MTA
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ConcordePossibly the greatest passenger plane of all time.
This weekend, I have been at Fleet Air Arm Museum for a model railway show and our layout was right under the prototype Concorde 
It was slightly worrying to look up and see cracks on the underside of the wing (  ) but apart from that she looked good. One of her engines was at the end of our layout as well:
I'm not really into aeroplanes, so all I know is that it is a Rolls Royce engine 
And yes, the turbine has been covered with perspex to stop little fingers getting in there...
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made-in-england
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Koooooooool
any pics of the layout?
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pauly
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concorde a plane brought out of service before its time 
its a shame they brought the concordes out of service in there entire history they only had 1 single fatal crash and thats why they were brought out of service 747s have had dozens of fatal crashes but there still in service
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James
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747s are because they're more profitable. Speed of the Concorde was outweighed by the ability to carry loads of passengers.
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igy569
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Not to mention that the concords are OLD. They needed to be replaced, or taken out of service. It was much cheaper to take them out of service. 
The concord used to fly over my grade school everyday at the same time. Class stopped for the few minutes it took to fly over.
It was still very cool. 
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pauly
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they are old now but back then they still had a few hundred air miles on their sheet left and it just seems a shame to take such a famous aircraft out of service early
it was there fame that lead to their downfall if they hadnt been so famous the crash would have soon been forgotten about by the general public the passenger dropped after that and they just weren't profitable enough so they where taken out of service and either cut up or turned into restaurants a lucky few went to museums
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MTA
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| made-in-england wrote: | | any pics of the layout? |
Yep, although none of my locos feature.
The layout is called South Preston. It is completely fictitious, although the main station is based on Littlehampton.
A view down the layout.
There's always one accident...
An Ivatt tank, more affectionately known as a 'Mickey Mouse' departs Fordham with a stopping service.
Bulleid Q1 No.33009 sits in one of the sidings at Fordham having been failedwith leaking tubes (it's great to have some imagination  )
The Brighton Belle leaves for London at speed.
The town scene.
The station building at South Preston.
The guard keeps a watchful eye on proceedings during shunting.
These wagons appear on all our layouts.
The Terrier yard shunter.
The main station, with the Brighton Belle having just arrived while a 2-BIL unit waits inthe bay platform.
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pauly
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makes me want to get me portable 00 layout out the loft again
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Sandman
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Once again some really great pics there Si.
Great layout there.
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steamyjim
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The engines are Rolls Royce Phantoms i beleive. 
I had the day of school on Concordes last ever flight. Went up by Brunels suspension bridge on the Bristol downs to watch it
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seven.mpd
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Thanks for the photos, and yes she's a cool plane.
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igy569
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Great pics! 
I wish I still had the pics of my HO layout. I built that in pre-digital days, and I lost all the pics in a flood.
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Les
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Great Pictures and a wonderful imagination.
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Wilescoman_123
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wow that looks great ! love the detail !well done !
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johnreid
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I too mis my HO layout, I had hand laid 5 scale miles of code 83 weathered rail and had at least 90% of the scenery complete. I tried to sell the house and the Realtors insisted that the Layout had to go as it made another Bedroom available. The house didnt sell, and my layout now sits under a landfill someplace
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CCairns
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| Quote: | | the prototype Concorde |
It is actually the 2nd prototype, No. 002. 001 is of course in France.
| Quote: | | so all I know is that it is a Rolls Royce engine |
| Quote: | | The engines are Rolls Royce Phantoms i beleive. |
The engine chosen was the twin spool Rolls-Royce/Snecma Olympus 593, a version of the Olympus originally developed for the Vulcan bomber, developed into an afterburning supersonic engine for the BAC TSR-2 strike bomber and then adapted for Concorde.
| Quote: | | they only had 1 single fatal crash and thats why they were brought out of service |
Wrong. The French grounded their fleet straight away, but the British Airways fleet continued to fly for a few more days, before also being grounded. Expensive modifications, including kevlar lining in the fuel tanks and specially-developed burst-resistant tyres, soon had it flying again.
Rising maintenance costs and a slump in flying after the American 9/11 were cited as the reasons for Air France & British Airways to retire Concorde.
However there are some other theories as well -
Branson wrote in The Economist (23 October 2003) that his final offer was "over £5 million" and that he had intended to operate the fleet "for many years to come." Any hope of Concorde remaining in service was further thwarted by Airbus' unwillingness to provide maintenance support for the ageing airframes.
It has been suggested that Concorde was not withdrawn for the reasons usually given, but that during the grounding of Concorde it became apparent to the airlines that they could actually make more revenue carrying their first class passengers subsonically.
Rob Lewis suggested that the precipitous Air France retirement of its own Concorde fleet was the direct result of a secret conspiracy between Air France Chairman/CEO Jean-Cyril Spinetta and then-AIRBUS CEO Noel Forgeard, and stemmed as much from a fear of being found criminally liable under French law for future AF Concorde accidents as it did from simple economics. Further, on the British Airways side, a lack of engineering (maintenance) commitment to Concorde by then-Director of Engineering Alan MacDonald was cited as undermining BA's resolve to continue operating Concorde from within.
Basically it was another of those Anglo/French deals that went south, but at least we had the opportunity to see it in operation.
I was fortunate to get a champagne flight on Concorde going down to the Scilly Isles from Heathrow to achieve Mach 2.01, but could not get through on the phone when they were selling off the seats on the last flights.
| Quote: | | and either cut up or turned into restaurants |
All but 2 of the original 20 Concordes still survive, with the missing 2 being the crashed Air France one plus a 2nd French Concorde which was used for spare parts before being scrapped in 1994. They are either on display at Airports worldwide, or in Museums, but none are restaurants that I'm aware of.
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pauly
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wow you are a man who knows his stuff all above is probably correct but I can imagine that the crash was a big nail in the coffin
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CCairns
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Being a pilot, Aviation has been a hobby as well as my full time employment.
We used to have a good Airshow at Prestwick Airport (now Glasgow Prestwick International, but quite a distance from Glasgow!), and these were around the time that Concorde was being test flown up the West Coast of the UK, so we used to get it flying past during these Airshows.
And for those who are watching the 'Warship' series on Channel 5 at present, about HMS Illustrious, if you watch last week's episode you will see them changing one of its engines, which is a marine version of the Concorde engine.
Although the primary cause of the Paris Concorde crash was a piece of metal from a previous departure, which punctured the wing's fuel tank leading to the spectacular fire, there were other less obvious causes as well, including possibly being slightly overweight, taking off downwind, and critically a vital spacer missing from one of the undercarriage legs which caused the aircraft to veer sideways across the runaway, causing it to rotate early and never achieving the safe climbing speed for a single or double engine failure. Thus it stalled (stopped flying) into the hotel building. Had it achieved this safety speed it may have reached Le Bourget for an emergency landing.
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