Had a great time this afternoon with my friend Matt at the combined Flying Heritage and Historic Flight “Round Engine Day” at Paine Field. The main event was a series of fly-bys: FH’s P-47 Thunderbolt and HF’s Tigercat and Bearcat. As a bonus, we got to see quite a few more aircraft in the air: B-25 bomber, North American T-6A, A-1D Skyraider and some Chinese-built Yak clones (at least that’s what I think they were). After the flying, we visited the new Historic Flight “Kilo-6″ museum and came away quite impressed. Lots more photos after the jump.

Before the festivities began, one of the new 787 Dreamliners claimed the runway.

Grumman F8F Bearcat from Historic Flight, taking off.

Grumman F7F Tigercat taking off. These are all seriously large aircraft, you could walk under the nose of this plane.

There were three of these Chinese-built Yak clones flying today.

While we were watching the official show, the Mitchell B-25 “Grumpy” came trundling out to join in the festivities, unexpectedly (at least it was to us).

The Bearcat, Tigercat and Thunderbolt in flight.

Thunderbolt “Tallahassee Lassie.” The P-47 was known as a “cadet killer”–so powerful that it’s very difficult to fly if you haven’t much experience, I gather.

Tigercat with “Grumpy” waiting on taxiway.

B-25 lifting its nose gear during takeoff.

After the flying (seemed!) to be done we went and visiting the new Historic Flight “Kilo-6″ museum. The collection is nowhere near as extensive as the Flying Heritage Museum, but you can walk right up to all of the aircraft and poke around (without touching, of course). This is their Waco UP7F biplane. All of their exhibits and aircraft were immaculate.

This is their P51B Mustang “Impatient Virgin?”–the ladder was placed so you could go up and take a peek in the cockpit.

This is their North American T-6A. It flew earlier in the day and we just caught it landing as we pulled up for the main show.

“Grumpy” was open to visitors. The flight deck was off limits, but I poked my head up into the various access hatches. This is not an aircraft for the claustrophobic. Brave men flew these, I can’t even imagine.

The B-25 was nicely shop-worn.

Cockpit of the Mustang.

As we were leaving, we found this A1-D Skyraider just taking off, so we stopped to watch it do some fly-bys.

We viewed the flights from the west side of the runway and had an enjoyable time. You miss out on the engine start and commentary from the museum staff, but the planes are quite a bit closer and it was not very crowded. In all, a very enjoyable day!

This is my new favorite car, the 1905 Darracq which took the world land speed record at over 125 MPH. What an extraordinary machine, a car distilled down to its essential elements. I read about it in this month’s Octane and have spent the past few minutes watching clips on youtube. Kudos to Mark Walker for driving it on the road and for restoring an already “restored” car to as original a condition as he could get it.

Spotted this ad on craigslist tonight–someone selling their Daytona…but the photos of “their” bike are straight from this website. Sad thing is that anyone in the know would recognize the slight of hand, as the bike they’re selling would have a different rear suspension than mine. *Facepalm*

On a semi-serious note, though: when looking at CL ads, it’s not all that uncommon to discover that the photos in the ad are NOT of the car or bike you end up poking at when you go to see it. My Miata was sold that way: the car shown in the ad was very clearly not the one I ended up buying. I asked the seller about it a couple of times and she insisted the photos were recent ones of my car, despite a number of major differences.

It’s not the end of the world to use a “representative sample” in an ad, just let people know. And if you’re going to grab someone’s photos, maybe ask permission?

Went over to watch the Flying Heritage Collection’s Hawker Hurricane and Supermarine Spitfire fly on their “Battle of Britain” day last Saturday. It was just spitting (appropriate weather for the occasion), but I took the Triumph anyway, to make short work of the long summer ferry lines (motorcycles are allowed to bypass the queue). This proved to be a soggy decision when the skies opened in earnest on the ride back. (“Bah, I won’t need rain gear” was my thought before departing the house. Oops.)

I opted to not pay for museum admission this time ’round, as I’ve been in a couple of times recently–I was on the other side of the chainlink with the hoi polloi.

The Daytona–parked here by the fueling shed, which would be a suicidal place to park the BSA–is not running well at low speeds. Best guess is a coil pack on the fritz. The bike runs well above 3,000 RPM but is misfiring on a cylinder below that, intermittently (which, oddly enough, doesn’t trigger the “check engine” light). It makes slow speed riding a chore. Hopefully should have it sorted out soon.

