Palm Trees in southern Florida

Sunday, November 15, 2015

Museums & factories


The past week or so I saw the Spruce Goose and watched Leatherman tools being made.  All in all not a bad week.

The Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum was a splendid place to visit! 
 Worth the drive to McMinnville, OR!

Where it all started (the Wright Brother's replica)

 I have to start by saying that the Spruce Goose is a really big airplane. Spruce or aluminum or even paper-mache, no matter, it's huge and it did fly!

BIG!

A lot of different airplanes, including WW2 aircraft from the US, Great Britain, Germany & Japan. The first jet fighter even.
A LOT of airplanes!
 
 

If you like aircraft it's worth the stop, they even had a couple of aircraft painted in Coast Guard colors. After a career in Coast Guard aviation I'm partial to CG aircraft.

This was from before my time ('76-'97)

A rotor head I am intimately familiar with, on an earlier helo but the same MRH
I was impressed by the personal stories that were sprinkled throughout the aviation museum. A mannequin in a period uniform of some type with a single page story of a person who wore that uniform.

I really liked the slice of life stories

That was the aviation museum, the space museum was on the other side of the parking lot. Space capsules, rockets, a launch pad, an SR-72 and an X-15!
When I was a kid the X-15 was a big deal.

X-15

SR-71 on the ground
There are a large number of aircraft on display out side. My plan was to see them all after doing the inside, when I finished the rain was coming down in buckets so I didn't see the outside displays.

The Leatherman factory


I've always liked my Leatherman tool, got my first one around '88. When I heard the Leatherman factory gave tours I signed up!
You sign up at their retail store for the Wednesday or Thursday tours. It was interesting seeing the robots & the people & the raw materials. No photos allowed.

The retail store was worth a look if you are a fan of the tools, they have the older tools on display (I wish I could find that one I lost, I saw it on display) and the prototypes.

For what it's worth I had a Leatherman with a broken plier tip. At the store I was offered a new replacement (different model, mine was no longer made) right now or have mine repaired (6 weeks).
I took a new one. 
It does not have the ruler on the side, I did not notice that when I decided on the swap... my mistake.
The "Wingman"




3 comments:

  1. I was last at Evergreen in about 2004 and it was great then. The SR-71 was laying in pieces against a back wall at that time.

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