1929 Bellanca Pacemaker

"gmctavish needs more space" (gmctavish) 08/01/2017 at 11:47 • Filed to: Planelopnik

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A friend of mine is in Norman Wells, NWT, working towards being a bush pilot. He recently saw this, a fully restored 1929 Bellanca Pacemaker. They’re thinking it might be the only airworthy Bellanca, or at least the only airworthy Pacemaker.

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > gmctavish needs more space 08/01/2017 at 11:58

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A friend of my dad’s named Olin Longcoy had what was probably the last surviving US-made Senior Skyrocket, but I don’t know if my dad knows what happened after “Pappy” passed away. Might have been scrapped, may have just disappeared somewhere.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bellanca_31-40

gmctavish needs more space > RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht 08/01/2017 at 12:01

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Oh wow, hopefully it’s still intact somewhere.

I’ve seen that one on wiki, at the Reynolds Alberta Museum

WilliamsSW > gmctavish needs more space 08/01/2017 at 12:02

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That’s gorgeous! I can’t imagine that there are more than a handful of Pacemakers still airworthy (the FAA Registry lists 5 including this one). That should be a Wright Whirlwind out front.

Bellanca lasted a long time - and American Champion is making a number of their designs (Champ, Citabria and Decathlon at least) to this day.

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > gmctavish needs more space 08/01/2017 at 12:10

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“Pappy” Longcoy passed away in ‘89, age 80. His plane shop had at that time existed for about 45 years, and he had started off in cropdusting in the ‘30s and with a stint in government test-piloting. He was involved in the development of the “Flying flit gun” spray bar for DDT, and was involved in the founding of the Sun’n’Fun Fly-in.

So, I would have to ask my dad for a refresher, but that Senior Skyrocket has been MIA or KIA for almost 30 years.

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > gmctavish needs more space 08/01/2017 at 12:16

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Additional info of interest:

http://www.freepatentsonline.com/2395827.pdf

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > WilliamsSW 08/01/2017 at 12:21

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Speaking of American Champion Super Decathlons, there’s the formerly registered G-OCOK:

WilliamsSW > RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht 08/01/2017 at 12:24

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Nice! BTW - if you happen to have a tail number or serial number for that Senior Skyrocket, you can see if it’s in the FAA Registry still. Unlike car license plates, airplanes are searchable.

TheRealBicycleBuck > gmctavish needs more space 08/01/2017 at 12:33

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Thanks for posting this. My curiosity got the best of me and I found that the FAA maintains registrations forever, even when they are deregistered! You can even search the database by name .

Here are the search results for “Bellanca”: http://registry.faa.gov/aircraftinquiry/Name_Results.aspx?Nametxt=BELLANCA&sort_option=4&PageNo=1

I can’t quite make out the tail number, but it does look a U.S. registry, not Canadian. The FAA no longer issues “NC” numbers, but allows older planes originally registered under an NC to display it. The numbers look like 688E. Funny, all of the Pacemakers registered under the NC 6 series were deregistered, several being exported to Canada. It makes me wonder what’s going on here.

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > WilliamsSW 08/01/2017 at 12:36

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An Aeronca that belonged to him shows up in Google results as deregistered with the FAA, but that’s the only result of that kind I found - so the dereg happened long enough ago I can’t look up the tail number the easy way. My dad *probably* does not have it.

Unfortunately, I think at the time of his death (I may be remembering wrong) that it might have been disassembled for restoration, so it may have been scrapped when his wife cleared everything away.

gmctavish needs more space > TheRealBicycleBuck 08/01/2017 at 12:39

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I wonder if Canada allows vintage planes previously registered in the US to display their original number or something, I don’t really know anything about plane registration

WilliamsSW > RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht 08/01/2017 at 12:49

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Ahh, if it was disassembled, it was probably de-registered at some point. Hopefully someone picked up the pieces and restored it - that’s a really nice airplane. If you had the old N-number, you might be able to search that to find the serial number, then search that serial number to look for a new N-number, but that’s needle in a haystack stuff, sadly.

TheRealBicycleBuck > gmctavish needs more space 08/01/2017 at 13:28

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That’s a good question. I wonder if your friend can decipher the tail number for us. Maybe then we can get to the bottom of this mystery!

I’ll get the van warmed up.

ptak appreciates old racecars > gmctavish needs more space 08/01/2017 at 17:13

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Awesome! Reminds me of the plane from Tintin and the Crab with the Golden Claws