DAVE SMITH'S

IS I ACarl Schuppcl By BUDD DAVISSON

It towered over everything parkedin the liaison aircraf t area and itsblunt form made even the tractorspul l ing the people-movers lookstreamlined. And the tractors were

probably faster. Still, this huge ostrichof an airplane had its own charm aboutit. More important than that, it chal-lenged the aeronautical knowledge ofthe world's most aero-savvy people .. .

Dave Smith (left) and Wade Castellanos.

the Oshkosh flightline warrior. Themost common comment folks madewas, "Boy, it sure is big; now just ex-actly what did you say it is? A StinsonL-l? Never heard of it."

It's often said people buy airplaneslike they do their pets, their taste sayssomething important about them. InDave Smith's case, it seems rather ob-vious: one look at his airplane andanyone can tell its owner is a Texas os-t r ich f a rmer (rancher?) who alsodabbles in buffalo.

Come on, now, that's the truth!Would we lie about something likethat? Smith is Lomita, Texas' leadingostrich/buffalo breeder (no, he doesn'tcross breed them!).

Standing a story high, with 51 vin-tage feet between its navigation lightsand 34 feet tail to propeller, Smith'sL-l has to be one of the biggest air-planes ever built to haul only twopeople at 90 mph (on a good day). Ofcourse, speed wasn't its purpose. In1940, when it was designed, the pur-pose was to have an airplane thatcould land anywhere, takeoff in halfof that distance and be the eyes and

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short distance legs of the Army'sbrass. Seems as if the helicopter mis-sion has always been there waitingfor the helicopter. However, it does-n't take a really astute aviation typeto recognize the L-l isn't a helicopter.But, it's close.

The army contracted Stinson tobuild 324 of the airplanes which Stin-son designated as their Model 75. Allof the airplanes were built and deliv-ered in 1940 and '41, Smith's beingdelivered on December 22 of that year,only two weeks after Pearl Harbor. Bythe time the contract was completed,Stinson had been absorbed by Vultee,so technically Smith's airplane is aStinson/Vultee since Stinson was thena division of Vultee. Initially, thearmy called the machine an 0-49 (Ofor observation) until the system waschanged in 1942 and it became an L-l(L for liaison). It was the first of theL-birds!

The order for L-ls hadn't even beencompleted when the military foundthemselves deep in a war that was go-ing to demand a whole bunch moreairplanes than they had on order, sothey went back to Stinson to place anadditional order for another batch ofL-ls. Stinson's president, however,told them they didn't really need theL-l, because Stinson could build thema special purpose airplane that wouldbe cheaper, more efficient and mucheasier to maintain. So they obsoletedtheir own L-l with their near-leg-endary L-5 Sentinel.

The L-ls, although living on bor-rowed time, soldiered on throughoutthe war, with a few actually gettinginto combat theaters. However, it wasmuch easier to crate and ship the newoff-the-shelf L-birds like the L-4 Piper,L-2 Taylorcraft and L-3 Aeronca somost L-ls stayed stateside. A ship-ping crate for the L-l was nearly largeenough to let two of the othergrasshoppers snuggle down for thetrip overseas.

Smith's airplane bounced betweenvarious training bases around thecountry before being sold in 1946 bythe War Assets Administration at itslast base of operations in Alaska.However, although no longer wearingan Army uniform, the airplane didn'tleave government service completelybecause its first civilian owner wasthe U.S. Fish and Wildlife service.The L-ls had seen a fair amount ofservice in the Aleutians during thewar and it was ready made for flyingthe back country of the Alaska Terri-tory. Smith's airplane was especiallysuited for bush flying because it wasone of only five "F" models made,which were designed to be operatedon floats. With a 300 hp Lycoming

R-680 in the nose and wing area mea-sured in football fields, the airplanemust have been a marvelous, albeitslow, floatplane.

