Well, there is an orange Privateer sitting out at Merrill field in Anchorage across the street from Spernacks. It is labeled Experimental, but looks like a slightly larger version of the Tern. Seems to me that I remember a blue one sitting over at Bill Diehl's hangar for a number of years after he shut down.

The blue/gray one in the pic is a 7AC Champ. Pretty cool to see a discussion of this title and see a photo of my plane parked in the line up on the strip.

OK- stupid question from a flatlander, but what are the boxes that are placed over the wheels of some of the airplanes for? For keeping snow and ice off? To reduce weathering of the tires? Stepstool? All / none of the above?

Are they weighted or attached to the gear somehow? Just wonderin'...

-Bill

Heck, I like it there so much I bought a condo across the street! My roof is in the background of a couple of those pics. One of these days I'm going to get my airplane up there. Now if work would just stop interfering with my playtime.... K

RDUStinson wrote:OK- stupid question from a flatlander, but what are the boxes that are placed over the wheels of some of the airplanes for? For keeping snow and ice off? To reduce weathering of the tires? Stepstool? All / none of the above?

Are they weighted or attached to the gear somehow? Just wonderin'...

-Bill

There may be secondary reasons, but the main one is to block the sun rays from the tires. At almost $4k for a pair of Bush Wheels, it pays to protect them from the sun. You can also buy a pair of all-weather wheel covers from most any outfit that makes wing and cowl covers. That is what I have done.

Eric

There may be secondary reasons, but the main one is to block the sun rays from the tires. At almost $4k for a pair of Bush Wheels, it pays to protect them from the sun. You can also buy a pair of all-weather wheel covers from most any outfit that makes wing and cowl covers. That is what I have done.

Thanks, guess I wasn't too far off. Good idea, but I'd never seen it.

I'm just now getting ready to replace my weather-checked Airhawks, but for only $300...

Those houses in the background used to be my frog pond as a kid. Grew up on west 43rd. Anchorage sure has grown.

What's the difference from an older model Aeronca 15-AC and a Aeronca Champ. Some pics its obvious but others (seems like the older models) have them very close to the same? Thinking the Champ is a 2 seater and the Sedan is a 4 seater...Correct?

Sedan
http://www.n1331h.com/sedan_gallery/15a ... 8h_04.html
http://www.n1331h.com/sedan_gallery/15a ... 8h_01.html
http://www.n1331h.com/sedan_gallery/15a ... 1h_01.html

Champ
http://www.aeronca.com/cgi-bin/pics/pic ... fn=922.jpg
http://www.aeronca.com/cgi-bin/pics/pic ... fn=931.jpg

They do look very close to the same.

All the Champs seat two in tandem, so they're narrow airplanes.

The Sedan was a four seat airplane, so is quite a bit wider.

VERY different airplanes, though both are GREAT airplanes in their own right.

A Sedan with a 180 hp conversion is a superb back country airplane.

Never seen one with crosswind gear, but I don't doubt they offered it as an option. Cessna 170s were built in the same time frame, and cross wind gear was an option on them as well. They didn't seem to find much favor and disappeared in a few years, and you almost never see them now. A friend had a set and he tried them out on his 170 and said it was pretty weird to operate, and he really didn't think they would provide that much better cross wind capability.

MTV

The third one down is a Champ... MY Champ!

Great pics!

Bob K.
Anchorage, AK

mtv wrote: Cessna 170s were built in the same time frame, and cross wind gear was an option on them as well. They didn't seem to find much favor and disappeared in a few years, and you almost never see them now. A friend had a set and he tried them out on his 170 and said it was pretty weird to operate, and he really didn't think they would provide that much better cross wind capability.

My former C170, now robW56's, came to me with Goodyear crosswind gear. They were weird to use, and I wanted to replace the axles and old Goodyear brakes so I pulled them off, but I credit them with preventing a ground loop for all the years it had them (various owners' skillsets aside), which was nearly all the years (1955-2006.) Only by shear luck did I happen to keep any damage history out of the logbook with those new Clevelands. They do help, and basically allow you to rally sideways down the runway to a certain point.