I visited the Bomber Command museum as well as another aircraft museum that also had the Canadian aviation hall of fame. Got to go in a Lancaster bomber. Both museums had a Lancaster. The one at the bomber Command museum runs and taxi's. They are doing a start up up Aug. 17. It's powered by 4 Rolls Royce Merlins. The same engines in P51 Mustangs. The Bomber Command museum is hoping to rebuild a Halifax Bomber. I donated since my dad was a tail gunner in a Halifax. Most Halifax's had 4 Bristol Hercules radial engines. There is nothing cooler than a radial engine. The neatest are the 14 cylinder twin row. Amazing for engines built in the 30' and 40's. Second row of cylinders is spaced in between the first row. Just brilliant engineering. I didn't take many pics. but I also noticed how nice the welds were on the exhaust of old engines. I'm thinking they were all done with an oxy/acetylene torch. Tig came out in 1940 but was mostly for aluminum back then.
There were a lot of aircraft engines to look at. Was delighted to see a couple Avro Canada Orenda jet engines. Of course I had to let them know the info on the card was wrong. The Orenda engines came after WW II. The Orenda 10 was the most sucessfull engine that was put into service but not their greatest achievement. That would be the PS-13 Iroquois engine that powered the Avro Arrow. 26,000lbs. thrust with after burner first run in 1954. Most powerful jet in the world and considered by many 25 years ahead of it's time. The F15 has similar power but came quite a bit later. The Iroquois was tested in a B47 on loan from the US air force. It was so powerful they had to throttle the other engines back. It was the first jet engine designed with extensive use of titanium. Avro were pioneers in the use of titanium and in 1953/54 bought the majority of titanium available. Damn Canadian gov't. ordered everything scapped when they cancelled the Arrow program. Thankfully a few engines survived and a few Arrow parts were found. Largest lay off of workers in Canadian history. Between Avro and sub contractors about 30,000 laid off. Some experts say it couldn't have logically been based on money. Some even said Avro offered the deal of the century. 100 aircraft for $12,500 a piece. Most advanced aircraft in the world. First fly-by-wire in a non experimental manned aircraft and first to use 4000 PSI hydraulics. The alloy for the landing gear was 260,000 PSI tensile strength. Cancellation day is known as Black Friday. Avro Canada also had the first jet transport in N. America, 7 years before Boeing. Ex Avro employees were instrumental in putting a man on the moon. Chief areodynamicist headed up the Gemini, Mercury and Apollo programs as well as designed the landing craft. Head of mission control was ex Avro too. Chief of engineering was a consultant on the Concord and it's believed the engines were based on the Iroquois as one was sent over to the UK shortly before the cancellation of the Arrow program.