Historic photos

I received an email from a friend which was headed "Australia 1950 to 1965". It had a lot of historic photos on it, mainly from around Sydney. I have picked out the aviation related ones and posted them below.

RAAF PBY Catalina, 1952, for Rathmines.

"Super" also makes soils more acid. and kills native plants like gum trees.

That's a GMC 6x6, bigger than the blitz and the basis of the larger army DUCKS. which I used to work on and several of which sunk off Stockton beach during exercises with considerable loss of life of Army Personnel..

Re the Cat shot with the Jato, I watched the Frigate Bird being rebuilt. Just above where the water jet enters the water on the opposite shore of Kilaben Bay is the boatshed and House of my Aunt's which I helped build and spent a lot of time there. When we Knew planes were coming we would row over and get in the way and the crash boat would tow us back to get us out of the way.

The two DC4's are in good condition. I got to fly them in 65 for TAA and they later got storm radar fitted with slightly extended noses for the Radomes. TAA got rid of theirs in early 69 (or late 68).. There's one at SARS (Albion Park) that should eventually fly again, Nev

VH-BBN (2) Cessna 180C Skywagon (c/n 50820)

This 1960 180 was an ag spreader aircraft, owned, at the time, by aviation legend Col Pay. The

above photo was taken by Geoff Goodall at Bankstown in January, 1964. In this type of ag 180

the hopper was situated in back of the pilot, where the rear seat normally was. The spreader fairing

can be seen under the fuselage. This placement of the hopper blocked half of the starboard entry

door, making that door unavailable for entry or exit, (somewhat limiting in the case of an emergency),

the only way out being via the left hand door (or through the windscreen). Corespondent Peter

Reardon indicates he had to seek both exit choices on 180s within his first year flying as an ag pilot!

Unfortunately the pilot flying -BBN on 22 October 1969 wasn't so fortunate, as the aircraft crashed in

a paddock near Scone, NSW whilst spreading superphosphate, the accident proving fatal.[FLOATL]0[/FLOATL]

180's and 185's weren't brilliant topdressing aircraft. The hopper didn't just block the starboard door it was equal both sides it used to halve the entry space and make it hard alighting. When cancelled the super bounty was only something like $7 a ton, at the same time some glaziers were getting wool checks of several hundred thousand. In the scheme of things it was a drop in the ocean.

Often the super would stick in the hopper and not drop out. I remember being a few feet from a parked spreader 180 and there was this almighty bang and the rear bucked around. The tailwheel was there on the grass attached by a couple of wires and the tubular spring shattered . The crankshafts used to crack off near the prop because of the gyroscopic forces doing a one brake on hard turn when reloading with lot s of revs on. Hard life for a fairly good aeroplane .Nev

Back to pix.

It's hard to believe both these designs came out of the same country in the same decade;

one stressing function, the other elegance: