Glad this made it back to the top. Great post Jimbob, keep us updated with progress. Btw, How long is the line up for your job?
This is a good one to keep reviving. I might start marking all my repairs and updates. I like that. Pete
Thats rat bastad haha and yeah, JB's place of employment did my head in the first time I visited it over 2 years ago. Let me tell you anyone who is a WWI or WWII nut or even an afficionado of earlier and later conflicts would fall in love with the treasures that he gets to work with on a daily basis. History folks pure and simple. You are surrounded by living, breathing hostory EVERYWHERE you look. If only those planes, tanks, weapons, vehicles, armour etc could talk..... What a place !! Rat
It's been a while since I've had time to breathe with this project. The completion date has been looming and work has been frantic at times, but we are travelling well now, and I have some time to start uplloading the hundreds of images we have taken, and show you some of the really cool stuff we have found. It will take a few days, actually, more like a week or so, for me to get some images up and get up to date with this, but here's a start. It seems that the Germans numbered everything, including each rib in the wing.... Here's a shot of the Albatros upper wing with all the timber repairs completed, that's the Pfalz upper wing in the background..
The Albatros had been lifted in less than perfect places over the years, sustaining quite a bit of damage to the underside of the fuselage. So we could get acces to damage, we removed the undercarriage, and we put it in a big rotisery, picking up the engine bearers and tailplane attachment points. I'll go into more detail on the fuselage later if there is interest.
Back to the wings. Once all the timber repairs were done, it was time to prep them for the application of the fabric. As our fabricing experience was limited to WWII aircraft steel framed flight controls, we decided to enlist the help of someone a little more practiced in the art than us. We were in contact with a group of enthusiasts in France, and they offered to come out to Australia, and teach us all we needed to know to successfully fabric the wings. These blokes actually fly their aircraft, and all use original engines. This is them... http://memorial.flight.free.fr/indexuk.html So, the first step was to apply a cotton tape had to every rib, top and bottom, by stitching form the leading to trailing edge. This would provide something for us to stitch the fabric to. We placed the wings into stands that allowed us to stand them vertically for easy access to both sides. As you could imagine, stitching was a time cosuming job.
During work on the wings, we were lucky enough to have access to the original german applied fabric from the Albatros which had been removed during a previous restoration. This allowed us to accurately match paint colours, and even place the seams of the fabric in the same positions on the wing as original. Here is one of the lower wings with the original fabric draped over for measurement. The cross visible on the fabric is a repaint carried out sometime after the war. The lighter circle that you can see is the overpainted British rondel applied after capture on the Western Front.
The flight controls are of steel tube construction. These items still had thier original paint, so to stop the dope sticking to it, and possibly damaging it, we covered the frames in teflon tape first.
Next was the trailing edge wire. This is just piano wire, with a little tension on it. The wire then had to be wrapped in linen so it would not cut through the fabric when tensioned up, and also proved something to stitch to. After all this, we went over every square inch of the wings one last time to check for any sharp tacks or splinters that could tear the fabric during application. Then, FINALLY, we got out the fabric. More to come over the next week.
Nice stuff for sure, thanks for sharing. For HAMBER's around the country that like this sort of stuff, Rhinebeck Aerosdrome in upsate N.Y. is a must, mostly replica's, but very precise ones, and they fly every weekend during the summer. Great museum as well with many originals; in original condition. There is an Albatros in the Eglin Air Force Base amament museum near Ft. Walton Beach, Fla. At least they used to have one, as they aquired it when I worked there during the '70's, I was quite sure it was an original too, but I could be mistaken. Also the Lackland AFB in SanAntonio Texas has a cool little museum, with a B-17 Emmerson ball turret in it. People over 5' and about 120 lbs need not apply! But it would have been cool to play around with for sure! Pima museum in Tuscon, AZ is cool, mostly WW2 era stuff rather than WW1. Anyone lucky enough to be around Maryland (and this would be close to the only reason to be lucky about being in mayland); there is the Smithsonian's Silver Hill facility, which is a storage area of UNRESTORED aircraft and they'll do tours with prior arrangement. I don't know about you other folks, but most often it's the unrestored things that speak to me, whether it's castles in Europe, or old aircraft, there is something about seeing it just the way it lays after the passage of time. I think the restoration process runs the spirits out of them.
Awesome to see more of a.....'Downdate'! I cant wait to get back to Canberra again. StormKing, I agree that an unrestored aircraft is unique and a standout but without restoration they dont last long. Id rather see a restored original than the deteriorated remains thereof!
I always wondered - is this camouflage pattern printed, or sewn together? Where did you get it from?? Seems like about the wierdest camouflage colour scheme you could possibly come up with!
Great stuff Jamie. I've visited Jimbob's 'work' place a couple of times and it doesn't matter if you're into military stuff or aeroplanes or whatever. It's just the world's coolest fucking shed! Climate controlled and HUUUUUUUUUUGE! Great work on the Albatross. Will have to check it out next time I'm in town.
Sorry I never found this thread until today, great project. You mentioned that this is one of two survivors, is the other in the Old Rhinebeck Aerodrome? I seam to remember they had one with the same camo job, don't know if it was airworthy or not.
The Jalopy Journal
