Hi all!
I was wondering how far do you go restoring a plane before it becomes a new build?
There must be a part of a plane which must remain original to the original plane, or doesn’t it matter? I know engines are swapped, wings and other bit grafted onto another fuselage and all sorts of repairs are done, but where is the line drawn?
On my railway engines, the frames of the loco are the number of the particular engine, and that never changes, but what on an aircraft, gives it’s identity?
Some of the aircraft mentioned here seem to have been rebuilt so extensively, that nothing remains of the original, but the pilots seat maybe, is that enough to call it an original restored airframe?
:confused:
By: kittyhawk - 22nd March 2004 at 02:43
im building a P40E(replica) now and have spoken with a few doing the same, it seems that 90% of aircraft are composites or new planes.
take fighter factorys junk for example http://www.tidetech.com/fighterfactory/forsale.html they want $450,000 USD for some junk they “picked up” off the ground. now any engineer will tell you that NOTHING except maybe a few small pieces are useable there.
steel thats been outside for 50 years will never be airworthy, engine blocks would have hairline cracks, the skin is ofcourse not useable.
the only thing original you would use from that is maybe the flight stick, pilots seat and data plate, thats what you get for your $450,000!:p
By: Mark V - 22nd March 2004 at 01:23
Aircraft ‘built’ around a constructors plate do run the risk of being labelled ‘replicas’.
In my opinion it is more about continuity and provenance than the percentage of original parts.
By: Flood - 22nd March 2004 at 01:01
Tried raising this subject several times in the past (gotten used to being branded a heretic!) and the general opinion seems to be that as long as you have an identity you can insert a whole new airframe…
Look at the DH88s, or the Spits rebuilt from the constructor’s plate. If you’re really lucky you might find the pilot is older than every part on his newly restored mount!;)
Flood.
By: Melvyn Hiscock - 21st March 2004 at 23:45
no further than kissing on a first date.
Kind of you to ask though.
MH
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March 21, 2004 at 7:05 pm