More ›
Of Flying Boats, Hot Summers and The Short Sandringham
Of Flying Boats, Hot Summers and The Short Sandringham Reefing through piles of books and articles collected by late father I was intrigued to find a copy of an article published in the November 1976 Air Pictorial magazine on a flight taken in 1976 aboard a Sandringham flying-boat that had come for a visit to… Read More ›
Forgotten Links – The Chinnor Railway comes alive
Once upon a time Princes Risborough Station was a major railway junction with branches going off to Aylesbury, Oxford and Watlington. Today the grand brick built signal box remains along with the line to Aylesbury. The line to Watlington survived to Chinnor as a freight line carrying cement products from the Chinnor Cement Works until… Read More ›
Steam, Speed and Sewing – The Good Ship Consuta
Its no secret that I have a bit of a passion for steam engines so when Andy Rawson suggested I give David Eager a call if I fancied going for a trip down the Thames on an 1890s steam boat I jumped at the chance but there was immediately a slight snag when I found… Read More ›
Porsche 911 – fifty years young by Steve Roake
Goodwood Festival of speed witnessed this year the fiftieth celebration of the Porsche 911 sports car. Love them or hate them you have to admire anything that lasts 50 years, and when you think that Ferdinand Porsche was on a roll having previously created the Beetle car and then the model 365 from which this… Read More ›
Pot Plants and Planes – Convair 440 re-discovered
When this picture came through little did I realize what an interesting aircraft G-CONV was and what a life she had led prior to ending her days in a Scottish Nursery. See, that’s the great thing about ballooning and unplanned landings which means you end up going through the back end of nowhere where the… Read More ›
Mallard and the Canny Fox – Celebrating a 75 year old record
Now then, seems the old perennial adage ‘many years ago’ has crept up again and today I find myself celebrating Mallard’s record breaking run when she thundered down the East Coast Mainline and set the record for steam powered haulage back in 1938. It was mentioned, in passing, in ‘Complicated doings at Sackville Lodge’, but… Read More ›
A brace of Hurricanes – One could be yours
In the intro-outro last time we mentioned that we were pondering on what exactly to take to the Chiltern Hills Rusty Club Show. In an unlikely twist of fate our problem was solved for us. Well, in true live-for-the-moment fashion, we got a mail from Jeff Lawton to ask if we would like to come… Read More ›
What ever happened to Dave Jenks (and his dad’s Halifax)?
Dave Jenkinson, better known as Jenksie (or Jenks) and former Chief Observer for UK Competition Ballooning, as it was then, has entered the annals of ballooning history as being the only person ever to get a free balloon out of Camerons. Jenksie had entered ballooning in the mid eighties and came and crewed for some… Read More ›