Vintage Airplane - Mar 2013

8/20/2019 Vintage Airplane - Mar 2013

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MARCH/APRIL 2013

Si l A


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2014 Mustang

The Privilege of PartnershipEAA members are eligible for special pricing on Ford Motor

Company vehicles through Ford’s Partner Recognition

Program. To learn more on this exclusive opportunity for

EAA members to save on a new Ford vehicle, please visit

www.eaa.org/ford.

The Brood in a Mood Meet the Mustang family – a good group with bad intentions. For 2014, they take

to the street meaner than ever, led by the powerful Shelby® GT500®, which delivers

650 hp and boasts a test track top speed of more than 200 mph. Of course, power

runs in the family and even Mustang V6 produces an incredible 305 hp while

delivering an impressive 31 mpg hwy1 as well. But the advancements are not limited

to the engine compartment. With the 2014 Mustang lineup, cool features are as

abundant as horsepower. It starts with the available Pony projection lamp. When


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EAA Publisher . . . . . . . . .Jack J. Pelton,. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .Chairman of the Board

Vice Pres., EAA Publications J. Mac McClellan

Editor . . . . . . . . . . . . . Jim Busha. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . [email protected]

VAA Executive Administrator Theresa Books920-426-6110 . . . . . . . . . [email protected]

Advertising Executive . . . . Jonathan Berger920-426-6886 . . . . . . . . [email protected]

Advertising Director . . . . . Katrina Bradshaw202-577-9292 . . . . . . . . . [email protected]

Advertising Manager . . . . Sue Anderson920-426-6127 . . . . . . . . . [email protected]

Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . Livy Trabbold

VAA, PO Box 3086, Oshkosh, WI 54903Website: www.vintageaircraft.org

Email: [email protected]

O, I

the hangar door. It has been a wild and wooly winter here in the Midwest.Lots of moisture and an abundance of icy conditions have been going onaround here for many weeks. It’s not something I would label as brutal,but I am here to tell you that I am looking for some much milder weather

here in Indiana, and starting tomorrow would be very nice.I hope you all have had the chance by now to take a good look at the

January/February issue of Vintage Airplane magazine. I am quite happyto report to the membership that the reaction from our members todate has been remarkably positive and very complimentary. Our edi-tor, Jim Busha, as well as his “team” from the VAA and the EAA publica-tions department deserve a huge pat on the back for all of their eff ortsin transforming this magazine into a product that is easily 10 times thequality we have experienced in the past. Jim tells me that the majorityof the magic used to make this publication what you see today is beingperformed by Livy Trabbold of the EAA publications department. Al-though Livy has been assisting us with our magazine for several yearsnow, between her and Jim’s eff orts these two have had a dramatic im-pact on the product you see in your mailbox today. So, many thanksLivy, and be assured that your eff orts are greatly appreciated!T

is is certainly not intended to be an indictment of anyone previ-ously responsible for this magazine, but it is all about a new way ofthinking about how we can improve on the product. What we really havehere now is a product that has been reinvested in. It’s actually an at-tempt to raise the bar in the arena of content, presentation, and quality.Te team, as reinforced by the opinions of dozens of our members, hasli ll hi d l h f h d / b M

Straight & Level Vintage AirplaneSTAFF

2013:A year of enhanced membership benefits

GEOFF ROBISON

VAA PRESIDENT, EAA 268346, VAA 12606

VINTAGE AIRCRAFT ASSOCIATION

Current EAA members may join the Vin-

tage Aircraft Association and receive VINTAGE

AIRPLANE magazine for an additional $42

per year.

EAA Membership, VINTAGE AIRPLANE

magazine and one year membership in the

EAA Vintage Aircraft Association is available

for $52 per year (SPORT AVIATION magazine not

included). (Add $7 for International Postage.)

FOREIGN MEMBERSHIPS

Please submit your remittance with a

check or draft drawn on a United States

bank payable in United States dollars. Add

i d F i P t t f h

TM


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C O N T E N T S

Vol. 41, No. 2 2013

4No One Ever Met aStranger at the Red BarnCharles W. Harris

MARCH/APRIL

24Fleet FunStan Sweikar’s storied silver agechampion—Take TwoSparky Barnes Sargent

34 You’re Going to Do What Where?Earning my Ford Tri-Motor ratingDonis B. Hamilton

38182 Survivor. . . As if it came out of Tut’s tombBudd Davisson


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C O V E R SFRONT COVER: Chris Miller captures Stan

Sweikars Fleet over some green Wisconsin

farm fields.

BACK COVER: Radial Engine Cubs? Look for a

feature article in an upcoming issue to learn

more about them. Photo by Phil High.

ANY COMMENTS?

Send your thoughts to the

MARCH/APRIL 2013

Si lver AgeChampion

Fleet

49Sentimental Journey 2012Cub homecomingRoger Thiel


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F

the late summer of each year, the EAA Vintage Aircraft

Association’s Red Barn is the epicenter, the heart, and

soul of the whole wide world of vintage airplanes.

It is the place to be to be a part o f and enjoy thefinest historic airplanes from our long ago past,

which not only have brought us to where we

are today but also have constantly inspired us to

raise our interest and participation in the vintage

airplane movement even higher.

One only has to step across the road from the

Red Barn and stroll, endlessly enjoying the view of

scores of previous Oshkosh Vintage Grand Champions.Travel only a few more steps toward the south and be

spellbound by the rows of rare Wacos, Spartans, Ryans,

Howards, Staggerwings, and countless others from prior

aviation eras—each finer than its next door neighbor!

How can this all be possible, you ask? It ’s all because

of the generous support from Vintage members like

you. When one immerses o neself with other vintage

airplane enthusiasts, one comes to grasp the emotionalimport that there is simply no other place in the entire

universe that any of us would rather be during the

last week in July than the Red Barn

area of Wittman Field—during EAA

AirVenture Oshkosh!

This is “A Place Called Oshkosh”! Nothing is ever

planned or rehearsed; it is simply what happens at the

Red Barn. It is the mystical Camelot for old airplanes. It

is also the place to be during AirVenture. Experience it

for yourself; pull up a chair and sit in the shade of theRed Barn, grab a bag of popcorn, close your eyes, and

transport yourself back to the golden age of flight. This

is everyday normal Red Barn activities during Oshkosh!

It’s a place where history comes alive!

The invaluable Friends of the Red Barn fund, with

contributions each year by fellow Vintage members,

makes all of this supremely enjoyable experience

possible. Without the generous contributions providedby these Vintage members annually, very little of what

we experience and enjoy would be possible.

Please join us as a contributing member of the

Friends of the Red Barn as we provide the most ideal

and perfect setting possible for vintage airplane

owners, pilots, historians, and dedicated vintage

airplane buffs. Consider it a calling…as many of us do!

And please remember, no one ever met a stranger atthe Red Barn!

No One Ever

Met a Strangerat the Red Barn!Friends of the Red Barn

Charles W. HarrisDir ecto r Emeritus, VAA


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CONTRIBUTION

LEVELS ↓

DonorAppreciationCertificate

SpecialFORBBadge

Access toAir-Conditioned

Volunteer

Center

A “6-pack”of ColdBottled

Water!

Two Passesto VAA

Volunteer

Party

10 MinuteChair BackMassage at

AV2013

Breakfast atTall PinesCafé

Tri-Motor ORHelicopterRide

Certificate

Two Ticketsto VAA Picnic

CloseAutoParking

SpecialAir ShowSeating

EAA PHPCenterAccess

DIAMOND PLUS

$1,500 & higher X X X X X

2 people,full week

2 tickets X

Full week 2 people,full week

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$750 - $999 X X X X X

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✃ VAA Friends of the Red Barn

Name________________________________________________ ____________ EAA #___________ VAA #___________

Address____________________________________________________________________________________________

City/State/Zip_______________________________________________________________________________________

Phone___________________________________________________E-Mail_____________________________________

Please choose your level of participation:

■ Payment Enclosed (Make checks payable to Vintage Aircraft Assoc.)

■ Please charge my credit card for the amount of: ____________

Credit Card Number Expiration Date

Mail your contribution to: VAA FORB

PO Box 3086

____ Diamond Plus $1,500.00 or above

____ Diamond Level Gift - $1,000.00 - $1,499.00

____ Platinum Level Gift - $750.00 - $999.00

____ Gold Level Gift - $500.00 - $749.00

____ Silver Level Gift - $250.00 - $499.00

____ Bronze Plus Gift - $150.00 - $249.00

____ Bronze Level Gift - $100.00 - $149.00

____ Loyal Supporter Gift - ($99.00 and under)

All donors at all levels will have their name listed in Vintage Airplane

magazine, on VintageAircraft.org, and at the VAA Red Barn during

AirVenture.

Special for 2013, all donors for Gold Level and above will be entered

into a random drawing for a limited edition, 21”w x 18”h, signed,

numbered print by Randall Mytar shown at right.


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Round EngineRodeo

VAA Invites All Round Engine Aircraft to EAA AirVenture ’13

Th Vi t Ai ft A i ti i lli t th d t f ll


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Vintage News

The “Good ol‘ Days” are back

STEVE KROG

What Is It?

Welcome! Te “Good ol’ Days” are returning, atleast for a week! Tat’s right. For one full week fromJuly 29 through August 4, 2013, the U.S. skies willbe lled with the beautiful rumble of round-engine-equipped airplanes en route to Oshkosh.

