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You learned the fun way.

A close friend was a Nav on Blind Bat, exciting times!!

I got over 3000 hours of Flight Engineer and Flight Mechanic time in C123, C7A and EC121. Only piloted Cessna 150 and 182. Got too expensive so I quit.

I'm not a pilot here, but when I was about 10 years old I got to fly in a P-51 2 seat trainer. Dad had a buddy who was a doctor, and bought the 'Stang after WWII. He used to visit with my dad when he was in the area, and he took a shine to me. 'Told me if he ever flew into town in his Mustang, he'd take me up for a ride. Big mistake, as I was a WWII aviation junkie, even at that young age. Every time he came to town I'd bug him incessantly-"when are we going flying?" Finally the day came when he set down on a local strip. Dad took me out there to meet him, and he took me up for a ride. Needless to say I was in wide eyed wonder. I can remember every smell, every squeak, every sound that plane made. I got a Bucket List item knocked off before I was in my teens. He passed away quite a while ago,and I don't know whatever happened to that plane, or if it's even still flying, but I'll never forget the time I got fly in a Mustang.

152.

Your 3000 hours , where you got them, trump my excitement by a long way. How many landings and take-offs in a "mortar magnet" were involved during those hours?

Holy crap!

How did you get so many?


Most I ever heard of was from a FS smoke jumper named Dale Longanecker.

A 1972 M4 Maule.


It had the 220 Franklin. I was not very good.


Dad has a 172 now with an O-300 six.

Need to get some time in it.

So, you were fascinated with radial engines, hey? The Buo was a good machine. The 123 was the noisiest thing I ever hitched a ride in.

Started building and flying models in the early '50's, but throughout my life spent most of my money on boats and yachts. So the cost of aircraft ownership and of becoming a certified pilot always remained just beyond my reach. Was a member of Experimental Aircraft Association for years and took the controls of a Super Cub on floats at Oshkosh one year.

Now I have only an unfinished 1/5-scale Cub kit, a 1/5-scale Waco biplane kit in the queue, and plans for a 1/5-scale Monocoupe, plus a 55" foam ARF Cub trainer.

Love the Waco's.

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Kenny, I got 2252 hours in the Caribou when I was at Phu Cat, which equated to 2545 sorties. Most of the rest in EC121, some out of Korat.

Aeronca Champ
Cessna 172
TH-55
UH-1A,B,C,D,H,M,V
CH-47A,B,C,C+,D,F
Bell 47 G-2,G-3B2,G-5, H&J models
Hughes 500
Jet Ranger
Hiller 12E and Soloy conversion
Hiller 1200? (the model that was in the fly-off with Hughes 500 and OH-58)
Aleouette 3
Westland Scout
Beech Travelaire, Baron and U-21
Aerocoupe
Goodyear Blimp

I have PIC or IP/CFI time in:

Robinson R-22
Enstrom F-28C
Hughes 269A
UH-1H/V
UH-60A/L
JUH-60A
HH-60L
TH-67 Instrument Version
Bell 407
Cessna 152

OH-13E, Mineral Wells TX. 69-19. Wouldn't hover on a hot Texas November afternoon, but it had hydraulics.

Cessna 150, cheapest thing a high school kid could rent. Fun solo, not so much if you had a fat instructor on a hot day.

I'm really jealous of you guys! Wish I had some seat time in!

Aeronca Champ many years ago.

J-3

This will make a lot of fly guys jealous: I have 60-some hours of F-80 time.

Actually, they were a kind of hybrid plane, meant to give a jet upgrade to prop fighter types in Korea. You could call them two-seat F-80s or T-33s with guns and bomb racks. The official designation as AT-33 or Attack Trainer. Either way, they were interesting planes to fly. That was at Cannon AFB, NM about this time of year in 1970, btw.

You flew an F80?!?!? Wow.....

A little surprised by the number of rotorheads here on the 'Fire.

Dan they came THIS close to having F-86s for that course, but as there were no two-seat versions and most of the class were fresh out of flight training, they deemed it too risky. So they de-mothballed 24 of those AT-33s. Interesting to a pilot is the fact that no two of them had the same cockpit layout. There had been so many mods and changes that switches, dials and controls were all over inside. I never did find the cockpit altimeter (to verify pressurization) in one of them. Half of the preflight was spent sitting there finding stuff.