Hawker Sea Fury FB 11 ZK-SFR

When I was looking for photos of the late Sir Tim Wallis's Spitfire Mk XVI for a post after his recent passing, I scanned a couple of photos of it from the 25th anniversary of the Walsh Flying School airshow I attended at Matamata in 1991.  However there were a couple of other warbirds in attendance, so I also scanned my photo of the Hawker FB 11 Sea Fury ZK-SFR:

This Sea Fury was one of 24 FB 11 Furys that were recovered from a wreckers yard in Iraq in the 1980s.  It is not actually a real Sea Fury but rather a FB 11(c/n 37223 but also quoted as 41H643827) that was delivered to the Iraqi Air Force in 1952 and was coded 326.  It arrived in New Zealand on 19 June 1986 (airfreighted by RNZAF Hercules!) with very low hours and was completely overhauled and painted in Fleet Air Arm colours as WJ232, representing the aircraft of  Royal Navy pilot Peter "Hoagy" Carmichael in the Korean conflict.  Carmichael shot down a North Korean MIG 15 in the original Sea Fury on 9 August 1952 while operating off the carrier HMS Ocean.  

ZK-SFR was first registered on 11/2/87 to the Fury Syndicate of Auckland (Rob Booth, John Greenstreet and Steve Taylor) and its first post restoration flight in New Zealand was on 12 March 1988.  Ownership transferred on 18/8/93 to Flightwatch Services of Auckland (Rob Booth and Grant Biel).  It flew the Tasman several times, flown by Grant Biel, to participate in air races in Australia.  On 19/10/00 ownership transferred to Unlimited Aerobaticss Pty Ltd of Auckland (Steve Taylor) and it was cancelled from the NZ register on 24/5/01 and sold to Australia.

ZK-SFR originally lacked the wing folding and arrester hook mechanisms of a Sea Fury, but these parts were obtained from the FAA Historic Flight Sea Fury WG665 which was written off in a accident in the UK in 1990 and retrofitted to ZK-SFR in 1992.

In Australia it was registered VH-SHF3 and was operated by Harts Flying Fighters Pty Ltd of Brisbane, and it returned to New Zealand for Wings Over Wanaka in 2002 as in the photo below with Flying Fighters script on the tail.  

Later it was seized by Australian Federal Police in a case of tax fraud and it was impounded at Archerfield for many years.

It was purchased at an auction in 2018 by an Australian buyer, still registered as VH-SFC3 and in 2019 it was transported to Pays Vintage Fighter Restorations in Scone, NSW.  The intention was to restore the Sea Fury in Australia but it was cancelled from the Australian register on 20/6/20 and I understand that it was exported to the UK.