EAA Sport Flying No. 20

Formerly Sport Aviation Video No. 821, originally aired on the SpeedVision network This video (available from the EAA) contains two episodes on one DVD/tape. The first episode on the tape contains a segment about the Skybolt, including interviews and flight footage with Hale Wallace and Dave Ebershoff. There are many other interesting segments in the [...]

Flying High

Air show at Blackwell Field today to honor aerobatics design pioneer (From Dothan Eagle (Alabama), 11/04/ 2003, Page 1B) By Faith Ford Photography by Mike Lewis Curtis Pitts, designer of the Pitts Special and other aircraft, will be honored with an air show at Ozark's Blackwell Field today. OZARK - In 1943, Curtis Pitts [...]

Steen Aero Lab

New millennium technology meets the biplane (From Sport Aviation, 08/2002, Page 56) By Budd Davisson Photography by Phil High and Jim Koepnick Hale Wallace's 325-hp Super Skybolt. The new Steen Aero Lab has automated the various processes involved in turning out Skybolt parts, like using a CNC machine to carve out perfect [...]

EAA Honors Sport Aviation’s Greats

EAA and NAFI Halls of Fame induct new members (From Sport Aviation, 12/1998, Page 26) The 1998 EAA Hall of Fame ceremonies took place in the Eagle Hangar of the EAA Air Adventure Museum. EAA President Tom Poberezny was master of ceremonies for the 1998 Hall of Fame inductions and an inductee, [...]

Pioneer Designers

Perspectives On The Homebuilt Movement (From Sport Aviation, 03/1988, Page 43) By David A. Gustafson Photography by David A. Gustafson Homebuilts are still the centerpiece at Oshkosh and other EAA fly-ins around the country. They share the stage with a lot of different types of aircraft, but they are, nevertheless, a focal point for the [...]

Gimme an Open Two-Seater Every Time

(From Private Pilot, 08/1973, Page 20) By Byron G. Wels FLYING HAS changed. Frankly, it's improved quite a bit, with nicely enclosed cockpits, cabin air heaters, instrumentation that reduces the risk, and airplanes that are so forgiving in nature that anybody almost can be taught to fly one. The tricycle gear, with its drive it [...]

Boom in Two-Place Baby Biplanes

(From Private Pilot, 08/1973, Page 12) By Dennis Shattuck Photography by Paul A. Wilkinson (Cover photo) WHEN YOU'RE USED to looking at Waco UPF-7s and Stearmans and Travelairs as two-place biplanes for fun and games, the current crop of diminutive two-seaters look like mosquitos along side eagles. Once you get inside, however, your view will [...]

The Knight Twister

Control-Line (CL) Model Plans (From American Aircraft Modeler, March/April 1968) By J. Triggs These plans for a control line model of the Knight Twister were published in the March/April 1968 edition of American Aircraft Modeler magazine. See also the 3-Views available on the Knight Twister specifications page.

‘Old-Timey’ Flying Helps FAAer Fulfill Promise to a Buddy

(From FAA Intercom, 09/2001) O'Haver pilots the Knight Twister to Oshkosh for the 1999 air show. (Photo by Bruce Moore) When FAA Operations Specialist Bob O'Haver flew to Pensacola, Fla., this past June to complete the sale of an airplane, he wasn't just closing a business deal. He was fulfilling the last promise [...]

The Knight Twister

(From Unknown magazine, ?? 19??, Page 60) By John W. Underwood A model 75-85 Knight Twister Junior with 15 foot wing. There is something about small biplanes that excites the flying man almost as much as a trim feminine ankle. If he happens to be an amateur builder, then for certain, sooner or later, [...]

Knight Twister – Hale Wallace’s Baby Biplane Bullet

(From Sport Aviation, 10/1999, Page 44) By Budd Davisson Photography by Mark Schaible and Hale Wallace Before there was an EAA. Before Pearl Harbor. Before monoplane fighters. Before there was a Hale Wallace there was Vernon Payne and his little airplane. The year was 1928, the airplane was the Knight Twister and, to a world [...]

Knight Twister – First Flight

Gilbert/Parker Franklin-Powered Knight Twister 'Tiny Tiger' (From Experimenter, 07/1993, Page 21) By Bob Gilbert EAA 4900 This article was reposted at http://members.tripod.com/ninetyninegolf/twister.html and http://members.tripod.com/ninetyninegolf/Page-Two.html from the July 1993 Experimenter. Knight Twister N99G by Bob Gilbert (1967). (EAA lists the same article in the July 1993 edition... may be a follow-up, clarification, or editorial?) The following [...]

Vernon Payne’s History of the Knight Twister

Written in answer to Pete Bower's write-up in [Western] Sport Flyer, March 1985 (From Vernon Payne, 05/1985) By Vernon W. Payne (Written in answer to Pete Bower's write-up in [Western] Sport Flyer, March 1985; Dave Sinclair, Publisher, P.O. Box 98786, Tacoma WA 98498-0786 - VWP) In 1928 I was working for an aircraft school in [...]

Chutzpah!

Aircraft of the EAA Air Museum Collection Prototype (From Sport Aviation, 05/1981, Page 22) By Fred B. Kacena Photography by Jack Cox By Fred B. Kacena (EAA 22880), 206 W. Park Place, Newark, DE 19711 Next to his first great love, the famous P-51, was his Knight Twister, N3TL, "Chutzpah." The late Col. Thomas MacAdoo [...]

Knight Twister Chutzpah

Rare aircraft in EAA Museum (From Sport Aviation, 01/1980, Page 15) Photography by Lee Fray (Photo by Lee Fray) This Knight Twister joins other racing aircraft in the racing section of the Museum. The new and as yet, unpainted engine cowling which Tom Love had started, will be completed by the Museum's restoration shop. [...]

Twister’s Sisters

A Pictorial Collection of Knight Twisters, Now and Then (From Homebuilt Aircraft (Air Trails), Summer 1971, Page 60) By Staff Designed by Vernon W. Payne back in 1928, the original Knight Twister offered only 15-ft span, 55-sq ft wing area and a converted 40-hp Ford auto engine. Nobody expected that combination to produce a docile mount, [...]

How Does A 100-Hour Pilot Fly A Knight Twister? Very Carefully!

(From Sport Aviation, 09/1971, Page 31) By Robert M. Uebel The lightweight Knight Twister, N-11RU, built by Robert Uebel, before the first test flight and subsequent landing gear change. (Photo by C. D. Fairbanks) By Robert M. Uebel (EAA 44423) 1345 Washington Circle Cincinnati, Ohio It all started in September of 1968, while [...]

Knight Twister ‘Imperial’

(From Sport Aviation, 06/1971, Page 16) By C.D. 'Don' Fairbanks Photography by R.W. Fyan, Jr.   THE KNIGHT TWISTER "IMPERIAL" was born at the 1968 EAA Fly-In at Rockford. Two months before, I had purchased some "beginnings" for a basic Twister (including the wing ribs, basic fuselage, landing gear, and partially completed tail section) from [...]

The Colonel’s Pretty Prairie Special

Back in the thirties it wasn't uncommon to name airplanes after cities -- like Oshkosh and Los Angeles. Colonel Unruh started his little biplane in 1937, and named it after the little town of Pretty Prairie, Kansas. Twenty nine years later, with another plane in between, the Knight Twister-based design took to the air for [...]

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