The Vintage Aircraft Association (VAA), servingas the official host for this historic event, is invit-ing the round-engine universe to attend and par-

ticipate in EAA AirVenture Oshkosh 2013. All owners, pilots, and enthusiasts of round-

engine aircraft are formally invited to fly theirbeautiful airships to Oshkosh and participate inthis event, a weeklong gathering to get togetherwith others who share the passion for these fantas-tic old airplanes and engines.

•Special handling and parking will be provided to

all who y their round-engine aircraft to Oshkosh.•The VAA is working on an attractive package of

incentives provided to all who fly these beautifulround-engine aircraft to Oshkosh. Watch for fur-ther details.

O f ll d f Ai V ill b d di d

•Guided tours through the round-engineparking area will be conducted by knowledgeable VAA volunteers.

• A proposed turf runway for arrival is being de-veloped for those that might want or need to use it.

Rest StopThe weekend prior to the opening of AirVen-

ture—July 26-28, the Hartford airport (HXF) will

serve as a gathering point and rest stop for all.•HXF features two turf runways as well as one

hard surface runway.•HXF is located approximately 45 miles due

south of OSH.•Fuel, both 100LL and 92 octane auto, will be

readily available at a very competitive price.

•Food, refreshments, camping, motels, transpor-

tation, and entertainment will be available to all.Last year 154 aircraft and more than 300 people

gathered at HXF to partake in the pre-conventionweekend activities—a great relaxing time enjoyedby everyone!


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Air Mail

New format feed-back

Dear Vintage Airplane,Tis is my favorite magazine to get. I always look

forward to it. It seems Geoff is cutting back on thenumber of issues per year that will be sent out. Tat’s toobad, but if it has to be, we can live with it. I really like thearticles by Robert Lock. Is it possible to get these to saveon a disc? Maybe the compilation of these on a disc could

be a prot center and be sold. Te International StinsonClub has done this, and it is very useful.

Steve Krog’s articles are excellent, too. His piece“Wind: When is it too much?” makes a good point aboutpracticing in conditions that improve one’s abilities. Another article could focus on techniques. I am of themind that crosswind landings are best done three-pointrather than wheelies no matter how hard the wind is

blowing, especially the transition from two-point to taildown. Do we slam the tail down? If we baby it down, weground loop.

I would like to see two articles: an update of theFairchild 45 situation, and a story on the Antonov AN-2of which 18,000 were made. Get Budd Davisson to writeabout the AN-2. I’m sure he can nagle a ride in one.

Mark Davis A Stinson 108 restorer and pilot

Jim,Just received my January/February issue of Vintage

Airplane, and I want to thank everyone up there for a jobll d h C i h l

To Mike Leone/Budd Davisson — “Bonanza in

a Barn,” December 2012, Vintage Airplane I thoroughly enjoyed your article in Vintage

Airplane magazine, December 2012. It broughtback many pleasant memories of flying withmy father in his Bonanza N8508A when I was16 years old. You will note that his aircraft wasprobably on the Beechcraft assembly line threeaircrafts before yours.Te mechanical similarities are still very clear

in my mind. Dad bought Beechcraft Bonanza A-35N8508A new from the factory with a ContinentalE-135. Eventually he had it upgraded to 205 hp, andhe installed his third engine in it before he traded iti J 35 f l i j d B H h d d l


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A few special order items were installed also.Parachute seat backs on the two front seats and a“quick-release” door hinge assembly were specialfactory installations. His three parachute ares werealso installed.

A “water evaporative” air cooling (not condition-ing) helped cool off hot summer days as long theambient humidity was low. I note your rear modern

air-scoop which is a good improvement.Dad traded up to a J-35. I had a total of about 200

hours between the A-35 and the J-35.In 1972, my wife, Ellie, and I bought a 1967 V-35

which we ew for 40 years. We just sold it on Decem-ber 5, 2012, and we were on our third engine.

Our ying life has been very fortunate. Many enjoyable family trips, many with our two sons, acrossthe United States, Central America, and Alaska willlong be remembered in N798RD.

Tank you for the memories! My dad taught me alot about good ying and also to love Bonanzas.

Merry Christmas and many happy landings.James D. SheenGettysburg, Pennsylvania

Hi Jim,

Just a short note on Vintage, and

it appears that some of my friends aremore upset about that small mistake onthe cover than I am?Tey said they have sent letters to

the editor stating their opinion.Just want to reinforce that I never

had any concerns or disappointmentsabout it. It’s just a small mistake, and

I enjoy being able to blame all the badthings on my evil twin brother “Jim.”LOL. I hope to make it to OSH thisyear but will have to see if I can get thetime off of work as always.

Best,Chuck Doyle Jr.

J AN U AR Y / F EBR U AR Y 2 0 13

Ar o und t he P y lo nsF ull c i r c le Buhl19 27 D o le Ai r D er b y

C huc k Doy le Jr . ’ sS T E A R M A N

Chuck we are all sorry for the mix up! If you like you can

refer to me as your “evil twin!” We all hope you can

bring your Stearman to the Round Engine Rodeo-Jim


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To construct a wing rib, a holding xture must be

made. It is common to use a at board, such as a pieceof good pine board that may measure 1”x12”x72”.If no good at pine wood can be found, then con-sider using some 3/4” plywood of the same dimen-sions. Hopefully an example of an original wing ribis nearby, however in some cases where there are noribs available it will be necessary to loft a full sizedrawing of the rib outline. Coordinates for lofting

a rib can be found in airfoil data books or from oldNACA data. We won’t go into how to loft a wing rib atthis time.

First, trace the outline of the rib and all its diago-nal and vertical members. Ten, cut out blanks to

represent the spar dimensions. Te spar blanks will

be placed at the appropriate location in the wing rib.(Figure 1 and Figure2.)

Te small wood blocks should be drilled in advanceof gluing and nailing to the base wood to preventsplitting. Te blocks will guide cap strips and trussmembers in their proper location. Left in photo 1, thisphoto scanned from the ANC-19 book shows the Boe-ing factory worker nailing up a model PT-13/PT-17

wing rib. Te plywood gussets are precut and are inbins at the top of the table. Tis speeds up fabricationtime. I usually cut all the gussets and place them insmall cardboard boxes numbered as to their location.Te spar blanks are precisely located and glued to the

How to?

Construct a wing rib fixture

ROBERT G. LOCK


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base and they will accurately

locate the vertical members oneach side of the spar. (Photo 1.)If I anticipate diffi culty slidingthe spars through their respec-tive openings, I will leave thevertical member on the rearside of the front spar and thefront side of the rear spar out

of the rib, slide the ribs on,then insert the two verticalmembers and glue in place. Tismakes for a good accurate t.

In photo 2, a close up ofmy Command-Aire rib xturemade from aluminum insteadof wood. I once had plans to

construct ve airplanes, butstruggled to build just one. Tewing rib shown is an originalfactory part. Te lower photois a close up of the forward sec-tion of the rib showing frontspar opening and the method(Photo 2) used to make gus-

sets. Rather than use triangu-lar or square plywood gussets,the factory chose to use longplywood gussets that bridgedfrom one vertical upright to thenext, also reinforcing the capstrips. It took a lot of mahog-any plywood to make these andthere was much waste, whichin today’s market is costly. I re-member the rst sheet of 1/16”

x 4’ x8’ aircraft grade mahoganyplywood cost me $20.00, buth b k i 1959

PHOTO 2


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“An eyewitness saw the accident airplane ying to-wards the airport from the southwest. Te airplane ap-

peared to be in a steep descent with a slight left turn. A few moments later, the witness saw the airplane in atight right turn that developed into a spin. Te airplanerapidly descended towards the terrain.”

Te above statement appeared in a recent pre-liminary NTSB accident report. Unfortunately, theoutcome was fatal for both the pilot and passenger.

Could it have been avoided? Most denitely!Every student, young or old, receives stall train-

ing provided he or she has worked with a good, thor-ough ight instructor and designated examiner.However, the only requirement for spin recognitionand recovery is verbal discussion between studentand instructor; then between the student and exam-iner. Actual spin training was dropped from the FAAPractical Test Standards decades ago. So, how doesone know what to do or how one will react when ex-periencing an actual stall/spin entry? More on thatin a future article.

Is there any wonder how something like a stall/i id i i h l i ? A

many pilots and most new students are still quite ap-prehensive when asked to demonstrate a stall.

“On January 2, 2013, an airplane was substantiallydamaged when it impacted terrain. Te commercialpilot was fatally injured.

“Witnesses reported that the airplane was circlingand maneuvering at a low altitude around the beacharea when they observed it ascend abruptly. Approxi-mately 150-200 feet above the ground, the airplaneappeared to stop, make a sharp turn, and descend at

an approximately 55-degree angle. Te airplane ap-peared to start to level off when it impacted the topof a sand dune.”

Tis is but one more example of a fatal stall/spin accident that can be attributed to situationalawareness.

Lack of Proficiency More often than not, when conducting a ight

review and I ask the pilot to demonstrate a power-off stall with either a shallow bank left or right, thepilot will rst glance at me and then tense up. Beadsof perspiration begin forming at the temples, andh l b i bl h dd d l Af

Te Vintage Instructor

Stall/spin and $%**%%$

STEVE KROG, VAA DIRECTOR AND CFI


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for a second stall. Tat was not a stall but rather animminent stall.

