Here are some of the things she’s put on her Christmas list to Santa that will help the team through the coming year:

- 1 sq metre of new carpet – £4.99 – Click to buy
- 1 section of paint for the exterior – £9.99 – Click to buy
- Cleaning products for the cabin – £3.99 – Click to buy
- 1 Year of hosting for our website – £14.99 – Click to buy
- Crane hire for reattaching tail fin – £300 – Click to buy
- Sponsor 1 fully restored seat and have your name on it – £149 – Click to buy

And don’t forget you can purchase a variety of Save The Trident items at our online store. Click here

* Please note, all money received through this page will be earmarked to fund the gift you pay for, however in some circumstances it will go to the general fund which pays for all work on the Trident. No money will be used outside of the project.

Purchasing these items will not result in any stake in ownership of the aircraft or products bought

It proved quite fruitful and we managed to get the front cabin scrubbed thoroughly with chemical film remover as used by professional valet and road maintenance companies. This stuff worked through 28 years of smoke damage and dirt that had accumulated on the ceiling, walls and panels, and scrubbed parts very clean, ready for painting in the future.

We also put back in place the window and ceiling panels, which will be cleaned by team member Dave Matthews as he visits regularly to work on the aircraft.

In the cockpit, Neil spent the day working on the centre pedestal, sanding and flatting, and then painting it.

First up, we’ve put together a new flyer which will be available soon from the museum and various other places. They’re also going to be working on our website and information board at the aircraft.

I think you’ll notice the changes because Wright Angle are so good at what they do. We can’t thank them enough for their sponsored help.

Wright Angle Design provides a wide range of marketing communications services to clients of various sizes in the UK and across the world. Based in Berkshire, their skills and experience can provide high-quality services that are designed to help produce positive results. For enquiries please contact john@wrightangledesign.com or visit www.wrightangledesign.com

Nevertheless, Flavell stepped up to the task and have inserted a strong steel plate to give it more than enough strength. They also did a bit more work around the place. We thank them for this sponsorship and their help.

Again, HSS Hire helped us out with the hire of the generator, giving it half price.

Internally, the team have begun to strip the cabin so that we can make a thorough job of cleaning and restoring it. As you can see in the photos below, the forward cabin is now stripped of seats and carpets and is already looking much better for it!

Please donate if you feel you can to ensure snags like this don’t stop us in our tracks in the future. Thank you to those who have left donations for us at the museum, too. We really appreciate it!

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As you may have read in our earlier post, we had a pristine main landing gear leg and wheels delivered up from Northbrook College’s Shoreham Airport base to use on our aircraft. As you can see from the picture, these are immaculate. Until we use them, the leg has been set up on its frame in the museum car park, and is quite an attraction in itself!

New member Dave Matthews has joined the team at the museum and has already been a great help.

Over the past week we’ve painted anti-corrosion paint onto all of the exposed cuts around the wings and where the tail section was. This will hopefully stop and corrosion setting in before we put the plane back together.

Please keep up the donations if you can. Funding is short and we have a lot of work to do still!

The leg and wheels are being transported up to the museum at a fantastic, discounted price by Transram Europe.

Transram Europe are a crane-assisted road transport company based in West Sussex. They can easily handle all sorts of road transport of heavy and bulky items around Southern England, the entire UK and into Europe.

We thank both of these sponsors very much for their help in pushing forward our project. Please visit their pages for more information.

MSD have provided all of the equipment we need in terms of cranes, and have also provided us with workmen to help with the project to date. Their great prices and sponsorship has been invaluable.

Colin Best at JDPL has been an absolute star with arranging the escort up to Sunderland. He talked to the Police, Highways Agency, councils and many other people, as well as personally measuring and planning the route time and time again to make sure we got there without any hiccups.

We couldn’t have done it without these guys, so we want to say how grateful we are.

Please consider giving MSD and JDPL a call if you have any needs that they could help with. They really are professionals and know what they’re doing.

MSD Cranes – www.msdcranes.com
JDLP – www.jdpl.co.uk

Also a big thanks to Northumbria Police for arranging the escort team (Cleveland and Durham Police bikes) from so early in the morning, and not charging us for this service. They made sure the roads were clear and that no problems were encountered. We appreciate it and couldn’t have done it without them.

Now that the dust has settled, here is a selection of pictures from the move day:

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Following its transport across two fences and a live runway yesterday, it sat on its low loader transport overnight ready for its early departure at dawn.

Then, at 5.45am the transport began, heading across to the A66, then up the A19 to the museum.

More news and pictures to follow!