In 1966 to 1967 I attended the Spartan School Of Aeronautics in Tulsa, OK and obtained an FAA Airframe and Powerplant (A&P) license. I never knew of the previous history of Spartan aircraft. Thank you for this video.
Private pilot since 1987 here…the aircraft of my dreams is a PBY Catalina…ive often thought of literally living out of it as it is plenty big enough to reconfigure into sleeping quarters etc. Land on water or terra firma and sleep! How cool would that be??? What a beautiful plane…;)
The Executive was one of my Dad's most favorite planes. (He was a Marine Corps fighter pilot in WWII and Korea). A plane from that era that I've flown, albeit decades ago now, was the Staggerwing Beech. Like the Spartan, Beech did it right.
Lucky man! I had to build myself an RC model of a Beech Staggerwing, because I could never afford the real thing. 25" wing span I run on 4S batteries and a FPV set-up w/ pan and tilt for that realistic sensation during aerobatics. Actual flight is way too expensive these days.
$1 in 1936 is equivalent to $22.55 today. I just looked it up. So $25K in 1936 is about $564k today. I like the Executive. Saw some at the Arlington Washington EAA fly in. I have a Bonanza but would love a Spartan :)
Dream bird off the shelf: couple of options. Diamond DA62, if it's gotta be a single probably a TBM 960... or maybe a VisionJet... Dream bird built bespoke: A Prandtl-D planform flying wing. 36-38' wingspan. All carbon fibre honeycomb; that construction technique - and the landing gear design - from a Dark Aero One. (Hafta beef it up a little, b/c this won't be a single.). 2x Rotax 916is mounted pusher on the trailing edge of the wing. Blended fuselage centered on the forward spar, which is itself not too far forward of CG; four seats, back seats face aft. Fuel tanks behind. Carbon-fibre-reinforced titanium firewalls between cabin and tanks and between tanks and engines. Enough fuel to fly at MCT for eight hours. Heat-pump-based climate control. Oxygen for all seats. If I'm lucky I get to build a model, because both time and money.
Even if you have very deep pockets, you'd be hard pressed to find one for sale. I have personnelly flown or have flown in 7 different Soartans. As much as I love the airplane, I really miss those generous friends that shared their love with me. So many of these have made it across the pond now, so they are extremely rare in the U.S. now. GREAT, TIMELESS AIRPLANE.😊
USD 25k in 1936 is today a tick over half a mil. Considering that a new G36 Bonanza is nearly a full seven figures? yeah. It's the built-to-order part that makes it truly exclusive.
I would give a gonad to fly a Beech Staggerwing -- just something about that biplane that hits my pilot's heart. I'm currently in the process of making an RC model of one and its been a challenge cutting all the bits and pieces out of balsa and thin plywood.
It looks like my Spartan (s/n 17) shows up a bunch of times in this video, sometimes with the old green paint trim and others with the current blue trim. Is this an update of an earlier version of this video? Some of the narrative seems quite familiar.
Love the plane but I lean more toward the Cessna 195. Planes I fell in love with as a kid; the Sea Bee (Jungle Jim’s bird), the Cessna Bearcat - T50(Sky King liked his 310 but not quite as well), and the Bell 47 from Whirlybirds. Finally the Cessna 170 from various science fiction movies and the Goose from Tales of the Golden Monkey. Sigh, at my age I’d have trouble with a C-150.
$25,000 in 1936 is ~$500,000 today. So the Spartan cost a bit more than a 172 does today. Clearly things have changed. I'm thinking a modern equivalent would be the Epic E1000 or TBM 9 whatever.
People used to earn $1/day until Colt and Edison mass produced some things, and Henry Ford started the middle class at $5 day. And cut the cost of the Model-T to 1/5th of its original MSRP over two decades of slashing prices. $5/day for the best fabricators money could buy can easily make you an airplane for $25,000. And a new car was $260. Coke cost $0.05 per can/bottle for over 50 years. Hidden taxation through Inflation wiped out all of those gains. Now anything that takes human skill is prohibitively expensive, yet few are wealthy enough to afford it because the gains from capitalism have been confiscated by those who print the money.