When asked if he or she ever practices stalls, asheepish look is followed by a comment stating thatthe last time he or she had done a stall was two years

ago during the last ight review. It’s hard to maintainprociency and safe ying practices if one only doesone or two stalls every two years!

If I encounter this situation, I like to climb to asafe practice altitude and proceed to do several morestalls, rst demonstrating how stalls are required tobe done if the pilot were taking an FAA checkridein this day and age. Te procedure is quite diff erentthan the way many of us were taught decades ago.Together we then try a few more with me verbalizingeach step and the pilot executing the stall and stallrecovery. Tis will usually increase the pilot’s level ofcomfort and condence.

A h I lik d f d b ild

over the controls, recovers from the stall, and returnsthe aircraft to straight and level ight. One or twotries at the “falling leaf” and the pilot usually regainsthe condence and prociency to perform stalls whenying solo.

Tis maneuver also proves to the inexperienced pi-lot that though in a stall, the rudder control remainseff ective while proving that the aircraft will not fallout of the sky as is so often depicted in movies in-volving airplanes!

One word of caution: Not all of the airplaneswe y are created equal regarding stall and handlingcharacteristics. Make sure you know and understandyour aircraft before trying the “falling leaf” maneu-ver. Some are much more positively stable than oth-ers. KNOW YOUR AIRPLANE, and if uncertain, seekthe direction of experienced pilots ying that makeand model of aircraft.

BONNIE BARTEL


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Typical general aviation (GA) aircraft estimate av-erage altitude loss during stalls, assuming properrecovery technique, at between 100 and 350 feet. ANASA study done in the late 1970s proved that theaverage altitude loss in spins was about 1,200 feet.

Given these average GA gures, neither of the pi-lots in the two NTSB reports stated earlier in this

article ever had a chance. Both entered into the clas-sic stall/spin situation at low altitudes, the rst atapproximate pattern altitude, while the second wasmuch lower performing steep turns. Te pilot in therst example had own less than 10 hours in theprevious two years—lack of prociency is a near cer-tainty. Te second pilot ew more regularly but be-came xated with a point of interest on the groundbelow. As the turns became tighter, the stall speed in-creased and control inputs questionable, resulting ina low-level stall/spin—lack of situational awareness.Once the pilot recognized the stall, correct inputs ap-pear to have been made based on eye witness reports.H h f l i d b f h f ll

grees of bank. Aileron and rudder together will turnthe airplane yet keep the nose straight for a secondor two. Ten apply opposite aileron and rudder un-til you’ve reached a 20-degree bank in the oppositedirection. Tis maneuver really helps develop properaileron and rudder inputs, whether doing the Dutchroll or performing a turn to a diff erent heading. Te

rst time or two you try this, you’ll nd the nosemoving 30-40 degrees left and right of the point onthe horizon, but keep practicing. You’ll soon be ableto keep the nose directly on the landmark while roll-ing the airplane left and right.

Te other maneuver I’ve found to be very helpful isperforming medium-bank (30-degree) turns left andright for 90 degrees. As you reach the 90-degree pointin heading change, roll into a medium-bank turn inthe opposite direction for 90 degrees. Do this for aseries of a half-dozen turns in each direction whilealways keeping the ball in the center on the turn co-ordinator. When you can do this in a comfortable and

di d i h i i l i l i

With a littlepractice you’llnd that you

have regaineda good feel

for rapid,coordinated—

and safe—turns.KOEPNICKPHOTOGRAPHY.COM


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I V Aircraft Association from a medical perspective, but Idid not want to regurgitate all the rules and regulationsthat we all are afraid will ground us at our next medical.Rather I wanted to write an article that involves a topic Iam passionate about. Tat is why I support the EAA and

AOPA initiative to exempt airmen from the third-classmedical and instead use a state-issued driver’s license.

First, a little of my own background. I am a urologist,a physician dealing primarily with the surgical diseasesof the kidney, prostate, and reproductive system. I havea passion for aviation, especially antique/vintage air-craft. My father and I have built or rebuilt several air-planes starting with a 1931 Waco ASO Straightwing in

the 1970s when I was in high school. I nally was able tobring it to EAA AirVenture Oshkosh for the rst time inits history last year. I am also an aviation medical exam-iner (AME), primarily to assist pilots in our area of Frank-fort, Kentucky. When I arrived, the family doctor andnonpilot that served as an AME had retired, and therewas no one within 30 miles to do flight physicals. I ap-plied and was granted authorization after initial training.

Now, the third-class medical is required for all pri-vate pilots who do not “fly for hire” either passengersor freight. Substituting the driver’s license for the third-class medical sounds radical to the lay public because itfalsely believes that the medical ensures that the pilot

h i l h i f i i h FAA i d il

showing that self-certication and the use of the driver’slicense have worked for sport pilot certication and withno increase in accident or fatality rate. Already the FAAabsolves itself of pilot responsibility by stating that eachtime we y we are “self-certifying.” Tat is, we are safeand competent medically to y that day. Tis does not

change with the use of the driver’s license. Realistically,if the airman is t to get in a car and drive to the offi ce,he should be medically t to y his own airplane. To sayotherwise is not to trust our own ability to self-certify.

Most of the current medically grounding conditionsare going to limit our ability to drive a car as well. Heartdisease (coronary artery disease, angina, myocardial in-farction, heart replacement, valve replacement, and pace-

maker), diabetes, psychosis, bipolar disorder, personal-ity disorder, substance abuse, epilepsy, disturbance ofconsciousness, and loss of nervous system function areall currently disqualifying conditions. Most can now beapproved through special issuance. Te medical and FAAconcern is the “sudden incapacitation” that can occurwith these conditions. Interestingly, there were no sportpilot accidents attributable to “sudden incapacitation.”

Currently the proposal for exemption of the third-class physical applies to aircraft, nonretractable, less orequal to 180 hp, daylight hours only, and carrying onlyone passenger. Other more broad-reaching requests havealready been turned down by the FAA. Tis is a compro-

i i h h h h d i b i d i i

Ask the AME

Third-class medical exemption

JOHN PATTERSON, M.D., AME


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Good Old Days

The Cleveland plane makes port. Ford all-metal

monoplanes have totaled more than a million milesof safe, swift flying. The public is beginning to fly in

preference to other means of transportation.

From the pages of the past . . .


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Take a quick look through history by enjoying

images pulled from past publications.


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Cla s sified Ad sWhat would you have found . . .

Aero Digest , June 1938


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Aero Digest , June 1938

AeroDigest , October 1931


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Type Club Corner

Peregrinations of a J-3 Cub

Harry Ballance

Helping to paintthe field yellow,Ballance standsnext to the cubhe flew to EAA


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One should not attribute life to an inanimate object, such as a machine or airplane. However, whenone has owned an airplane as long as I have owned thisCub, it does take on the role of another family mem-

ber. Tis, as are all of them, is a unique airplane that Ihave owned since 1967, and it is simply not the sameas another J-3. We have been through a lot of stuff together; some of it bad, most of it good. She has suf-fered a lot of indignities and unmeaning abuse, suchas in the course of teaching people to y or tailwheelcheckouts. She has never complained or let me down.My wife even named her Judy after the line from a

Cary Grant movie, Judy, Judy, Judy. At the end of theday, after having own many diff erent types of air-planes in my lifetime, if someone said that I could onlyy one airplane, it would be my J-3 Cub. Tere is justsomething intangible about the Cub experience thatmakes it stand tall over all other airplanes. Tey arediffi cult to enter and exit, they have poor visibility onthe ground, they are uncomfortable after a ight of

any duration, and they are slower than almost any-thing in the sky. However, there is nothing that feelsquite as nice as rolling one on in the grass after a well-executed power-off approach. Having said all of that,I felt as though Judy deserved to take a little bit of a

i E i I h A l f D ll T

prices of hotel rooms in the Oshkosh area. Of course,the EAA does not exactly give one good value fortheir camping fees, either. If one likes to use portabletoilets and small showers with minimal hooks and

little hot water, I guess the experience was bearable.However, with the amount of money one saves overeven a cheesy hotel room, one could buy somethingreally nice for one’s wife or airplane. One just has tosuck it up with the lack of amenities. I had plannedmy trip using AirNav.com, which, to me, is a goodight planning and airport information tool. I used80 nm legs, simply because I did not want to feel un-

comfortable about fuel on any of the legs, and we had just de-rated my Continental A-65 from an A-75. Ac-cordingly, I had not taken the airplane on any cross-country ights suffi ciently long to get a good read onthe fuel consumption. I did take the trouble to pur-chase new sectional charts, as well as go by the lo-cal AAA offi ce and get state automotive maps for myroute of ight. Not that I y “nap of the earth” mis-

sions all of the time, but sometimes these automo-bile maps are just plain helpful. My contention is thatcurrent sectionals simply do not show adequate detailto make pilotage particularly easy, and the road mapsll in the gaps, so to speak.

O h Th d b f h bi i l

Harry Ballance and two interior shots of Judy .


