Moving on from my above post, here's my WIP so far on my latest. Adele Blanc-Sec's private aircraft I'm calling 'The Pink Lady.' Not sure of the final colour scheme yet, may do the tail in aluminium silver like the engine cover along with the wheel covers. ~ that will give it that golden era look.
GOLDEN OPPORTUNITY Time!!
Take the left over floats from your Ryan & graft 'em onto something else, Insta-Pulp 'Plane!!
Be sure to pick something small, I'd probably go for a P-26, or a P-6E or an F4B4, any of which would look
GREAT afloat!!
Other suit candidates are most any of the Testor's "Air Racers", Howard DGA, Laird-Turner, "Ike", Mister Mulligan etc.
2 quick true stories about Ryan trainers:
At 17 Dad & I attended the Reading, Pennsylvania Air Show, a yearly pilgrimage.
We discovered another father-son team
SELLING their 1942 PT-19!! Seems they needed dollars to advance the son's college education.
Nicely done up in USAAC "Yellow Peril" colours, it was airworthy-they'd flown it in to the show, had full tanks, and complete-including 2 helmets with goggles, plus two seat pack parachutes... Their "fly it away" price, $2,000... far less than
MANY new 1971 cars!!
It was a genuine bargain. priced to sell, quite reasonable, &
VERY tempting.
Neither Dad nor I doubted our collective ability, absent licensing & certification though we were, to get that crate HOME ourselves!!
We were equally bereft of ideas about
WHAT we would tell my mother when we called her for a ride home from the airport, or how to explain
HER 'new' car was still where we left it, in Reading!!
Alas mine own college days loomed ahead very shortly, $2k went a
LONG way back then, and we didn't have funds to spare, so, ruefully, we passed up a splendid opportunity. Which we still marvel over to this day!!
Fast forward to the 90s, Sun n'Fun in Florida where I watched a chap self-prop his magnificently restored silver radial engined PT-22.
Which promptly jumped
ONE chock and began chasing her pilot 'round the tarmac in circles!!
Fortunately he'd not fully opened the throttle, so this wasn't a high speed catastrophe, indeed it was amusing enough to draw a crowd.
Now that pilot had a tighter turning radius than his Ryan, so once he'd succeeded in dodging the whirling prop he began to turn inside it.
At which point his quarry managed to jump her
OTHER chock!!
No longer tethered to a single point, the PT-22 began describing bigger, & more erratic, circles, complicating our hapless aviator's attempts to board his empty 'plane. The crowd remained, but receded, giving the beast all the room she asked for.
Our vaunted birdman's valiant attempts to re-enter his cockpit proved fruitless, and a deliberate groundloop, with attendant damage, seemed inevitable, his runaway now dangerously close to damaging other 'planes & property.
In an instant though, the dainty demoness doubtless distracted or dizzy, a brave bystander darted from the throng, leapt aboard the offside wing, and cut the throttle!! Crisis deferred, but not averted.
Suitably embarrassed, our grateful flier tiredly caught his kite as she slowed, hurled himself into the closest seat and applied the brakes.
Accident averted, the disappointed onlookers dispersed.
Only a few of us remained to watch our chastened ace firmly re-chock his wheels, and tightly tie down his freedom seeking steed!!
I'm certain he sought succor in some suitable adult beverage, as shaken and chastened as he appeared!
Obligatory aero-babe picture
Good Times!
Valerik
"Just "Plane Crazy"
17 August 2011, 02:49:57 PM