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Bretta,
If your prop blades have been in the family for over a quarter of a century it is very right and proper that they remain there. In addition, the value will rise in the next five years or so as the centenary of WW1 passes through 2014 to 2019.
Your blades are valuable in the sense that they will soon be a hundred years old and come from close to the dawn of aviation. Their present sawn condition is perfectly valid and not to be regretted. It shows how they were disposed of at squadron level and how someone struggled home with them. It is always possible that it might have been the pilot, whose landing accident wrote off the other two blades, or his mechanic.
You might consider typing out what you have discovered from us about the blades and from Google about the FE2B and attaching the note to the prop or framing it and keeping it with the prop for future reference in fifty or a hundred years time.
If you clean the blades by wiping them with warm soapy water, then let them dry, then repeat the process carefully until no more dirt comes off, then let them dry for several days and finally polish them with pure beeswax out of a tin, you may well see a considerable improvement. (beeswax out of a Sainsbury's aerosol will contain modern silicone polishes which are too powerful for 100 year old lacquer.) Don't polish the brass.
With kind regards,
Bob
If your prop blades have been in the family for over a quarter of a century it is very right and proper that they remain there. In addition, the value will rise in the next five years or so as the centenary of WW1 passes through 2014 to 2019.
Your blades are valuable in the sense that they will soon be a hundred years old and come from close to the dawn of aviation. Their present sawn condition is perfectly valid and not to be regretted. It shows how they were disposed of at squadron level and how someone struggled home with them. It is always possible that it might have been the pilot, whose landing accident wrote off the other two blades, or his mechanic.
You might consider typing out what you have discovered from us about the blades and from Google about the FE2B and attaching the note to the prop or framing it and keeping it with the prop for future reference in fifty or a hundred years time.
If you clean the blades by wiping them with warm soapy water, then let them dry, then repeat the process carefully until no more dirt comes off, then let them dry for several days and finally polish them with pure beeswax out of a tin, you may well see a considerable improvement. (beeswax out of a Sainsbury's aerosol will contain modern silicone polishes which are too powerful for 100 year old lacquer.) Don't polish the brass.
With kind regards,
Bob
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