This aircraft has an interesting history, which I have researched on the internet. The airframe is one of the six original F2B frames found in a barn at Weston-on-the-Green in the 1960s which were transferred to the RAF Museum. The fuselage bears constructor’s number 7434 and was built in 1917 as RFC F4516, serving with No.13 Squadron.
The Fighter Collection at Duxford acquired the fuselage in a trade with the RAF Museum in 1989 and Skyport Engineering were contracted to restore it in May 1991. Trading with the Shuttleworth Collection provided an upper wing, further tail components, flying controls including rudder bar, undercarriage and tailskid structure. Skysport Engineering provided complete original instruments and an aero Vickers machine-gun. Aero Vintage provided the original Lewis gun, together with a No.2 Scarff ring.
By October 1992 the basic airframe restoration was completed, incorporating over 60% original wooden components. New woodwork was varnished in a distinguishing shade. All of the steel parts were recovered, apart from new flying wires, which were made to original patterns.
The Rolls-Royce Falcon Mark 3 engine was acquired from the Prague Technical Museum in a complex trade that included a rare Grand Prix Bugatti engine & supercharger parts and an early Liberty aero engine. The propeller is an original, purchased at Christies.
The Shuttleworth Collection overhauled the engine with The Fighter Collection providing industrial and technical back up and sourcing of parts. A radiator was made to original drawings and pattern, as were oil and fuel tanks, plus cowls.
As precise information on the aircraft's original markings was lacking, the restorers decided to paint the Biff in the colourful markings of D-8084, an F2B of 139 Squadron, which fought at Villaverla in Italy during 1918. D-8084 had been photographed on a number of occasions, including when HRH Prince Edward of Wales (later Edward VIII) flew as an observer.
The restored aircraft first flew in June 1998 and its (UK) civil registration was G-ACAA. In mid-2006 it joined the Shuttleworth Collection's old stalwart D8096 and another newly rebuilt F2B D7889 (G-AANM) in a probably never to be repeated three-ship formation, appearing together once each at Duxford and Old Warden.
D7889 subsequently went to new owners in the USA and the Fighter Collection sold D8084 in 2006 to Peter Jackson in New Zealand (where it is now operated by The Vintage Aviator). It carries the NZ aircraft registration ZK-BRI.
It flies regularly from Hood Aerodrome and has been joined recently by another Bristol F2B, ZK-JNU which is powered by a modern Ranger engine.
I believe the cockpit has been finished in a post-war configuration.
The clear doped linen has aged to quite a dark cream with all manner of stains and marks. Excellent resource for those modellers who like a more weathered machine.
