Another Wingman quiz

[Fence Sence]

Re: Another Wingman quiz

Pic of Mr. Awesome’s vert stab...

http://www.aafo.com/hangartalk/showt...-metal-freebie

[TWD]

Re: Another Wingman quiz

Yes, we still have Tinkertoy. It is our Smoker. We make a point of flying it over the local parades. Dad is king of burning the smoke oil. He still flies it regularly although he is 83, so my brother, sister and i bought him an Aeronca L3 to continue his flying antics after he gets cut off from flying Tinkertoy.
A friend just finished restoring a stock T-6. Took him for a ride and he could not believe how fast it is. I would reckon that any T-6 that won the gold race over the years is plenty fast compared to a stocker. The paint is getting a little tired as much of it hasn't been painted since before we bought it in 87. Critical Mass is getting painted as I type this, so maybe Ken will decide that we need to go thru it. He is the driver of our project list.
As a side note, Dennis Sanders told me last month that Tinkertoy was the first T-6 he ever soloed. Gary owned it at that time.
TJ
PS Fence Sence is correct. Tinkertoy and Kitchen Pass are part of the stable.

Hello Tom. Do you all still have Tinkertoy? That was always a great airplane -- I remember when it first turned up at Mojave in the '70s with Gary Meermans. How many T-6s does the family have these days?

Neal

[wingman]

Re: Another Wingman quiz

Tom -- Gary always said #97 (the future Tinkertoy) was special, and that he really didn't know why it was quite fast even with pretty stock power. It was built up pretty much as a racer, as Kitchen Pass was thirty years later. How do the two airplanes compare today, in level flight at comparable power?

Here's the future Tinkertoy on the course at Reno 1977.

Tell your Dad Hello for us. Tell him Birgitta misses him.

Neal

[Racer 18]

Re: Another Wingman quiz

Yes, we still have Tinkertoy. It is our Smoker. We make a point of flying it over the local parades. Dad is king of burning the smoke oil. He still flies it regularly although he is 83, so my brother, sister and i bought him an Aeronca L3 to continue his flying antics after he gets cut off from flying Tinkertoy.
A friend just finished restoring a stock T-6. Took him for a ride and he could not believe how fast it is. I would reckon that any T-6 that won the gold race over the years is plenty fast compared to a stocker. The paint is getting a little tired as much of it hasn't been painted since before we bought it in 87. Critical Mass is getting painted as I type this, so maybe Ken will decide that we need to go thru it. He is the driver of our project list.
As a side note, Dennis Sanders told me last month that Tinkertoy was the first T-6 he ever soloed. Gary owned it at that time.
TJ
PS Fence Sence is correct. Tinkertoy and Kitchen Pass are part of the stable.

TJ,
Great to see the Dwelle family is prospering. Flew my last race in '94, with you as #1 and myself #3 in Silver. Always enjoyed flying and racing with the Dwelle's. Fond memories of a demo race at Abbotsford, BC and flying home night formation with your dad, Eddie Van Fossen, Al Goss and myself. Sold my T6 about 10 years ago and upgraded to an RV6. Please say hello to the family.
Randy
Thunderbolt #18 (ret.)

[wingman]

Re: Another Wingman quiz

The airplane that became Tinkertoy had a number of lives before Tom Dwelle. Here in 1983 it's the pace plane, taking newbies out for a practice race. Jerry was not part of the formation -- we were on a different mission (which led to a couple of widely published images -- a posthumous thank you to Jerry MacDonald for that little flight). We had gas, and Jerry heard over the radio that the practice race was happening and we went over to get a couple of photographs. I don't think we were as close as this looks -- racers always are the priority and don't need distraction...

Neal

[wingman]

Re: Another Wingman quiz

Thunderbolt had my all time favourite T-6 paint scheme. Not authentic for a T-6 at all, but it really was a good looking airplane.