24/60

measurably. My take was thathe simply did not believe any-body could be alive—and stillflying—who had owned anairplane that long. Continu-

ing northward, I crossed themountains west of Chatta-nooga and made a refuelingstop at Jasper, Tennessee. Thisis a nice little airport, but it israther unique, in that one hasto climb in circles to obtainsufficient altitude to clear the

mountains that surround it.My third, and last, stop for theday was at Falls Creek Airportin Lebanon, Tennessee, where I visited my friendsSteve and Brenda Sachs, and Judy got to spend the

i h i h i h i h S ’ S d

have made signicant progress on my trip. We con-tinued along to Sullivan, Indiana, crossed the Wa-b h Ri d h D ill Illi i A

Flying Judy in present day and in 1967 (below) .


25/60

Saturday morning I was off to Kankakee, Illinois,then Campbell Airport just north of Chicago. After arelatively quick turn at both places, I made my way toHartford, Wisconsin, the intended gathering place forthe Cub mass arrival the next morning. Te gathering

of Cubs at Hartford was most impressive. I saw onewith a three-cylinder Lenape “Papoose” engine. Later,at Oshkosh, it was on display with yet another one.I was told that there were only ve of them made,and it was interesting to see two of them representedhere. Te Cub Club did a nice job of organizing the as-semblage. Tey also held a nice supper and presenta-tion afterward. Te Cub that had own the greatest

distance was from Oregon, the oldest pilot was 87,and he had also owned the airplane since 1945. It iskind of hard to compete with those numbers. I retiredearly, in that the ying to Oshkosh was supposed tobegin at 6:00 the next morning.

I did l d i h bi

it was established in its climb. Te object was to keepthe airplane in front of you in sight, which, since wewere all J-3s, was doable.

I just followed the airplane in front of me,through the dreaded Fisk Arrival, et al. Since I was

just following someone, and I did not have to worryabout somebody ying a Cherokee blindly overtak-ing me, the arrival was pretty simple. We landedto the north, with a 7-knot crosswind right out ofthe west. While this is okay for a Cub, 90 degreesat 7 knots is pretty limiting for other more skit-tish taildraggers. I suppose that ATC just did notunderstand this, as there was an east/west runway

available. Te parking was well-organized, and whenI parked in my row, I was amazed at how many yel-low Cubs had come to Oshkosh. I was later told thatsome 150, perhaps more, had been counted. One ofthe most impressive things I have ever seen in mylif h f l ll C b


26/60

Fleet Fun


27/60

Stan Sweikar’s

Storied Silver Age

Champion—

Take Two!

This 1929 Fleet Model 2 is anirresistibly attractive little bi-plane—eye candy, if you will. Itsradiance arises from deep withinits lustrous fabric skin, and thisKinner-powered beauty playfullyexudes a friendly spirit of “Fly me,I’m fun!” Te more you really study

its features, the more you’ll un-derstand that the Fleet’s naturalaura of simplicity belies the verythoughtful and methodical com-ponent designs that comprise its

b i I f


28/60

A Storied HistoryNC431K was manufactured

in August 1929 by Consolidated

Aircraft Corporation of Buffalo,New York, for Fleet AircraftIncorporated under Approved TypeCertificate 131. Eighty-four yearslater, it’s one of only 31 Model 2Fleets listed on the FAA Registry, anairworthy survivor of slightly morethan the 200 that were manufac-

tured. Sweikar’s Fleet was rst pur-chased by the Cleveland Institute of

Aviation. It used it as a training air-craft and owned it until 1934, whenit began flying from one owner to

h i il i h Mid

look at other Fleets, you’ll see thatmost of them have been modifiedwith a larger vertical stabilizer.”

In 1958, John Richardson ofIllinois became caretaker of theFleet until 1972. “His wife , Joan,won a women’s aerobatic champion-ship in this plane,” recalled Sweikar.“Then Buck Hilbert, past presi-dent of the EAA Antique/ClassicDivision, bought it. He had it re-

covered with Razorback berglass inJune 1973. It looked pretty nice inits Tennessee red with beige wings,but it was heavy.Ten author and pi-lot Richard Bach bought it in April1975 h h ll i Thi

it from Newhouse. “Te metalworkwas kind of ragged,” said Sweikar,an A&P, “so I went ahead and redid

that and brought it to Oshkosh in1987, and we won Silver Age. I wascoming back to Oshkosh in 1988and had an engine failure nearFredericksburg, Virginia. I had toput it in a tree line on the edge of aswamp—the wings got wiped out,but I was ne and so were the fuse-

lage, prop, and tail group.”Sweikar and his friends disman-

tled the biplane and hauled it home,where it evolved into a 24-year res-toration project. (About midwayh h h i S ik ’

Results of thecrash in 1987.

Far left: Theremains of the

lower wingpanels after

the crash.

The new stringers are installed.

Stan Sweikar working on thewing fabric.

Johnny Cook applies the 24-karatgold leaf lettering.

P H O T O S C O U R T E S Y S T A N S W E I K A R


29/60

tedious aspects of the Fleet’s re-birth was the ex tensive wingreconstruction. Sweikar made phe-nolic guides per the airfoil sectiondrawings, and then went to a lo-cal shop that had a press brakeand pressed the rib caps out. “We

annealed the 2024 T-3 metal firstand then formed the ribs,” elabo-rated Sweikar. “After making therib caps, I had to assemble the up-per and lower caps into completedib B hi k b i b k i

the 1920s, most people just usedDuralumin for fairings, not struc-tural applications—so the Fleetdesign was ahead of its time.”

Sweikar then acid etched, alo-dined, and epoxy primed all theribs. Rightfully proud of his atten-

tion to even the smallest details, heinvited the author to look inside thewings. “Te interior is as good as theexterior,” said Sweikar. “If you comeover here, you can see the fittingsf h i ” h l i d

also revealed a beautiful spar thatwas simply gleaming from threecoats of epoxy varnish. All the wingttings were glass-bead blasted andcadmium plated and then paintedwith silver polyurethane.

Those new spars came from

Wicks Aircraft, and with a chuckle,Sweikar said, “Te upper one is 28inches long, and it’s one piece, lami-nated. Tey said they used up everyclamp in the surrounding countiesj f l i ”

The neatly finished cockpit.

Gold leaf design finished.

P H O T O S

A N D Y

Z A B A C K

ANDY ZABACKCHRIS MILLER


30/60


31/60

Sandy and Stan Sweikar are happyto be flying in their Fleet again.

S P A R K Y

B A R N E S

S A R G E

N T


32/60

aluminum leading edges, whichare challenging to make,” he said.“Gar Williams, a master restorer inthe Midwest, suggested that I goto Wag-Aero because they have an8-inch roll. So I contacted Wag-Aeroand gave them a ‘go-no-go’ gauge,

and they rolled the leading edges forme. The 8-inch sections were thenush riveted together, so you can’tsee where the joints are.”

When it eventually came time toinstall the wings, there were plentyof folks lending a helping hand, in-cluding Mike Roe, Mike Myers, John

Eney, Ed Stewart, and Ken Reed.

FuselageSweikar also enlisted Mike Roe’s

sheet metal expertise on the lowerli h i ’ il

to the airplane, including the cock-pit coaming and nosebowl, whichhave the airplane’s serial numberstamped on them.

While sandblasting the fuselage,Sweikar said he gave a heavy sighwhen he discovered some internal

corrosion in the tubing: “In fact, itstarted blasting right through thelower longerons, so I wound up re-placing a large portion of them, aswell as the tail post.”

He followed those repairs withepoxy zinc chromate primer on thefuselage and tail group and then

painted them with black polyure-thane. A nice touch inside the cock-pits was the addition of half a dozentriangular wood panels, installed toguard against knees and elbows in-

d l ki h f b i

taching the new cables on the castaluminum rudder horn. “It wasn’ttoo hard to learn, but then I’m alsoa yachtsman, and basically wire ca-bles are the same as marine line,” hesaid. “The cable strands are needlesharp, so you have to be very care-

ful and even use sewing thimblesto protect your ngertips. Once youknow how to go about it, it doesn’ttake that long. It’s just a little time-consuming putting the serving—the cotton wrapping—on, and thenvarnishing the serving.”

Landing GearSweikar’s Fleet originally had a

tail skid and balloon tires, but ithas been updated due to a dearthof replacement parts and his desire

b bl h i l f

“I look around, and I’m older, but the airplane is younger!”

—Stan Sweikar, owner, pilot, and restorer CHRIS MILLER


33/60

was pretty new back in the 1920s. You land on oil and taxi on springs,and it’s a good system.”

Engine and PropThe Fleet was originally pow-

ered by a 100-hp Kinner K-5, butit was converted to a 125-hp B-54in 1953. “Te B-54 is really the op-timum engine for the airplane,”shared Sweikar, “and I used coppertubing for the fuel lines, with brassfittings—that’s how it was origi-nally. Te engine was overhauled byBrad Ball in California and is run-ning beautifully. Te stacks are niceand clean, and it’s not consumingany oil, which is a real tr ibute toBrad. This engine has not burned

a quart of oil in 74 hours and hasnot leaked whatsoever—it’s almosteerie, because it’s like what Bachwrote about in his book Illusions.”