What a great pair of airplanes! The Spitfire is a prettier and more capable aircraft, but I find the Hurricane my favorite, for no reason I can articulate. The Collection doesn’t scratch fly days unless the cloud ceiling is below about 1000 feet–though I suppose if it was tanking down or there were high winds, that would also keep the planes inside the hangar.

They ferried the pilots out to the aircraft in this very nice MG YT, which is probably a ’49. I guess MG was ready to introduce the “Y” series just before the war when Hitler put the kibosh on that, so it’s reasonably appropriate. I think we can all agree the wheels are a sign the owner possesses sublime taste.

I have the Ferguson (reluctantly) up for sale and there seems to be some interest. I’m asking $4,400 which seems way too low given what I have into it…surprise, surprise, eh?

Fergie started right up for these photos–though it still needs to have the radiator repaired before doing any serious field work. The restoration is now a couple of years along and there are plenty of signs of use, but it still looks great and is a wonderful machine. I have it on craigslist but you can get hold of me here if you’re interested, of course.

I have done very little to this car and it has, thus far, been very reliable. It’s fun to drive–though it’s not as personable as the MGs. I put a new $150 top on a long while ago, which was a pleasantly easy and speedy operation. It doesn’t fit as well as it might behind the door glasses–but I just used the pre-punched holes and bolted it in place without any hand fitting. It’s waterproof and folds up and down as it should, so I’m satisfied.

I also have had to replace one of the flexible brake lines in the rear as a caliper was sticking. That’s it for repairs or running costs aside from petrol.

I traded the tinted side windows to a friend who put his un-tinted windows into my car, which removed one of the aesthetic issues I didn’t like. Now to find a cheap white trunk lid without a luggage rack…

The gearbox sounds like it’s full of marbles (it had no fluid in it when I bought it, filling it made no difference to the sound), but it functions perfectly and doesn’t seem like the era-without-lubricant fazed it much. The A/C has no charge–which is OK as I don’t really have a use for it. And I have a new valve cover gasket, which I’ll fit at the next oil change.

I’m just about to roll over 149,000 miles. I’ve gotten as low as 29 MPG and as high as 31 in my normal driving style. Turns out this car is fairly unusual, in that it doesn’t have power steering, windows, etc. It’s better for that, I think, can’t imagine needing power steering in this light machine, and fewer electrical items on an aging car is a good thing.

I would like to change the exhaust note. I consider my white MGB, Reggie, to have a near-perfect four-cylinder exhaust note. Slightly deep, slightly gruff, not too loud but pleasant, typical of older MGBs and MGAs. The Miata is much “buzzier” and tinny. It’s actually a bit loud, in a “kiddie-ricer-fart-can” sort of way. Maybe I can just hang an old MGB exhaust on it…

Took the GT on a road trip today, the shot is from the upper deck of the Port Townsend ferry. Car did well, some berry-flavored, baked on bird droppings aside. Be nice to get the overdrive in, though!

Had an enjoyable time at the vintage races at Pacific Races on Saturday. I didn’t unsheath my camera all that often but was thrilled with the three vintage Alfas, including the machine Nuvolari drove to victory in the 1935 German Grand Prix, widely considered the greatest drive of all time.

Nuvolari’s GP-Winning Alfa

Maserati 300S

Another P3 Alfa with fabulous patina.

Innes Ireland’s BRP Mk. 2

Racers…well, duh.

Lotus 23

Another Lotus 23.

Porsche 906.

Alfa Romeo TZ and Guilleta.

Cooper Type 57 and Lotus 26R.

Ford GT.

Another Alfa, probably a 2300.

Bentley 6.5 litre in the paddock.

Great period Innocenti Mini with a Mini Marcos peeking out from behind.

Alfa Junior Zagato. (The Alfa club had this large tent set up, or they commandeered it, either way lots of joking about the necessity given what happens when you mix Alfas and water…)

Dino 246 and what I think is a Ferrari 575 of some sort.

Update: I went to the regular first Saturday South Whidbey Sports Car meeting, on time for once…and everyone else was late, no joke (see photo). I had to run before anyone else arrived as I was headed to the vintage races at Pacific Raceways. This has taught me a valuable lesson about timeliness: don’t bother!

This really is a pretty decent driving car, way wacky-reading speedometer aside. Taking it out for its first post-paint-job drive today. (I’m calling the concept of red wheels on an MGB a “Kevin” for reasons I’ll keep close to my vest.)

Jim did the final buff and I spent some time today polishing the car with a foam pad. I still have some hand polishing to do…it’s not looking too bad. Not perfect but pretty darn decent.