Know this airplane?

[Dusty]

I'm looking at the 100HP Taylorcraft that's listed on Barnstormers.

http://www.barnstormers.com/listing.php?id=75700

Does anyone know anything about the airplane?

I'm 3000 miles from WI - can anyone recommend someone who knows Taylorcrafts, or at least rag & tube, near Franksville, WI that I could get to do a pre-buy inspection?

[VictorBravo]

Re: Know this airplane?

I had a couple of e-mails exchanged with this guy when I was looking for an airplane. Even spoke to him once, and that was well over a year ago!

When I got some money together, I left FIVE voice mail messages, ready to make a cash offer, and never got a return call from David Guntly.

My recollections are that he has a one-off 100HP approval, but if I remember right he said that he couldn't get the 1500 pound gross weight because the FAA didn't think the elevator trim was enough. If it is a pre-war trim, I'm not sure I disagree. I seem to recall he said he had the Gilberti / Harer mods done.

He said it was in OK condition, and not a showplane. Fromm my experience buying airplanes many times, this PROBABLY means that when you get there is is kind of rough.

The airplane was advertised on Barnstormers for a long time, and Barnstormers sells airplanes very quickly if they're good ones. With all due respect to that guy, I would be suspicious that there is some reason he hasn't sold it yet. I hope I'm wrong. but $17,500 for a hotrod 100HP T-craft should sell fairly fast if it's a straight plane.

You are completely right to have someone in this club go there and look at it for you. I'd be real interested in the quality of the 100HP upgrade and how it was done, the existence of the Gilberti mods, and the paperwork on the airplane.

He has photos of it and he e-mailed them to me. So I know he has them to send you.

Bill Berle
Los Angeles

[Dano"T"]

Re: Know this airplane?

I flew this plane last weekend. I flew down to take a look at it for a friend. This plane is covered in Razorback. It is a 1940 with a O-200 in it. It weighs almost 890lbs empty. It does fly okay....it will not compare with my C85-8 powered BC-12D though. It is a pretty nice looking little bird, but the performance was very similar to a standard A-65 powered T-craft. I had hoped for it to be a real rocket....but....it is covered in razorback. Bill is right...he could not get an STC for 1500lbs because of the butterfly trim tab on the pre war airframe. This plane is beige with brown stripes and has a short engine mount reinforced for the O-200 and has a Sky tec (or similar) starter. David Guntly is a very nice fellow, but unless he gets someone who doesn't know T-Crafts well he may have to trim that price down. It has 2 wing tanks...but one is unuseable because it leaks. Also, I metioned this was a 1940 model...but it has post war BC-12D wings. Gross weight 1280lbs will give useful load of 390lbs...add 18 gals of gas and it goes to 273. I know It will fly well overgross but it must be loaded correctly...Not legal though. So...the plane is functional, flys great, has similar useful load to standard 1200lb gross BC-12D and about the same performance with more fuel burn (I'm guessing on that, it does have mixture control). These factors all cancel out the benefit of having an O-200 on a T-Craft and make the harer STC only useful in bringing it to the same capabilities as a standard BC-12D. Hope this helps. If you read this David Guntley...thanks for the hospitality...sorry if I'm not helping the sales effort but this forum is for us T-craft enthusiasts to help each other out.

Dan Gervae

[mulwyk]

Re: Know this airplane?

Dan:

Why do you think it has A-65 performance with the O-200? Is it because of the added weight of the Razorback cover?

Bob Gustafson

[Dano"T"]

Re: Know this airplane?

absolutley,

I own both a 1940 BC-65 and a 46 BC-12D-85. My dad also owns a BC-65. My BC-12D-85 is 815 lbs with stitts fabric.will outperform this 100HP T-craft without question. My dad also flew it and we were in agreement. I told my buddy that it performed like an A-65 powered T-craft...and he said that my dad had told him the same thing. As I said, it flew nice...just didn't perform like a 100 hp T-craft should. The empty weight of 890 came from The owner....it could be more than that or less...See the thread on Razorback thats going right now,

Dan

[mulwyk]

Re: Know this airplane?

Dan:
Might be a nice bird if someone were willing to strip off the Razorback and recover her in Stitts. I think Bill is right, it's a little over priced at $17,500. Some restoration guy like me might take on the project if it were priced less than $14,000. At 17.5K it would be hard to recover the old girl and then resell her at anywhere close to cost.

Bob Gustafson