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Archive project news and media releasesFirst new parts manufactured as restoration progresses- 20/4/05
"Concorde Story" author to give Lecture at Brooklands- 30/3/05 Taken from the title of his book, "The Concorde Story" the lecture will take guests on a trip from Concorde's early days right up to its retirement in 2003. Covering from the early aerodynamicists, da Vinci, Newton, Bernouilli, through the tragic Paris accident, which Chris has his own views on, it will be an evening for all Concorde aficionados not to miss. Entry will be £5 for Adults and £2.50 for Children, with all proceeds going to the Museum's Concorde fundraising effort. To reserve your place, send an email to concordemailbox@brooklandsmuseum.com stating how many places you require. Payment will taken on the evening at the entrance. Following the lecture, Chris will be on hand to sign copies of his book, which will be available to purchase on the night. G-BBDG's rebuilding is now well underway and visitors to the museum can see on-going progress in a specially constructed exhibition area that also tells the story of the "Brooklands Concorde" Rebuild off and running - 13/3/05
The last week has seen fantastic progress with Majestic Marquees on site to erect a 40m x 25m tent over the airframe, which was moved into place the week before. Hire specialists HSS have also kindly offered to support the project by helping with services inside the tent, as well as de-humidifiers to help protect items in long term storage - such as the cabin seats. ASI's initial work will be concentrated on manufacturing the aluminium channel spice plates to be used in the repair and fitting them to the sections, before they are mated together in around 6 weeks time. The plans call for the scheduled work to be completed in early June, after which the aircraft will be painted inside the tent. The tent will then be removed to allow the tail fin and undercarriage to be fitted in late August. This website will document the major stages in G-BBDG rebuild as it progresses, but is no substitute for getting up close and personal and seeing in person what's going on at the museum. As part of on going events surrounding the rebuilding of Concorde, Chris Orlebar, former Concorde senior first officer and author of "The Concorde Story", will be at Brooklands to give an evening lecture on the Sunday of the May bank holiday weekend. More details on this to follow. 5 main spections reposition for rebuild - 3/3/05The five main sections of Concorde 202 have been re-positioned by ASI as the rebuild gets underway in earnest. For exclusive pictures of the first day proper, see the Restoration diary Rebuilding of G-BBDG getting underway - 1/3/05
The full restoration of Concorde G-BBDG took a step closer this week when Air Salvage International (ASI) arrived on site to start work on the structural rebuilding of Concorde 202. Their initial work will see them deliver their jigs to the site, along with shuffling the 5 main components into place before the main repair work gets underway in a few weeks time. Once the sections are lined up, jigged and trestled in place, Brooklands museum will erect a marquee style tent over the airframe to allow the detailed work to get underway by the middle of March. As well as providing a suitable work area for ASI, the tent will also house a temporary Concorde exhibition which is hoped will be open in time for the easter holidays. Over the coming months this will be updated with the progress being made by ASI. ASI expect to have the 3 fuselage sections completely re-joined by around the end of April, with the main wings completely re-attached in early June. Over the summer the aircraft will still rest at ground level, thus allowing museum volunteers to begin the lengthy repainting process. Work will primarily concentrate on the fuselage area. The Tent is scheduled to be removed in late August, after which ASI will return to the museum to airbag, then jack the aircraft to allow the correct Concorde specification landing gear to be fitted. Museum volunteers will fit such items as the air intakes, droop nose, tail fin, outer wings, elevons etc... when ASI complete certain stages in their rebuilding programme. Concorde will be on show throughout the rebuilding programme at the museum, except where access has to be restricted for health and safety reasons. Brooklands museum is currently open 7 days a week from 10am till 4pm The rebuilding of Concorde G-BBDG will be documented here on this website's restoration pages, with the major highlight features on this news page. Captain Mike Bannister to give guest lecture at Brooklands
He will give a lecture entitled "Concorde - The Long View" which will be followed by a Q+A session as well as plenty of time to sign autographs and memorabilia. Entry will be £5 for Adults and £2.50 for Children, with all proceeds going to the Museum's Concorde fundraising effort. To reserve your place, send an email to concordemailbox@brooklandsmuseum.com stating how many places you require. Payment will taken on the evening at the entrance. This will be the first of 5 or 6 lectures planned for each year that will feature key people from the Concorde story. These will continue in the run up to the museum's official opening of Concorde G-BBDG after the bulk of its restoration is complete.
