de Havilland DH88 Comet Racer Night Run

Shuttleworth's 1934 de Havilland DH88 Comet Racer undergoes a night run of its Gipsy Queen engines.
Three examples of the DH88 were built for the 1934 MacRobertson Air Race from Mildenhall to Melbourne. The first Comet was first flown on 8th September 1934, and it received its Certificate of Airworthiness the following month. The other two received theirs in October 1934.
G-ACSS was flown in the race by C W A Scott and Tom Campbell-Black, and was entered into the race by A O Edwards, the then manager of the Grosvenor House hotel - the name the aircraft wears.
It completed the race in 70 hours and 54 minutes, making it the winner of the speed prize (the other main prize for performance against handicap was won by a DC-2 operated by KLM, which finished a close second overall).
Following the race, the G-ACSS was evaluated by the RAF, and appeared in its K5084 number at the 1936 Hendon Pageant. After suffering a couple of accidents in the hands of the RAF, it was sold as scrap - but bought and restored at Essex Aero Club by F Tasker.
Nicknamed 'The Orphan' it competed in the 1937 England-Damascus Air Race, finishing fourth.
Other records it held at the time include the out-and-back times to the Cape, as well as England-New Zealand-England (a feat it completed in 10 days, 21 hours and 22 minutes).
Abandoned at Gravesend during WWII, it was statically restored for the 1951 Festival of Great Britain, before being given to Shuttleworth in 1965 where work began to restore it to flying condition. This culminated in a first flight in 49 years on 17th May 1987.
It moved to Old Warden in 1994, following the closure of Hatfield, but initially the runway was too short to allow for safe operation. The runway was extended in 1999, but the Comet suffered a landing mishap in 2002. After research and modifications were carried out into issues with the undercarriage, it flew again in 2014 - and is now a regular performer at Shuttleworth air shows.
The Shuttleworth Collection in Bedfordshire, England is home to a vast array of vintage aircraft, vehicles, as well as agricultural machinery. The Collection hosts a series of flying days from May to October each year, and is open to the public on non-flying days as well.
General admission and event tickets can be purchased at www.shuttleworth.org.

[@Bradburger]

Very nice as usual, and thanks for all the hard work you do to keep these historic machines where they belong!

[@trevuser2007]

That's fantastic, love it. Nicely filmed and edited chaps. Do you really check / adjust the mixture by looking at the colour of the exhaust flames? (:+} I do hope so !!

[@MonostripeZebra]

such a beautiful aircraft!

[@kiwidiesel]

Awesome!!

[@johnnycomelately6341]

wonderful

[@tomasinacovell4293]

So it has a single-stage turbocharger?

[@horsebee1]

Great to see her running and a tribute to those who restored her but why a night run as apposed to a daylight run, was there a specific purpose for this?

[@jr0815_aka_gulredrel]

They and we all wanted to see that beautiful flames coming out of the exhaust stacks 😅

[@ShuttleworthCollection_OW]

Pilots had suspicions that the starboard engine (which has 2 carburettors) was running rich during the 2021 season so as part of the scheduled maintenance this winter we decided to remove both carburettors and investigate. Issues were found on both carbs, and then they were reassembled and stub pipes were fitted to the exhausts to allow us to witness the colours of the flames at dusk.

[@horsebee1]

@@ShuttleworthCollection_OW Ah now that make sense good old fashion fault tracing before the advent of computers.

[@jr0815_aka_gulredrel]

Back to basics. No fancy individual cylinder head and exhaust temperature gauges or injection system. 👍

[@captainaxle438]

Why would you want to fly such a rare piece of history as that, at night? It's more dangerous and nobody can see it. Now stop this nonsense and never do this again. One loose screw can crash the airplane. Don't endanger the airplane with a "loose screw in the head" pilot

[@peterlovett5841]

It wasn't going to be flown. There were no cowlings on the engines for a start. It appeared to be merely an engine test run, possibly after maintenance.

[@ShuttleworthCollection_OW]

This was a ground run at night, not a flight. Pilots had suspicions that the starboard engine (which has 2 carburettors) was running rich during the 2021 season so as part of the scheduled maintenance this winter we decided to remove both carburettors and investigate. Issues were found on both carbs, and then they were reassembled and stub pipes were fitted to the exhausts to allow us to witness the colours of the flames at dusk.

[@georgewhitworth9742]

Ah yes, the chair-bound air marshal, self-appointed of course.

[@captainaxle438]

@@georgewhitworth9742 well said mr. Shitworth