I've been on the hunt for a simple taildragger for a while, and decided that something in the American Champion line would be a good fit for me. I wanted something that was simple (I have the 'complex' box checked multiple times!), tandem, tailwheel, aerobatic, and decent on grass/dirt strips. The aerobatic requirement eliminated the Cub variants, Huskies, etc, so I was pretty much left with something in the American Champion line.

Another requirement was that I had to be able to legally haul a couple of hundred pounds so I could take my son flying (I'm 6'3" 200ish, and he's 6'5" 240 and still growing!), so that eliminated the lower horsepower Citabrias and Decathlons.

I found a very nice mid 90's Super Decathlon with a gross weight upgrade kit and placed an offer on it through a broker, but I admittedly lowballed it a bit and didn't get the plane. In hindsight I was lucky I didn't get that plane since I hadn't yet discovered the plane I eventually purchased!

Browsing through Trade a Plane I stumbled on a late model Citabria 7GCBC (I now have the decoder ring and can speak "Champion") High Country Explorer. This is a 180hp airplane, with flaps, and a standard (ie not the Decathlon symmetrical) wing, and it had larger 8.50 tires.

I fell in love. The High Country Explorer was the perfect plane for me.

While camping at Oshkosh with the Pirates, I decided to call the number on the ad and see if the plane or owner happened to be at Oshkosh.

The plane wasn't, but the Quinn Anderson, the owner, was about 20 rows away from our camp! We got together a few minutes later, and it turns out Quinn is a BTer and, more importantly, a hell of a nice guy. His 10 year old daughter was with him as well, and clearly Quinn is doing a great job raising her - A great kid!

Sometimes a deal just feels right, and this one did. After talking about the plane for a bit, I made an offer and Quinn said he would sleep on it. He emailed me the next morning saying we had a deal, and we shook on it at the Pirate Party that evening.

Quinn's the kind of guy whose handshake seals a deal, and it was an incredibly straight forward sales process with no surprises at all. He is truly a man of his word, and the plane was even better than depicted.

Now that we had shaken on a deal, we had to figure out the mechanics of the pre-buy and my insurance required training. BT to the rescue again, as my dear friends Steve Guetter and Kjersti Kittelson (who own a great J35 Bonanza) offered their mechanic in Minneapolis for the prebuy. Quinn said "no problem, I'll get the plane down there" and in fact delivered it before we had fully executed the purchase agreement (did I mention he's a stand up guy?!).

Steve and Kjersti also introduced me to Hans Meyer who would do my 10 hours of insurance mandated training, and offered to let me stay at their house for the long weekend (and even gave me a car to drive!).

Once the prebuy was done, I hopped on a commercial flight to MSP on Thursday night then Ubered over to Fleming Field (KSGS) where I met up with Hans and I actually saw the plane for the first time.

Yes, I purchased a plane sight unseen, and had actually never flown this model of Citabria!

It was gorgeous, and everything Quinn had said (and more!).

After a quick brief, we launched and started my training in the fading light of a pretty summer evening.

The next day Hans and I flew the wings off of her, and logged almost 8 hours of dual. As a side benefit I got an amazing aerial tour of MN and Lake Superior (man, did we luck out on the weather!). It also turns out Hans flies an Albatross and is likely the highest time Howard 500 guy on the planet, so I got to visit that hangar and explore for a bit!

Saturday was spent with Steve and Kjersti helping them set up for the Minnesota Sea Plane Association's annual Pig Roast and having fun with airplanes.

On Sunday my time in Minnesota was drawing to a close, but I was able to fly my new plane to the MSPA Pig Roast and enjoy some great food, airplane watching, and camaraderie before I started my journey home.

Sunday and Monday were spent flying home, low and slow. I took the time to explore a number of fun grass strips including Gastons and Trigger Gap (a neat backcountry strip in Arkansas) and never got above 1,000agl. I also had to do a little weather dodging, but XM, Foreflight, etc, make it a lot easier than it used to be.

A third BT connection, Chester Jurkis, helped me with hangar space in Dallas so my pretty new bird can stay that way!

Really fun when a plan comes together, and this one certainly did. Thanks to Quinn, Steve, Kjersti, Hans, and Chester for helping!

Of course, we need pics, so here they are:


At Trigger Gap (17A) on the way home.


Fun day with Hans!


Looong day of flight training!

Thanks for the kind comments Robert, "you can be my wingman anytime"!

Loved the time I got to spend in your plane as well, congrats!

You better check... I think you may be in heaven! One thing for sure, you must be living right... nice to hear about such a great experience as this. I think that "grin picture" says it all.

Very nice! What's the useful?

I'm surprised insurance required 10 hours, though, especially with your experience.

I only had about 40 hours of tailwheel, and mostly in a Cub... I wanted $1mm smooth (and the hull value is fairly high since it's an '05) so they said "10 hours!". Turned out to be a lot of fun and definitely worthwhile.

Robert

What is your cruise speed and fuel capacity?

Also, have you done any aerobatics in it yet?

I love long cross country flights in taildraggers....just not too often!

35 gallons usable, and I figure 100kts and 10gph. Does a touch better on both, but that's "close enough".

I've done a couple of crappy rolls, but haven't flown without luggage yet so nothing over the top. For some reason the aileron rolls are eluding me and I keep ending up waaay nose down.

Robert

Congratulations Robert....beautiful airplane.

Dave

100 kts is fast compared to the 80 kts I get in my cub.

And 80 knots is fast compared to the 75 mph out of my Superstol

Congrats on the new bird Robert and a great story

That isn't really awesome Robert! Congrats!

Beautiful plane Robert! Great story too. Enjoy your new plane.

Bring that puppy over. I wanna check it out!

The Citabria 7GCAA I learned in was a pig in the aileron/ballistic roll department even with spades and the longer acro sticks. We always did a slight dive to get 120, quick pitch up to 20°+, freeze elevator at neutral and then FULL aileron... anything less than 100% was going to mean you were too nose low even with 20° up a few seconds before.

The roll is slow enough that even as a novice I learned to use a touch of top rudder and and a slight push at inverted to keep the flight path flatter. Aileron only rolls meant even more pitch up at the beginning. Keep practicing, you'll get the "feel" for rolling it.

Chuckle... yeah, I have access to a 85hp Cub, and traffic literally passes us on the highway. Fun airplane, but not useful for any sort of traveling.

Robert