1931 Mooney A-1 with Diesel Engine

[RogerDetroit]

First time logging on.  I am not a pilot, but rather a student of history of the Packard Motor Car Co.  Fact is that I am president of the Packard Motor Car Foundation - a 501c3 group restoring the Packard Proving Grounds in a suburb north of Detroit

I am trying to research the following Mooney aircraft to see if it still exists.  Back in 1931 it was powered by the world’s first diesel aircraft engine – built by the Packard Motor Car Company and known as the DR-980.  This engine won the Collier Award in 1931 for: (1) setting a flight endurance record of 84+ hours without refueling and (2) radio communications – first time a ground radio station spoke to a pilot in flight.  So diesels are not new to Mooney.

Tail number is/was 476W.  I have attached FAA data, but that does not tell me if the plane still exists.  I would like to contact the current owner.  Attached are items for your review:

• Photo of 476W over the Packard Proving Grounds in 1931 – note the aircraft hangar in the infield of the test track
• FAA data sheet

Any help in finding out more about this aircraft would be much appreciated.  Thanks for any help or advice.

 

[Simon]

Wow, amazing post.

I'm sure you'll get a good response here.  And hopefully you'll find what you came looking for.

 

[MBDiagMan]

I have the book "The Al Mooney Story" close at hand.  When I first read your post my impression was: I never heard of such a model.  All of Al's designs were labeled beginning with an M.  His first design being 1, second being M2 and so forth.  It might be that A1 was a modification level of one his designs.  The picture you posted looked a little similar to his M4 which was called the Alexander Bullet.

I am quite confident that there will be historians much more informed than myself that will offer lots of information.

Several years ago I saw lots of pictures of the abandoned Packard facilities.  I am quite pleased that something is being done with them.

[Dave Colangelo]

This design dates to the original Mooney aircraft company which predates the company that would make the M series aircraft that are still around today. Both companies were started by Al. It looks like the original company was in Wichita where this one was eventually deregistered so that makes logical sense and the plane most likely never ended up all that far from where it was built. This site lists them as being built in 1930. The Mooney company of this era went bankrupt in '31 and shut its doors.

 

This site sheds a bit more light on the A-1 story

Young Al delighted in the company of Wichita’s many other aviation greats,
as he developed the Mooney A-X/A-1/A-2 (his "M-5") – an
improved 5-seat version of the Alexander Bullet. (there are no known Bullet's remaining)

April
4th, 1930, to garner publicity for his design, Al took off in his new
"Mooney Low Wing" on a non-stop transcontinental record attempt, for
his airplane’s weight class, from Los Angeles to New York (Glendale, Calif. to
Long Island, N.Y., to be exact). But alas, a broken fuel pump spoiled the
record attempt — forcing the plane down near Ft. Wayne, IN — only setting an unofficial record of 1,980 miles covered in 22 hours, 27 minutes. It was, nevertheless, a
stout feat for a personal plane of 1930.

Despite inspiring apparent imitators, only a handful of the A-X/A-1/A-2 were
built before the stock-market crash of 1929 ushered in the Great Depression,
and the collapse of American industry, including — most particularly —
American aviation. Mooney was bankrupted, but Bridgeport’s president graciously
ate most of the losses.

 

Trying to hunt down the last known owner may be a good start but considering the age, the fact that this dates to the earlier bankrupt Mooney company the plane may very well no longer exist.   

 

Im sure others will chime in here with more info. 

Edited May 31, 2017 by Dave Colangelo

[RogerDetroit]

I appreciate the responses.  

MBDiagMan:  The Packard photos you saw are from the Packard Plant in downtown Detroit that is now owned by a Spanish - Peruvian business man/developer.  Our group is preserving the Packard Proving Grounds in (Utica) Shelby Twp., MI.  We are preservationists and he is a developer.

Dave:  Thanks, I did know about the first bankruptcy, but thought it was 1931, not 1930.  I said it was a 1931 because of the FAA cert.  From aerofiles.com website it says the A-1 was powered by a Packard diesel - like that confirmation.  Seems they talk of only ONE, A-1.  Can this be?

Keep the info coming.  All this helps the history of both Packard and Mooney.

--Roger--

 

[KSMooniac]

I live in Wichita and am intrigued...the original Mooney plant of that era is long-gone. I looked up that last owner's address and it appears to no longer exist as well. We have an aviation museum in town, and it might be worth a call to them to see what they might have in the archives. I bet they would do their best to help a preservation group. They have an M-18 at the museum, but nothing that I recall from the first Mooney company, at least on display.

 

Good luck!

 

http://kansasaviationmuseum.org/

 

Sent from my LG-US996 using Tapatalk

 

 

 

 

[carusoam]

Welcome aboard, Roger.

