Flying Boats

This old Grumman was a workhorse for many years, built like an anvil but really well behaved in the air. Too bad they were retired before I got a chance to fly one.
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bluee said:
Seawind.
http://www.seawind.net/index.html

My father has one.
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Really, did he finish it? There's a guy on my street who was building one but I lost track of his status. Lots of litigation involved in this one.

We've got a Seabee on our field and we usually get a few Sea Rey's that show up for our flying.
 
RE: Dornier CD2 Seastar...
weilke said:
Had they put smaller tanks on it, they wouldn't have this perceived problem :wink2:. The plane has 418gal tanks and a useful load of 3000lbs. Of course, if you fill up to the gills, you are not going to have much payload left, same limitation applies to a King Air C90Gtx and a raft of other business aircraft (the KA 250 has a useful of 3810lbs and 3645lbs of useable fuel, that leaves 165 payload :yikes: .

If you put 2000lbs in the cabin, you can go 200nm with 45min reserves. Better than a Caravan on amphibs and similar to a Viking Twin Otter 400 on Amphibs (the only two new aircraft they are competing against). This is not a long-distance travel plane for 12 people, this is a 6 guys + luggage to a lodge 100miles away plane.

At some point, they may offer a 'boat only' version without the landing gear which will improve the payload but make maintenance a real bear.
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The McKinnon G-21G Turbo Goose didn't have that problem at all - perceived or otherwise. It carried up to 586 gallons of fuel and could still manage a respectable passenger load - and cruised up to 40 knots faster than the Seastar.

The basic numbers on the McKinnon G-21G are:
Empty Weight: 7,000 lbs.
Max Gross: 12,500 lbs.
Useful Load: 5,500 lbs.
Full Fuel (586 gal @ 6.7 lbs/gal for Jet A): 3,926 lbs.
Remaining payload: 1,574 lbs.

Based on FAA std. of 170 lbs/person - that still equals 9 seats filled, including pilot.

Basically, with pilot plus 7 others, some baggage, and full fuel, you can still go 1,200 nm in the G-21G.

With the seats filled with ten 200 lbs persons (which is a more realistic number these days) on board plus maximum baggage (602 lbs forward and 400 lbs aft), you can still carry 2,498 lbs of fuel, which equals just under 373 gallons - which will still carry you over 800 nm.

And FYI - the McKinnon G-21G Turbo Goose is being reborn as the Antilles G-21G Super Goose. They haven't delivered any yet, but they seem to be just as far along ramping up with their new production as Dornier is with the Seastar.
 
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I don't think anyone's mentioned the SeaRey yet. It's produced in kit form. Chesapeake Sport Pilot is in the process of building one. I poked my head in the hangar a few weeks ago and it's coming along nicely! Getting decently close to finished.
 
Art VanDelay said:
But you just said there were NO "Lakes" only Renegades and Buccaneers ?
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He said there were no Lake Amphibian planes, not no Lake amphibian planes, get the difference? Lake Amphibian would be a proper name which doesn't exist, it's Lake Aircraft Co and they built amphibians.
 
Henning said:
He said there were no Lake Amphibian planes, not no Lake amphibian planes, get the difference? Lake Amphibian would be a proper name which doesn't exist, it's Lake Aircraft Co and they built amphibians.
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NO, he said in his original post that there were only Buccaneers and Renegades and that there was never a model called "Lake Amphibian". The name Lake Amphibian DID in fact exist and it was what they called the LA-4-180 which followed the Colonial Skimmer and pre-dated the 200hp Bucanneer or LA-4-200.

Scroll down and see:
http://lakeflyers.com/about_lakes.htm
 
After the fall of USSR, Russians produced a number of designs, such as Aerovolga LA-8 and Orion SK-12. They have large areas that are Canadian-like in their topography and those flying boats are much cheaper to operate than helicopters. LA-8 is a more refined design by a well-funded group, twin IO-540, 8 seats. The SK-12 is an evolutionary design, twin Rotax, 4 seats. It's cute in its "Soviet" features, such as the working gas tank - makes fuel management much simpler on a twin. Also, nice touches like wheels folding so they serve as bumpers for mooring. Not sure what to think about mechanical wheel brakes though, and the Jabiru-style center Y-stick is ugh... I saw pilots switching hands on it, which looks awkward.
 
Art VanDelay said:
But you just said there were NO "Lakes" only Renegades and Buccaneers ?
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No I didn't, I said there were no "Lake Amphibians". Lake produced aircraft named "Buccaneer" and "Renegade", but did not produce any aircraft it named "Amphibian".
 
Art VanDelay said:
NO, he said in his original post that there were only Buccaneers and Renegades and that there was never a model called "Lake Amphibian". The name Lake Amphibian DID in fact exist and it was what they called the LA-4-180 which followed the Colonial Skimmer and pre-dated the 200hp Bucanneer or LA-4-200.

