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A remarkable heritage story played out just outside a small mining village in north Nottinghamshire between 1935 and 1971, which has not been widely recognised outside of the specialist aviation historian community. A number of world first achievements took place at Hucknall airfield, which were the equal of the finest efforts at Farnborough and other world famous locations. The new Hucknall Flight Test Museum, situated in an old Wing Hangar facility on the Hucknall airfield site, aims to bring this story to life and present it, for the very first time, to the general public. The golden era of British aviation is something to be remembered, celebrated and preserved for future generations, and Hucknall’s astonishing aviation legacy and contribution to this era is no exception.
The HUFTM charity is able to raise independent funds to assist us in working towards the creation of a modern national standard museum, which will enable a high quality restoration of the Wing Hangar to it’s former condition, and allow us to extend and expand our exhibition and museum facilities. All public donations towards this vision are gratefully accepted.
The museum is housed in the Hucknall Wing Hangar, a rare twentieth century Grade 2 listed industrial building, originally constructed in 1944. It was built specifically to provide dedicated ground test facilities for ongoing Merlin and Griffon engine development, which was continuous throughout World War 2. The building consists of two test hangars, originally with an aircraft wing section suspended in each. Both hangars were joined to a central blockhouse which provided test control facilities.
Engines would be mounted on the articulating wing section for testing in an identical manner to a service aircraft installation and this enabled the full range of engine management and ancilliary facilities to be incorporated within the test programmes.
In the 1950’s Wing Hangar No2 was converted to enable the development of turboprop and gas turbine engine technologies.
The Hucknall Flight Test Museum Charitable Incorporated Organisation, in association with the Rolls-
One of the key aims of the HUFTM project is to extend the currently limited accommodation offered by the Wing Hangar so that, amongst other objectives, we can create the space to display related aircraft types within a specific Flight Testing context to enhance the Flight Test Establishment story.
Why not help us in this ambitious endeavour?
The HUFTM CIO volunteers work in very close association with the Rolls-
