Dan Air Doves

[markw]

I've tried searching "The Pond" and these forums but without success, but does anyone know if anyone has made up a set of Dan Air textures for the Dove that I have managed to miss? I've just finished reading the excellent history of the airline and didn't realise Dan Air used Doves on a Bristol-Cardiff-Liverpool and beyond service, and other bus-stop services out of Bristol until replaced by larger Herons and Daks, and eventually the 748. There's a nice black and white pic of one in the book, and although black and white I think I can guess the colours used...If no-one has made one yet, I'll have a go as it'll go nicely with the Dan Ambassador and might appeal to virtual flyers who fancy a bit of airline hedge hopping. It would also help fill a small gap in the extensive range of Dan craft available.

If the texes have been produced and it's a case of me being myopic, or if someone is working up a set I'll not bother, but if not and people are interested I'll get the permissions sorted and have a go.

Cheers,
Mark

[Garry Russell]

Hi Mark

I know of no Dan Air exisiting or on the go

Garry

[Garry Russell]

I knew I'd seen on on AB but the site was down earlier :-(

Back up now

http://www.abpic.co.uk/photo/1005926/


Garry

[markw]

Thanks for the link to the colour shots, confirms what I thought colour wise.

I'll have a go at doing a couple once I've got permissions sorted, I didn't think I'd seen one in FS but I thought it better to check!

[DaveB]

Looking forward to it Mark. All power to ya

ATB

DaveB :tab:

[DispatchDragon]

Mark

Nice find, They had long gone when I showed up with Dan but there were guys who flew them on the west country run.

They were replaced actually by the Nord 262 - Somewhere I have the paint that Tony Madge (i think did for me) a couple

of years back.

Leif

[DelP]

Hi Mark,

Check your PMs ;-)

ATB,

Derek

[markw]

Thanks Derek. I've managed to get one side done and will hopefully have G-AIWF done tomorrow.

Hi Leif, you're right, I'd forgotten the Nord, although the Doves had gone by 1965, and the sole Nord arrived in 1970 after evaluation as a Dakota replacement. I think the sequence was the Doves were replaced by a couple of Herons (G-ANCI and AOZM) in 1963, and sometime in the mid 1960s by the DC3. Eventually in 1970 the Dak was replaced by the Nord. Interestingly, Graham Simons book on Dan Air relates that Dan Air tried a number of aircraft to find a Dak replacement on West Country services including the Jetstream prototype, Twotter, Islander and Beech 99 as well as the manufacturer's demo Nord 262. Eventually they obtained an ex Air Ceylon Nord (G-AYFR) but remarkably when it was introduced on the Bristol-Cardiff-Liverpool-Newcastle route some passengers complained about it! The Nord finally replaced the DC3 on the route on the 22 July 1970 and the last DC3 in service, G-AMPP was retired for preservation as G-AMSU. The Nord had gone by 1973 at which point presumably the 748 would have been used as the only suitable kit in the fleet at the time (I doubt a 1-11 would have been used!), especially as the 748 was used on other Cardiff/Bristol based services such as to Amsterdam and Leeds/Glasgow.

I don't know if you've got a copy of Graham Simons book on Dan Air but it's a fascinating read, I got mine from the Dan Air website on http://www.danair.org/ which is the official website of the Staff Assoiation, together with a video which is closely linked to the book. It's a shame the airline wasn't able to forge links with Virgin when they hit trouble in the 90's and I do wonder if The Bearded Wonder regrets not having been able to persuade the rest of the Virgin Atlantic board to buy the airline as a European feeder to his long haul operations, although he's managed to do pretty well without them. The whole BA takeover saga is very sad and even allowing for a slightly skewed viewpoint seems to come across as very shabby but typical of BA at that time. Having sampled the delights of BA EuroGatwick as the former Dan Air services became known, and on a couple of ex Dan Air routes, it wasn't BA at it's best and they came across as the poor neighbours to Heathrow Mainline, and not as good as even the franchise Maersk services out of Birmingham, although they were still streets ahead of the alternative Alitalia services we could have used which were not fun.

[markw]

As a PS I forgot to add that Dan Air also used Bristol Freighters quite extensively on cargo in the 1950s, but also converted at least one to "Wayfarer" passenger standards for charter operations. Some of the Freighters operated on behalf of the Air Ministry to Singapore, and on secret rocket equipment flights to Woomera in Australia, which would make for interesting challenges when the new FS model arrives! Dan Air used the "Wayfarer" passenger Freighters alongside the Daks in 1959 on IT flights from Blackbushe and Manchester to places like Basle, Palma, Ostend and Pisa, which must have been a real test of endurance!

[Garry Russell]

The Nord was indeed a horrid little thing :o

Very unpopular with pax with just about all who operated it

The replacement was the HS.748....one of my paints has the Link City title. ;-)

Years later Metropolitan operated Twin Otters for Dan Air in their full livery

Garry