I like to visit aviation museums when I can, so having a few days at Heathrow gave me the opportunity to visit the museum at Brooklands, and re-visit the RAF Museum at Hendon.
The Brooklands museum has a collection of airliners and also a few other aircraft. The airliners are all classic British designs and include the beautiful VC-10. this example was used by the United Arab Emirates Royal Flight.
The Vickers Vanguard and Viscount were turboprop aircraft, commonly seen at Heathrow when I started plane spotting.
Also a common sight was the British Aircraft Corporation (BAC) One-Eleven. This plane was so noisy, it had to be fitted with "hush kits" to allow it to fly into some airports.
The main drawcard here is the second British production Concorde (G-BBDG) Which was used as a test aircraft for enhancements required before Concorde entered passenger service with British Airways.
My previous visit to the RAF Museum at Hendon was as an Air Training Corps Cadet in the early 1970's. It was then housed in a single hangar on the same site. The museum now comprises 6 hangars.
As you enter the Museum, you are greeted by a Gnat T.1 of the Red Arrows and then the huge Short Sunderland flying boat.
In common with many air museums, the exhibits are crammed in, and often almost impossible to photograph clearly. One exception was this Eurofighter Typhoon, suspended nicely from the roof.
Other aircraft I could get clean shots of were this Short Stranraer flying boat, the Bristol Belvedere and a P-47 Thunderbolt.
There was a good selection of aircraft from world War II, including a Messerschmidt Bf-109, a Hawker Tempest, Westland Lysander, A P-51 Mustang, Boulton Paul Defiant and a B-24 Liberator.
Lastly are a couple of post war jets, the Jet Provost trainer and Hawker Hunter which was used in many different roles by both the RAF and Royal Navy.
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