Bellanca????

[INA201]

I have seen a few Bellanca aircraft at various fly ins and was just curious if anyone has any experience with this aircraft.  Looks pretty cool! I watched the Mooney Ambassador video and recall how they spoke of the fabric covered wood wings on the old Mooneys had an almost perfect airfoil surrounding the wood.  Anyway, maybe some folks who have experience with these older wooden wing aircraft will jump in. I know there are some good stories from the wood wing days. 

[Marauder]

I have seen a few Bellanca aircraft at various fly ins and was just curious if anyone has any experience with this aircraft.  Looks pretty cool! I watched the Mooney Ambassador video and recall how they spoke of the fabric covered wood wings on the old Mooneys had an almost perfect airfoil surrounding the wood.  Anyway, maybe some folks who have experience with these older wooden wing aircraft will jump in. I know there are some good stories from the wood wing days. 

There was one on the field I was based at and got to know the owner. Surprisingly fast and that wing was build strong. I think there is a similar picture of a Viking where we see, like the Mooney photo, people standing on the wing.

Like all wood wing planes, I remember it was tough finding people capable and willing to work on them.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk Pro

[jasona900]

I have a friend with a Super Viking.  I found it to be a nice flying airplane, with a very responsive roll rate.  It was fun to fly, but it is not as efficient as a Mooney.  The cabin is bigger, but I cannot speak to the useful load difference.  His is very well maintained, and doesn’t seem to give him any more trouble than any other airplane.  

[kerry]

I love tube and fabric. The wood wing is nothing to repair compared to a metal wing.  Just find a good cabinet maker(not kidding).  I have friends who have cruisair's and they taught me the skills of wood and fabric.  That's what got me into wood wing Mooney's.  If looking for a turbo the Viking is a hard value to beat.  I've been told many times that ice doesn't build up on wood wings.  Not sure if it's true or not.  I can't confirm it on the internet so it must not be true. lol.

[BDPetersen]

I ferry a friend’s 17-13 occasionally ( to retrieve him from having his MU-2 serviced). Pleasant flying, a bit cramped. Solid. Makes me love my “C”.

[Raptor05121]

Only experience I have with them is one taking off behind me by 4 minutes and then passing me by 20-30kts as we both climbed through 4k.

[Bob_Belville]

27 minutes ago, Raptor05121 said:

Only experience I have with them is one taking off behind me by 4 minutes and then passing me by 20-30kts as we both climbed through 4k.

Well, a Viking has 300 horses (a Continental IO520 or Lycoming IO540) vs. your 180 so you needed to be in an Ovation or similar for a fair comparison.  

[kerry]

11 hours ago, Bob_Belville said:

Well, a Viking has 300 horses (a Continental IO520 or Lycoming IO540) vs. your 180 so you needed to be in an Ovation or similar for a fair comparison.  

True.  But you have to figure the cost difference between the 2 planes.  The Ovation is going to cost you $200,000 more.

[Bob_Belville]

Just now, kerry said:

True.  But you have to figure the cost difference between the 2 planes.  The Ovation is going to cost you $200,000 more.

Whatever.

[kerry]

You can buy an Ovation for 70K

[M20F]

Excellent planes and better than Mooney’s in innumerable ways, except one.....very few people can work on cloth/wood. 

[triple8s]

On 11/8/2017 at 9:31 PM, kerry said:

You can buy an Ovation for 70K

Where? Boy i got screwed!

[kerry]

1 hour ago, triple8s said:

Where? Boy i got screwed!

My point was a super Viking is 70K and an Ovation is going to set you back 270K.  Performance is roughly the same.  In an earlier post I stated the Ovation is going to cost 200K more.  In my opinion the super Viking is a good performance value.

1 hour ago, triple8s said:

Where? Boy i got screwed!

 

[Kale McManus]

You can't find a nice 1979 super Viking for less than  $125.000 but flying it is great a friend of mine has one wood and fabric just scares some people it's better in my opinion has no memory like aluminum 

[carusoam]

Memory and aluminum...?

Aluminum, a metal, gets formed by yielding it, then heat treating it to relax internal stresses...

Metals get to bend and then return to their original form if they don't get yielded.

Compaired to wood (a natural composite material) and other traditional composite materials... if you bend them, they break...

In other news... wood rots, and aluminum oxidizes...

Composites are looking better as time goes along...

Mooneys were originally made of wood. Then aluminum. Now they are partially composite.

Their props started out as wood (M18), then aluminum, and now some are retrofitted with composites...

Go O!

Best regards,

-a-

[thinwing]

On 11/10/2017 at 2:46 PM, Kale McManus said:

You can't find a nice 1979 super Viking for less than  $125.000 but flying it is great a friend of mine has one wood and fabric just scares some people it's better in my opinion has no memory like aluminum 

As long as they are ALWAYS hangared..wood wings are fine...however I have seen two dry rotted mainspars from a persistent water leak equal a total