CYRIL AYLES Married to Margaret. Children: Mandy aged 45, Marina aged 42 & Trevor aged 41, plus  9 grandchildren.
Now living in Gosport, Hants.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      Cyril at Fisgard
AT CONDOR 09/50 to 03/53
LEFT the RN 09/70                                                                                                 

RN CAREER
HMS THESEUS - RNAS ford - RNAS Abbotsinch - RNAS Culdrose, 750 Sqdn - RNAS Arbroath - RNAS Hal Far - RNAS Abbotsinch - RNAS Lee-on-Solent (NAMDU) - RNAS Brawdy - RNAS Lossiemouth, 800 Sqdn (Buccaneers) - HMS EAGLE - RNAS Lee-on-Solent.
Early retirement as AA1 in August 1970.

POST-RN CAREER
      "I qualified as a teacher of Design & Technology at King Alfred's College, Southampton University, and taught in a local comprehensive school. I got rapid promotion to Head of Year then took early retirement at age 54.
      "For several years, I designed and manufactured children's toys based on vintage aircraft and, in conjunction with a local artist, manufactured pub signs and sold them to the USA.
      "I have logged over 50 cruises to all parts of the world, plus numerous tours. We are frequent visitors to our own apartment in Tenerife.
      "I served for sixteen years on the Gosport Sea Cadets Admin Committee and ten years as the Chairman. I also represented the District Cadets on Southern Area admin. (which kept me in touch with the modern RN)."

HOBBIES & PASTIMES
      " I still have the pleasure of taking my grandchildren ice-skating, 10-pin bowling, swimming, and on holidays."                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    Cyril & Margaret
                                                                                                                                                                                              

NOTEWORTHY EVENTS
      " The only one I can remember from my time in the Service was while I was I/C of the metal workshop at RNAS Brawdy. A large German transport aircraft made an emergency landing with hydraulic failure. I was called in to investigate and found a long supply pipe running from the keel to the starboard engine with a large crack in the middle of the run.
      "Telex messages revealed that no spares were available and the pipe had to be made up by the aircraft's manufacturers. Meanwhile, the aircraft was urgently needed. We had materials and spares available in the workshop, but all to Imperial standards and the aircraft was Metric. The German engineer produced a handful of female Metric pipe unions, which did not fit our Imperial pipe. So we had to manufacture two double-ended male connectors with Metric threads at one end and Imperial at the other, plus the appropriate tapers to fit the pipe bell ends.
      "It was quite a turning job setting up the gear trains on the lathe. When we got the official go-ahead, the team of four Artificers produced the goods after a full day's work. A piece of vent pipe was belled out and fitted, using the new special unions. The aircraft was signed up for a test flight after a hydraulics functional test. The undercarriage functional had to be carried out in flight as no jacks were available.
      " The work earned us a commendation, and the German squadron gave us a PU and a special plaque."
      "There was one amusing interlude I remember. While I was instructing at Arbroath in the '50s, I was taking courses of POAFs on conversion form engines to engines & airframes. One particular class of Aussies were practical jokers - especially after 'tot' time in the afternoons.
       "We had yellow blackboards in the classrooms then, for which we used blue chalk. You may remember the Scottish 'Bluebell' match. The Aussies drilled a hole in the end of the chalk and packed it full of Bluebell match heads. You can imagine what happened when the chalk was used on the board."