Neal

[TWD]

Re: Another Wingman quiz

So much of the paint job is 37 years old. Wow.
TJ

The airplane that became Tinkertoy had a number of lives before Tom Dwelle. Here in 1983 it's the pace plane, taking newbies out for a practice race. Jerry was not part of the formation -- we were on a different mission (which led to a couple of widely published images -- a posthumous thank you to Jerry MacDonald for that little flight). We had gas, and Jerry heard over the radio that the practice race was happening and we went over to get a couple of photographs. I don't think we were as close as this looks -- racers always are the priority and don't need distraction...

Neal

[wingman]

Re: Another Wingman quiz

More than that, I think. It turned up painted at one of the Mojave races, so maybe as early as 1978.

[TWD]

Re: Another Wingman quiz

So Ken built up Kitchen Pass as pretty much a direct copy of Tinkertoy. It is an SNJ-5 vs HVD II, but in general the race mods are all on it. Last time I checked, Kitchen Pass needs 3 more inches of MAP to keep up when in formation. Meaning if Tinkertoy is 24 inches, KP is at 27. Same RPM of course. This is in stock trim. This can make life difficult when Dad leads the formation (he only flies Tinkertoy), he likes to run a lot of power and it is hard to keep up. I have to call him at least once per flight to "give me a couple of inches".
One thing that engine builder Larry Klassen always said was that the engine on Tinkertoy was the strongest of all the ones that he built for Eddie, Al, John Moore and Us. He didn't know why as he built them all the exact same way. He used to run them on a test stand at his shop with a fixed pitch prop, so he could quote the RPM that each engine achieved.
After we finished building it, I raced Kitchen Pass the first time. I landed after qualifying and Ken was pissed. He was disappointed with my qualifying time and was convinced it was my fault (not his new airplane). I told him that I was quite sure that was all the speed that thing had at the time. Someone can check, but I recall that he raced it the next year and it went about the same speed. He finally forgave me after that.
A friend of mine has been flying KP for a year or so now. KP is the only T-6 he has ever flown. I am planning to put him in the front seat of Tinkertoy this spring to get his opinion on the differences between the two.
TJ
PS - Dad says he misses Birgitta too.

Tom -- Gary always said #97 (the future Tinkertoy) was special, and that he really didn't know why it was quite fast even with pretty stock power. It was built up pretty much as a racer, as Kitchen Pass was thirty years later. How do the two airplanes compare today, in level flight at comparable power?

Here's the future Tinkertoy on the course at Reno 1977.

Tell your Dad Hello for us. Tell him Birgitta misses him.

Neal

[TWD]

Re: Another Wingman quiz

Randy,
I hope you are well. That race in 94 will be forever etched in my memory. I didn't realize that was your last one.
That weekend in Abbotsford (1991) was a good time. The flight home was really cool. Departing CYXX under the overcast layer with Eddie in the lead looking for towers. Down the coast low over the islands. I think you said it was your first night landing in 10 years. Most impressive of all was the formation takeoff out of Auburn's 60 foot wide runway the next morning. I'd love to have a video of that. Seems like you were at my very first demo race in Shafter in our Yellow Air Plane also.

Neil, I 2nd the favorite paint job comment. In fact, I lobbied Ken to paint KP the same as Thunderbolt. He went with a variation of it that matched an airplane he flew in the Air Force. I think Thunderbolt wore a P-47 paint job from WW2 and my Great Uncle flew P-47's in WW2, so it all goes around in aviation, I guess.
TJ

TJ,
Great to see the Dwelle family is prospering. Flew my last race in '94, with you as #1 and myself #3 in Silver. Always enjoyed flying and racing with the Dwelle's. Fond memories of a demo race at Abbotsford, BC and flying home night formation with your dad, Eddie Van Fossen, Al Goss and myself. Sold my T6 about 10 years ago and upgraded to an RV6. Please say hello to the family.
Randy
Thunderbolt #18 (ret.)

