Aircraft Museums:

junkyard

It might be worth putting this one up as a sticky if it gets enough support. The only two I can think of here are the Irish Air Corps Museum in Baldonnel and the Foynes Flying Boat Museum in Foynes Co. Limerick. The science museum in London is worth a trip, they have a lot of static display planes there.

Owen

Junkyard, that is gift. I'm always stuck for somewhere to go with the Missus on a Sunday on a drive. Foynes it is!

RoundyMooney

Not too far from me either, certainly not too far for a weekend spin...

There is also the Cavan & Leitrim Railway Museum, in Dromod, Co Leitrim.

Details here, which seems an interesting site if you're into aviation history at all.

junkyard

Foynes only had one replica plane the last time I was there but its worth a trip if you have an interest in sea planes. A friend of mine has one in his garage unfinished and built another a few years ago. There used to be a couple based in Cork harbor during world war 2, I'll try and dig out a few photos if I can find them.

ednwireland

royal air force museum hendon for me - fantastic vulcan bomber walk through sunderland flying boat, lancaster bomber me109 spitfires huricanes vickers valiant harriers blue streak. 200+ planes
http://www.rafmuseum.org.uk/

peasant

If you ever find yourselves in the south of Germany with time to kill:
http://www.technik-museum.de/uk/sinsheim/
http://www.technik-museum.de/uk/speyer/
Both not too far from Baden Airport (one of those lovely Ryanair locations)

or if Ryanair drops you off in Friedrichshafen:
http://www.zeppelin-museum.de/firstpage.en.htm

conor_mc

If you're in New York with the missus and three days of shopping, shopping and more shopping has really gotten on your nerves, drag herself off to the USS Intrepid for a few hours of payback!!!

Tom Dunne

conor_mc wrote:

If you're in New York with the missus and three days of shopping, shopping and more shopping has really gotten on your nerves, drag herself off to the USS Intrepid for a few hours of payback!!!

The Intrepid is no more. They have it off somewhere doing renovations. :mad:

Seeing as we are going international, I've been to a few in the US: Tuscon, Arizona where there's a plane graveyard thingy, Boeing Museum in Seattle and my personal favourite, McMinnville in Oregon - where the Spruce Goose is.

conor_mc

tom dunne wrote:

The Intrepid is no more. They have it off somewhere doing renovations. :mad:

Aw, you're kiddding me! And I'm off to NY in May!!!!

Zaph

If anyone happens to find themselves in San Diego, the Aerospace Museum in Balboa Park is well worth a look. The displays include:

Lockheed A-12
Supermarine Spitfire Mk.XVI
North American P-51D Mustang
Apollo 9 command module
North American F-86F "Sabre"
Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-15
Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-17
McDonnell Douglas F-4S Phantom II
Bell AH-1E Cobra

Davidth88

The best ones I have been to are the following

Pima Air Museum in Arizona ( has the added benifit of being next to AMARC which is the open air storage facility ). Incredible museum but bring sun-block in the summer !

IWM ( Imperial War Museum ) in Duxford

I have not been there but the new Cold War Museum at Cosford looks interesting.

I have not been to any museums here in Ireland , but Foynes always interests me , wasn't that were Irish Coffee was invented :-)

Turbulent Bill

Toronto Aerospace Museum isn't bad if you happen to be in the area (http://torontoaerospacemuseum.com/indexh.html). It has a few Avro CF-105 bits scattered around.

Sabre Man

ednwireland wrote:

royal air force museum hendon for me - fantastic vulcan bomber walk through sunderland flying boat, lancaster bomber me109 spitfires huricanes vickers valiant harriers blue streak. 200+ planes
http://www.rafmuseum.org.uk/

Yes, that's a great museum. There's also a good one in Duxford, a little north of London. They often have air shows during the summer.

piraka

Davidth88 wrote:

I have not been there but the new Cold War Museum at Cosford looks interesting.

I called into Cosford last summer on my annual pilgrimage to Fairford. I found it excellent. Great exhibits on missiles during and post WWII, including a rebuilt V2. The highlight was to stand beside one of my favourite aircraft the TSR 2. Cosford is in a great location, it is near Warwick Castle, Stratford upon Avon and 40 miles from Oxford. I'm looking forward to going to the cold war hanger this year, past by it during the development last year, it looks great.

Ruu_Old

Thread stuck.

FunkyDa

Moorabbin airport, in Melbourne, has a small museum. Bit far for a weekend spin, though.

jmayo

Sorry I can't resist this ... but Wanaka in NZ offers the Warbirds over Wanaka museum with display of either Hurricane or Mustang when either isn't in the maintenace hangard. Also have lots of Russian 1930/1940s stuff.
And on the way home you can drop into nice museum outside Vancouver.
Failing that there is always Duxford which in comparison is quiet near.

