Today what could be argued to be the ultimate experimental homebuilt returns to the airfield as proof that wooden aircraft still have a part to play in GA. After many months of hard work and not a little money the fuselage of the three quarter scale Mosquito built by a small group of enthusiasts from the Aeroclub of Luçon Chasnais to satisfy their desire for a twin engine aircraft, returns here. Or at least the fuselage does, on the back of a lorry to be reunited with its wings and undercarriage. The original work took around seventeen years in total and then after a couple of years of happy flying was ground looped on landing. Today is a big step to hearing its beautiful sound as it takes to the air again.It does actually sound like a it has Merlin engines even though I think they are the same as used in the Cessna Cardinal. Hopefully there will be some video of the day posted online as I am not able to be there to lend a hand.
Any pictures or links?
I am trying to find some and will post as soon as I do.
I am still trying to get information on the events of Friday and whether or not the mosquito wings and fuselage were rejoined, and whether or not there are any photos or video, but things have been a little chaotic over the last few days due to the tour de France passing and many roads being blocked off including those to the airfield. To give you a flavour of things Chris Froome crashed within about 100 metres of the threshold to runway 27.
But if Silvaire’s photos have wetted your apetite to see more of the history why not type “mosquito returns to Fontenay le Comte” into your search engine or is it browser? Meanwhile I will keep investigating for the update.
As you can see if I’ve managed to upload the photos, the fuselage arrived on Friday but there was not time to join it with the wings so I hadto be content with taking the photos on my phone in the hangar.
I wonder how far this resembles the original Mosquito? This is the best I can find:
Here is a pic that may be of interest …… many were built in Walthamstow East London by Wrighton furniture.
This pic is no 1000 that they built.
One of the boys sitting at the front told me a few years ago that this was his first job from leaving school at age 14 and he fitted the wing tips, at the time this pic was taken he had fitted all 2000 of them.
A much better and more complete pic can be bought from the Vestry House Museum Walthamstow.
For those that don’t know, the de Havilland Museum is just north of London and they have some wonderful examples of original but sadly non-flying mosquitos. It’s a lovely place to visit.
I know someone whose job in the RAF was a boatbuilder/shipbuilder, it was his job to repair damage to Mosquitos’ woodwork. He later moved on to repair Sunderlands and the Princess during the Berlin airlift. I always found it ironic that we also had a British ex navy man here as well. He had been an Air traffic controller with the Fleet Air Arm.Only the military eh 
The 3/4 scale Mosquito here was made from plans in books, like the one Peter posted, and also as many photos and videos as they could get hold of. Everything basically had to be built from scratch so tools had to be made first. It would have been full sized but it would not have fitted in the garage they were using to build it. The story has it that when they tested the engines in that same garage the phrase from the Italian Job “you’re only supposed to blow the bloody doors off” became you’re not supposed to blow the bl**dy doors off" in French of course. To see how much this aircraft resembles the original, it is best to see it in flight. Many ex RAF pilots including some who had actually flown the mosquito have commented on the memories ot brought flooding back. But a lot of work still needs to be done before it flies again, but there are still old videos of it online flying before the accident.