[Big_Jim]

Re: Another Wingman quiz

So Ken built up Kitchen Pass as pretty much a direct copy of Tinkertoy. It is an SNJ-5 vs HVD II, but in general the race mods are all on it. Last time I checked, Kitchen Pass needs 3 more inches of MAP to keep up when in formation. Meaning if Tinkertoy is 24 inches, KP is at 27. Same RPM of course. This is in stock trim. This can make life difficult when Dad leads the formation (he only flies Tinkertoy), he likes to run a lot of power and it is hard to keep up. I have to call him at least once per flight to "give me a couple of inches".
One thing that engine builder Larry Klassen always said was that the engine on Tinkertoy was the strongest of all the ones that he built for Eddie, Al, John Moore and Us. He didn't know why as he built them all the exact same way. He used to run them on a test stand at his shop with a fixed pitch prop, so he could quote the RPM that each engine achieved.
After we finished building it, I raced Kitchen Pass the first time. I landed after qualifying and Ken was pissed. He was disappointed with my qualifying time and was convinced it was my fault (not his new airplane). I told him that I was quite sure that was all the speed that thing had at the time. Someone can check, but I recall that he raced it the next year and it went about the same speed. He finally forgave me after that.
A friend of mine has been flying KP for a year or so now. KP is the only T-6 he has ever flown. I am planning to put him in the front seat of Tinkertoy this spring to get his opinion on the differences between the two.
TJ
PS - Dad says he misses Birgitta too.

Interesting conversation pertaining to relative horsepower settings. Back in July, Randy and I were part of the NATA clinic in Millington, TN. There were at least a dozen T-6/SNJ/Harvard's there participating. We flew a couple of flights with Joel Stinnett, the new owner of #43 Midnight Miss III. (Midnight Miss won 7 Reno Championships with Dennis Buehn, and before that was built up as Race #4 Eros.) Now, we were in the CAF's bone-stock T-6, but Joel still had the race motor in #43. When we would brief the flights, we had to build in at least 8-10 additional minutes up front to allow his engine to come up to temperature, and afterwards in the debrief, he routinely (I think Randy and I flew at least three sorties with Joel) reported using 10"-12" less mp to hold formation with everyone. And since we were parked close to Joel's plane, it was quite eye-opening to look at the difference in construction between our two planes. Yeah, the race T-6's are built 'stock' according to the rule book...but side-by-side...well, to quote Robert Duvall out of Days of Thunder: "There is nothing 'stock' about a Stock Car!"

[Big_Jim]

Re: Another Wingman quiz

Interesting conversation pertaining to relative horsepower settings. Back in July, Randy and I were part of the NATA clinic in Millington, TN. There were at least a dozen T-6/SNJ/Harvard's there participating. We flew a couple of flights with Joel Stinnett, the new owner of #43 Midnight Miss III. (Midnight Miss won 7 Reno Championships with Dennis Buehn, and before that was built up as Race #4 Eros.) Now, we were in the CAF's bone-stock T-6, but Joel still had the race motor in #43. When we would brief the flights, we had to build in at least 8-10 additional minutes up front to allow his engine to come up to temperature, and afterwards in the debrief, he routinely (I think Randy and I flew at least three sorties with Joel) reported using 10"-12" less mp to hold formation with everyone. And since we were parked close to Joel's plane, it was quite eye-opening to look at the difference in construction between our two planes. Yeah, the race T-6's are built 'stock' according to the rule book...but side-by-side...well, to quote Robert Duvall out of Days of Thunder: "There is nothing 'stock' about a Stock Car!"

A couple pics of Joel's new toy...

[wingman]

Re: Another Wingman quiz

Racers are different -- from other T-6s and from each other....

[Big_Jim]

Re: Another Wingman quiz

Racers are different -- from other T-6s and from each other....

Randy Diafani's "Thunderbolt"....the T-6 that was painted like a....well.....Thunderbolt.

http://www.aerialvisuals.ca/Airframe/Gallery/0/73/0000073235.jpg

[wingman]

Re: Another Wingman quiz

Paint still looked good in 2008...

Neal