RadioRetro

junkyard wrote:

Foynes only had one replica plane the last time I was there but its worth a trip if you have an interest in sea planes.

SEAPLANES?????? FLYING BOATS dear Sirrah! And the Foynes museum is great, despite having just the one replica (A Boeing B314 Clipper iirc). Also operating from there during 'The Emergency' were Shorts Sandringhams, the civilian version of the Shorts Sunderland, on which my father earned his aircraft engineering qualifications.

And isn't the Baldonnell museum closed to the public?

FiSe

Just returned from my easter break in and around Edinburgh. And I had to visit /Scottish National/ Museum of Flight based at East Fortune WWI naval and WWII training airfield. I'm not too mad about jets and you can see more aircrafts in Duxford, but this museum has real WWII feel, buildings, hangars, whole area got me immediately... And to see Komet, Vulcan and be able to get tour around and inside Concord was a bonus
Highly recomended
http://www.undiscoveredscotland.co.uk/northberwick/museumofflight/index.html

Owen

Went to Foynes today on Junkyard's excellent recommendation, and I enjoyed it thoroughly. There's a cinema that shows an olde-worlde style newsreel detailing the growth of the Aviation Industry pre WWII, and how Foynes came to be such a landmark in the seaplane atlas. On display were the communications equipment, a partial, scale model of a Flying Boat, and of course, personal effects of Captain Blair.

There were also 3 Simulators running Flight Sim 2002, with bucket seats, yokes and pedals for those wanting to try their luck at commanding a Flying Boat.

junkyard

I'm glad you enjoyed it ned, needless to say its come on a good bit since I was there last.

Turbulent Bill

peasant wrote:

If you ever find yourselves in the south of Germany with time to kill:
http://www.technik-museum.de/uk/sinsheim/
http://www.technik-museum.de/uk/speyer/
Both not too far from Baden Airport (one of those lovely Ryanair locations)

or if Ryanair drops you off in Friedrichshafen:
http://www.zeppelin-museum.de/firstpage.en.htm

I went past the Sinsheim museum on a bus a few weeks ago, couldn't stop off (boo!!) but it looks like a great place. They have the aircraft up on stilts so they all look very dynamic. It's strange when you come through the town and see a Concorde and a Tu-144 apparently taking off!

el tel

For a day away the Ulster Folk and Transport Museum, Cultra Co. Down, is a great place with plenty of planes, trains and automobiles.

The best aviation-only museum which I been to is The National Museum of the USAF (the world's largest and oldest military aviation museum) at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, Ohio. They have every plane you could ever wish to see, including the XB-70 Valkyrie.

The Technical Museum in Munich also has an excellent aircraft room and is well worth seeing.

WexCan

Duxford is fantastic, try to avoid airshow days though since it can be quite expensive. Unless, of course, you want to watch the airshow.

merkuree

In no particular order.....and just a few....but all orth visiting if anyone plans on making a trip

Some of these are not strictly museums, but you will see connies, old DC iron at these airfields/museums.

Arizona
Pima Air Park, Tucson, Arizona and AMARC (adjacent to one another)
Marana Air Park, North Tucson, Arizona (although not a museum and difficult to get shots
Kingman Airfield, Kingman, Arizona
Flagstaff Air Field, Flagstaff, Arizona
Chandler Field, Phoenix, Az
Avro Air Park, Phoenix, Az
Tucson Airport (south side of the airport).....reclamation shop for boeing/dc

California
Victorville, CA......open air storage for commercial stuff

Travis AFB, Fairfield Co, (25 miles NE of San Francisco)
Chino Airport, Chino, CA
Riverside, March AFB, CA DC-6s, ex- usaf stuff
Palmdale - Lockheed prod and museum, Edwards AFB, CA

Moffett Field, Mountain View, CA - home of the NASA B747SP

Washington State
Boeing Museum, Renton, Washington (5 miles south of Seattle)
Boeing Factory, Everett, WA (30 miles north of Seattle)

Virginia
Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center near Washington Dulles (367-80, F-BVFA, SR-71)

Washington DC
National Air and Space Museum, Washington, DC


Tennessee
Smyrna Airport, tennesee

Maine
Lewiston Airport, Maine (used to be 3 connies here....not sure if they are still there)

Florida
Sanford Airport, Florida (another couple of connies plus some DC-7s, DC-6s)

North Carolina
Maxton Airport, 50 miles from Charlotte.....NW 727s, 747s, DC-8s, 707s