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 Post subject: Fairchild C123 provider
PostPosted: 31 Oct 2021, 09:37 
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I ran across this collection of enjoyable C123 flying short stories by Ralph Grigg in Air Facts:

https://airfactsjournal.com/author/ralphgrigg/

He was very resourceful and got-R-done.

I feel privileged to have had the opportunity of owning and flying one.


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 Post subject: Re: Fairchild C123 provider
PostPosted: 03 Nov 2021, 13:03 
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Thanks....i really enjoy his stories.

You 'owned' one? Very cool. I would have wanted to be your fuel supplier!

Care to share the story that goes along with why you needed C123? Sounds interesting.

Mark


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 Post subject: Re: Fairchild C123 provider
PostPosted: 03 Nov 2021, 15:25 
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I want one.


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 Post subject: Re: Fairchild C123 provider
PostPosted: 03 Nov 2021, 20:42 
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Username Protected wrote:
I ran across this collection of enjoyable C123 flying short stories by Ralph Grigg in Air Facts:

https://airfactsjournal.com/author/ralphgrigg/

He was very resourceful and got-R-done.

I feel privileged to have had the opportunity of owning and flying one.


The early models had just radial engines and later models had two radial engines and two turbojet engines. Can you tell us a bit about how the dissimilar engine types were used/managed for flight?


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 Post subject: Re: Fairchild C123 provider
PostPosted: 03 Nov 2021, 20:55 
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Username Protected wrote:
I want one.


I think you can fit a nice Minnie Winnie in one. :) Would make for a heluva story. :)

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 Post subject: Re: Fairchild C123 provider
PostPosted: 03 Nov 2021, 22:15 
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Username Protected wrote:
Thanks....i really enjoy his stories.

You 'owned' one? Very cool. I would have wanted to be your fuel supplier!

Care to share the story that goes along with why you needed C123? Sounds interesting.

Mark


OK

Luckily it had over 2,000 gallons of fuel in it when I purchased it. It was quite an adventure and a bit of a long story so I’ll start with how I acquired it and post more when I have time about surviving hurricane Andrew, prepping it for the ferry flight, the battles over ferrying it, flying it home just in time for the “Storm of the Century “, selling it, working with the new owners, seeing it being trucked up I95 recently etc. I’ll try not to bore y’all.

I was purchasing quite a few drug seized aircraft in the late 80s to sell or part out. They were all stored at Red Aircraft at KFLL. I had become friends with the guy that managed the seized aircraft and the FBO owner where they were stored. The C123K was a fixture there and had been parked for about 8 years. I had no interest in it as I knew it was out of my league. It finally was scheduled for auction along with a C-175 and an Aerostar. A couple days before the sale I got a call from my friend that managed the sales. He told me that not a single person had come for the inspection day for the 123 and I should consider buying it as it was likely going to sell “real” cheap.

I was good friends with Harry Doan, the Warbird collector, at my home airport of New Smyrna Beach. Harry had previously owned a C123K that he had sold to Barry Seal, later bought back and subsequently sold again to Southern Air Transport before being shot down dropping AK47s to the Contras in Nicaragua. I hung out at his hangar a lot and had coincidentally known Seal while working line service in Baton Rouge. I also became friends with James “Woody” Woodhall that worked for Harry. Woody had been a C123 crew chief and had served in Vietnam. I got to sit in Harry’s 123 during engine runs and Harry showed me the camera mount that was used during the whole crazy affair with Seal, the Sandinistas and the Cartel leaders. (By the way the Tom Cruise movie is 90% made up Hollywood BS). I lived next to the airport and heard the unmistakable sound of the 123 coming and going in the middle of the night numerous times during the period when Seal was using it and basing it on Harry’s ramp. Harry had told me about staying in his hangar apartment overnight trying to figure out what was going on after he learned their schedule patterns. Seal would always leave him cash along with a large tip to have it topped for the next mission. It was usually gone for two days and each time it arrived or departed a Lear and a bunch of government cars would be there to meet it.

I wanted to purchase the Aerostar and the Cessna at the Customs auction and I didn’t think I would have near enough money to buy the C123K nor did I have a clue what to do with it besides selling it to Harry. He would have known what I paid and probably not let me make much off of him. The sale was scheduled the day before Daytona Bike Week started and I knew Harry was not aware of it because he would have asked me to fly down with him. I used to fly his Baron with him to the Starman Bros. and other aviation auctions. We got along well because we had a connection in dealing with salvage as he got his start in military surplus salvage. He had a yard full of H19s and S58s and used to do rides for tourists off the Main Street pier. Harry made enough money on his bars, restaurants and the Main St. Pier during spring break and bike week to support his Warbird habit all year. He had 50,000 sq’ of hangar space packed with warbirds and projects.

Harry had recently purchased an Island with an overgrown airstrip in the middle of Crescent Lake. I used to go there with him on weekends and he hired a few of my employees to help clear the runway. I was managing it for him. I had been unsuccessfully trying to get him to sell me an abandoned fish camp with a dilapidated dock that fronted the airstrip. I had a Lake Amphib at the time.

