Category Archives: Bird of the Week

By:      Norm Goyer Grumman certainly built some outstanding aircraft including the F4F Wildcat, F6F Hellcat, TBF Avenger, F7F Tigercat, F8F Bearcat, F9F Panther and on and on. But, their early aircraft, with the exception of the pre-war twin engine Widgeon … Continue reading →

By:      Norm Goyer One of the very first practical helicopters was built in Germany in the early 1930s  by Professor Henrich Focke. Focke first experimented with rotary wing development with his licensed copy of the Cierva Autogyro. He had … Continue reading →

By:      Norm Goyer I know that anyone who really wants to fly can attain his or her goals by creative pursuance of current aviation practices and policies. You need to know what you don’t need to learn to fly, that’s … Continue reading →

By:      Norm Goyer Over the years there has been some very interesting gull wing airplanes and some unusual ones. But, why a gull wing? Let’s look at some of the most well known and some rare gull wing aircraft. My … Continue reading →

By:       Norm Goyer England depended on a series of Hawker biplane fighters between the wars; some models fought into World War II as well. In fact  biplane Fairey Swordfish torpedo bombers  were heavily involved in the sinking of the Bismark. … Continue reading →

By:      Norm Goyer Okay, guys and gals, here is a single place low wing which you probably can buy and fly for under $7000. No kidding, these are great little planes designed by the master homebuilder Pete Bowers who honed … Continue reading →

By:      Norm Goyer The Yankee AA-1 is one of the most economical two passenger certified aircraft available on the used market. It not only makes a great puddle jumper Sunday flier, it is easy to maintain and great fun to … Continue reading →

By:      Norm Goyer Thanks Wikipedia for the facts about  CPT and V-5 Learn to Fly government programs. NG This week’s Under the Radar Column revisited the various GI Bill flying programs from 1944 to 2011. These were and are … Continue reading →

By:      Norm Goyer While doing research for an article on the history of air racing I stumbled on a wide variety of interesting tidbits regarding the very large international air racing scene during the early 1920s. The battle of aviation … Continue reading →

By:      Norm Goyer The Travel Air Model R was designed and built by employees of the Travel Air Company, mostly on their own time. When the company finally agreed to finance the remaining work an all out effort was put … Continue reading →