Good luck with your project.  Keep us updated as you go along.

Al Mooney was quite an interesting gentleman. Many of us will be interested in the details that you come across.

Best regards,

-a-

[Dave Colangelo]

Its a slow day in the office thus old news paper I shall read... 

They started planning the design very precisely on... 

Saturday, April 6, 1929 page 1.

A new aircraft company for Wichita is being organized by A. W. Mooney, until recently chief engineer and designer for the Eaglerock Aircraft Company, of Colorado Springs. The company plans to produce a monoplane. Details

 

It looks like bridgeport bought mooney on, 

Friday, May 10, 1929 page 1.

Announcement yesterday that the Mooney Aircraft Company has been absorbed as a subsidiary of the Bridgeport Machine Company. Charter has been granted to the Mooney Company. A factory will be erected on a tract adjacent to the Bridgeport plant on the opposite side to the one now occupied by the Stearman plant. A. W. Mooney elected president of the new Mooney Company. He was former chief engineer of the Alexander Eaglerock Company at Colorado Springs. Further details.

Sunday, May 12, 1929 page 5. Long article about the newly organized Mooney Aircraft Company. Details

You may want to try and get hold of that article. 

 

and more news paper transcriptions that may be of interest to you here. 

Tuesday, June 10, 1930 page 4

Mooney Aircraft company has purchased the factory and ten acre tract of the Swift Aircraft company west of the municipal airport for $25,000 and yesterday moved to the new site from its former quarters at Bridgeport Machine works. The company has a second low wing monoplane near completion. The new Mooney site adjoins the new site of the Stearman Aircraft company

The transcripts also list at least 2 pictures of the aircraft being taken but regrettably dont have the photos. It looks like they may have the microfilm of the newspaper here which may have the images. If only one was built it may be the one that was involved in the forced landing scenario.

 

There is a nice pic of a model A-X here

On a complete tangent, on the history of Packard, I went to Lehigh University the alma mater of James Ward Packard and they still have the Packard 1 on display in the Packard engineering building (the first automobile built by Packard) once a year they take it out and drive it around (or at least they did when I was there) it still runs!. 

 

The plane may also have flown out of the original Mooney airfield. Which regrettably no longer exists. Although this field may be related to the later 1946 forming of Mooney.   

Edited May 31, 2017 by Dave Colangelo

[Dave Colangelo]

Still no definitive answer but I know where you may find it, apparently... 

 

The Al Mooney Papers were donated to the History of Aviation Collection, Special Collections Department, Eugene McDermott Library, The University of Texas at Dallas, by his son John Arthur Mooney on November 24, 1986.

Which includes... 

 Al Mooney Papers, Handwritten and typed narrative notes, Folder 21, Box 2, Series I, History of Aviation Collection, Special Collections Department, Eugene McDermott Library, The University of Texas at Dallas.

Al Mooney Papers, Baxter manuscript, Folder 3 through 6, Box 6, Series I, History of Aviation Collection, Special Collections Department, Eugene McDermott Library, The University of Texas at Dallas.

 Al Mooney Papers, Mooney manuscript, Folder 8 through 12, Box 6, Series I, History of Aviation Collection, Special Collections Department, Eugene McDermott Library, The University of Texas at Dallas.

 

What you are looking for is most likely in 

(Box 12 Folder 5) Model A-1. 1930 January 25   Engineering data prepared by Al Mooney for the Mooney Aircraft Corporation, Wichita, Kansas.

(Box 29 Folder 2) A-1. 1929-1930   Blueprints.

So if you can make it down to Dallas (or at least contact them for transcripts) his personal notes may detail what became of the plane.
 

Edited May 31, 2017 by Dave Colangelo

[MooneyMitch]

This is a very interesting thread.  I wish I had some quality information to add, but I will watch and follow the evolution here.

Awesome!!   Thank you for sharing.

[Yetti]

Is this the radial diesel?  I would be interested for more information on that engine and if they still exhist

[Dave Colangelo]

28 minutes ago, Yetti said:

Is this the radial diesel?  I would be interested for more information on that engine and if they still exhist

There is a link in the OP but it looks like ~100 were built and they dont seem to be regarded as too reliable. The national air and space museum has one in storage. You can find a lot of the technical data on the engine here and some more drawings/pics here

Edited May 31, 2017 by Dave Colangelo

[aviatoreb]

I nominate for the best first timer post prize. 

[1964-M20E]

other than liking the radial engine I'm sure glad Al cleaned up the design by the time he got to the M20s 

 

Interesting post.

 

 

 

 

[RogerDetroit]

Thanks for the compliments on my first post.  I hope we all learn something from this research.  I will try and respond to a few comments.