Why not? 1. P&W doesn’t make radial engines any more. 2. The Spartan is a welded tube airframe skinned in aluminum. (vid is incorrect about monocoque). This expensive to build. 3. Radials burn a lot of fuel. 4. New planes like Diamonds and Cirrus (and likely the C210, Bonanza, Mooney outperform the Spartan. Still I think aviation misses something without these classic planes. Should be thankful that enthusiasts restore and fly them. Cheers
@danbenson7587 1. Doesn't need to be a P&W 2. Steel tube structure with aluminium skin still being the standard for agplanes and is actually one of the cheapest and fastest ways of aircraft building 3. So what? 4. It would be intended for another niche market
@@r.guerreiro140 Whoa, partner, I’m not against yr idea, just answering what the investor/manufacturer would have to consider. There are more nasties along the way, like can the type certification be bought, and are the drawings still around. Then manufacturing process certification and quality certification and on and on. Then the tooling. Went thru Mooney plant 15yrs ago and there are 1000s of parts in plane you don’t see. It’s daunting. But to revive the Spartan, Probably the best way is go experimental kit with pre-molded fiberglass replica and avoid certification headaches. When I learned to fly (1969), there was an abandoned (I never saw it move from tie down) Spartan at the airport. I hope it found some TLC. In those days, WW2 era planes were not appreciated and pampered as now. Hard to believe, there was a disassembled P51 in a crate beside the hanger…maybe 2 hours on it. The ex military hangar stored crated Allison and Packard Merlin engines and all nature of sundry parts. Best your way. Cheers.
@@r.guerreiro140 Sir Richard Branson has said the best businesses are founded out of frustration. I say: It's your dream. You can't expect someone else to independently share the same vision and bring it to fruition... Besides. If they did, you couldn't afford a ride in it let alone the two-million dollar price tag. Buuuut if you build it you can!
Everything on the Spartan Executive is handmade and that means someone with skills has to make it. Good, Cheap, Fast - pick two. You can't have all three. If it's good and fast, it won't be cheap. If it's good and cheap it won't be fast. If it's fast and cheap it won't be good. 🥸
In 1966 to 1967 I attended the Spartan School Of Aeronautics in Tulsa, OK and obtained an FAA Airframe and Powerplant (A&P) license. I never knew of the previous history of Spartan aircraft. Thank you for this video.
The Spartan 7W was not a monocoque airframe, it was a truss and metal shell structure. The shape of the fuselage was completely non-structural.
Thank you for this history lesson. I just subscribed.
thank you! glad you enjoyed it!
Private pilot since 1987 here…the aircraft of my dreams is a PBY Catalina…ive often thought of literally living out of it as it is plenty big enough to reconfigure into sleeping quarters etc. Land on water or terra firma and sleep! How cool would that be??? What a beautiful plane…;)
The Executive was one of my Dad's most favorite planes. (He was a Marine Corps fighter pilot in WWII and Korea). A plane from that era that I've flown, albeit decades ago now, was the Staggerwing Beech. Like the Spartan, Beech did it right.
Lucky man! I had to build myself an RC model of a Beech Staggerwing, because I could never afford the real thing. 25" wing span I run on 4S batteries and a FPV set-up w/ pan and tilt for that realistic sensation during aerobatics. Actual flight is way too expensive these days.
$1 in 1936 is equivalent to $22.55 today. I just looked it up. So $25K in 1936 is about $564k today. I like the Executive. Saw some at the Arlington Washington EAA fly in. I have a Bonanza but would love a Spartan :)
Dream bird off the shelf: couple of options. Diamond DA62, if it's gotta be a single probably a TBM 960... or maybe a VisionJet...
Dream bird built bespoke: A Prandtl-D planform flying wing. 36-38' wingspan. All carbon fibre honeycomb; that construction technique - and the landing gear design - from a Dark Aero One. (Hafta beef it up a little, b/c this won't be a single.). 2x Rotax 916is mounted pusher on the trailing edge of the wing. Blended fuselage centered on the forward spar, which is itself not too far forward of CG; four seats, back seats face aft. Fuel tanks behind. Carbon-fibre-reinforced titanium firewalls between cabin and tanks and between tanks and engines. Enough fuel to fly at MCT for eight hours. Heat-pump-based climate control. Oxygen for all seats.
If I'm lucky I get to build a model, because both time and money.
Even if you have very deep pockets, you'd be hard pressed to find one for sale. I have personnelly flown or have flown in 7 different Soartans. As much as I love the airplane, I really miss those generous friends that shared their love with me. So many of these have made it across the pond now, so they are extremely rare in the U.S. now. GREAT, TIMELESS AIRPLANE.😊
Just saw one of these at the Mankato MN fly in. I can only imagine the pockets deep enough to keep it in that beautiful of flying condition.
USD 25k in 1936 is today a tick over half a mil. Considering that a new G36 Bonanza is nearly a full seven figures? yeah. It's the built-to-order part that makes it truly exclusive.