Update - December 2004Work is now expected to get underway on the main structural re-assembly of Concorde G-BBDG in 2005. This is this anticipated date when contractors ASI will have staff available after they have completed re-assembling Concorde G-BOAA at the Scottish Museum of flight as East Fortune. The plan involves laying out the airframe and working on re-joining the 2 wings and 3 fuselage sections at the same time, before raising the aircraft to jacking height and re-fitting the Concorde spec landing gear. The tail fin and nose will be reinstalled as part of the rebuild after the main structural assembly is compete. It is expected that the structural rebuild will take 14-16 weeks. The restoration will be detailed, in depth, here on this website. The museums fundraising campaign is progressing with over £100,000 being raised so far. To ensure the full restoration, another £150,000 needs to be raised over the coming 12 months. To contribute, you can download the donation form and send in you donation, or purchase on line the fundraising CD for £10.99 If everything goes according to plan, it is possible that Concorde will be open for visitors to see inside, as the cabin restoration get underway, from mid summer 2005. Journey's end for Concorde - 5/6/04 The majority of the crowd waited to watch the unloading of the airframe section onto jacks where it will remain for the next few months. All 18 remaining Concorde airframes from the 20 that were built are now safely in their final museum resting places. G-BBDG was split into 5 main sections for her final trip : the 2 main wing sections, the main fuselage, the forward fuselage and the aft fuselage. Several smaller components had already been shipped to the museum, such as the outer wings and the tail fin.
The rebuilding of Delta Golf and her restoration will be visible to the public at Brooklands, where museum visitors can experience first hand the work bring done to return the first British production Concorde to her former glory. Over the Summer months the museum's fundraising campaign that will fund the restoration project will step up a gear with a presence at the summer's main airshows being planned. A fundraising CD will soon be available which will be full of amazing Concorde pictures from the museums archives, along with a bonus video documentary that will tell the story of how G-BBDG was moved to Brooklands. The CD will be available on-line as well as in the museum's shop and at the airshows. Concorde set for final ever journey - 4/6/04
Concorde G-BBDGs final journey will be completed on Saturday June 5th when she travels from Filton to Brooklands museum. Concorde 202 is scheduled to leave Filton onto the A38 via the crash gates at 11am and is expected to arrive in Weybridge from around 4pm onwards, the journey times being dependent on traffic. To celebrate this great achievement the Museum will stay open until 8pm. Visitors arriving after 4pm will benefit from a concessionary rate of £5 per adult and £12 for a family ticket. All adults will be invited to charge their glasses with free bubbly and toast the most famous airliner ever as it is driven into the historic site in preparation for its rebuilding as a major exhibit. The picture above shows the aircraft loaded in preparation for the journey Only centre fuselage to come - 27/5/04 The 95ft long centre fuselage section is now ready to be transported. Air Salvage International completed the removal of the wings on the morning of the 27th. A diamond tipped cutter was used to give a cut that is only a few millimetres wide. with the landing gear removed the wing was lowered to the ground on a special set of tracking jacks, before being lowered onto the flatbed low loader Due to the bank holiday weekend, the trip will take place on Saturday June 5th. If all goes according to plan the fuselage on its low loader will depart from the A38 crash gate at Filton at around 11am. The 125 mile journey could take anything from 4-7 hours depending on traffic. The Museum will be open until 8pm on Saturday May 5th, with concessionary entry after 4pm. Work to re-assemble the airframe will get underway in earnest later on in the year. Over the Summer some preparatory work will be undertaken as well as an extensive fundraising programme to supplement the funds that have already been raised. Test Pilots Toast Delta-Golf's Arrival - 6/5/04
Members of the original BAC flight test team visited Brooklands Museum to toast the arrival of Concorde 202. They included Roy Radford, who was Captain on Delta Golf's final flight on December 24th 1981, and Peter Baker, who flew as co-pilot on the aircraft's first and last flights. Joining them were Alan Smith, Johnnie Walker and Alan Heywood who was one of the flight engineers. Allan Winn, the museum's director, was on hand to welcome the test crew back to the aircraft that they spent the majority of their Concorde test flying time on. Museum volunteers and staff had cleaned up the aircraft overnight since its arrival. Also on display alongside the main fuselage section were the Brooklands built tail cone section and the droop nose assembly that was used for fatigue testing in Farnborough during the 70s. The droop nose that will be fixed to the aircraft is on display at the museum, and it is hoped to have it on public display at the Royal International Air Tattoo in July. Planning is at an advanced stage for the remaining centre section to be transported to the museum in a few weeks time. Due to its size it needs to be transported on a Saturday to avoid traffic congestion.
Delta Golf arrives at Brooklands - 5/5/04
Concorde G-BBDG has returned home to Brooklands museum at Weybridge, the site where the forward and rear fuselage sections were constructed before being shipped to the final assembly lines at Filton and Toulouse. The forward and rear fuselage sections arrived on the historic site shortly before 5pm after being separated from the centre fuselage section at Filton earlier on in the day. Work is now underway at Filton to remove the wings from the remaining section before it to is moved to Brooklands in a few weeks time. Queen's Motors provided their 30ft and 40ft trailers to carry the loads Full restoration and reconstruction will get underway later on in the year, but this can't start until the funds are in place.
