RAF Manston History Museum - Wings & Wheels last Sunday

What a place to chip away at bits of plastic and sniff the 'Poly' and paint. last Sunday was one of the Manston History Museums occasional cockpit open days with a few military vehicles and 2 local modelling societies displaying their skills.

I crammed myself into the cockpit of the museums Canberra B15, WT205 nose always amazed at how cramped and ergonomically dreadful the instrumentation is laid out plus sod all visibility from the cockpit (The Buccaneer was even worse!)

Canberra Cockpit and below the coal hole for the 'Nav' & weapons 'bod' claustrophobic or what!

The real bonus for me was meeting the East Kent Scale Model Society and Shepway Model Society their work was superb and they were a very friendly bunch, I will attend East Kent's meetings in future at Manston which is just down the road from home. I thought it would be worth posting pics of some of their superb work for your delectation and inspiration!

 

                                      The first set of pictures are East Kent modellers 'creations'

This is a flea sized model of the flying flea garage built kit plane from the 1930's! z scale figures next to it!

German built Daimler armoured car?

Leonardo's 'Tank'

A combine harvester! I believe made from a diecast model stripped re painted and detailed!

A Cromwell

Meteor T7

The East Kent Scale Modellers in front of the museums T33 Shooting Star

Opposite EKSM the Shepway contingent with equally impressive modelling skills

'The serpent & the warrior'

The Saracen (not in opposition to the above Templar!)

very interesting mix of vehicle subjects

Never really understood the appeal of these kind of busts (others I do understand more!) but superbly painted

Ferret

Model or real vehicle sometimes hard to tell from a picture!

Definitely the real thing the museums superb Jaguar with hatches and cockpit open  for the day

Nice to be able to closely examine the aircraft, this one flew 35 missions in the Iraq war and later flew with 41 Squadron before early retirement in 2005.

Bomb Disposal Landrover

The rare Meteor TT20 painted to represent a NF11 of 85 Squadron

The museum also commemorates its long association with the ATC

A working Merlin was also present used to control nuisance bird populations at key sites in Thanet.

 This Saturday is the Shepway Modelling Societies annual show at Hawkinge at £1 a snip combine it with a visit to the Kent Battle of Britain Museum nearby and a pint in the 'Cat and Custard Pot'  the old pilots pub. Not much of the famous airfield now survives it is now a 'Wimpy' estate !