My '44 Flying Control Dodge

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We had a number of visiting aircraft over the weekend. The first was a Pitts Special on Friday evening, followed by a Bucker Bestmann and de Havilland Chipmunk on Saturday morning about 9am. I took the photo opportunity for some more 'Follow Me' duty, leading the Bestmann and Chipmunk to the display area.

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2016 was a record year for military vehicle and classic cars entries into the show, there being over 100 MV's and 300+ cars entered. We had some nice unusual MV's too, such as this ambulance car, and we also had Chris Till's Sherman back again.

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The good weather allowed uninterrupted vintage racing on the circuit, although the wind picked up on Sunday, it at least stayed dry.

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Back on the aviation theme, we had a rare Bristol Hercules aero engine which was running at regular intervals across the weekend. It made a nice change from the 'Merlin' and 'Griffon' engines often seen at airshows. The team operating it are restoring four into running condition.



Engine run video....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lfLaEKsRZls

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The classic car field was well stocked with polished paint and shining chrome.

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On Sunday, while the Twisters Aerobatic Duo flew their second display, the Sherman, FV432 and Stalwart took to the arena for a blast around.

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I started packing away small display items about 3pm on Sunday, and later, by the time most other vehicles had gone, I got my three vehicles together for a quick photo-shoot. Shortly after, I took the Ford to the Croft Engineering workshop to be locked up for the night. I would return first thing in the morning to drive that home, followed by taking the Dodge to its storage yard. It was a busy, long weekend, but an excellent show.









For more pictures, see my website page of the event - http://www.sacarr.co.uk/mymvs/events/2016/croft.htm

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Today is also Faith's birthday, 72 years old today!

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Looks like there'll be one more event for the Dodge this year. I've been invited back to my daughter's school with the vehicles a week on Friday. The year six class are doing WW2 history and will be visiting Eden POW camp earlier in the week. Last year I took both Jeeps, but this year I'm going to get the Dodge home and take that and one Jeep. It will give it some exercise before the winter sets in!

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The school visit was going to be Friday just gone, but it was forecast for rain, so it was postponed now until early November. As it's been a while since the Dodge has been anywhere, I went over today and warmed the engine through and then moved it forwards a couple of feet so it's not sitting on the same spot on the tyres.

All being well, it will be home in a couple of weeks for the school trip, and may be joined by a few other vehicles. I'm trying to find anyone else local who is interested in coming along, subject to the school being happy with us all invading!

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Last event of the year!

Blackfell Primary School - November 4th

I had a great morning at my daughter's Primary school this morning ( 'though not her class ) teaching the kids about World War 2 history. The year 6 class ( 10~11 age ) have been studying WW2 this term, including a recent visit to Eden POW Camp in Yorkshire. Living close to the school helped with getting the vehicles there, so I was able to take all three, and a friend brought his Jeep. Another vehicle owner had to drop out due to illness, not wanting to spread bugs to the kids.





I'd recruited some other local guys to do lectures. Before morning break, we had a guy from the local aircraft museum talk about the war in the North East, a talk about the entertainments association ENSA plus a sing along, and childhood memories of WW2 from my dad.





After break, we took the kids onto the school field to see the vehicles, some weapons and gas masks etc., then it was time for Head Teacher Mrs Watkins and Class teacher Miss Kitchen to have a go behind the wheel of my '43 Ford. Their smiles said it all.

With half an hour left, we went back to the classroom and I did a 20 minute presentation on the air war and the 8th Air Force, followed by questions. It was a very enjoyable way to end the week, and great to see the kids so interested in history. I'm hoping to add some pictures of the teachers behind the wheel, and also some taken by the school, but need permission first and the kids faces blurred out.

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For some time, I've been concerned about the visibility of the lights on the Dodge. I rarely drive it at night, but always drive with the lights on to make the Dodge as visible as possible due to its slow speed. However, the 6 volt lights aren't that bright, and the 5w indicators virtually pointless. So I decided it was time to upgrade.

Many of the replacement LED bulbs have the majority of the diodes mounted on the side, pointing to what would be the reflector in a normal car. Due to the shape of the housings, and the lack of a parabolic reflector, these aren't very useful. I decided I would have to find or make something more suitable. After a quick internet search, I found some ultra-bright 12 LED clusters designed for 6 volts. The brake and tail light will have two clusters fitted into the original 6 volt housing.

This is the glow from the current 6 volt tail light.



The first conversions were the indicators. I had some spare 12 volt BA15S bulbs which would be the donor for the fitting. The glass was smashed and the filament and support wires pulled out. The centre terminal was drilled out and a new brass pin glued in, with the solder built up the base again for the contact, and the LED cluster wire attached to the other. The negative wire was soldered to the inside of the metal fitting. The cluster was then epoxied onto the end of the fitting.

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On November 3rd, I brought the Dodge home ready for a school visit the following day. Before the afternoon rain came, I got the front indicator covers stripped of their paint and rubber slits, and cleaned and polished the plastic to reveal a much larger area of amber. The inset image shows how it used to look. It doesn't look quite so good, but it's far more visible to other drivers. I also got my first two amber LED clusters fitted. The LED's have a nice clean cut off between on and off, unlike the filament bulbs.





I tried fitted the other amber LED's to the rear, but there wasn't enough resistance in the circuit, and the LED's stayed on permanently, rather than flashing. I'm sure I can sort this with resistors to increase the load, but that can wait until it is warmer next year. It was too cold to be messing around for long outdoors.

So for now, I've fitted some 21 watt filament bulbs to replace the 5 watt bulbs that were fitted. They are much brighter, but don't really flash properly, as the filament doesn't cool down enough before powering on again. So currently they alternate between bright and dim. The gif animation below is from two frames of a video of the light to give an impression of how it is currently. I'll do another next year once the LED's are fitted and the circuit resistance sorted.

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Today I removed the brake/tail lights to convert them to LED's. Originally I thought I was going to have to cut open the metal bulb housing, but realised I was able to prise open the glazed end that was crimped over the main body. This allowed access to the bulb, which was carefully smashed, leaving the filament wires behind.

One of the coloured lenses had been cracked for some time, so I ran some cyanoacrylate glue into the crack. The LED clusters had their wires shortened a bit, and they were epoxied onto a plywood plate which would go into the bulb housing.



The LED wires were then soldered to the tinned filament wires and covered in epoxy to give a little vibration protection to the solder joints. Once the LED's were epoxied to their mounting plate, the plate was epoxied into the housing.

The front housing and lens were then crimped back onto the housing. One of the light covers had quite a bit of surface rust, so it was stripped back to metal, primed and resprayed green.

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These stills give a comparison between the filament and LED lights. It's not a perfect comparison due to different lighting conditions for each picture, but give a general idea.



The animated gif below is compiled from a video shot during testing. It shows the tail light LED coming on first, followed by the brake light. Each LED cluster is quite close behind the coloured glass, and so doesn't illuminate the whole glass as the bulb did, but the light is much more intense and noticable.