Concorde all set to come home - 30/4/04 The delivery marks the start of Phase Two of the operation to move the aircraft to the Weybridge site from Filton, where it has been in storage since 1981. Phase Two will see the aircraft’s fuselage section cut into 3 main parts and its wings removed for the 125 mile journey from the West Country. The initial delivery on Wednesday will see the two main sections that were built on the Brooklands site, the forward and rear fuselage assemblies, coming home. Precise timings are not yet known, but it is hoped that the aircraft sections will arrive shortly after 3pm. However, the Museum’s clubhouse and tearooms will remain open until 8pm, should the airframe be delayed en-route. Phase one (as seen in the picture) was completed 3 weeks ago when the outer wings, tail cone, tail fin and engine intakes were transported to the museum. The centre fuselage section along with the removed wings will be transported to the museum before the end of May. More arrivals at Brooklands -10/4/04
The final structural parts that could be easily removed from Concorde G-BBDG have now been safely transported to their new home at Brooklands museum where they will be re-attached to the airframe during the restoration programme. CeeJay Systems again provided their custom built jig and a Warrick flatbed vehicle to transport the Weybridge-built tail fin. The fin had been removed from the aircraft at Filton in 1989 when the aircraft was moved to the purpose-built storage hangar. Queens' Motors were on hand to move the two forward wing sections and the air intakes the 125 miles to Weybridge. The forward wings were placed on Queens' 40ft flatbed lorry, while the intakes went on their 30ft transporter, which with its "hi-ab" hydraulic crane helped to load and unload all three vehicles. Andy Lambert from Mobile Tracking Systems escorted the wide load along the M4 and M25. Earlier in the week the National Rescue Group had provided two motorway recovery vehicles to assist in transporting the two twin secondary nozzle assemblies (TSNs) to Brooklands. The secondary nozzle assemblies are the mounting points for the "buckets" which double up as both thrust reversers and secondary nozzles. The "buckets" have been at the museum since their earlier delivery from Filton. All major removable parts have now been removed from the airframe and the next stage will be to section it for its transportation to the museum. This will get underway in the coming weeks. Some further pictures will soon be added to the multimedia section. First structural parts of G-BBDG delivered to Brooklands - 7/4/04 The specialist jig designed to carry the wings and tail fin at an angle (to enable the load to stay within UK wide load limits) was put to good use carrying the left outer wing back to the museum. Also carried on the load were the two section tail cone and the dorsal fin - both of which were both designed and built on the Weybridge site in the 1970s. Over the coming days the other wing sections and tail fin will be transported to the museum, along with several other parts that have been removed from the aircraft for ease of transportation. Concorde G-BBDG was the first production specification Concorde built in the UK. It will be transported to Brooklands museum where a full restoration programme will be carried out on it over the coming months. Concorde Campaign Takes Off With A Sonic Boom- 5/03/04Donations to Brooklands Museum’s campaign to bring a Concorde home to the its birthplace are running at a rate of around £1,000 per day says a delighted Allan Winn, Director of the Museum, who is spearheading the appeal to raise £1million to dismantle the supersonic aircraft currently at Filton near Bristol, move it to the Brooklands site in Weybridge and ultimately put it on display in a new building. In the short term the Museum Trust still faces the massive initial task of raising £250,000 by May in order begin the process of preparing Concorde G-BBDG for the 100-mile journey by road. “Once we have Concorde on site we will begin the task of restoration that will make this historic aircraft – the first British production Concorde – the flagship of a breathtaking display of post war Vickers and BAC transport and training aircraft. We are the only museum in the World that can bring such a collection together,” says Allan. In his appeal to South East businesses for help, Allan has said that in-kind support could be just as valuable as money when the task of rebuilding the supersonic masterpiece, begins. “We need everything from paint to dehumidifiers so that our growing army of volunteers can get on with the task.” With the assistance of British Airways Engineering, Brooklands already has much of the necessary ground equipment and tooling for Concorde and, again, due to the enthusiasm of BA, Airbus UK and BAE Systems for the project, the majority of parts originally thought to be missing from the airframe promised to the Museum have been located and transported to Brooklands. The Brooklands team is also building up a good set of spares. “This will be the only Concorde in the South East of England, Britain’s most populous region, that the public will be able to board and enjoy a fantasy supersonic experience,” says Allan. “We will make it as close to the real thing as possible and, for corporate events, it will truly break new ground.” The University of Surrey is one of the latest organisations to pledge support, and its students will play a critical