Oshkosh Fly-In:

Bleriot XI

Breriot XI bis, First US Air Mail, 1911

Judy and I just today left Oshkosh, Wisconsin and the EAA Air Venture fly-in. We spent nearly two weeks camping right at the airport, (Whitman Regional,) and got to be up close and personal with about every aircraft you can imagine. We walked around under the new Boing 787 Dreamliner, and studied a flying replica of the 1911 Bleriot XI that delivered the first sack of air mail on September 23, 1911. By the way Lewis Bleriot flew the original model of this aircraft across the English Channel on July 25, 1909, and claimed the 1,000 Pound prize for the first channel crossing.
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Frazier Lake Airport

Here is a story about one of the most unique airports I have ever seen. It is about five miles out of Gilroy, California where we have been staying for the past month. I have been volunteering again this fall at the Wings of History Air Museum. One of my fellow volunteers suggested that we should visit the Frazier Lake Airport open house this weekend.

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Prop Shop

My son Glen and I worked in the Prop Shop at the Wings of History Museum over the weekend. What we were doing was painting something. It is not exactly a prop as in airplane propeller. Yet it is a prop in another sense: Read More »

2009 in Review

I guess that I have gotten into the habit of providing a little statistical review the first of each year. I promise to make it brief. Read More »

Wings

We are back in Gilroy California. Last spring I spent some time volunteering at the Wings of History Air Museum. See my blog for May 12, 2009, http://www.dinsmore-enterprises.com/20090512.html

At that time I was helping build a new wing for a Pietenpol, “Air Camper” that had landed in a plowed field after an engine failure. When I got back today the crew was still working on the wings for the Pietenpol. They have the fabric stretched over the left wing and it has been stretched drum tight and saturated with nitro dope.

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Playing With Airplanes:

When I was a boy I built model airplanes and dreamed of flying. As a teenager a buddy and I took over a botched P-38 Lightning, “Comet Really Flies Kit.” It was supposed to be powered by rubber bands. We had to create some of the bulkheads from the plans, since the preprinted wood had been broken and mutilated. We almost finished it when we got a brilliant idea. We each had a small Cox “Thimble Drone, 0.049 cu. in.” gas airplane engine from our multi-crashed trainer airplanes. We would install these engines in this tiny little airplane with 36 inch wingspan. To make a long story short we succeeded even beyond our grandest dreams and flew this airplane on control lines for hours and hours.

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