The undoubted highlight of the 2014 UK Airshow season was the visit of the Canadian Warplane Heritage Museum Avro Lancaster Mk.X to these shores, which really was as magnificent a spectacle, as it was unexpected. Fortunately, the UK is blessed to be at the forefront of the historic aviation movement, and home based enthusiasts have an embarrassment of aviation riches to choose from. Even though I very much enjoyed catching up with the two Lancasters last summer, I will remember 2014 as having a number of personal aviation highlights, one of which was the magnificent Gloster Gladiator pair at the September Shuttleworth show – a spectacle that will live long in my memory. The magnificent Gloster Gladiator is certainly one of my favourite aircraft and represents the absolute pinnacle of bi-plane fighter design, as far as the Royal Air Force is concerned. Despite its ageing appearance, the Gladiator was to see service well into the Second World War, fighting against much more modern aircraft and giving a very good account of itself.
In my opinion, there can be few aircraft in the history of aviation that are as enigmatic and stunningly beautiful as the Gloster Gladiator. Entering service as the worlds air forces were beginning to introduce monoplane fighter designs, the Gladiator was the absolute best of breed, with regard to bi-plane fighter design and even though it was a technological masterpiece of aviation design, the world of aviation had moved on significantly by the late 1930’s. The Hurricane and Spitfire fighters of the RAF would be critical in the survival of Great Britain and the beautiful Gladiator would be relegated to secondary duties, but this rugged little fighter took to it’s task with aplomb and with it, creating its own piece of RAF history. Rather than look at the service history of the Gladiator, lets take a closer look at the two aircraft pictured above, which are some of the rarest aircraft in the world.
GLADIATOR SURVIVORS
For an aircraft as important as the Gloster Gladiator, it is perhaps surprising that there are only two airworthy examples in the world today. This weeks header image was taken at the 2014 September show at the Shuttleworth Collection and shows both aircraft standing next to each other – I think that you will agree with me that this was certainly one of the aviation sights of the year and one I was glad to catch on camera. The aircraft in the foreground is Gladiator Mk.II N5903 (G-GLAD), which is part of The Fighter Collection, based at Duxford. Over the years, she has been one of the most eagerly anticipated restoration projects in Europe and initial progress was frustratingly slow. I remember being at Flying Legends 2008, when TFC Chief Pilot took this beautiful aeroplane up for a test flight and we all hoped that it would be a regular performer from this point – unfortunately, there must have been some technical issues manifest themselves, as on landing back at Duxford, the aircraft was returned to the hangar, where she stayed for the next few years. Finished in these stunning RAF no.72 Squadron colours, the scheme depicts an aircraft operating out of Hornchurch, in 1937, with the blue fin and forward stabilisers denoting the personal aircraft of the ‘B Flight’ commander. Returning to the air as recently as May 2013, this rare aircraft can now thankfully be seen regularly thrilling the crowds at Duxford airshow events, although the sight of two Gladiators in the air at the same time is still a very rare one.
It is difficult to believe that the Shuttleworth Collection’s Gloster Gladiator I L8032 (G-AMRK) has been thrilling Airshow audiences for over 60 years now and for many of these years, she was the only flying example of the ultimate bi-plane fighter in the world. Constructed as the last Mk.I airframe from the initial RAF order, this aircraft was not actually fully assembled until 1938, which really is the story of the Gladiator. By this time, the Spitfire and Hurricane monoplane fighters were very much the order of the day and Gladiator airframes were not really needed – usually, they would have been relegated to secondary roles, but there were so many aeroplanes available, that many older types were simply left to rot, or scrapped. We really are so fortunate that two Gladiators managed to survive these days.
Gladiator L8032 arrived at the Shuttleworth Collection in 1960, following the closure of Gloster Aviation. She was already in flying condition and it was thought that the collection would be the best custodian for this extremely rare aircraft – at the time, the only flying example in the world. Previously presented in a camouflage scheme of No.247 Squadron, which was the only Gladiator unit to take part in the Battle of Britain, the aircraft now wears the colourful flashes of a No.73 Squadron aircraft, which was flown by future WWII fighter ace ‘Cobber’ Kain, at the 1937 Hendon Air Pageant. Although extremely rare, she continues to be one of the longest serving display aircraft on the UK Airshow circuit and is an absolute stunner!
THE GLADIATOR IN DIE-CAST
The die-cast aviation collector is a very lucky beast indeed and despite the complexity of the Gloster Gladiator design, the aircraft takes its place in the Corgi Aviation Archive line-up. Presented in their hugely successful 1/72nd scale range, the superb Gladiator is a real triumph in die-cast model engineering and takes quite a lofty position in the history of our hobby. This model was one of the first 1/72nd scale model aircraft to feature full wire rigging, which was achieved extremely effectively by the Corgi design team – these really are stunning little models. The ability to display a fully rigged, 1/72nd scale Gloster Gladiator straight from the box, is something that many former plastic kit constructors would hardly believe was possible, but with some ten model releases to date, we are certainly pleased to have them in our collections. With nearly all of the previously released models already consigned to the die-cast aviation history books, we have a very small number of the two models pictured above, available for sale, but unfortunately, once these have gone, they will be gone for good. In order to secure one of our very last Gladiators, please click on this RARE GLADIATOR link, for more details.
OUR LATEST OFFER OF THE WEEK
In our first Newsletter of 2015, I would like to wish all our readers a very happy and prosperous New Year and hope that you all had an enjoyable Christmas holiday. This is always a very busy time of the year at Flying Tigers, as you rush to try and get everything done before the big day, usually to be struck down by some seasonal ailment or other – this year, it was a festive ear infection, but you can’t keep a good man down! Anyway, I am hoping that the die-cast aviation hobby comes back strongly in 2015, as we have seen a number of years of uncertainty of late and it would be nice to think that the situation will improve markedly over the coming twelve months. It will be interesting to view all the developments.
We begin the year with a stunning model offer for fans of the F-16 Fighting Falcon. Surely one of the most successful aircraft of modern times, the Fighting Falcon has already been in service for over 30 years and shows no signs of disappearing any time soon – operating with many air forces around the world, the General Dynamics F-16 is still very much a front line combat aircraft. We currently have no less than 12 different F-16 models available and we have drastically reduced each and every one of them. The model above is a Lockheed F-16C CAS Viper, wearing this unusual and extremely appealing ‘Lizard camouflage’ scheme, which was tested at the huge US Air Force Base at Nellis, in Nevada. With very few models still remaining, our last examples are being made available at just £34.99 each, whilst stocks last, which represents a discount of almost 44% for this superb model.
Perhaps one of the most challenging schemes for the plastic modeller to execute well, was that of the US Air Force Display Team ‘The Thunderbirds’. These beautiful aircraft are uniquely finished, but not with the modeller in mind – they are a nightmare to get right! Fortunately, the die-cast aviation hobby came to our rescue and not only produced an accurate representation of an F-16 Fighting Falcon, with some very appealing additional weight to it, but they also finished it in the very appealing, but difficult to achieve Thunderbirds scheme. Surely the most iconic livery for an F-16, our last remaining Thunderbirds models are also included in this weekends OFFER OF THE WEEK, obviously whilst our remaining stocks last!