Closing date for the December 2026 issue (No 476) is 28th November 2026
Latest Issue
Issue 475: November 2026
Quite a number of price reductions have been notified of late, probably due to an ‘end of season’ lull in sales generally. One resulted in the sale of N-90 G-BZYY. Also sold have been a stainless 45L tank and two 8hp fans.
New for this List are bottom ends from Shabs Kay and David Stagg, the former being a 2020 Tekno which has never flown and is stored in the UK. The second is a Cameron 90/105. Also new this issue is G-BZBJ, a well used LBL77A from Peter Ollivere which is transferred over from ‘Stop Press’.
We can report that Graeme Church has sold his Adventure Balloons (NZ) Ltd company but still has a requirement for a pilot ‘down under’, see Situations Vacant.
Meanwhile Zebedee has reduced the price of the anonymous UM-150 envelope G-CMUO and can report this flies beautifully after having made a private 5-up flight with Jonathan Greatrix and his partitioned basket some weeks ago. Your scribe is not ‘Group B’ rated, so thanks to Jonathan for his help. It has a UK ARC till August ’27 subject to adding your certified bottom end and ideal for the Alps in the New Year!!
Time for bed said Zebedee!
For several months we have been contemplating the future for our business, as has Chris Dunkley at Easy Balloons. Don’t panic! No immediate changes are planned, but being realistic the next few years will see us winding down and we thought we should spell out some timely truths and maybe encourage some youngsters into balloon maintenance & repair.
We have written a joint statement which we hope will trigger both business enterprise and some thoughts as to how you can ease the pain of your next repair …..
Scam Warning
WARNING!
We have been alerted by two of our advertisers to a scam which is currently doing the rounds. In each case the potential buyer agrees to buy an item and then sends a cheque in payment. However the cheque is for more than the asking price of the item. The ‘buyer’ then asks the seller to refund the difference. Because it sometimes takes a week or more for the bank to process a cheque, it can be some time before the seller realises the cheque has bounced.
We have heard of 4 advertisers who have received enquiries in the past week for equipment. They all involve a complicated routine involving (international) cheques and the fact that the enquirer is on honeymoon… beware !