Tales from the RAF

Canberra Man · Dec 13, 2010

Hi.
I've got quite a few of these, mostly humerous. See what you think.

Theres a new erk on the dispersal and I get the job of showing him round the Lincoln. Its a cold day and as the NAAFI wagon had just been, we took our coffee and cakes up into the nose out of the wind and I carry on my chat. After our coffee, we tidy up and before I could stop him the newby threw his coff dregs down what looked like a drain in the floor. It wasn't a drain, worse! There was a bang and a thud and a ten man dinghy popped out of its storage in the wing root. The lookalike drain was the flotation switch for the dinghy in case of a ditching at sea. The lad got 7 days confined to camp and had to give £5 towards the cost of restowing the dinghy.

Ken

SirKit Breaker · Dec 13, 2010

I have several. Got into loads of scrapes in the RAF.

Fitted a wirelocking tab washer under a bolt for the fuel level probe mounting under the wing of a HS125. Only noticed that the tab wasn't predrilled to take the locking wire after i had fitted it, so i drilled it in situ cos i couldn,t be arsed to remove it

, drill slipped and i drilled a 3mm hole into the wing tank, fuel came pouring out and i didn't win any popularity contests

When i worked on civvy airliners, i went to Majorca to fix a 757 which had gone tech, flew back on it as an extra crew member, whilst sat in the galley helping myself to some light alcohlic refreshment i noticed a sign on the trash compactor "OUT OF ORDER DO NOT USE", being the ever inquisitive engineer i pushed the "compact" button to see what was wrong

and it worked fine

, so tried it again

, no problems, took the sign off and proudly told the Head Stewardess that i had fixed the trash compactor

. She was not in the least impressed, she had stashed 1000 duty free embassy regal in it for her 4 weeks off

poppypiesdad · Dec 13, 2010

TALES from the RAMC , one day pulled up to the front gates of Ash Vale depot to do some ambi stuff, we sat there for about a hour till staff got the map the right way round

Jamie

Canberra Man · Dec 13, 2010

Tales from the rAF.

We are in malaya and the canberra's are returning after a mission against the terrs. I pick mine out on the peri track and turn him into the pan, signal to open bomb doors with an armourer standing by in case of hang ups. No hang ups, far worse. As the bomb doors open a thousand pound bomb squeezes through the opening and crunched into the tarmac. The ground crew were wondering which way to run and how fast whan we realised it hadn't fallen far enough to arm. The air crew must have wondered what was up with the ground crew counting theyre worry beads. Fun over for the day.

Ken. canberra man

Canberra Man · Dec 14, 2010

Hi.
Safety? suggestions.

If the enemy is in range, so are you.

It is not adviseable to eject over the area you have just bombed.

Tracer works both ways.

5 second fuses are usually 3 seconds.

Any ship can be a minesweeper - once!

If you see an armaments technician running, try to keep up with him.

When one engine fails on a twin, you always have enough power to get to the scene of the crash.

Ken Canberra Man.

pmac10 · Dec 15, 2010

Canberra Man said:
Tales from the rAF.

, signal to open bomb doors with an armourer standing by in case of hang ups.

Ken. canberra man

on Tornado flight lines we had armourers standing by to ensure there was a hang up!

ive seen practice bombs fitted to a pod back to front!

SirKit Breaker · Dec 16, 2010

Taking the thread off at a bit of a tangent, but when i was on Boeings we had a saying
Bits Of Engine In Neighbours Garden

They frequently came back with bits missing

Canberra Man · Dec 18, 2010

Tales from the RAF
A Canberra is going on a navex and I'm out front controlling things. I point to the port engine, the turbo starter bangs, clouds of black smoke and she settles down to idle. I point to the starboard engine and all hell is let loose. The turbo starter explodes, pieces of broken turbine blades go through the fuselage wall and into No 1 fuel tank, kerosene pours out onto the still burning pieces of the cartridge and the whole lot goes up. A quick phone call to the fire section, has their brand new Rolls Royce fire engine charging round the peri track, it halts at the bonfire and an erk jumps down clad in gents natty asbestos suiting with a big helmet on. he pointed a huge pipe at the blaze and shouted. "Send it froo". The trouble was, noffink came froo! They had been so busy polishing their new toy, the had'nt filled it with foam. It was a cold day, so we stood in a big circle warming our hands. Then, the wheel hubs and cockpit coaming, which are magnesium alloy, went up with a brilliant flash, we just looked the other way! Someone muttered. "What about the ejector seats?" We all stepped back a few feet and sure enough, there was a triple explosion and three steel tubes, dragging the remains of the seat shot a couple of hundred feet into the air. The next morning there was a perfect slhouette of a Canberra burnt into the tarmac, with two Avon engines in situ'. Shortly, there were also new faces at the fire section.

