There's no such thing as a "totaled" plane....

[Scott Richlen]

Well, here's the before picture, John Lindberg's Legacy.

Unfortunately, a handle malfunction (slider bar slipped during the pull-out from a wing-over) resulted in this....

 
John decided to throw it out.  Of course, I said "wait! this thing is barely scratched!  I can fix it!"  So it became mine.

Here's the result...


See?  There's no such thing as a "totaled" airplane!

Scott

[Tim Wescott]

My dad used to say "if it can be built by man, it can be fixed by man".

He never said anything about cost effective though.

Nice rebuild.

[Randy Powell]

That's like there's no such thing as a total car. It just depends on whether or not it's worth fixing. The one I splatted the other day wasn't much worse than yours' but it was already a bit overweight, the paint was unmatchable and it would be much easier to build another from scratch, so it went in the can after salvaging the parts. It's always a decision when a plane crashes.

[Scott Richlen]

Randy:

Well, you do have a few good points you're making.  But if we let reality get in the way of our folly, it'll just ruin everything!

Scott

[Steve Helmick]

All of Randy's planes I've seen crashed (only two, I think), pretty much turned to chaff with no parts bigger than a fitty cent piece, broken engine, etc.

The other problem is that there could be hidden damage that will make all the repair efforts for naught. I hope your ReLegacy has a good future ahead of it.  Steve

[Avaiojet]

You don't throw away a whole model away just because it's banged up a little.

Kudos!

Charles

[John Lindberg]

Good job on my plane, Scott, I'll pick it up next week. 

[Allen Brickhaus]

Nice rebuild Scott.

Allen Brickhaus

[john e. holliday]

The rebuild looks better than the original build.   Sorry John, you get me next time.  The original does looks nice.   

Now did it come out lighter or heavier?   No flight reports seen.   My Olympic that went in at an Iowas contest was not worth the effort of a rebuilt as I was pointing out to the gentleman that told me to rebuild.   I brought my P-39 home from VSC with the thought of rebuilding until I started getting into it.  There were so many fractures in that airframe that could not be seen until getting into it.  I did give my Shameless to an individual to rebuild as it did not crash like the Olympic and P-39.   Tall weeds tool off the nose and tore up landing gear.

[Scott Richlen]

It turned out to be 65 oz on my scale and 67 on Dick's.  Not sure what the original weight was, but I'm sure it must be heavier.  I did a few things to lighten it up such as a molded top block and a lighter tail wheel and wire (whoa!) but I'm sure that with the scarfing (is that the right term?)in the wings for the wing sheeting and the glue, it has to weigh more.  I also extended the nose by 1/2 inch since John's was tail heavy and he had added 3 oz to the nose to make it more flyable.

I took it to the field today to fly it, but it was way to windy for test flights.  Those will have to wait till next Saturday.  If nothing else, we ran the engine and made sure my new tank worked (the nose is too short for a large enough standard uniflo metal tank so I fabricated a uniflo tank that was an inch and a quarter deep.  Same rpm upright and inverted.

Scott

[Bill Little]

Very nicely done, Scott.  It should be fine, and the weight doesn't sound too high.

What engine?

BIG Bear
RNMM/AMM

[Scott Richlen]

PA-51.  We ran it at the field today.  It's a real horse.  Hopefully it will pull the Legacy as that thing isn't very small!

[Bill Little]

PA-51.  We ran it at the field today.  It's a real horse.  Hopefully it will pull the Legacy as that thing isn't very small!

Hi Scott,

Shouldn't be a problem at all.  I have heard from some that the PA .51 is stronger than the .61.

BIG Bear
RNMM/AMM