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Apart from the Spitfire, Supermarine's fighters were a pretty rubbish lot. The RAF and FAA seem to have had very few 'duds' post-war, and almost all of them came from Supermarine.

Sorry .... wrong link

More use to Train and Aircraft terminology than Armour - so that's my excuse . Also I've only built 3 tanks (now) in over 40 years of model making (I'm not counting @gwrrob's Cromwell or my RC 1/16th Scale Challenger 2 in that (I must get the upgrades fitted on that))

The Fleet Air Arm experimented with a ‘belly flop’ form of carrier landing in the early days of jet aviation using strengthened airframes and a rubberised deck so the whole fuselage dragged ..... that was never going to work was it

Dean Goods almost there...

Which is ironic, as the US military is now the largest user of Hawker Hunters (albeit through a civilian contractor). As has already been mentioned, the Hawk/T45 Goshawk is definitely worthy of being on that list (in production for 45 years, 1000+ built including about 300 for the US Navy). Ironically it got some stick in the early 1970s for 'duplicating' the joint European Alphajet, but is still in production nearly 30 years after the last Alphajet appeared. The Gnat was also quite successful. The Indians seem to have used it to great success in their wars with Pakistan.

No it's not utter-tosh, don't forget that during WW2, multiple manufacturers were building parts of aircraft for other manufacturers. So design proposals would have been shared around. The Firebrand does look re-markedly like a Hawker aircraft. I worked for Hawkers - so don't insult me!

Most of the problems the RAF and FAA had were with the early versions of the Avon; they were awful. The US wouldn't touch it with a bargepole preferring the much more reliable Sapphire for license production. The US wouldn't finance the Hunter for export to Europe until it had got to Mk4 because of anxieties about reliability. Basically the RAF made a premature decision that the Avon was to be the future engine in the late forties and got it wrong and didn't have the courage to say so.

I don't blame the Manufacturer, it was very much a transition era from prop to jet and the Government at the time didn't seem to have a clue what they were doing (as it was on the Railways to be honest), so requirements & specifications were ever changing to what they wanted - especially from a carrier-borne aircraft and the manufacturers couldn't keep up. Ironically the Spitfire outlasted a number of it's replacements in Service..

Why thank you young Sir, the loco's not bad looking either !

A fine beast sir.

That bit at the front. Is eithe toe plate or a Glaciis plate. Baz

Here she is, earning her keep on South Pelaw this afternoon.

Where is your ballast from? Looks super.

Hi David, I for one certainly enjoy reading your posts - though I may have missed one or two. The layout looks very good. The station buildings are excellent, including the texture and colouring. Here's to the next 300 posts!

Remarkable attention to detail. It's these seemingly innocuous details that play such a large part in establishing atmosphere.