Scroll down and see:
http://lakeflyers.com/about_lakes.htm
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You're mistaken, the LA-4-180 had no name.
 
jpower said:
I don't think anyone's mentioned the SeaRey yet. It's produced in kit form. Chesapeake Sport Pilot is in the process of building one. I poked my head in the hangar a few weeks ago and it's coming along nicely! Getting decently close to finished.
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Those are cute. There is one a few hangars away from me. There are some other similar LSA designs.
 
There's a nice old Mallard on the ramp at PMP that has a nice RV style interior;
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I could deal with selling the house and living in an Albatross,

Can't afford to though!
 
I guess the flying boats kind of went away because engines got better. I remember reading somewhere that one reason flying boats were used on trans-oceanic flights wasn't necessarily that they could land on water. The story I heard was that the engines were a little weak for the large planes, so they needed A LOT of runway. The solution was build a flying boat, then your runway could be as wide as the ocean! I think I remember the Pan Am Clippers needed about three miles of “runway” to get airborne.
 
Now, that's purrr-teee!

N98BS, 1947 Grumman G-73 Mallard, s/n J-18.

Registered to LAC Management of Spotswood, NJ since Oct. 1990.

Do you ever see it fly?

What was the deal following the Chalk's Mallard crash in Dec. 2005? Was it just the turbine Mallards that were grounded, the commerically-operated ones, or all of them (pending a full inspection of the wing spar structure for cracks and corrosion)? The AD that came out (2006-01-51) was an Emergency AD that was supposed to be an interim measure pending development of new inspection and repair guidelines by the TC Holder (Frakes) but I've never seen anything new come from Frakes and the "interim" AD note has never been revised, amended, or superceded.
 
Yes, lack of airports with large runways was the primary reason for flying boats. The planes could land in any harbor, and conveniently get people to the city/town.

That must have been a really cool way to travel.
 
roncachamp said:
You're mistaken, the LA-4-180 had no name.
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Look at my source ! It clearly says "Lake Amphibian" to the right of LA-4-180. Are you one of those persons that can NEVER admit when they are wrong or do you just work for the FAA ?
 
Art VanDelay said:
Look at my source ! It clearly says "Lake Amphibian" to the right of LA-4-180. Are you one of those persons that can NEVER admit when they are wrong or do you just work for the FAA ?
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Well the TCDS doesn't have anything but letter/ number designators for ANY of the Lake models :)

I think the various companies that have produced the Lakes used "Amphibian" interchangeably and ambiguously for their product throughout the years.
 
Art VanDelay said:
Look at my source ! It clearly says "Lake Amphibian" to the right of LA-4-180.
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Sure does. It also says, near the top of the page:

"A 'Lake Amphibian' is the general term applied to the family of single-engine, amphibious flying boats, starting with the Colonial Skimmer in the late 1940's, and continuing today through the Turbo Seafury and Seawolf."

That's pretty much what I said on the matter. So is that wrong? Are you now going to dispute your own source?

I've scanned a few pages from the 1970 Flying Annual & Pilot's Guide. The 200 HP amphibian is shown with a name, Buccaneer, but the 180 HP amphibian has only a model number, LA-4.

That annual also had a pilot report by Archie Trammel, I've included a scan of the first page. Note that he also refers to the 200 HP amphibian as the Buccaneer, but the 180 HP only by LA-4.

Are you one of those persons that can NEVER admit when they are wrong or do you just work for the FAA ?
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I have no problem admitting I'm wrong, when I'm actually wrong.
 

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I thought you guys were talking about flying boats?
 
Speaking of boats: does anyone know anything about SeaMax? It totally looks like A5, only available today. I know, I know - no folding wings, not roadable, etc. Still, what's up with the slow sales of that? Only 4 are registered, 1 invalid registration. Also I heard that the original importer flopped and the dealer company has a new owner since 2011. Is there anything wrong with it? Look at the numbers of preorders for A5, they have hundreds.
 
Most planes are developed by pilot/engineers who are typically horrible business men. That's why most of them, along with most small businesses fail.
 
Henning said:
Most planes are developed by pilot/engineers who are typically horrible business men. That's why most of them, along with most small businesses fail.
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Well, if the Eclipse morass teaches us anything, crooks aren't any better at shepherding an aircraft to market than engineers.
 
weilke said:
That is because the same kinds of people run the icon outfit that ran Eclipse.
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Why don't you focus on the question that I posed about SeaMax? Leaving innuendo and defamation aside, why is that people putting deposits for A5 do not go and buy SeaMax instead? This is not a question about the business practices of Icon management. Answer plainly or forever keep your peace.
 
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