The Malta Aviation Museum’s Hawker Hurricane IIa Z3055 had been recovered from the seabed off Wied Iz-Zurrieq during September of 1995 after having ditched there on the 4th of July 1941, being flown at the time by Sgt Thomas Hackston. The wreckage of the submerged aircraft was discovered and salvaged from the seabed by diver Mr. David Schembri. Cassar Enterprises kindly offered and A-frame barge to enable the lifting of the aircraft from the Wied iz-Zurrieq sandy seabed free of charge. The initial phases of restoration by the Malta Historic Aircraft Preservaiton Group were sponsored by Frank Salt of Frank Salt Real Estate Limited in memory of his father Flt Lt J H Salt and the ground crews that served with him during the WWII.
At the start of the restoration of this historic aircraft, it had been decided that we were to aim for a static restoration but as things unfolded and the restoration team gained experience, it was agreed that the final goal was to have the aircraft in full working condition as it had been in 1941. As one can imagine, a task of such magnitude is an enormous undertaking and involves a lot of hard work to physically restore the aircraft and to source the funds required to pay for the very expensive bills!
During 1999, the airframe consisting of a Warren Truss structure was essentially complete and the time had come to start trial fitting the woodwork that gives the Hurricane its very distinctive shape. Lorry Borg - a wood turner with years of experience - had carried out most of this work. At the same time, David Polidano was carrying out a fair amount of work on the cockpit area. This work involved sourcing appropriate instrumentation of the period that still worked or could be restored to working condition. The engine cooling system, oil cooling system and pneumatic system for the brakes also needed sorting out. As all this plumbing was being carried out, we had to keep in mind the fuel, hydraulic and electrical systems so that nothing would interfere with these installations once the time came to install them.
During the year 2000, Lorry Borg had permanently installed the woodwork. The rudder and elevator had been rigged and were working properly. Ray Ebejer who is the team’s expert lathe operator entrusted to do all the jobs that require precise engineering, was working on the very complicated elevator trim mechanism. The Millennium also proved to be the year that we started work on the famous Rolls Royce Merlin that would eventually power the aircraft. Andrew Cilia was entrusted to lead this part of the project joined by Mario Zammit, Ray Ebejer, John Hawkins, James Watson and myself. The various bits and pieces of a Packard Merlin 224 that we had were inspected to determine whether it was going to be possible to get a Merlin working.
The Museum was lucky enough to benefit from the expert advice of Mr. Hedley Griffiths of Jersey Aviation from the very early days of the project. In February, Mr Griffiths came to Malta specifically to coach the restorers on Rolls Royce Merlins and to help them assess the feasibility of the project. It was during this visit that it was confirmed that the museum had almost all the necessary parts to do the job. The museum decided to start off with the two cylinder heads and after several months of work results were coming out. This period was not without its obstacles ranging from punctured water passages to bent valves to missing rocker gear. The museum is greatly indebted to Mr. Maurice Caruana and his engineers for helping out with aluminium welding and the loan of specialized tooling during this trying time. Around November of the same year, the museum received a phone call from Mr. Paul Cardona who donated a complete wartime Merlin 224 engine. With this Godsend in hand, it was now almost certain that enough parts were in hand to make up one serviceable engine.
2001 saw the aircraft nearing the day where the fuselage would be covered in fabric. The cockpit was by now 90% complete. A few minor adjustments to the woodwork were needed and by Easter, it was time to have the fuselage covered. This job was entrusted to Vintage fabrics of the UK, Clive, Linda and Andrew Denney. During the Easter holidays Linda, Andrew and David Polidano were hard at work covering the many wooden panels, tail surfaces and fuselage with fabric. After two weeks, all the fabric work was done and it was time to start putting rib tapes on. For this job Clive came over from the UK to carry out this very time consuming task. The next step was to apply the red dope.
2001 also saw the continuation of the Merlin, which by now was looking more like a brand new V12. We were kindly assisted in this task by a generous donation from no other than Sir Ralph Robbins, chairman of Rolls Royce Plc.
Ray Ebejer constructed a test bench and once this was finished the engine was transferred onto this bench and had the super charger fitted. Plumbing the engine to instrumentation then commenced. By October, the engine was nearing completion and a date had been set to ground run the engine for the first time. The 8th of December saw an attempt to start the engine but due to several problems, the engine was still static. After repairing a faulty magneto switch and improving the P leads, it was decided to have another go on the 13th December.
Again, the engine failed to start on that day and after a couple of backfires (very noisy ones!!) Mr. Griffiths was consulted and it was determined that the timing was incorrect and 3 volontary members of the museum set out to rectify the problem. It was found that the timing was 180 degrees out! Once we had this sorted, the engine just needed a final check to make sure everything was safely in place. At 14:45, the engine was primed twice, the booster coil was pressed, mags on, the starter button pushed and the Rolls-Royce roared to life with that spine-tingling melody of metal that only a Merlin can make! Struck by a mixture of euphoria and panic, the first reaction of the restorers was to switch the monster off!!!! a job they of course managed to do safely! Out comes the champagne and congratulations all round.
Historically, this was a very significant moment for the Museum. Now Malta has a resident working Merlin for the first time in over fifty years. Moreover, we proved to ourselves that we could accomplish tasks that were thought to be beyond our capability (Note to sceptics: we told you so!) and since then, our sights have been set higher. We ran the Merlin every remaining weekend during December to make sure that everything was working safely and to our satisfaction.
