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Piper Staggerwing |
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Rob Kellar and I went down to Dewey, Arizona in March to fly home Rob's newly acquired experimental aircraft, a Piper Staggerwing.Yes, I know, it's Beechcraft that made the Staggerwing but Rob said that was a little out of his price range so he found one that was a little cheaper.This aircraft started out as a Tri-Pacer then was converted to a Pacer (tail dragger) and a bottom wing was added as well as a 180hp Lycoming and a C/S prop. I was a little skeptical at first to go down with him to get it but I thought that the Pacer was a great little airplane so even if the bottom wing fell off it would still fly ok. |
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When we got to the airport in Edmonton to catch our flight down, I realized that I had convienantly left my wallet at home but I did remember my passport.Mike, the fellow Rob bought the plane from, had a little strip in the hills near Prescott Az. It was 1400' and the elevation was over 5000' and the morning we departed was 80 deg F.We decided to leave with half tanks after we added up the weight of both Rob's somewhat flabby older mans body and my slim trim athletic build.After a long ground run and two tight sphincters, we were airborne with a least 100' of unused parched Arizona ground below us.Our first leg took us to Kingman Az where landed NORDO as the PTT switchs were defective. We fuelled up and left for Cedar City and then on to Parowan, Utah where we got new PTT switches. Our final leg of the day took us over Great Salt Lake and into Brigham City. As Rob was picking up the tab due to my empty pockets, I refrained from ordering the "surf and turf" that night prior to going back to the flea bag motel. The next day took us to through Idaho and into Cut Bank, Montana where we encountered a problem. The transponder we needed to fly across the border was not working. The airport manager told us that the only way we could fly across was with a discreet transponder code or a waiver from the FAA which could take up to a week to get. After a failed attempt to revive the transponder, we thought of a loophole. Del Bonita is a border crossing less than 15 minutes from Cut Bank with a grass strip that is in the" Twilight Zone", neither in Canada or the US. Flying into Canada was not a option but taxiing was, so off we went. There was a 10kt crosswind when we confirmed that a little grass part of a field with a fence down both sides was Del Bonita. I mentioned to Rob that if it looked like he was going to roll the plane up into a ball on landing that he roll it through the fence on the Canadian side as that is where our health care kicks in. After a short taxi into Canada we cleared customs and gave the feds the GST on the plane, then departed for Drumhellar where we overnighted. |
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Unfortunatly, due to weather, we could only make it to Lacombe the next day but we got up early and made it home for breakfast the following morning.
All in all it was a great trip and the plane flew "hands off". We did get a lot of comments on the aircraft from pilots who had never heard of a "Piper Staggerwing" to which I replied " it was a top secret project at Piper and only three were made. I also mentioned that the first two had crashed and we were taking the last one back to Canada unless Rob was offered "stupid money " for the last remaining flying condition Piper Staggerwing. No offers were tendered!
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