Blackbushe - SBAC Visitors 80's-90's

[Cessna954]

It used to be the case that airfields around Farnborough would see an influx of visitors during the bi-annual airshow. Whilst I'm not old enough to remember the glorious days of the 50's & 60's I did have my trusty camera at hand during regular visits in the 80's and 90's. As my slides are archived in manufacturer order not chronological or location, and I'm about half way through scanning, hopefully i shall have many more yet to to be rediscovered.

1986 and by this time Blackbushe was owned by British Car Auctions and this shot of their Agusta 109 nicely illustrates the use of the disused runway 14/32 for overflow parking. Note the rare Nord 260!!


another 1986 aircraft, Busy Bee Fokker 27



1988 and a BAe company hack, former Berlin Jetsream


another company hack, Short 360


and the Short Brothers HS125


you could always rely on seeing some good European registered aircraft


1990 and a European government aircraft, German Border Guard Puma


King Air belonging to the B*#@!rds Against Aviation, as we knew them up on the Queens' Building roof terrace


LEC operated this Islander out of their private airstrip at Bognor Regis


occasional 'heavy metal' visitors - Swiss Falcon 50


1992 and a nice Falcon 10




a nice HS125-600


1994 and a BAe Jetstream 41 demonstrator


a Fokker full of Dutch enthusiasts


a nice Swiss King Air 350


Former GDR Government Let 410


Sabena Xingus were quite common, here slightly later when a few had been sold to Air Venture


The Britten Norman Islander CASTOR demonstrator


a participant in the SBAC anniversary flypast the Percival Gull Six G-ADPR - now in New Zealand I believe


1996 and Flight Refueling's Cessna 441 hack


Luxembourg registered Cessna 340


Pliatus PC12 demonstrator


a smart Danish Merlin


1998 and a Swedish Cessna 550


After a 13 year absence I attended the Farnborough Airshow on a trade day in 2013 and had the best aviation day out of that year. I'll certainly be looking to go again this year.

Hope that you've enjoyed the pictures and if you frequented Blackbushe during SBAC weeks of yesteryear hope that the pictures bring back some memories.

Cessna

[Mike]

Great stuff, thanks for posting them.

[LondonEye]

Lovely stuff. Thanks. Particularly like the interest of the L-410, Xingu and Merlin.
Pete

[andygolfer]

a lovely selection Cessna, thanks for posting them

I've been scanning more this afternoon but they are nowhere near as clear as yours. I found some from a SBAC show which I think was 1970 in the days when I only had a small kodak 35mm camera, no such thing as zoom lenses so makes me realise how lucky I am nowadays.

what scanner are you using for yours BTW?

Andy

[Cessna954]

what scanner are you using for yours BTW?

for 35mm negatives and slides I use a Nikon Coolscan V which my wife brought as a xmas present some 10 years ago. As the Nikon driver is no longer compatible with the latest Windows OS I use VueScan software, which I recommend regardless. VueScan can also do a lot of the processing, your choice, or you can also do it in Photoshop where I usually use a plug in called Neat Image to reduce the grain and noise. All quite laborious and hence why I'm only half way through after 10 years.

Cessna

[PorkScratching]

Great selection and well scanned. I certainly recognise a number of those aircraft from the 1980s, including the Nord 260 - I saw one at Luton, but couldn't manage a photo. The German Puma is an interesting rarity too.

[nick197]

Very interesting, thanks for sharing