VH-RAW (1) de
Havilland D.H.82A Tiger Moth
(c/n DHC78)
VH-RAW was one of those Tigers whose true provenance has
always been questionable. It was
registered to Robbys
Aircraft Co of Parafield on 4 October 1957 with the c/n DHC78.
However,
so far as can be
ascertained it had no Canadian connection. Geoff Goodall took
these two shots
in the hangar at Parafield
in 1963.. In the lower one the poor old girl looked
decidedly seedy after
several years of hard
agricultural work. In 1965 it went to Trojan Aerial
Spraying at Parafield and
was re-registered
VH-TSG. It was acquired
by Trojan after being
retired and dismantled by
Robbys. There was
some shuffling of aggie Tiger ownership at the
time because DCA required
each
agricultural spraying/top dressing company to retire a third of their
D.H.82s each year running
up to 1966 - so
some ag companies bought dismantled Tigers just to increase their fleet
size on
paper, so that they
could keep
their operational Tigers in service to the end. It is
possible that
Trojan's registered this machine just
for that purpose.