To enhance safety and ease of op-eration, Sweikar installed a BendixEclipse Y-150 electric starter forthe Kinner, along with an Odyssey

battery. He also installed a Fahlinpropeller (98-inch diameter, 51-inch pitch), but while flying it toOshkosh, discovered that it wasn’t“the optimum prop for this air-plane. I talked to Sensenich, andthe optimum prop is 90-inch diam-eter and 67-inch pitch. So I’m not

really cruising that fast in the Fleetright now, only about 75 mph. Itshould be cruising around 85 to90 mph with no problem, so I’ll bechanging the propeller soon. I’ve

d d S i h 90 i h

signed the main spar of the upperwing with the latitude and longi-tude of Wingfield Airstrip—justto provide the next restorer with

a bit of history. Then he used theblanket method to cover the Fleet’s28-foot top wing, commencing theprocess by rolling a 72-inch-widebolt of Ceconite 101 down the en-i l h f h i (Y i k

back in 1929; they didn’t run fin-ishing tapes completely across theribs back then.”

He did have to extend his paint

booth in order to accommodatepainting the 28-foot upper wing.“I used a regular old high-pressure Binks spray gun and probablywasted a lot of paint,” he said,shrugging, “but I’m not in the busi-ness of restoring airplanes! ThatBinks equipment really works nice.I sprayed 14 cross coats—a nd across coat is actually two coats—so that’s 28 coats. After aboutthe fourth cross coat, I beganwet sanding the Randolph butyr-ate dope with 400 grit paper, andsanding required approximately

seven hours per side on the upperwing alone. It’s just a labor of love;it’s a hobby with me.”

Fine Finishing DetailsSweikar’s wife, Sandy, a talented

seamstress and pilot, created somerather complex leather covers t o

protect the fuselage fabric fromrudder cable wear and also for stra-tegic locations atop the horizontalstabilizer. Contact cement enabledthe leather covers to bond easilyto the fabric surface. She also usedher commercial-grade sewing ma-chine and invoked her ingenuity

and experiences sewing marinecanvas in order to professionallyfashion all of the interior leatherwork, as well as the all- weathercockpit, engine, and prop covers.

O i l i d

1929 Fleet Model 2Manufacturer’s Specifications

Length 20 feet 9 inches

Height 7 feet 10 inches

Wingspan 28 feet

Chord 3 feet 9 inches

Airfoil Clark Y expandedto 15 percent

Gap (at C.S.) 54 inches

Stagger 23 inches

Angle of incidence 0 degreesDihedral upper 0 degrees

Dihedral lower 4 degrees

Landing gear tread 64 inches

Weight empty 1,022 pounds

Disposable load 560 pounds

Gross weight 1,582 pounds

High speed 113.5 mph

Cruise 90 mph

Minimum speed 40 mph

Climb at sea leve l 930 fpm

Ceiling 16,000 feet

Gas capacity 24 gallons

Price $5,500

(Derived from Aviation , May 18, 1929,and Aircraft Records.)


34/60

for the front cockpit.When Bach owned the biplane

in the 1970s, “he put the ‘Great American Flying Circus’ logo on it,”

said Sweikar. “He also used that onthe Travel Air biplanes in the movie Nothing by Chance, where they barn-stormed the Midwest. So I decidedto put that logo back on the Fleet,with gold leaf. Johnny Cook, a localartist, did the work; he put a stencilon the nished fabric and then ap-plied something like varnish overthat. When it got tacky, he laid onthe 24-karat gold leaf with a fine,uff y brush, and he did a great job.Tere’s no protective coating on topof that, and it will not tarnish.”

Flight Controls and FlyingT h e F l e e t h a s s i n g l e l a n d -ing wires and dual flying wires,which Sweikar replaced with newMacWhyte wires, including the ter-minal end fork ttings, clevis pins,and bolts. For those who mightbe unfamiliar with the difference

between landing and flying wires,Sweikar offered a simple explana-tion: “On landing, the wings wantto droop—so the landing wireshelp support the wings, and theflying wires keep the wings fromfolding up in ight.”

Te ailerons (lower wing only) are

constructed of wood with aluminumleading edges. Te articulating push-pull control system for the ailerons is

just one of the Fleet’s patented com-ponents. “It was very advanced forh i i h i f

The instrument panels and in-struments, while not original, aremore or less period, according toSweikar, with the exception of the

radio and ignition switch for theelectric starter. The modern en-hancements do make a diff erence inempty weight; this Fleet was nearly170 pounds lighter when it cameout of the factory in 1929 than itis today. “It did gain some weight,”shared Sweikar, “but it does have adiff erent engine, hydraulic brakes, aScott tail wheel, a starter, a battery,and lots of dope. So it all adds up,but it doesn’t really hinder the over-all performance.”

Describing the Fleet ’s range,Sweikar smiled and proffered this:“W ll i h

speed indicator while making histhree-point landings, but he saidthe Fleet is supposed to stall around40 mph, so he keeps his approach

speed around 60 mph. “ The air-speed bleeds off pretty fast, just likeall biplanes,” said Sweikar. “So I usepower-off approaches, and it han-dles just fine. My first flight afterthis restoration was July 1, 2012.”

Take Two!Sweikar, smiling and ref lecting

about his long-awaited milestone ofhaving the Fleet back at Oshkosh,thoughtfully remarked, “It’s like areunion in a way. It’s almost like aashback of 1987, but 25 years havelapsed since then. I look around,

and I’m older, but the airplane isyounger! Hopefully it’ll be a familykeeper for a while.”

More than three decades ago,Richard Bach wrote the following inhis book Illusions:Te Adventures ofa Reluctant Messiah, which featuredNC431K: “You are never given a

wish without also being given thepower to make it true. You mayhave to work for it, however.” Tatconcept became a timeless messagethat tumbled and swirled throughthe prop wash of time until gen-tly falling into Sweikar’s hands andtaking form in his workshop. For

you see, that’s just what happened:Sweikar was given a wish after his1987 crash, and he worked dili-gently until he fullled the wish tohave his award-winning Fleet air-b i

Outside Loops!The F lee t ea s i l y a cqu i reda reputation for its strongconstruction and aerobaticcapabilities. In July 1930, stuntpilot Paul Mantz climbed in hisFleet Model 2 in San Mateo,California, and proceeded to set arecord of 46 consecutive outsideloops. His record stood for nearlyhalf a century.

—Juptner’s U.S. Civil Aircraft,Volume 2 and other aviation resources

A N D Y

Z A B A C K


35/60

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36/60

I was headed to

Valle Airport, Ari-

zona, in the re-

mote desert north

of Flagstaff in late

February 2012 to

y a 1929 Ford

was supposed to meet Bryan God-love, chief pilot, designated ex-aminer, and guts of an operationcalled FordTypeRatings.com.

It was late when I got to Valle. Iwas met by three friendly, smiling

folks: Larry, the mechanic, BryanGodlove, and Thad Kelly (soon tobe my instructor).

We set up shop in the conferenceroom of the terminal building and

h li i i k

walk around the air plane isstraightforward. But everythingis located way up in the air. Theplane had suffered left wing-tip damage, the repair of whichsquared off the wingtip.

A form of r udimentar y tailwheel steering is provided by twohuge bungee cords attached to therudder. Otherwise, directional con-trol on the ground is differentialb ki d i h

Earning my Ford Tri-Motor rating

Donis B. HamiltonEAA Lifetime#234279

Vint age Lifetime # 19053

You’re Going to Do What

Where?

-


37/60

of fuel, or you will un-port the fuellines and starve the engines. After a quick lunch, Thad and I

crawled into the cockpit. Startingthe engines warm is easy; startingcold is another matter. The drillis to start the front engine first(only one with an alternator). Af-

ter six seconds of prime, engagethe starter for six blades. Switchthe magnetos on and keep primingfor three-second bursts every fouror ve blades. Cold usually resultsi b l h d b kfi fi

the addition of power on the out-board engine and a jab or two atthe inboard brake. Once turning,you use power on the inside engineand perhaps a stab of the outsidebrake to stop. Lots of inertia andweight—plan ahead.

The controls on this airplane are

large and require a long travel. Theelevator, for example, is a full arm’slength in throw: nose down to noseup. The rudders move about 24inches.Te ailerons—oh boy, the ai-l k d h lf

up to 18 inches and check the en-gine instruments located on theengine pylons outside of the fu-selage. Full power and the controlwheel pushed all the way forwardgets the tail up in the air quickly.The wing blanks the tail when onthe ground.

Lightly loaded, the Tri-Motoraccelerated rapidly and sailed rightup to rotation at 80 mph. It seemedto require an awful lot of ruddertravel to keep the airplane tracking

i h Wi h lif ff 80 h


38/60

Turns to the right don’trequire back pressureuntil about 30 or 40 de-grees into the turn. Now,

folks, when you roll thatold heifer into a 60-degree banked turn it requireslots of rudder and oneheck of a pull. Te planeis not mean; it is just bigand the controls are un-boosted. So raw muscle

is required. After steep turns, we

jum ped right into thestall series. Stalls in thisairplane are really verygentle and straightfor-ward with no tendencyto drop a wing or have asharp break. Approachstal ls are pe rforme dby easing the power offand holding altitude by

the addition of elevatoruntil the wheel is com-pletely in your chest.

A t t h e s t a l l t h e a i r -

plane simply develops ahigher rate of sink andthe nose mushes down,nodding over every oncein a while. Relaxation ofback pressure and addingpower started the planeflying immediately. De-

parture stalls are donewith slight banked turnsand 15 inches of power.Same feel. It is a r eallydocile stalling airplane.

Following stalls, wedid engine-out proce-dures. This is where themen are separated fromthe boys. The airpla nedemonstrated no meantendencies, but oh lord,

Hamilton with Thad Kelly.

Cover for a promotional Ford Tri-motor brochure.

