N2256D turns 63 today...

[Ryan Smith]

And to celebrate, she's returning to service after her annual inspection. I have been looking over the airplane's logbooks and records to learn more about her past. Apparently, she was flown as a charter airplane for the first five years and 1400 hours of her life. Upon moving east, she saw reduced service, and has flown about 1000 hours since 1975. It's been cool to go back through and see when my grandfather owned her and seeing some of his logbook entries for maintenance performed, as well as seeing all the work that my father did during her facelift back in the mid-1990s.

I was hoping to sneak out for a flight today, but I believe the weather will keep us both grounded by the time she rolls back out the door. My instructor and I both battled his Maule on Monday, which seemed to be more cantankerous than usual in the crosswind that we had. The day before, the other Maule that's located on the field was damaged when it ran off the runway and ended up on its nose in some soft dirt. Perhaps we'll be able to coordinate a barbecue run this weekend to celebrate; I could use some redemption from my terrible effort earlier in the week.

When is everybody else's airplane's birthday? So do you do anything special on your 170's birthday?

[GAHorn]

I don't know which birthday I'd celebrate, or how... the one when it was born as a Salvadoran and celebrate with a piñata filled with parts..?? ...or the one when it was "born-again" as an American and baptize it with WD-40!

[170C]

George, I have forgotten, was your plane assembled in Wichita with the intent to export iy initially or was it exported sometime after first being owned/operated domestically?

[GAHorn]

It was rolled off the assy line with the tail number YS-146 and sent to the El Salvador Cessna distributor. (It had an "agriculture kit" and "camera kit" as original equipment because those items deferred expensive import taxes from the Salvadoran gov't.) It was operated in El Salvador for a couple decades then was sold about 1970 to an AMOCO oil company aircraft mechanic who noticed it sitting in a field.
It was put on a barge for Florida, and a new/different engine installed and it received it's first U.S. Airworthiness certificate in 1971. (It was carried on the FAA registry for a while as a "1971 Cessna 170-B" and had a goofy tail no like N4922.)
It was subsequently sold, then run out of gas in Cut-and-Shoot, Texas (Yep! For real!) and supposedly damaged in a wind-storm, then acquired by a student-tech at Embry-Riddle who spent about 17 years restoring it. When it was finally restored it was registered with the near-obverse of it's original tail no., N146YS, and won the Restoration Award at Oshkosh. (The restorer Bill Goebel, passed on to me an incredible amount of spare parts, documentation (four huge binders, Cessna factory correspondence, and 17 years of reconstruction photos), and materials including the EAA Award Letter which allows the airplane to park in the winner's area if I ever get the courage to fight the swarming-masses.)
It was the cover photo airplane and feature article in Cessna Magazine for May '97.

I had a client in the Hawker simulator a few years ago who was the personal pilot for the President of El Salvador. The Salvadoran authorities retained all the original records of the airplane and he used his personal connections to obtain for me microfiche copies of the original logs (all in Spanish, of course.) Not much to read however, as the records of a new airplane in Salvador are fairly sparse.
Bill Goebel certainly made up for that, however. I think I actually have the proverbial paperwork that weighs as much as the airplane.

[170C]

Well George Cut N Shoot isn't too bad. It could have been in Big Foot, Dime Box, Hogeye, Nameless or any of another strange named places

[GAHorn]

And don't forget "Uncertain, TX".

(I once met the mayor of Uncertain. It is in East Texas and used to have a dilapidated oiled-dirt runway, but it also had a huge, wooden, two-story hotel at midfield with an upstairs ball-room which supposedly was very popular back in the oil-boom days of the 1930s, with large orchestras and dances held for the newly-rich oil tycoons. It was so odd and out-of-place because it looked like it belonged in 1850's San Francisco. I doubt it even exists anymore....shame, it'd be a good fly-in place.)

[hilltop170]

George-
I'm pretty sure that hotel/dance hall is not there anymore. I used to fly to the Uncertain Airport back in the late 1970s in the 170 to eat seafood at a nearby restaurant on the arm of Caddo Lake, can't remember the name. Anyway, I don't remember seeing a hotel in those days.

That is the spookiest runway I ever took off from at night. The trees get closer to the runway the farther northwest you go and at night it was just like taking off into a black hole. I always held my breath and concentrated on staying over the runway until above the trees. And it took awhile with four people on board.

[GAHorn]

The last time I saw the hotel is was reduced to dry-wood-peeling-paint-creaking-floors about 1967/68. If it wasn't restored then it was likely burned or torn down. Pity.

Hope this link works... the ordinary airport search routines don''t work, but these may: (old hotel site appears vacant)
https://maps.google.com/maps?t=h&ie=UTF ... 17&vpsrc=6

https://skyvector.com/airport/TA42/Fly- ... ge-Airport

[Joe Moilanen]

Hey George, your "Camera Kit" that was in your airplane is now in a 170 in Alaska. I used your kit parts for templates, made my own pieces, and sold the original kit pieces to Matt Nolan, here is his website: www.fairbanksfodar.com

Joe

[cessna170bdriver]

'98C spent her 60th birthday (last October) in the hospital... in traction...

[jrenwick]

Is she sitting up and taking nourishment yet?

[cessna170bdriver]

Is she sitting up and taking nourishment yet?

I hear rumors that the skin graft to support her third leg is imminent...

[Ryan Smith]

So s/he's transgender? I'm confused.

[jrenwick]

I hear rumors that the skin graft to support her third leg is imminent...

EEEEEEK!

[GAHorn]

Hey George, your "Camera Kit" that was in your airplane is now in a 170 in Alaska. I used your kit parts for templates, made my own pieces, and sold the original kit pieces to Matt Nolan, here is his website: http://www.fairbanksfodar.com

Joe

OK, Joe! Thanks for the update! (I knew you'd acquired the kit from Bill, but didn't realize the ultimate outcome. I have pics of your install and am impressed!)