Mosquitos?

[supercub]

How many are in the USA.....and of those......are any flown on a regular basis? Would love to see one, and would really love to see one in flight some day. Thanks
Brian

[Race5]

Re: Mosquitos?

How many are in the USA.....and of those......are any flown on a regular basis? Would love to see one, and would really love to see one in flight some day. Thanks
Brian

There are a couple under restoration, others as static display. None currently fly. I believe the project in NZ is the closest to being flown.

[Shawn Aro]

Re: Mosquitos?

Kermit weeks has one and it used to fly its in the eaa musiem? Shawn

[AirDOGGe]

Re: Mosquitos?

Current locations of existing Mosquito airframes, Including Mr. Week's bird...

LINK: http://www.mossie.org/Mosquito_loc.htm

[dvddude]

Re: Mosquitos?

As mentioned above, none currently fly. There are two in restoration however being restored to fly : 1) Jerry Yagen's is down in New Zealand being worked on by Glyn Powell and AvSpecs. I've heard anecdotally that it will supposedly fly this year, but I'm thinking it will probably be close to another 2 to 3 years. It's nowhere close to being done. As they say, the last 5 percent takes 90 percent of the time in restoration, 2) Bob Jens Mosquito is with a company in Canada, currently being restored to airworthy condition. I estimate that this one will fly before Yagen's example.

Also, although technically "airworthy", but not flown, is Kermit Weeks' example, currently on display at the EAA museum in Oshkosh. Kermit keeps it up there because the climate is much better than the harsh hot, humid climate of Florida which can wreck havoc with the sensitive glue and wood construction of the Mosquito. During W.W. II, the RAF had many problems with delamination of the wood structures and consequently, in-flight catastrophic failures due to the heat and humidity problems in the China, Burma and India theater of operations.

Glyn has stated that he will build one more flyable example of the Mossie for himself, when he is done with the Yagen's example. So, it looks like we will probably only have 3 potentially airworthy examples of the Mossie for some time. Also, Bob Jens has stated that he will probably only fly his Mossie only once or a few times for photo ops before he permanently grounds his Mossie, relegating it to static display.

[supercub]

Re: Mosquitos?

I saw a video of Oshkosh this last year and sitting in the warbird area out in the grass was a Mosquito........was that Kermits or ?? I thought there was one flying Canada and some in England.

[dvddude]

Re: Mosquitos?

I saw a video of Oshkosh this last year and sitting in the warbird area out in the grass was a Mosquito........was that Kermits or ?? I thought there was one flying Canada and some in England.

Yes, that was Kermit's. Sometimes they wheel it out for the airshow. None flying in Canada and there used to be some flying in England. All, unfortunately ended up static in museum's scattered around the world. The last flying Mossie, a T3 example, was destroyed at an airshow in 1996 with fatal results due to engine failure and resultant unrecoverable spin/loss of control. Not to be too graphic, but there is video of that crash on youtube if you search under Mosquito crash.

[kiwiracefan]

Re: Mosquitos?

As mentioned above, none currently fly. There are two in restoration however being restored to fly : 1) Jerry Yagen's is down in New Zealand being worked on by Glyn Powell and AvSpecs. I've heard anecdotally that it will supposedly fly this year, but I'm thinking it will probably be close to another 2 to 3 years. It's nowhere close to being done. As they say, the last 5 percent takes 90 percent of the time in restoration, 2) Bob Jens Mosquito is with a company in Canada, currently being restored to airworthy condition. I estimate that this one will fly before Yagen's example.

Glyn has stated that he will build one more flyable example of the Mossie for himself, when he is done with the Yagen's example. So, it looks like we will probably only have 3 potentially airworthy examples of the Mossie for some time. Also, Bob Jens has stated that he will probably only fly his Mossie only once or a few times for photo ops before he permanently grounds his Mossie, relegating it to static display.

Glyn powell has also built a static fuselage and wings to test his moulds and jigs.. the fuse as far as i am aware went to a museum in north america, i think it went to Canada... but im not sure about that.
For all the sailors out there.. the shed where glyn powell has his workshop and moulds was where the NZ challenger for the America's Cup in 1987 was built.. the big KZ-7 challenger was raced against Dennis Connors multi hull flyer...

[split-s]

Re: Mosquitos?

Isn't "FEG" still airworthy?

[dvddude]

Re: Mosquitos?

Isn't "FEG" still airworthy?

I'm not familiar with "FEG", which one is that? There may be several Mossies that may be potentially "airworthy", but currently the only one even close that is "unrestored", that is not static in a museum, and has a realistic chance of flying again, is Kermit's example at the EAA.

[dvddude]

Re: Mosquitos?

Glyn powell has also built a static fuselage and wings to test his moulds and jigs.. the fuse as far as i am aware went to a museum in north america, i think it went to Canada... but im not sure about that.

This is true. Glyn built that static fuselage and wings as a "proof of concept" to test the jigs and moulds as you say. After they were completed they were delivered to a museum in Canada to combine with other authentic Mossie parts to make one complete static example. IIRC, the only reason the project was not considered airworthy is strictly because of using a different type of non-airworthy wood, and not due to any "lesser standards" of workmanship being involved.