With Brian Godlove.


39/60

it took one hell of a push on therudder. According to the opera-tions manual, it is approved proce-dure for the pilot to use both feeton the rudder, and I would haveused both except that I couldn’tget my long le gs and big f eetaround the control pedestal. If thestrength goes, there are only twooptions: Get the rst offi cer’s feeton the rudder or pull the power onthe good outboard engine.

Te loss of an engine drill is the“2/5/2 Procedure.” Te rst two isto advance all controls to METO

power, and obtain directional con-trol with approximately 5 degreesbank into the good engine and theball not more than one-half out ofthe cage.

Next comes the ve. After iden-tifying the bad engine, you securethe engine: power off , props to full

course pitch, mixture to idle cutoff ,mags off, fuel off. Remember thepropeller doesn’t feather. Te naltwo steps are to declare an emer-gency and immediately turn to the

i i bl l di

dent needs to remember is thatthis is a big airplane; the f lareand touchdown are started muchhigher than one would normallyexpect. The old bird was gentleto land, and as soon as the mainwheels touched, forward elevatorwas applied to keep the tail up.When the first officer calls out“50” (mph indicated), a positivepull back on the wheel brings thetail down for the remainder ofthe rollout.

After a couple of takeoffs andlandings, Thad started failing en-

gines on departure. After a fewone-engine-out approaches, Thadbegan failing the remaining out-board leaving only the center en-gine. With the center engine, theTri-Motor is like a big Piper Cub—a really big underpowered Cub. Assoon as I lost the second engine,

I declared, “We are committed.”There is no doubt about continu-ing any distance with only a singleengine in the Ford Tri-Motor. Tebest rate of climb is 250 feet per

i d

ight and 30 minutes of grindingon those poor starters, we nallygot all three engines running.Tad reviewed some of the thingsI needed to improve on and issueshe thought might come up duringthe checkride.

After the air work, we did pat-terns including balked landingsand takeoff s. After the third land-ing, we taxied in, and T had an-nounced he was ready to sign meoff for the checkride.

Te oral was actually easy; virtu-ally everything had been discussed

in the course of the preceding dayand a half, and I had been providedwith a list of likely questions withmy orientation packet. Bryan andI soon got in the plane and tookoff for the air work. I thought ev-erything went very well except twoslipups. On the steep turns, I did

the rst one to the left. I balloonedabout 100 feet high and had towork it back down to altitude. Tesecond goof came in the patternwhen Bryan called for an abort on

k ff I i


40/60

. . . As if it came out of Tut’s tomb

182

S


41/60

“For sale: 1957 C-182, 2,625 hours

TTAF, 1,230 SMOH engine. Original

paint, interior and panel, only mi-

nor avionics upgrades. $XX,XXX.”

Let’s say you were looking foran airplane and you saw thead above. What would youthink? First, you’d look at the

engine time and say, “I don’t know.It’s getting up there.”

Then you’d see that everythingelse on the airplane—the paint, up-

holstery, and panel—is the sameas it had been when it came out ofthe factory 56 years ago, and noth-ing has been changed since. Fifty-sixyears measured in airplane time is

l i A d 2 600 h

Budd Davisson

S urvivor


42/60

punched and patched holes from anendless parade of avionics.

You also know for a fact thatCessna’s famous plastic instrumentpanel cover and window moldings

always become as brittle as a pieceof last summer’s taff y. For those rea-sons, you know the interior will be amosaic of cracked and broken plas-tic and moldy-smelling upholstery

with spurts of foam where stuffingis slowly making its way to freedom.

And “original paint”? Whoa! Youpicture your neighbor’s ’57 Chevypickup that has been a backyardlawn ornament for the last decadeor so. Like the Chevy, you know thesignature ’50s Cessna stripes will beoxidized to the point that they aresemitransparent panels of colored

dust against aluminum that has thesheen of a Teonying pan. Also, without even examining the

airplane, you know that some of thepast occupants included field mice,spiders, and whatever that magiccritter is that eats upholstery piping.

It may be original, but it ’s going

to be grim. Assuming the airplane has no

serious corrosion, the hangar rashisn’t too bad, and the owner is will-ing to dicker on the pr ice, what

ll h h i d

The tailcone and left elevator skin

were replaced with original parts

from the factory in the early ’80s.

The way they looked back in the

day.

Look, Mom! No cracks!

P H I L H

I G H

P H O T O S


43/60

“For Sale” sign in the window. To aman, we all did a double take: Canthis possibly be an untouched 1957airplane that fits the above adver-tising description? Unbelievably,the answer is yes.

Bernie Lewis from Erie, Colorado,brought in what has to be the mostoriginal ’57 C-182 in existence. Infact, this should be the reference air-

plane for anyone restoring a similar182 because, if it’s on Bernie’s air-plane, that’s the way it’s supposed bedone; Bernie hasn’t changed anythingin the 26 years that he’s owned it.

“I’ve owned a bunch of Cessnas,and when I ran across this one in1986,” he says, “I had to have it. It

was 30 years old but didn’t look closeto that. So, naturally, I bought it. Atthe time, it had 1,213 hours on itand still had the factory plastic coveron the back seat!”

B i ’ fl i d h h

“I went right into the CFI thingat the beginning, then quickly slidinto the corporate/airline ying. I’velogged a little over 21,000 hours,which includes 12,000 hours in King

Airs. However, I always had a littleairplane of my own. In fact, my rst

was a Luscombe 8E I bought when Iwas a sophomore in college. It cost$2,100, and I ew its wings off .

“I worked my way up the Cessnachain, 120, 170, 180, restoring or re-habbing them as I went. Te 170, forinstance, got repainted in the factory

Bernie had the engine over-

hauled shortly after he bought

N4015U in 1986.

1957 brochure, Flight with a New

Flair .

Air speed correction chart.

P H I L

H I G H

P H O T O S


44/60

scheme and color, and I totally re-

stored the 180. I even bought a ’56172 for my wife toy. I’ve always hada soft spot for square tails.”

He had a K model Bonanza and aComanche prior to running acrossh 182

the original owner had shortened

the bottom stripe and painted thename of his business on it. So, if youlook really closely, you can see wherethe bottom stripe has a section thatis the same color but was repainted.

“Al if i ll h

ship, the airplane was wind dam-

aged while I was on a trip. Theelevators and part of the vertical nhad to be reskinned.

“At the time, original parts werestill available from Cessna, so atl I h hi i f

Yes, it’s all original. Cessna 182’s serial number plaque. P H I L

H I G H

P H O T O S

KOEPNICKPHOTOGRAPHY.COM

Cumming, Georgia, saw it. and gave Bernie a check.”


45/60

“The original owner was carefulwhen he updated radios and avion-ics and didn’t modify the panel inany way.Te only changes I’ve madewere newer radios and a GPS, andthey were picked because they t theoriginal panel cutouts. The entireinstrument panel is just the way itcame out of the factory.”

A smal l item on the fusela ge,which is seldom, if ever, seen, is thedecal that is situated midway be-tween the doors and the tail.

Bernie says, “All 182s had that de-

cal, but most have faded to nothingor became so worn that they wereremoved or painted over. It’s closeto a miracle that mine has survived,but from the day I purchased the air-plane that decal loomed large as oneof the items I was going to go out ofmy way to protect. To my knowledge

no one has made them available, butI’d think there would be a ready mar-ket for them.”

An editorial comment about thatdecal: To those seeking custom-

d d l d i k h di

g, g ,Bob says, “I went to Oshkosh with

a friend with absolutely no intentionof buying an airplane. We were going

down the ightline and came upon agroup of people gathered around anabsolutely beautiful 182. My friendhad owned one, and he started talkingabout what a quality airplane it was.Ten we heard the owner, who is quitea guy—A&P, CFI, professional pilotand kept it in perfect condition—say

that Bob Hoover had stopped by tolook it over and marveled at its origi-nality. I was tempted and my friendsaid the price was right.

“We sat around that night at ourtrailer talking about the airplane.My friend and others kept saying Ishould buy it. I had just sold my busi-ness and retired, so my wife and Iwere planning on doing some travel-ing.Tis airplane would certainly llthe bill, so the next day I went back

gIt took a little while for the air-

plane to make it down to Bob’s place,but when it arrived, Bob wasted no

time getting current again.“Bernie brought the air plane

down,” he says, “and gave me a BFR,and the airplane was everything Ihoped it would be. At least it was un-til I took my wife for her first ride.Or tried to. She has a really bad back,and we found that she couldn’t make

the transition from the step to theseat no matter how hard she tried.She felt bad. And it broke my heart.But we had to look elsewhere.”

So, keep your eyes open for an-other C-182 ad. It will read approxi-mately as follows:

“For sale: 1957 C-182, 2,650 hoursTTAF, 1,250 SMOH engine. Originalpaint, interior and panel, only minoravionics upgrades. $XX,XXX.”Tis time, take it seriously.

The illusive Cessna decal.

P H I L

H I G H

Around the Pylons


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The Cosmic Wind StoryThe tale of the Cosmic Wind

Goodyear midget racers stretchesf S h C lif i h

sturdy all-metal construction anda widespread reputation for supe-rior flying qualities, thanks to al h i l d d

and pilots, along with many oth-ers who had far less impressive re-sumes, jumped at the opportunity

i l i i h

CelestialBreezeTe Cosmic Wind story Don Berliner

EAA 5654, Past Presid ent , Societ y of Air Racing Historians


47/60

to Cleveland in just a few monthsfor what was then the ultimate insporting aviation.