January 2002 and it was time to offer up the engine to the airframe. A Saturday morning date was set and the workshop was cleaned and tidied (an historic occasion in itself!). The fuselage was rolled to the front on Friday afternoon in readiness for the next day. During The next morning saw the preperation and double-checking of the engine mount and it was time to put the engine in place, an operation that took the best part of three hours. The operation was made a whole lot easier by the expert handling of the crane by its owner-driver Mr. Vincent Grech. After an absence of 62 years our Hurricane Z3055 had a fully functioning engine on its original bearers: it had now started to look more like a Hurricane. February saw the museum restorers plumbing in the engine to the airframe and whilst most of this work is now complete, quite a bit more is still needed to finish the job.
A radiator and oil cooler were obtained from the Cambridgeshire Bomber and Fighter Society in exchange for a two bladed wooden Watts propeller manufactured in our workshops by our director Ray Polidano, ably assisted by Lorry Borg, Tony Spiteri, John Hawkins and Sandro Magri. This radiator and oil cooler was in a very poor state and needed re-coring and work done to the tanks. The next task was to find some one who had the knowledge and ability to repair such a complicated piece of kit. After several weeks of enquiry, Mr. John Rummery from Replicore radiators in New Zealand was contacted. Mr. Rummery who has had past experiences with Hurricane radiators is the only supplier that we know of that produces the original Serck hexagon tube pattern used on the Hawker Hurricane. This special core that had been specifically designed for the Hurricane improved cooling efficiency by 21%, which is all-important especially in ground-running aircraft. It was therefore decided that Replicore’s package was best suited and the radiator has since been shipped to New Zealand for extensive re-building to a fully serviceable condition. Mr Rummery has generously discounted the cost of the intensive work required.
Another important aspect of this restoration project is the propeller. At first a three bladed wooden Dowty Rotol propeller was earmarked for our fighter. This was eventually dropped due to the prohibitively expensive nature of the necessary repairs. At this stage it was beginning to look as though the whole project would stall for want of a propeller. The location of a de Havilland propeller hub purely by accident in our stores got the ball rolling again. We could now use a brand new set of Hamilton Standard propeller blades to assemble a Hamilton Standard propeller as was built under license by de Havilland’s.
During May we had the long awaited cowlings, manufactured to a very high standard, delivered to our workshop. These cowlings have since had their internal structure assembled and have been fitted onto the aircraft. In August, the remaining cowlings and fairings had finally arrived and the next month or so were spent together with James Watson (while his wife was away on holiday!!) fitting the top cowlings and remaining fairings.
In September we had the return of the radiator from New Zealand. The standard of workmanship put in by Mr. John Rummery of Replicore Radiators is excellent to say the least. Definitely worth the waiting for! It has since been fitted to the aircraft and the cooling system is now complete. Another part of the project which is now close to completion, is the electrical installation, being capably handled by Andrew Cilia. In the mean time Ray Ebejer has been very busy manufacturing several complicated hydraulic components for the aircraft. He has so far managed to manufacture an automatic-cut out a flapjack a catch gear jack a variable flow valve and several other items required for the completion of the hydraulic system.
During 2002 our Hurricane restoration team was busy at work completing the aircraft’s fuselage. January of that year the newly restored Packard Merlin was offered to the airframe. The following months we had the electrical installation completed. A radiator and oil cooler was sourced from the UK and was eventually sent to John Rummery of Replicore Radiators in New Zealand for overhaul. During the summer of 2002 the team was busy fitting cowlings and fairings to the front end of the aircraft, while the team’s lathe worker was entrusted with the manufacture of certain hard to get hydraulic components. Towards the end of the year the expertly restored radiator and oil cooler returned back from New Zealand and was soon fitted to the aircraft and the cooling system was completed and pressure tested. The last major item to be added to the aircraft during that year was the freshly overhauled de Havilland propeller.
The start of 2003 the team was still busy competing the front fairings and cowlings, as well as manufacturing the ever so difficult hydraulic components. By March most of the cowlings were complete and our focus turned to the completion of the windscreen and canopy. The canopy gave the team some trouble to fit properly and took a bit longer then initially anticipated, however the end result is an original and free running canopy that seals well with the windscreen. By now the hydraulic components were complete and individually tested, so it was time to install them to the aircraft as a complete system. After the hydraulics were complete we manufactured the centre section flaps and essentially the external appearance of the fuselage was complete. It was now time to have the aircraft prepared for it’s final camouflage scheme, so preparation work such as spray painting the fabric covered parts in silver dope and priming the front aluminium panels. All this work was completed by the end of July and it was time to call out the Vintage Fabrics team to spray the aircraft in its final Warbird scheme. The fuselage is now only lacking fuel tanks and brakes. These will be fitted to the aircraft once the wings are complete and fitted to the aircraft. Work has now commenced on the construction of the wings and so far the two rear spars are almost ready.
During 2004 work on fabricating a new set of the main spars of the wings, from patters taken from the wreckage of a hurricane which crashed in russia was taken in hand. By the end of March 2005 work on one wing was in advanced stage of completion wheras works on the second wing was about to be started. The volonteers at Ta' Qali are working hard in an effort to successfully complete the wings by September 2005 so that the completed aircraft will be inaugurted in time with the new Air Battle of Malta Memorial Hangar and with Merlins Over Malta event that is going to bring back to Malta a flying Spitfire and Hurricane after an absence of 60 years.
As one may gather, the amount of money needed to complete this project is enormous. The museum has managed to get this far thanks to a number of sponsors, benefactors and our tireless team of volunteers. There is still a way to go financially to realise the dream of taxiing Hurricane Z3055. The search for more sponsors and benefactors is an on going effort. It is only with such help that this dream of such historical significance to Malta can become reality.
Currently visitors at the Malta Aviation Museum can visit the restoration workshop and follow the progress being made on the restoration of the wings.
This article is updated regularly.