Ken Canberra Man.

pmac10 · Dec 18, 2010

monday morning, a HAS site in Germany, launch a 4 ship, Inverness Cally Thistle 1, Celtic 0, Glaswegian flight line Corporal still bitchin' about this and aircraft taxies with ground power still connected, bang!, its amazing what you can cover up on a HAS site as opposed to a flight line.

Canberra Man · Dec 18, 2010

Talesfrom the RAF
A Canberra from 9 Squadron was detailed for night bombing at Donna Nook bombing ranges in Lincolnshire. They took off and presently arrived at the range and saw what appeared to be the red marker light for the target, the bomb aimer lined up on the target and 4 25lb smoke and flash practice bombs winged their way to the target, the light went out congrats all round and back to base where a different story was found. Supposed marker light was the red fanlight for the ladies bog at the Prussian Queen pub in Donna Nook village, luckily time had been called some hours earlier, because the bomb was dead centre. The Pilot, Fl/Lt Ted Flavell wrote a song about it. If your'e interested, I'll send it.

Ken. Canberra Man

DurhamSparky · Dec 19, 2010

Tales From the Royal Navy....!!

Part 1

HMMMM...! not sure if i can tell to much as what happened on deployed missions never really happened if you know what i mean!! hahaha

but any way on a regular patrol that we were assigned to we were a bit lax in the engineering department and one of the lads who was soon to be called "Lub Oil Linda" (Karl Nolan) was doing his bit for queen and country and proceeded to clean the stinky area next to the Lub Oil plants and coalescer,

after he got bord and went of watch the next 4-5 watches (me included) noticed that the bilge was getting sludgy and was a pale orange colour?? alarm bells should have been ringing now but nope nothing at all as we had pressing matters of water fights and drinking coffee to attend too!

we proceeded to pump bilges every 4 hours and they went directly out into the open water (will keep which sea it was nameless for security reasons)

after 5 watches manoeuvring room got a "LOW" Lub oil warning in tank 2 so we investigated as good engineers do and found a small drain cock in a inconsiderate location that we hardly look at hoofing oil out at a constant rate!

after some red faces and departmental witch hunts we realised we had basically polluted the sea with over 3000 Litres of Lub Oil which floats and when mixed with water under pressure (i.e a bilge pump) creates a thick white foam that can be seen for miles!!!

luckily we had not reached our intended location and had not compromised our existence that may effectively have had us sunk!

pmac10 · Dec 19, 2010

the plumbing forumn needs you now!

ian.settle1 · Dec 19, 2010

DurhamSparky said:
Tales From the Royal Navy....!!

Part 1

HMMMM...! not sure if i can tell to much as what happened on deployed missions never really happened if you know what i mean!! hahaha

but any way on a regular patrol that we were assigned to we were a bit lax in the engineering department and one of the lads who was soon to be called "Lub Oil Linda" (Karl Nolan) was doing his bit for queen and country and proceeded to clean the stinky area next to the Lub Oil plants and coalescer,

after he got bord and went of watch the next 4-5 watches (me included) noticed that the bilge was getting sludgy and was a pale orange colour?? alarm bells should have been ringing now but nope nothing at all as we had pressing matters of water fights and drinking coffee to attend too!

we proceeded to pump bilges every 4 hours and they went directly out into the open water (will keep which sea it was nameless for security reasons)

after 5 watches manoeuvring room got a "LOW" Lub oil warning in tank 2 so we investigated as good engineers do and found a small drain cock in a inconsiderate location that we hardly look at hoofing oil out at a constant rate!

after some red faces and departmental witch hunts we realised we had basically polluted the sea with over 3000 Litres of Lub Oil which floats and when mixed with water under pressure (i.e a bilge pump) creates a thick white foam that can be seen for miles!!!

luckily we had not reached our intended location and had not compromised our existence that may effectively have had us sunk!