I would give a gonad to fly a Beech Staggerwing -- just something about that biplane that hits my pilot's heart. I'm currently in the process of making an RC model of one and its been a challenge cutting all the bits and pieces out of balsa and thin plywood.
A beautiful aircraft.
It looks like my Spartan (s/n 17) shows up a bunch of times in this video, sometimes with the old green paint trim and others with the current blue trim. Is this an update of an earlier version of this video? Some of the narrative seems quite familiar.
Oh you a lucky one! yeah, there were issues with the original thumbnail, and I eventually needed to re-do the whole video.
Was yours the green one owned by Spartan Aircraft Co and kept at the flight school in the late 60s ?
I was there.
Herschel Augsberger used to fly it.
@@hotrodray6802 The one you are thinking about was NC-17662. It is now based in Midland, Texas.
Love the plane but I lean more toward the Cessna 195. Planes I fell in love with as a kid; the Sea Bee (Jungle Jim’s bird), the Cessna Bearcat - T50(Sky King liked his 310 but not quite as well), and the Bell 47 from Whirlybirds. Finally the Cessna 170 from various science fiction movies and the Goose from Tales of the Golden Monkey. Sigh, at my age I’d have trouble with a C-150.
Katmai 182 with the 350 HP would be my dream bird.
OV- 10 bronco, the ultimate off-road camper . A slide out fold open deck and a bikini top.
I think the 7W and the Globe Swift were the most beautiful light aircraft of their time.
Cozy MkIV, with a Higgs Falcon (FI 250hp).
$25,000 in 1936 is ~$500,000 today. So the Spartan cost a bit more than a 172 does today. Clearly things have changed. I'm thinking a modern equivalent would be the Epic E1000 or TBM 9 whatever.
People used to earn $1/day until Colt and Edison mass produced some things, and Henry Ford started the middle class at $5 day. And cut the cost of the Model-T to 1/5th of its original MSRP over two decades of slashing prices.
$5/day for the best fabricators money could buy can easily make you an airplane for $25,000. And a new car was $260.
Coke cost $0.05 per can/bottle for over 50 years.
Hidden taxation through Inflation wiped out all of those gains. Now anything that takes human skill is prohibitively expensive, yet few are wealthy enough to afford it because the gains from capitalism have been confiscated by those who print the money.
First time that I've ever heard that they had air conditioning... And a refrigerator.
Why don't restart its production line?
Why not? 1. P&W doesn’t make radial engines any more. 2. The Spartan is a welded tube airframe skinned in aluminum. (vid is incorrect about monocoque). This expensive to build. 3. Radials burn a lot of fuel. 4. New planes like Diamonds and Cirrus (and likely the C210, Bonanza, Mooney outperform the Spartan.
Still I think aviation misses something without these classic planes. Should be thankful that enthusiasts restore and fly them. Cheers
@danbenson7587 1. Doesn't need to be a P&W
2. Steel tube structure with aluminium skin still being the standard for agplanes and is actually one of the cheapest and fastest ways of aircraft building
3. So what?
4. It would be intended for another niche market
@@r.guerreiro140 Whoa, partner, I’m not against yr idea, just answering what the investor/manufacturer would have to consider. There are more nasties along the way, like can the type certification be bought, and are the drawings still around. Then manufacturing process certification and quality certification and on and on. Then the tooling. Went thru Mooney plant 15yrs ago and there are 1000s of parts in plane you don’t see. It’s daunting.
But to revive the Spartan, Probably the best way is go experimental kit with pre-molded fiberglass replica and avoid certification headaches.
When I learned to fly (1969), there was an abandoned (I never saw it move from tie down) Spartan at the airport. I hope it found some TLC. In those days, WW2 era planes were not appreciated and pampered as now. Hard to believe, there was a disassembled P51 in a crate beside the hanger…maybe 2 hours on it. The ex military hangar stored crated Allison and Packard Merlin engines and all nature of sundry parts. Best your way. Cheers.
@@r.guerreiro140 Sir Richard Branson has said the best businesses are founded out of frustration.
I say: It's your dream. You can't expect someone else to independently share the same vision and bring it to fruition... Besides. If they did, you couldn't afford a ride in it let alone the two-million dollar price tag. Buuuut if you build it you can!
Everything on the Spartan Executive is handmade and that means someone with skills has to make it. Good, Cheap, Fast - pick two. You can't have all three. If it's good and fast, it won't be cheap. If it's good and cheap it won't be fast. If it's fast and cheap it won't be good. 🥸
750hp Turbine Lancair Evolution
Fw190-A4
F8 Bearcat.
Air conditioning? Really?