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By: - 18th May 2014 at 17:30 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
It would be interesting to know what provenance the auctioneer offers for that attribution. What is the guide price?
By: - 18th May 2014 at 17:35 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
£300-400, next lot is a mounted prop tip from same aircraft with same estimate.
By: - 18th May 2014 at 17:49 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
It would be interesting to know what provenance the auctioneer offers for that attribution. What is the guide price?
"Dashboard clock from prototype Spitfire K5054 which crashed at Farnborough in 1939, black face with luminous Arabic numerals, marked above the '6' "L5/37", and verso AM (crowned) and 5054, all over a rectangular base, 6x6cm. £300 - 400"
You will have to contact the auctioneer to fins out what they know of its origin.
By: - 18th May 2014 at 17:53 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
You will have to contact the auctioneer to fins out what they know of its origin.
I'm curious rather than interested!
By: - 18th May 2014 at 20:43 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
I thought the only piece of K5054 to survive was a bolt(?) fashioned into a hammer by a Supermarine engineer and currently on show at the Southampton museum?
I may be wrong....
Baz
By: - 20th May 2014 at 22:50 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Now on ebay, same vendor has a prop tip:
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/A-Very-Rare-Antique-WWII-Prototype-Spitfire-Fighter-Cockpit-Clock-from-K5054-/151307768059?pt=UK_Clocks&hash=item233aa550fb
I will probably pass on these.
By: - 20th May 2014 at 23:26 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
I don't believe a word of it.
By: - 21st May 2014 at 07:11 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
I emailed the auctioneer several days ago about the prop tip but didn't get a reply.
Pete
By: - 21st May 2014 at 07:47 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
So is it that the clock did not sell at auction, and the seller is now trying his luck on eBay, or is it that the auction buyer is endeavouring to make a quick turn on the item - or, heaven forfend, that the prototype Spitfire had two clocks in it! When I looked at the eBay hyperlink, I found only the clock being advertised.
By: - 21st May 2014 at 08:09 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
We know that the prototype Spitfire was written off following a landing accident at Farnborough on 4 September 1939. F/Lt White was killed when the aircraft flipped over on its back.
It would be my view that for an aircraft to arrive on its back in that dynamic situation, the propeller tip must surely have struck the ground. There appears to be no evidence of this on the item in question.
The yellow paint looks to be very much an afterthought and poorly positioned.
Mark
By: - 21st May 2014 at 09:29 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
The seller claims that his Grandfather worked there at the time and picked it up and mounted it etc, but he wasn't willing to elaborate with names etc when I asked.
Pete
By: - 21st May 2014 at 09:48 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
At the time, it was just another aeroplane - the Spitfire had yet to make its name.
Did it have a 2 blade Watts at the time of the accident, or a 3 blade?
Bruce
By: - 21st May 2014 at 10:17 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
The seller claims that his Grandfather worked there at the time and picked it up and mounted it etc, but he wasn't willing to elaborate with names etc when I asked.Pete
Are we talking about the clock and/or propellor tip?
By: - 21st May 2014 at 11:22 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
Did it have a 2 blade Watts at the time of the accident, or a 3 blade?Bruce
2 blade Watts I believe.
By: - 21st May 2014 at 11:25 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
initially a watts, but I very much doubt so by 1939!
By: - 21st May 2014 at 11:35 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
I only ask as it doesn't 'look' like a Watts propeller tip. That said, I cant find a decent pic to compare it with.
If it had been changed to 3 blade, it would likely have been a DH prop, which are, of course aluminium.
Bruce
By: - 21st May 2014 at 20:52 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
.... it doesn't 'look' like a Watts propeller tip.
If it had been changed to 3 blade, it would likely have been a DH prop, which are, of course aluminium.
Bruce
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Bruce,
I have a substantial and comprehensive collection of images of the prototype right through to the crash in military camouflage. I cannot see the prop in the detail crash shots but all the others show a fixed pitch two blade prop. Latterly the blade profile was slimmed down.
Mark
By: - 21st May 2014 at 21:30 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
On the clock it is a nice Mk2 Jaeger Le Coultre 8 day RAF clock dated 1937. By itself it is worth in the region of 200 to 250.
As to coming from a specific aircraft - these clocks were ubiquitous and hence were used in most aircraft of that era - but are often called Spitfire Clocks. - even though Hurricane etc would be just as valid.
There was a Mk2 last year being sold as a Dambuster Lancaster clock - from the family... For me unless I had a picture of the clock with a distinctive marking showing it in situ and being removed - it is a leap of faith especially as value being asked was 4 to 5 x market value.
Cannot say that this or the Lanc clock did not come from the stated aircraft - depends on the solidity of the provenance.
Probability is a different parameter.
On the inside shot - the large instrument on the shiny bezel is that a Mk3 clock ? The mk2 was always mounted on the LHS ?
By: - 22nd May 2014 at 05:00 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
I agree Brian, the Mk II clocks are not that uncommon and the 1937 date should not seduce one into thinking its from the prototype.
Another argument is that most Mk I and early Mk II Spitfires had the cutout on the left hand side for the MkIIIA 6a/676 chronograph.
The Mk II clocks where fitted to just about all later Mk.s of Spitfire, most being the 36 hour or one day clock.
I guess at the end of the day..."Yer pays Yer money and Yer takes Yer chances".
Kind Regards Mike
By: - 22nd May 2014 at 07:26 Permalink - Edited 1st January 1970 at 01:00
I have lightened the contrast on this shot of the prototype to show the panel at some stage in the development programme.
The clock(s) could clearly have been positioned in a number of places but my money would be on the initial clock being one of those larger diameter affairs still standard fit up to and including MK II (1940 production) as illustrated in the Pilot's Notes.
Here a shot of the prototype in military camouflage, possibly my latest shot, and still with a two blade prop of narrower proportion compared with earlier images.
Mark
Posts: 1,101
By: sopwith.7f1 - 18th May 2014 at 12:00
J.P Humberts auctioneers have a cockpit clock for sale in their auction on 20/5/14. Lot number 82, it is listed as having come from Spitfire prototype K5054.
I don't know if it is from that aircraft as the clock is dated 1937, when it should be dated from around 1935/36 "or earlier if Supermarine had a stockpile of them", though I suppose it could be a later replacement.
Bob T.