The airplane spent the next 15 yearsrattling around Alaska's bush, even af-ter the Territory became a state. Afterbeing sold into private ownership,however, Smith says its history be-comes a little vague.

Smith came by his interest in L-birds honestly since he flew L-19s forthe Army reserve for 10 years. In fact,his first Warbird was, naturally, a birddog. Then he went the T-6 route, per-forming in shows and teachingformation. His heart, however, alwaysstayed with the L-birds.

By the time Dave bought the L-l in1984, San Antonio was beginning to

see a lot of L-bird activity, which wascontinued until they now have a stablewith all of the WW-II L-birds, L-lthrough L-6.

"We flew the -1 for about a year,"Smith says, "but, it was really in sadshape."

Besides having a tired engine, birdshad gotten into the cavernous wingsand they did what birds usually do inthat situation. The net result was lotsof damage to the fabric and airframe.Since covering something as huge asan L-l is such a mammoth task, Smithdecided they might as well go thewhole restoration route and make theairplane as original as possible, insideand out.

The airplane is typical Stinson,meaning it used no wood anywhere in

The instrument panel contains only the basics needed for a liaison aircraft of WW-II vintage.SPORT AVIATION 83

its primary structure. At a time whenmost rag wing birds used wood sparsand ribs, Stinson opted for a wingstructure that was totally aluminumwith a fabric covering. With years ofbush operations behind it, some of theL-l's structure had seen better days,but Smith had a complete set of fac-tory drawings for the airplane, so,when it came time to make a new part,they just took out the appropriatedrawing and either started buildingthe new part themselves or they tookthe blueprint to a machinist who hadonly to follow the directions.

"Most of the parts have a vendortag and number stamped on them," hesays. "So, we just became one of the84 SEPTEMBER 1994

newer vendors."The original airplane was probably

covered with cotton, something thatdidn't appeal to Smith, because heknew it would have to be replacedagain sometime in the foreseeable fu-ture. After putting on enough fabricto cover his front yard, the prospect ofdoing it again wasn't terribly appeal-ing, even though the wing fabric wasscrewed, not rib stitched, in place.

"We argued with ourselves aboutthe fabric, since we wanted to be origi-nal, but Ceconite just made so muchsense," he says. "We did, however,make sure we got the early, 1994 ver-sion, Ceconite," he related with a grin.

The L-l's tail is unique because its

structure is entirely stainless steel.Stampings and U-channels arespotwelded together to make a unitthat is impervious to corrosion.Whether this is unique to the float-plane vers ions is u n k n o w n , but itshould come as no surprise that thevendor's tag on the tail surfaces reads"Fleetwing." That company is bestknown as the builder of a limited se-ries of spotwelded, entirely stainlesssteel amphibians so they had the stain-less/spotwelding technologyStinson/Vultee needed.

The rest of the airplane is entirelychromoly tubing, lots of it.

Dave quickly credits Wade Castel-lanos for all of the mechanical work onthe airplane, which entailed taking theairplane down to the last nut and boltand bringing it back up. Smith saysWade is the one who made this thelast flyable L-l in the world.

While Wade was doing his mechan-ical thing, Dave was busying himselfwith the authenticity of the finish andthe interior. When it came to the paintjob, he was lucky because he happenedacross an original WW-II color print ofan L-l on Adak Island in the Aleu-tians. Using original mi l i ta ry paintformulas, he simply matched what hesaw in the picture and, since his air-plane had been based in Alaska, feltcertain he was being as accurate aswas possible in bringing his airplaneback to its original configuration.

Doing the outside of a military air-plane is one thing, but seriousauthenticity starts with all the tinybits and pieces in the cockpit thatdisappear the instant an airplane isput in civvies and the military stuffbecomes dead weight. Smith's L-l isunique enough just being an L-l, butthe neat goodies he has scrounged upto complete the interior restoration iswhat real ly puts the cherry on amighty big cake.

