What’s the Bournemouth Air Show got to do with locks I hear you say? Well apart from taking place in sunny Bournemouth and the shop seemingly under the flight path a great deal. It seems that every time the skies thundered with some flying relic from WWII the phone rang or customers need attention! I particularly wanted a picture of a Lancaster bomber or Spitfire to show you but it wasn’t to be, perhaps tomorrow or Saturday… In the meantime this is from the Bournemouth Air Festival website.

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It’s not generally known that the first locks that Ingersoll made were in fact WWII aircraft locks – not key operated devices but secure devices to hold bombs in place until released or the locks that held the glider tow rope in place or even the locks that held Spitfire cannons in place. Of course after the war the demand was considerably reduced and so Ingersoll’s chief designer Jack Taylor patented the now familiar 10 lever security lock. Attached is a page from the Ingersoll catalogue for aircraft locks, but so far we haven’t managed to find an example for the collection. We live in hopes ….

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If there is interest I could post the whole catalouge.