Beech was responsible for some of the most beautiful aircraft which also had
great performance and utility. As far as the tail goes, I like the looks of the
twin tail. Although is is in the prop wash, I'm unaware of any problems. The
only ones I'm aware of are the problems with the spar carrythrough in ones from
the earliest years. And Beech never turned a straight tailed 18 out the door.
I know there were at least a few with weather radar in the nose but still twin
tail taildraggers. A number flew overnights shuttling cancelled checks around.
They were owned and operated by (somebody's name) stage lines. A friend that
was a Cessna test pilot told of flying in one with a friend who worked for the
stagelines. He said he went to the airport, took one look at it and said to
himself "Do I really want to do this?" Not wanting to seem unmanly, he went,
and he said that when he got in the right seat, all became clear. It had the
latest gear in the panel in those pre glass cockpit days, full weather radar,
and the engines ran better than in the ones in the Cessna's he flew. They spent
all their money on engines and instruments, not on paint.
The turbine converted Bonanza was butt ugly. The same guys did a piston to PT6
conversion on the Duke. I had an opportunity to fly in a Duke once in the late
sixties, and I can tell you with a pair of PT6's it would have been the first
King Air. And it looked great.
Don't know where Beech will be going, but I can't imagine anyplace good.
Textron only bought them for the space to build the newer bigger Citations, and
their really enviable private runway. There is constant speculation that they
will kill off the King Air, which would be stupid. Insiders say that the head
guy for Textron Aviation wants to kill them now, but the president of Textron
told him Don't be stupid, When the rug came out from under the corporate jet
market, the King Air was the only thing that kept you alive.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Ken Norton" <ken@xxxxxxxxxxx>
To: "Olympus Camera Discussion" <olympus@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Thursday, July 19, 2018 4:08:15 PM
Subject: Re: [OM] A Taildragger Once Again
> But I've never seen or heard of a conversion to conventional tail. the
> question crying out for an answer is WHY?? Looks like someone took a tail of
> a King Air 90 and hooked it on the back. Maybe a cheap repair for excessive
> hanger rash?
Flying or AOPA magazine did an article on that conversion many years
ago. I'm sure my dad still has a copy of it around. The full
conversion extended the nose which added weather radar and additional
storage. The tail conversion modernized it and made it look current as
the twin-tail design was definitely dated and no longer desirable at
the time. But they had to put a humungous tail on it. The old tail put
the vertical stabilizers into the prop wash.
The 18 (and variants) are among the more beautiful aircraft designs.
It has some of the same lines of the Staggerwing and is artistically
correct. Even this conversion still looks pretty good. I do agree,
though, with the PT6 conversions. Those tend to look a little dorky.
AG Schnozz
--
_________________________________________________________________
Options: http://lists.thomasclausen.net/mailman/listinfo/olympus
Archives: http://lists.thomasclausen.net/mailman/private/olympus/
Themed Olympus Photo Exhibition: http://www.tope.nl/
--
_________________________________________________________________
Options: http://lists.thomasclausen.net/mailman/listinfo/olympus
Archives: http://lists.thomasclausen.net/mailman/private/olympus/
Themed Olympus Photo Exhibition: http://www.tope.nl/
|