On the Ramp Right Now!

andrew wrote:

Kim wrote:With the 1900, I can't help but imagine a bunch of stoned engineers, gathered in a booth in some dark corner bar, with napkins and drafting pens in hand, chanting "More Fins, Dude!"

Generally, I usually view lots of fins as a fix for an inherent design flaw. I noticed that there is even a sub-fin forward of the vertical fin.

I'll bet this plane was a tail-wagger in its original configuration.

I'm pretty sure that it's a way to ad a little stabilizing surface to help the airplane track better...in this case, maybe with the heightened forward area of the fuselage...without doing a major revamp of the design. You see these additions all the time on floatplanes to negate the floats' area way out in front of the plane.

Lots of great plane have fins affixed as they evolve...the P-51 and it's brethren grew dorsal fins on the front of their rudders as they traded their turtle decks for those beautiful Malcom Canopies.

So, they're useful mods/improvements...it just struck me as a bit entertaining as I gazed at the "Fin Farm" on that 1900 !!!

P.S. The FAA has one of these that they use to check and calibrate the accuracy of the landing systems at our airport. It REALLY looks wild, with a BUNCH of extra probes, antennas, bumps and bulges that accommodate it testing equipment! I refer to it as "The King Air that Flew right through a J.C. Whitney Catalog" !!!!!

Hoofed it down to the airport Sunday afternoon to get some photos of two flights of Blackhawks stopping through for some fuel. My boss had a arranged to have some "Surprise BBQ" waiting for the crews while my buds refueled their helicopters.

We missed the first flight of four, but caught the second bunch as they swung in from the northwest.

All eight Blackhawks are attached to B Company of the 1st Battalion, 106th Aviation Group out of Chicago, Illinois. Their training mission will take them to Little Rock, Arkansas, and Fort Hood before their deployment to Kuwait.

The guys were looking really tired, so I left them to enjoy their chow and rest in some comfortable chairs, while I took photos of our dynamic crew as they fueled up the Blackhawks...

















P.S. In the midst of all these big choppers, our own Dr. Paul landed in his R-22 and, not wanting him to feel snubbed, I promised to take a photo, and make his Robinson look as massive and intimidating as possible!

Neat Pics kim,,thanks for sharing.

As far as gauges,,all one really needs is a fuel gauge and compass,,,done!. lol.

Oh wait,,it's 2012.

So, it seems that a car factory somewhere in Mexico has a line shutting down due to a shortage of specific components. A shipment is on the way, but won't get there in time.

We get a call from a cargo company that the shipper is gonna divert a semi-truck to meet a cargo jet at our airport. ALL we go to do is move two pallets of the most critical parts from the semi to the jet, for a high-speed run to Mexico, to keep the line running. The shippers ALSO want digital photos to document the two pallets' being moved.

The driver doesn't speak much English, and retires to the air conditioned cab of his truck while the pilots and I search the hot trailer for the skids with the proper numbers.

Figure where they are ???? Well, of course !!!

You put the important ones in first Kim, just to make sure they don't get missed.

cribbs74 wrote:You put the important ones in first Kim, just to make sure they don't get missed.

Ah !!! Makes Sense!!!! And these were apparently REALLY important !!!

Airports are such funny places!

The place can be desolate, with NOTHING going on, then the tumblers line up and we're swamped. We had this project, which became my baby, a full ramp of transient aircraft needing fuel to keep our new trainee hopping, my Boss and the airport manager were dealing with a military contractor/inspector who wants our whole fuel farm to be re-plumbed, and Jamie the office girl was dealing with a belligerent base customer who accused us of over-charging him for fuel (he was shown to be wrong, but offered no apology for being a %^#&$&-head).

The cargo company kept calling my boss, wanting re-assurance that the correct pallets were being loaded on the Falcon (LOTS of bucks involved in shipping them this way!), AND that we were documenting it with photos (NEVER go to the airport without your camera!).

An hour later, the ramp was empty, and we're standing there, looking around like we dreamed it!

Fun at the airport!

More and more, I'm coming to admire Beechcraft's flag-ship / money-maker: the King Air series of twin turbine airplanes. I mean, if you design a plane that's as strong as an Old-School Bridge that will fly when missing some of it's major parts https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OWuPmGPBW8o , and will tolerate having ALL kinds of appendages attached to it airframe, well, it must be a good dog.