He says, "I wanted the airplane tobe correct for 1944 and started look-ing everywhere for stuff . I got anoriginal pilot's manual and the originalchecklist that's black with green ink soit shows up under the ultraviolet lightsin there."

The list of hard-to-find stuff goeson and on. The correct flare gun andflares are in their mounts along withan original brass A-2 carbon tet(empty) pump type fire extinguisherand an original type parachute sits inthe bucket seat.

Smith has no secret to finding thecritical artifacts. "You just have to goevery place there is," he says, "andevery time you talk to someone, theygive you a lead going somewhere else.The hand mike, a T-10, was handed tome by a guy at a map company in San

Antonio, 1 he same guy had a type D-1 canvas, aircraft mooring kit, thatwas mounted to the inside of the air-plane. We had to remanufacture itusing some old OD canvas, since itwas falling apart, but we were able torestore it exactly, right down to thestencils and snaps."

The radio installation is worth men-tion because it's doubtful if many atOshkosh had ever seen or were awareof the existence of "medium fre-quency" radios. The L-l was equippedwith both low and medium frequencyradios, but the medium frequencyband, 8,000 kilocycles, was droppedduring WW-II. In his searching, how-ever, Smith came across a complete setof radios in both frequencies and withbrand new control heads.

In talking to so many people duringhis restoration of the airplane, hewould occasionally come across peoplewho had flown the airplanes duringthe war. Most would have a story ortwo for him, but once in a while onewould contribute to the authenticity inthe form of another piece of the au-thenticity puzzle. That is how the mapcase came to be holding an originalAlaska sectional, circa 1944, whichwas used by a pilot in flying an L-l

from Fairbanks to Adak Island. That'sabout as authentic as you can get.

In seeking an old Sport Aviationmagazine with a picture of an L-l in it,Dave visited a retired airline pilot inFort Worth who had mentioned hehad that particular magazine. In thecourse of their conversations, Davementioned the N number the airplanecarried during its civilian days, N704E.His host then told him of a flight hehad made in which he ran out of fuelin a J-3 on floats in the Alaska bushand figured he was going to sit on thelake for weeks before he was rescued.However, an airplane happened alongin a few hours and gave him enoughfue l to get to his destination. Thegood Samaritan airplane was 704E.

The world of aviation is a small onein which circles are always completed.

Dave says the L-l doesn't fly like aCub because most Cubs are faster, atleast when landing. The L-l hadeverything on it that 1940 STOL tech-nology could muster and every bit of itis still state-of-the-art today. Theflaps, for instance, are slotted unitsthat are extended with 8 pumps of aratchet handle, giving that many dif-ferent positions. Dave isn't sure of themaximum extension but it is well past

40 degrees.As the flaps come out, the ailerons

are coupled to them and droop ac-cordingly, but not at the same angulardeflection. So, when the flaps are fulldown, the L-l has, in effect, 51 feetof flaps.

As if that isn't enough lift, the air-plane has full length, automatic leadingedge slats. As the angle of attack in-creases, the slats, which are notinterconnected with one another, popout. Dave says in slow, steep turns, it'snot unusual to have only one pop out.

The net result of all those lift de-vices on a wing that big is that Smithsays he routinely flies the airplane asslow as 28 mph. In a normal wind hefigures his takeoff is never more thanapproximately three airplane lengthsor under 100 feet. In some of thewinds Texas can generate, that mustmean there are times when he has towork hard to keep from taking offwhile floating backwards.

When hearing such outlandish air-speed numbers and takeoff distances,it is important to keep in mind howbig this airplane is. Its empty weightis a whopping 2,590 pounds and itgrosses over 3,300!

When asked what the most excitingpart of the project was, Smith wasquick to volunteer, "The first flightwas exciting, but taking it to Oshkoshand putting it on display was a tremen-dous thrill. It made it all worthwhile."

And so another circle has been com-pleted. Now those who took the timeto notice know what came before theL-2. Now they know the mother of allgrasshoppers. •*

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