The reconstructed cockpit section of Spitfire IIa P8088 in the Wellington Hangar at Brooklands shortly after its arrival on December 14.SUPERMARINE SPITFIRE IIa P8088/G-CGRM will be auctioned by the Historics at Brooklands company atMercedes-BenzWorld at Weybridge, Surrey, on February 18.

The cockpit section arrived at the BrooklandsMuseumon December 14, and will be on showin the Wellington Hangar at themuseumuntil the auction. Built at Castle Bromwich in February 1941, P8808 went to 118 Sqn at Ibsley, Hampshire, that April, and became the personal mount of former Aeroplane contributor Alec Lumsden, who had the name of his girlfriend, Bette, painted on the cockpit door.

Seen at Biggin Hill on January 11, Rearwin Sportster c/n 462 carries mid-1930s period registration G-AEOF, issued by theCAAin December 1981. The practice of allocating unused “vintage” registrations has since been stopped.AT BIGGIN HILL, Kent, the first-ever flight of a British-registered Rearwin Sportster is approaching as the restoration of G-AEOF, owned by Shipping and Airlines (SA), nears completion.

The wings were fitted just before Christmas, and the 85 h.p. Le Blond engine is installed and running, following a rebuild by Vintech at Little Gransden Airfield, Cambridgeshire. The Sportster was one of several vintage light aeroplanes imported from the USA in 1979/80 by Philip Mann.

Spraying underway on the nose section of the IWM’s Boeing B-17G, 44-83735/F-BDRS, at Duxford on January 11.THE FUSELAGE OF the Imperial War Museum’s Boeing B-17G Flying Fortress, 44-83735, was being given its first coat of olive drab paint in the spray booth in Duxford’s restoration hangar on January 11.

The repainting will be completed in three sections, the forward fuselage, the centre fuselage section and the rear section, with neutral grey being applied to the lower surfaces.

The work was expected to take two weeks. Since the B-17 was moved out of the American Air Museum (AAM) at Duxford in May 2011, four full-time conservation staff and 50-60 volunteers have been working on the restoration project, which has entailed anti-corrosion work on the wing centre sections and flap shrouds, outer wings and fuselage.

The business end of KA114, which is due to become the world’s only air worthy Mosquito later this year.AT ARDMORE AERODROME, Auckland, New Zealand, the epic rebuild of de Havilland Mosquito FB.26 KA114 to fly with Avspecs Ltd reached a major milestone just before Christmas, when the aeroplane stood on its wheels for the first time in more than 60 years.

It has been under restoration for nearly eight years, and is destined for Jerry Yagen’s Military Aviation Museum at Virginia Beach, on the USA’s east coast (see Next to Fly, August 2011 Aeroplane, and Mosquito Reborn beginning on page 42 of this issue). The first flight is now expected during the third quarter of 2012.