role in the project. “The University has strong connections with the late Sir George Edwards who was very much the catalyst behind the whole supersonic project. We are delighted they are joining our team,” commented Allan. Mobile Tracking Systems, based in Fareham, Hants, are co-ordinating the massive task of moving Concorde with helpful advice from Surrey Police and abnormal load specialists. A dynamic logo depicting Concorde flying over the Brooklands Banking has been created free of charge by Positive Media of Byfleet and this will become the symbol of the fundraising campaign. “It is the generosity of individuals that is particularly exciting,” says Allan. “I was delighted to receive a cheque from our Royal Patron Prince Michael of Kent. The enthusiasm of all our friends is inspirational. We now need a wider public to get behind this thrilling project that will be a major coup for Surrey.” To contact Allan Winn regarding the bring Concorde home to Brooklands campaign call 01932 857381 ext 243 or email allanwinn@brooklandsmuseum.com. Moving Concorde to Brooklands- 19/02/04Moving Concorde to Brooklands by road will be a mammoth task. Fortunately, members of the team currently planning to do this are no strangers to moving aircraft. The key people have already moved some 15 aircraft (or major components) to the Brooklands Museum site. The main obstacle to be overcome is the sheer physical size of Concorde's component parts. The airframe must be dismantled into smaller sections before the move, but unlike aircraft previously transported to Brooklands, Concorde was never designed to be dismantled. The largest parts will be around 9 metres wide (30 feet in old money), or to put it another way, two car lengths! Although much of the route will be along the motorway network, some roadside ‘furniture’ may need removing at both ends of the journey. For the first time in the UK, it is hoped that the aircraft's main components will have their journey displayed on an internet site in real time. This will allow both enthusiasts and sponsors to see how the move is progressing. Extra help with the project will be very welcome and because funds are very limited, we would still like to hear from:- 1. Transport companies (even those with larger vans) that
regularly travel empty between Bristol and Weybridge. If you feel you can help with transport, equipment or planning, please contact Andy Lambert on 01489 571600 or email: concordemove@mtsgroup.co.uk. Or if you wish to assist financially, please contact Brooklands Museum's Director, Allan Winn on 01932 857381, or email allanwinn@brooklandsmuseum.com. Volunteer AppealIf you wish to help Brooklands museum with the Concorde Project,
Brooklands Press Release [Thu-30-Oct-03]Concorde at BrooklandsFollowing today's announcement of the allocation of British Airway's Concordes to museums worldwide, Brooklands Museum at Weybridge can report that it is negotiating with the airline over the future of Concorde c/n 202, registered G-BBDG. This, the first British production Concorde, was used for much of the flight testing prior to Concorde entering service and is currently stored at Filton, near Bristol. Brooklands Museum Director Allan Winn says: "We are determined to ensure that the predominant role played by the British Aircraft Corporation's Weybridge organisation headed by the late Sir George Edwards in the design, development and production of Concorde is recognised and celebrated. We will be working closely with British Airways over the next few weeks to determine how that story can best be told." Brooklands Museum's Aviation Curator, Julian Temple, says Brooklands has made a vital contribution to Concorde since its design work began in the late 1950's and the site's unique historical association with this - the world's most famous aircraft - was the prime reason for the Museum's ambition to acquire an example for its aviation collection. "A greater proportion of the Concorde airframe was manufactured by the British Aircraft Corporation at Brooklands than at any other factory in Britain or France. In particular all the forward and rear fuselages, the massive tail fins and rudders as well as many more smaller components were made here. Thousands were employed here on Concorde in the sixties and seventies and many local people still have proud memories of their association with this outstanding supersonic airliner", he said. Brooklands-built assemblies, like those from other British and French factories, were shipped to either Toulouse or Filton, near Bristol, for final assembly and test flying. Brooklands Museum will make a further announcement over its plans for the available Concorde once its feasibility studies with British Airways have been concluded.
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© 2004 Brooklands Museum Trust Ltd, all rights reserved, Registered charity no. 296661. |
The
Concorde lecture series at Brooklands museum continues on Sunday May 1st
when Captain Chris Orlebar, former Concorde pilot and author will give a guest lecture at 7pm on the Bank Holiday weekend.
Former
British Airways Chief Concorde pilot Mike Bannister will be the guest as
Brooklands kick off a regular Concorde lecture series on Sunday February 27th
at 7pm in the Chequred Flag room at the museum. 
Having been removed, Concorde
Delta Golf's wings arrived at the museum late on Thursday May
27th. 
Concorde
G-BBDG (Delta Golf) will be arriving at the Museum on the afternoon of Wednesday
5th May.