This past week, we had this Army MC-12 stop by for fuel and food. Carrying the rather innocuous tag of "Collection Platform", it had just returned from mid-east, where it had snooped around, listening and recording radio traffic, measuring radar strengths, and other assorted missions outside the comprehension of a fuel truck driving redneck.

I also had a school-tour going a the time, and referred to it as a 'Spy Plane' for the benefit of a bunch of wide-eyed Second-Graders!









http://www.military.com/features/0,15240,194565,00.html

Very cool Kim! I'm a big fan of Beechcraft, not so much of Raytheon though.

I thought I saw a kitchen sink hanging off that plane. When all the electronics are powered up, they probably suck 200HP on the generators.

BTW, was that Robert Redford in the baseball cap narrating the video?

andrew wrote:I thought I saw a kitchen sink hanging off that plane. When all the electronics are powered up, they probably suck 200HP on the generators.

BTW, was that Robert Redford in the baseball cap narrating the video?

Yep,,,I occasionally act as a Drama Coach for ole Bob...as us insiders call him !!!!

WingingIt74 wrote:Very cool Kim! I'm a big fan of Beechcraft, not so much of Raytheon though.

They make PT-6's ???

Kim wrote:

WingingIt74 wrote:Very cool Kim! I'm a big fan of Beechcraft, not so much of Raytheon though.

They make PT-6's ???

Raytheon Aircraft and Beechcraft have been rolled into Hawker Beechcraft. Raytheon was the US licensed manufacturer for the T-6 Texan II (a derivative of the Pilatus PC-9).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beechcraft_T-6_Texan_II

Wow, that MC-12 has got all sortsa things on it!

RknRusty wrote:Wow, that MC-12 has got all sortsa things on it!

Yep...bet they could hear an Eskimo fart !

RknRusty wrote:Wow, that MC-12 has got all sortsa things on it!

Yah, I think all the other snoopers are just decoys and that one is the real deal.

[quote="andrew"]

Kim wrote:

WingingIt74 wrote:Very cool Kim! I'm a big fan of Beechcraft, not so much of Raytheon though.

They make PT-6's ???

Raytheon Aircraft and Beechcraft have been rolled into Hawker Beechcraft. Raytheon was the US licensed manufacturer for the T-6 Texan II (a derivative of the Pilatus PC-9).


Oh, OK. We get the Texan II's on the ramp quite bit...hadn't thought about who cranked them out.

Kim wrote:
Oh, OK. We get the Texan II's on the ramp quite bit...hadn't thought about who cranked them out.

I think the Texan II is one beautiful aircraft. Built in the 48" to 60" span, it should be quite a decent flyer.

A few months ago, we had two of their predecessors on the ramp (T-34C's) that were painted up in pre-WWII colors for a ceremony commemorating that model's long service life:



These old dogs will be gone before too long.

Kim wrote:A few months ago, we had two of their predecessors on the ramp (T-34C's) that were painted up in pre-WWII colors for a ceremony commemorating that model's long service life:

I don't get it... it was never a pre-war plane. Design started after WW2 and was based on the V-Tail Bonanza Model 35. The T-34's (aka Model 45) first flight test was in 1948 and was selected by the USAF as their primary trainer in 1953.

WingingIt74 wrote:

Kim wrote:A few months ago, we had two of their predecessors on the ramp (T-34C's) that were painted up in pre-WWII colors for a ceremony commemorating that model's long service life:

I don't get it... it was never a pre-war plane. Design started after WW2 and was based on the V-Tail Bonanza Model 35. The T-34's (aka Model 45) first flight test was in 1948 and was selected by the USAF as their primary trainer in 1953.

I'll have to check with Rory..he knew the inside deal on it. I'm thinking that the paint scheme wasn't directed at the plane's design, but a specific group within the Navy.

To many folks (especially younger ones), this is just another twin-engined airplane parked on our ramp.

But to me and my kind, the shape and attitude of this Cessna 310 is MAGIC.

A Cessna like this served as the trusty mount of my childhood hero, Sky King!

If you stood between me and a TV set on a Saturday morning in the early 1960's, you would have had to deal with a wild-eyed kid, tearing at you to get in the house and watch the latest adventures of "The Flying Cowboy"!

I thought his plane was a tail dragger twin...