We have lately been working mostly on preparing to move the center section out of the concrete hall and into the workshop.. This is because we will start work on repairing local corrosion damage in the center section. These lesions are mainly localized to the areas within the wing, float and engine mounts. This will be a time consuming job. If we are lucky, we will not have to do other and more intrusive work on the center section. Ultrasound examinations, as IKM Inspection AS has done for, shows us that fortunately there is little corrosion on the most complicated parts of the support structure in the center section.
The center section will take up a lot of space inside the workshop. To free up this space, it has been a priority to work with the Caproni nose section. The latter has of course had some consequences for the progress of the work with He 115 cockpit and nose section. The first relocation of the center section inside the concrete hall has now been completed. The plan further now is to saw out a five meter wide opening in the west- the wall of the concrete hall. Through this we will then roll the center section. When the center section is out of the concrete hall, we must immediately close the opening in the brick wall. The process of sawing out the hole in the concrete, move out the center section and then close the hole in the concrete wall must happen in one and the same day. We plan to do this during the autumn.
When we raised the plane, we found in the Kanzel parts of a measuring instrument that we did not understand the use of. We understood that these were parts of a drift meter, but we were unsure how this had been mounted in the plane. The drift meter was then given a temporary preservation and then stored. On the starboard side at the front of the Kanzel there is a rectangular hatch. Behind this hatch we found the remains of a magnesium bracket and the remains of a cloth cuff. We did not understand what this hatch and bracket had been used for. In pictures by Heinkel 115 this hatch appears, with few exceptions, as closed.
Then we are lucky and are contacted by Marc Bressan who lives in Switzerland. Marc Bressan has a very solid knowledge of and experience with German aircraft instruments. He had restored and built up a complete drift meter himself. Marc offered us to share with us his extensive knowledge and documentation about He 115 Tribsgërete. He sent us a bunch of pictures that showed us what a complete system should look like and work.
The information we received from Marc showed us that we needed a lot to have a complete system for drift measurement.. Marc now offered to complete and donate to us parts he had left over from the restoration of his own Tribsgërete. With these parts we were now in possession of a complete system for drift measurement. The drift meter that we found in the plane in 2012 was only temporarily preserved and did not open up for interior cleaning and preservation. Marc opened this for us and did a thorough internal preservation of the meter for. This facility for measuring drift, will when these are mounted in the aircraft show these well again forward in the Kanzel. We owe Marc Bressan a very big thank you for the help the project has given.
This equipment, along with everything else we have found on board, shows that a very well-trained crew was needed for them to be able to operate and benefit from all the aircraft's systems.
The following pictures we have mainly received from Marc Bressan:
