An early-ish start of 9.45am on a cloudy Suffolk morning, Peter and Bee convened in the museum car park to head out to the HAS. Today was the day when work would start in earnest. A learning curve for both of them, but a challenge eagerly accepted.
First things first, Peter got his trusty flask out and offered Bee a cup of sweet tea, she wrinkled her nose (sugar bleurgh) and politely declined. Peter then donned a set of overalls and fetched a few bits from his car. In the meantime, Bee found a torch in one of the drawers and they both did a close-up survey of hinges, catches and handles, taking photos as they went to record the condition, damage and progress.
Treating the Scout as if it were a car (as will be explained below), they both agreed that when labelling what they took off, it would be called offside (O/S) and nearside (N/S). To them this made perfect sense and so sandwich bags and marker pens were set to one side to dutifully capture loose nuts and bolts; all bagged and tagged, with a note in each bag explaining the dismantling procedure.
There certainly is something to be said for the joy of going around what is supposed to be moving parts and giving it the WD40 treatment for that “just in case it’s sticky” situation.
Within about 10 minutes of figuring out how the doors should come off, the WD40 did its job and all 3 gave up the goods effortlessly.
Let me explain why the doors had to come off: –
Broken perspex sheeting
Brittle perspex sheeting
UV damaged perspex sheeting
All needing some kind of replacement or TLC further down the line.
The museum had already been blessed with a wonderful gift of some replacement perspex windows and these will, in the not-too-distant future grace the Scout in its beautification and restoration process.
Once the 3 damaged doors had been removed, they both set about figuring out how to dislodge the “slidey” part of the N/S and O/S front doors. It took some logical looking at, but they soon figured out that the “pretty” panel over the stationary side of the window was actually the guard to keep the “slidey” part from falling out.
I know, I can hear audible gasps from the gallery, but these are serious aviation technical terms, and we intend to use them wisely.
Now that the “slidey” and broken windows were separated from the doors, un-riveting and re-riveting is next on the agenda. Conventional rivets are both understood by Peter and Bee and the process is pretty straightforward. However, these are domed rivets and require a different process of extraction and reseating, which neither Peter nor Bee have experience in.
However, Bee has been given a privileged opportunity of spending some time with a technician who will be teaching her this process. This knowledge she will share with Peter, and they will both be wiser for it.
This concludes several very fruitful and successful hours today and we both thank you for going on this journey with us and the museum………
Peter and Bee will be returning to the HAS next Sunday, 5 February 2023 to tackle the 2 severely damaged roof panels, 1 above the pilot (O/S front) and 1 on the N/S rear area, so watch this space.