 

Actually the engine was economical and very reliability, but was unpopular due to the unpleasant nature of its diesel exhaust fumes and considerable vibration when running.   Packard only made 100 engines.  It is noted for setting two, world’s first records. 

Endurance recordOn 28 May 1931, a Bellanca CH-300 fitted with a DR-980, piloted by Walter Edwin Lees and Frederic Brossy, set a record for staying aloft for 84 hours and 32 minutes without being refueled. This record was not broken until 55 years later by the Rutan Voyager 

Radiophone Communications RecordOn 3 June 1929 the first two-way, radiophone communication took place over the skies of the Packard Proving Grounds in Utica, (now Shelby Township, Michigan). Heretofore, gasoline powered aircraft caused too much electro-magnetic interference for the weak voice signal to be heard over the static. Only a strong Morse code signal could be heard. As diesel engines neither have spark plugs, nor spark plug wiring the EM static was greatly reduced and allowed voice communication to be used. The two-way ground to plane voice communication was witnessed by the U.S. Department of Commerce. 

You guys gave me some very good leads and thanks to Dave Colangelo, I will be working with the archivist at University of Texas at Dallas where Albert Mooney’s collection is housed.  But, they are so backlogged that they cannot get to my request until July 1. 

Meanwhile, there must be more on the last owner, Edward Stone, but Google searching brings back and overload of information.  Wish he had a more unique name.  Hope someone knows more about Edward and what he did with the plane.

[takair]

Very interesting history lesson between Roger and Dave.  Good stuff!  

Dave....you must have a most interesting office to have "newspapers" with this type of history.  Are you a historian as well?

I guess I didn't know or appreciate that Al Mooney went so far back!

[Dave Colangelo]

2 hours ago, takair said:

Dave....you must have a most interesting office to have "newspapers" with this type of history.  Are you a historian as well?

I have perhaps the most generically uneventful and tragically windowless office on earth but there is at least a high speed internet connection, I like to think of my self as an "aggressive googler" in reality but am regrettably not a historian and instead a lowly engineer with fairly decent search engine manipulation skills. 

 

On any note I looked into Ed Stone as well and came up fairly empty handed. Out of curiosity where did the picture you have come from? I tried a reverse image search but came up blank on that as well. One interesting thing that I noticed in my research is that this image seems to be of a plane in flight taken from another plane (or ballon) in flight which (compared to the many images I came across) is a bit out of norm for the time and an interesting side though. If you do find the plane I will happily get my speed graphic out and recreate this shot.  

 

Regards

Dave 

[carusoam]

Al had an incredible history that went way back...

Somebody on MS found one of Al's houses, like the one he was born in Colorado.  Looks,very similar today...

Best regards,

-a-

[Yetti]

@don.muncy is in Dallas as well as some others that might be able to help out.  I want a radial diesel.   the fumes would not bother me the least

[peevee]

8 hours ago, carusoam said:

Al had an incredible history that went way back...

Somebody on MS found one of Al's houses, like the one he was born in Colorado.  Looks,very similar today...

Best regards,

-a-

I didn't know he was born in denver.

[carusoam]

I couldn't find the thread.  I thought Joe Z may have posted it...

Might be a mixed memory in my aged noggin... 

Best regards,

-a-

Edited June 1, 2017 by carusoam

[peevee]

40 minutes ago, carusoam said:

I couldn't find the thread.  I thought Joe Z may have posted it...

Might be a mixed memory in my aged noggin... 

Best regards,

-a-

find the address and I'll go take a picture of it some day.

[Andy95W]

Joe Z. post:

I posted this once before, but I think it's pretty cool so I'll post it again.

I've read the book and highly recommend it to anyone in the Mooney community. In the early pages of this book Al mentions that he was born at 1223 S. Lincoln Street in Denver. That's about 15 minutes from my house, so I drove over to take a look. Sure enough, the old house is still there. The weather was lousy that day so I didn't take a picture, but here's a picture from Google Street View:

BTW, I'm proud to be a third-generation Denver native, which is pretty unusual. Al was born here in 1906 and my grandmother was born here in 1908. The house she was born in also still stands.

 

[peevee]

 

 

actually worth less than I would have guessed in Denver, sold for $510k in may of 17, I bet I can find the listing. Lots of photos.

http://www.recolorado.com/homes-for-sale/1223-S-Lincoln-Street-Denver-CO-80210-200634316

 

[DonMuncy]

6 hours ago, Yetti said:

@don.muncy is in Dallas as well as some others that might be able to help out.  I want a radial diesel.   the fumes would not bother me the least

Yetti,

Were you suggesting I might be able to help in looking in the UTD archives? In reading the earlier posts, I'm not sure how I can help, but if pointed in the right direction, I would be glad to take a stab at helping.