Some of the 13 midget r acersthat showed up on the west side ofCleveland in late August 1947 forthe rst of three annual GoodyearTrophy Races looked like they had

been assembled under consider-able time pressure. Others lookedmuch more professional, and nonemore so than the twin all-metalCosmic Winds owned and f lownby top Lockheed test pilots TonyLeVier (#3 Little Toni, NX-67888)and Herman “Fish” Salmon (#10Cosmic Wind , NX-67889).

As was later revealed when twoof the racers became the passionof British restorers, they were farmore complex than what becamethe norm for typical homebuilts.

As would be expected from a team

of Lockheed designers who vol-unteered their time, and laid-offproduction workers who were paid50 cents an hour, LeVier & Asso-

ciates’ airplanes displayed a partnumber stenciled on ever y oneof many hundreds of lar ge andsmall metal pieces. Anyone whohas seen a Cassutt r acer beingbuilt from simple plans and basicworkshop tools can be excused forexpressing amazement. Also in a

manner familiar to industry peo-ple, the major components werebuilt in separated locations, with asingle location for nal assembly,in this case LeVier’s garage in theLos Angeles suburb of La Canada.

It was later discovered that theorigins of the sophisticated de-sign actually dated back to WorldWar II. One blueprint examined bythis writer showed the fuel tankinstallation. All the relevant sta-tions of the fuselage were clearlymarked, strongly suggesting thatmuch of the design work had been

completed. The blueprint, drawnby one Mr. Bojens (later identi-fied by LeVier as Lockheed’s “topdraftsman”), was dated 1944, at

least two years before the class wascreated. It is tempting to assumethat the Cosmic Wind might havebeen under consideration by Lock-heed as a high-performance sportsplane that would appeal to return-ing ghter pilots.

In the 1947 initial Goodyear Tro-

phy Race, the two Cosmic Windswere outrun by racers designedand built by prewar National AirRaces winners Steve Wittman and

Ar t Chester. One of the reasonswas the failure of an otherwise ex-cellent team of engineers to calcu-

late correctly the center of gravity.Both Winds were so tail heavy thata reported 75 pounds of dead weighthad to be wrapped around the enginemounts to make them yable. By thenext year, the mounts had been ex-tended 12 inches, and the originalcanopy, which had been faired into

a high turtledeck, had been replacedby a low-drag bubble, which paid off in a victory by Salmon in what hadbecome his #4 Minnow.

Little Toni Cosmic Wind

Weald, Shobdon, and Halfpenny


48/60

For 1948, LeVier’s aluminumand red #3 had been repainted redwith white trim and renumberedN20C; Salmon’s had changed fromthe yellow and black #10 to the me-tallic bronze with cream trim #4

Minnow N21C; while the newestone—Glen Fulkeron’s #5 Ballerina,N22C—was dark green with creamor very light green trim and ownby future great Bob Downey.

The trio of Cosmic Winds wereraced in all three 1949 Californiaregional races and then the thirdand final Goodyear. The #4 Min-now, after its 1948 victory, hadbecome the test bed for a plannedsecond generation of CosmicWinds. It had a new, slimmer fu-selage and smaller tail, while itsoriginal low wing had lost its di-

hedral as it became a mid- wing.Te hoped-for major jump in speedfailed to materialize, and the air-plane was returned to its 1948 con-

guration, while the new fuselageand tail then went into storage.

Te period of maximum Ameri-can activity for the trio of racersended in the early 1950s whenthey became part of the stable of

J.E. Smith’s Pacific Air Races Inc.They soon embarked on separatetravels, which took them to somesurprising locales.

#3 Little ToniIt sat idle for more than a de-

cade until the start of the Renoera. In 1965 it reappeared as RickTownsend’s blue and white #7French Quarter Special and wasthen sold to veteran racer RoyBerry who began a program to re-turn it to its original name, num-ber, and colors. Roy raced it into

1970, then sold it to Ian McCowen,who took it home to England andre-registered it G-AYRJ.

In 1971 McCowen won at North

Green, while Neil Williams wonwith it at Biggin Hill, its top speedbeing 202 mph. In 1972 McCowen

dominated the class, winning fourof the six British races at Notting-ham, Goodwood, Halfpenny Green,and Tees-side and equaling its bestspeed. The 1973 season saw winsin only one of ve races but enoughsecond places to qualify as runner-up for the championship, as Mc-

Cowen shared the piloting dutieswith Brian Smith.

In 1974 the new and somewhatimproved Bal lerin a Mk.II tookover the Cosmic Wind leadershipof Little Toni with four wins byBill Walker, as Little Toni could dono better than a third place. 1975

wasn’t much better, and it was re-turned to the United States, endingup in the hands of Seattle airline pi-lot Jim Fernandez, who has prom-ised to complete the restoration tooriginal as soon as he nishes sev-eral higher-priority projects.

#4 Minnow After some racing in the early

1950s by Bob Downey and EddyCuster, it was sold to the mysteri-ous Milton Blair, who dismantled itand used parts in the constructionof a prototype counter-insurgency

airplane for a U.S. Air Force com-petition. It failed to win a contractand sat around in pieces until be-ing sold to English amateur builder

Little Toni


49/60

(and King’s Cup Handicap Racewinner) Paul Bannister. In 1993the components were transferred,along with a supply of parts, rawmaterials, and construction draw-ings to a group comprised of JohnTempest, Rob Millinship, andTrevor Sanderson, which has plans

to restore the two Cosmic Windsand race them for nostalgia, amongother reasons.

#5 Ballerina After its days of racing in the

United States ended, it becamepart of Pacific Air R aces Inc. andwas then sold to Milton Blair. In1961 he took it to England on apermit that limited him to ying itin several air shows prior to takingit home. Blair promptly sold it tothe Tiger Club, which added it (asG-ARUL) to its fascinating collec-

tion of sporting airplanes. Blair’sviolation of the law came to the at-tention of offi cials of Her Majesty’sCustoms offi ce, which couldn’t ndBlair to present him with a bill for£6 000 i d

Club for what was then well morethan $10,000.

Not long afterward, Blair bor-rowed an American-built MidgetMustang from Bannister andpromptly wrote off both it andhimself. Te accident investigatorsdetermined that while Blair had

logged a couple of thousand hours,he apparently had never quite got-ten around to obtaining any sort ofpilot license.

A pi lot ’s repor t on the air -plane (tiny by contemporary Brit-ish standards) was written for anEnglish magazine by famed Welshtest/aerobatic/racing pilot NeilWilliams, who compared its yingcharacteristics to nothing less thana clipped-wing Spitfire. A highercompliment is hard to imagine.

In one of the true highlights of theCosmic Wind saga, Williams flew it

in the 1964 World Aerobatic Cham-pionships in Bilbao, Spain, nishingahead of more than a few special-ized aerobatic airplanes, despite theracer’s lack of inverted fuel and oil

I d A 29

terns for re-creating the airplaneas Ballerina Mk.II.

#5 Ballerina Mk.IIOnce the second Ballerina rolled

out of Bannister’s well-equippedworkshop, it was entered in For-mula One competition, starting

in September 1973 at Tees-sidewhere Bill Walker won at 202.7mph. He started out 1974 by cross-ing the finish line in first place ata British record 221.15 mph butwas then penalized for a pylon cut.Walker then reeled off four straightwins to take the national title. Teairplane didn’t race in 1975 but re-turned in 1976, leading off with asecond place behind American BillSullivan (#51 Cassutt racer, 111meters) at Le Castellet, France.This was the first American-styleinternational pylon race to involve

competitors from as many as threecountries. With Fred Marsh as pi-lot, Ballerina Mk.II proceeded towin the other Br itish races thatyear, as well as the first such race

h ld i D k

Ballerina Ballerina

Stead, Marion Baker, Nick Jones,d th B f th R d


50/60

three and won two.The last ful l season for #5

was 1981, when Graham Horderraced it to a fifth place at BigginHill because of a pylon cut , and

then second at both Saintes andSt. Valery, France. It was thenbought by Peter Kynsey, whoraced it sparingly: sixth at BigginHill in 1985, fifth there in 1986,and sixth in 1987 at Compiègne,France. That was the final race for Ballerina Mk.II and for any of theCosmic Winds in Europe or any-where else. Since 1987, Kynseyhas flown the racer in air showsfrom its base at Duxford.

#6 FillyBowing in during 1973 was a

completely new British CosmicWind, the dark blue G-BAER, builtby Robin Voice using many Amer-ican-made parts, some of whichappear to have been flown in an

li C i Wi d h h h

1981. Its nal year was 1982, whenit was flown three more times by

Voice, finishing its career with asixth place at Pau-Uzein, France, at199.5 mph. Its most recent owner

was Alexander Truman.

#4 Mrs. RobinsonThe last Cosmic Wind to fly

was N89CW, built by Bill Warwickfrom a project started by a retiredairl ine pi lot and almost com-pleted by Goodyear racer Bill ieRobinson. It was then acquiredby one-time Formula One racerJoan Alford Noar, who finally do-nated it to the EAA AirVentureMuseum. It will probably neverbe flown, let alone raced.

#6 Miss Cosmic WindSometime before May of 1957,the fuselage and tail that weretried experimentally on #4 Min-now in 1948 were combined with

l i i i Mi

and the Berr ys—father Roy andson Damon. It was retired afterthe 1972 season to the Planes of

Fame Air Museum. Accor ding to Tony Amb ro se,

a font of reliable information onsuch matters, Charlie Hillard toldhim the fuselage of Miss CosmicWind was used as the basis for theSpinks Acromaster, which Hillardew successfully in aerobatic con-

tests for many years.

#3 Little Toni Mk.IIThe project dates back t o at

least 1993 and is being worked onwith the two restoration projectsin England.

Tere are currently just two Cos-

mic Winds in ying condition, bothin England. The two under resto-ration are far from flying status,while the one in the EAA museumwill probably never fly again. Thereproduction of #3 Little Toni byTrevor Sanderson, the third mem-ber of the English “Cosmic WindTeam,” is a long-term project.

With no active Cosmic W indsliving in North America, the fu-ture of the series will depend, to agreat extent, on the ability of theBritish Formula Air Racing As-sociation (FARA) and its French

counterpart, Association des Pi-lotes d’Avions Formula (APAF),to rebuild European FormulaOne air racing. In the past fewyears, the typical summer ’s rac-i h d l h b li i d

Ballerina

Sentimental Journey 2012


51/60

Three levels of deep yel-low fill the eye: the color

of the J-3 Cub ying for-mation with you, the in-

terior features of the J-3 in whichyou’re riding—and the warm yel-low bath of the late afternoon sun.Te traffi c pattern at Sentimen-

tal Journey, over L ock Haven,Pennsylvania, becomes a stunning

“mixing bowl” between two closemountain ridges, which shine withbright green sides, as more tinytraces of yellow—the Cubs—fly aclassic racetrack course as if overa painted landscape. It is gorgeousby anyone’s standards, and to PiperCub fans: iconic, opulent.

A four th le ve l of deep yel lowsprawls on the ground: rows androws of Cubs, parked alongside therunway, pointing the way to thefactory buildings where they werecreated, starting in 1937.

Below, the Susquehanna River

winds through the city/town,which takes on an even further em-blematic image, as if the illustrationfrom the opening page of countless

American adventure books (espe-i ll f l i h i )

pilots fly their C ubs around thedazzling vistas again and again.

On the ground, the annual Juneantique aircraft fly-in called “thefeel good event of the east” is tak-

ing place. Everything is competent,charming, understated, authen-

tic—and just a bit raw. The meet-ing/socializing place is a hugecovered pavilion of picnic tables,

Sentimental Journey 2012Cub homecoming

Roger ThielRoger Peperell pho t os

Hi A

of economic good news. At the air-port a portion of the former show


52/60

highly functional but rough-cut.The f ly-in registration, camping,forums, etc. are efficient, yet notoverly promoted. In short, the y-in itself is like a J-3 Cub!

Overhead, “yet another” J-3 Cubies by, but here, it is always a freshsight. Attendees tend to raise theirheads up to the sound of a Continen-tal engine every time. Te roar of anoccasional large antique is appreci-

ated, but here it does not dominatethe scene; the Cubs are the stars.Tis is almost certainly the “anti-

quer” event with the most aircraftsharing a similar color scheme, and

l i d f

and dozens more. Much individ-ual initiative includes a poker run

organized by some raffish camp-ers, and on most afternoons, a longline forms for a corn boil ( yel lowcorn, that is). For all of this, thepicnic table pavilion is central, thesite for reunions worth, well, wait-ing a year for. About 10 years ago,Sentimental Journey built a mod-

ern building for vendors, and thePiper Aviation Museum (formerlythe plant’s administration build-ing) is open for tours.

A spot landing contest is featuredone afternoon, and for this year’sbomb-drop competition, the win-ner actually put a our bag into thefour-foot-wide target! A first-timehighlight this year was a daily airshow featuring Greg Koontz andThe Alabama Boys—including acomedy, stolen J-3 (what else?), anda truck-top landing. A Saturday eve-ning banquet is the crescendo of the

event, but after all of this, anythingwould be an anticlimax.For most attendees, the visit will

include a trip into town. Lock Ha-ven’s main street exudes classic,

ll h i h d

port, a portion of the former showaircraft parking area has beentaken over to store industrial drill-

ing implements.Tis year’s highlight was to com-

memorate the 75th anniversaryof Piper’s move to Lock Havenand of the J-3 Cub. Other vintagePiper models are featured, year-to-year, on a rotating basis. They-in was also highlighted by gor-

geous weather, strong attendanceby planes and people, and strongvendor sales. Sentimental Journeyitself sold many special commem-orative items: T-shirts, hats, andother specialties, producing a verywelcome bottom line. Fly-in direc-tors reported aircraft registrations

from other countries, includingCanada and Germany, and visitorsfrom as far away as Switzerlandand the United Kingdom. Approxi-mate numbers were 300 airplanes,including 80 J-3 Cubs, and severalthousand attendees.

The trip to “Cub Haven” meansa visit to the mountains, unusualfor most attendees, and the slopesshine with the fresh, bright, green,waxy image of early summer. Thefly-in’s schedule usually includesJune 21, the day of longest light.Late afternoon/early evening fly-

bys take on a postcard, picture-book quality. The attendees whosay “Don’t change a thing” tend tobe the jaded residents from cities,especially on the East Coast.

S i l J b

Lock Haven’s main street charm.

Tis is almost

certainly the“antiquer” eventwith the mostaircraft sharing

a similar colorscheme . . .

Te Vintage Mechanic


53/60

Previously we looked at the approach to an aircraftrestoration, not looking at the overall scope of the

project but rather breaking down the tasks into moremanageable objectives, such as:

1. Restoration of wood components such as wings,center section, controls, empennage

2. Restoration of fuselage structure such as tubu-lar, aluminum monocoque or semimonocoque, orwood

3. Restoration of landing gear including main andtail wheel installations

4. Restoration of rewall-forward including en-gine, propeller, accessories, and intake and exhaustsystems

5. Final assembly and rigging—preparation for testight.

Te overall goal is to produce a beautifully restoredaircraft that is safe and fun to y. Tis goal is immensewhen viewed from the beginning. But smaller goalscan be achieved and progress measured when the res-toration project is broken into structural groups.

O hi I i l l h d

remembered that the center of gravity was around 27to 33 percent of mean aerodynamic chord (MAC), so

I worked diligently to achieve that goal. Illustration1 shows the aircraft on scales and leveled prior tocovering the fuselage. Tis was done because a heavy12-volt battery had to be mounted somewhere in the

fuselage structure. (Tere was actually no place toh b i f k i )

g

Approaching a restoration project, Part 2

ROBERT G. LOCK

ILLUSTRATION 1

and rigged prior to locating the battery box. Tenelectrical cables had to run forward through conduit,

back up a little and speak a little more to fuselage res-toration. Illustration 3 shows the fuselage in October


54/60

g ,which had to be routed below the oorboards. All thistook much forward looking and planning.

Weight and balance readings were taken with theairplane weighed at this time, even though the fuse-lage was not covered. Engine weight calculations andengine mount arm were also determined and guresrecorded for future reference. Since the fuselage isnot covered, it is very easy to measure the arms ofvarious components in the fuselage, such as frontand rear seats, instrument panel, battery box, bag-

gage compartment, main and tail wheel centerlines,datum line, and rewall. Knowing how far the rewallis located forward of the datum line makes measuringarms in the future very easy, particularly engine ac-cessories, oil tank, fuel tank, etc. Illustration 2 showsthe second trial assembly of the ship, which includedrigging. Since no rigging data was available anywhere,I had to write my own rigging manual, which was no

big deal but was very handy for future use.

One very interesting thing I did just after this pic-ture was taken was to remove the engine and all ac-cessories rewall-forward and put the ship back onscales and level. (Te tail was mighty heavy!) I recallthe center of gravity turned out to be about 34 inches

f f h d ( h l i l di d ) Wh

g1982, four years after I started the project. Te wingshad been nished and work was slowly progressing

on the fuselage. Keep in mind that the project wasstarted in 1978 and nished in 1989. I did all thework myself including engine overhaul. I had somehelp from George Boys in Tracey, California, who wasvery familiar with the Wright R-760 and R-975 en-gines and was a huge help. Tank you, George.

Several details can be gleaned from this photo-graph. Te newly fabricated engine mount ring iswelded in place. (Te entire engine mount is weldedto the frame.) Forward fuselage supports a cardboardfuel tank. Te airplane sits on an entirely new landinggear—that took about 140 hours to make! It was dif-cult because toe-in and camber cannot be adjustedonce the components are welded. Tere were a fewwelded repairs made to the fuselage structure. Most

were inner sleeve type because the completed repairlooks better; however, a few outer sleeve repairs weremade under the oorboards. Te important thinghere is to continue to add parts, making sketches andmeasurements so if welding was required it couldb l d b f l i h li d

ILLUSTRATION 2

ILLUSTRATION 3

In September 1982 a very special person came visit-ing my small shop in Reedley. He was designer Albert


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AERO CLASSIC“COLLECTOR SERIES”

Vintage Tires New USA Production

Show off your pride and joy with afresh set of Vintage Rubber. Thesenewly minted tires are FAA-TSO’dand speed rated to 120 MPH. Somethings are better left the way they

were, and in the 40’s and 50’s, these t

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