The night before the auction I went by Harry’s house to drink some scotch with him. He didn’t bring up the auction so I knew he had not seen the C123 sale advertised. After a few drinks I asked him how much he would pay for a ferriable C123. He quickly answered “$100,000. if it was K and I had the money”. The “if I had the money” part was a ruse. He kind of reminded me of Mr. Hainey from Green Acres when negotiating-kinda looked like him too.

I presented a proposal to him. If I turned him on to one-and it was a “K” and he gets it for under 100K then he has to give me title to the abandoned fish camp on Bear Island or agree to give me 10% of the gross proceeds when the 123 sold-regardless of how much he had invested in it. If it sold at auction for over 100K and he still purchased it then I could eat and drink in any of his bars and restaurants forever and he didn’t owe me anything else. He whined a little but agreed and we shook on it. His wife Teresa was there and laughed at us.

I told him to meet me at his Hangar at 8 AM and I would have his Baron ready. I didn’t give him any details until we pulled up and I parked next to the 123 at FLL. He looked at it briefly and we walked through it. It was as nice or nicer than the one he previously owned. I borrowed a car from Clay at Red Aircraft and drove to the port where the sale was held. The two aircraft I wanted went first and they brought more than I wanted to pay. Then the 123 came up and only brought an unbelievable $11,500. I, Harry and everyone else there were dumbfounded. I was pissed at myself because I was sitting there with 30K cash in my pockets. To add insult to injury my friend that ran the sale came up to me with a furniture dolly stacked with file boxes while Harry was settling up in full with the little bit of cash that he had brought for the required “deposit”. The boxes were full of the “just found” complete set of records for the 123 from day one. Both of the R2800-99Ws were low time (one with less than 100 hrs) and both of the J-85s were also very low time since “new”. US Customs initially followed up to Harry and tried to rescind the sale so things probably worked out for the best due to Harry’s clout. I wasn’t on the best of terms with Customs at the time and they would have probably squashed me by re-seizing it or something.

Sadly, we lost Harry when he went of the end of the runway in his Skyraider at the Tyco air show a month or two later. Harry’s widow Teresa called me soon after and knowing about our deal asked what I proposed. She told me that some of Harry’s friends were telling her since there was nothing in writing with me that she should just sell it to them. We agreed on a price that was a few times what he paid for it and I was OK with it.

Here is a previous post pasted from the “stupid things you’ve done thread” about my first attempt to taxi it (I should have quit while I was ahead):

Not to hog this thread (I could fill pages here) but the last story reminded me of another similarly stupid thing that I did but on a larger scale. I purchased a Fairchild C123K that had been sitting for 8 years. It was parked opposite a PBY Catalina at the Ft Lauderdale International airport. I was over anxious to run it up and taxi it in prep for a ferry flight. I had someone calling the checklist for me the first time. After I started both recips he called “turn off aux hydraulic and check pressure” which I did. As I moved forward I checked the nose wheel steering with the tiller wheel and then subsequently tapped the brakes to check them. I did not know that the aileron deice boot pump that also pressurized the main hydraulic reservoir (to prevent the high up engine driven pumps from cavitating) was inop. Unbeknownst to me the engine driven pumps then cavitated and the nose wheel steering went dead as I was initiating a hard 90 degree turn so I pressed the brakes. Right to the floor! Turns out that they were on an accumulator that gave one application and I had already used it up testing them! Meanwhile I was moving quickly straight towards the parked PBY directly in front of me. My last resort to prevent a catastrophic collision was to lift the power levers and reverse the props to attempt to stop. One of the untested IOC motor was stuck and the other functioned so the left engine throttled up in reverse pitch hard while the right throttled up in forward pitch hard. With a very loud 4000 HP roar the aircraft pivoted with the nose gear full 90 degrees left in a second! The only thing I could do was pull the mixtures and shut the mags off. The 110 ft wing span beast spun 270 degrees in an instant. It happened so fast and when it slowed I was afraid to look out as I thought there would be PBY nose shrapnel from the 13 ft diameter prop everywhere. Luckily the Rt wing went over the Catalina cabin striking the prop dome while the spinning prop barely missed the nose. The aircraft finally came to a stop just before contacting my truck and trailer with jacks on it. After riding out hurricane Andrew chained to the I-595 overpass with a Cadillac parked in the back I had an epic battle with the FAA obtaining a ferry permit and ferried it home to New Smyrna, refurbished it and sold it.


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 Post subject: Re: Fairchild C123 provider
PostPosted: 04 Nov 2021, 00:22 
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Location: 13FA Earle Airpark FL/0A7 Hville NC
Aircraft: E33/152A
Username Protected wrote:
I ran across this collection of enjoyable C123 flying short stories by Ralph Grigg in Air Facts:

https://airfactsjournal.com/author/ralphgrigg/

He was very resourceful and got-R-done.

I feel privileged to have had the opportunity of owning and flying one.


The early models had just radial engines and later models had two radial engines and two turbojet engines. Can you tell us a bit about how the dissimilar engine types were used/managed for flight?



The jets were typically used for takeoff and initial climb with heavy payload only. Other than that they were just defuelers. They ran on avgas. They were J-85s (military equivalent to the GE CJ -610s used on the early Learjets). They were operated by rotary switches in the overhead panel and were very simple with an open (for inlet shutter), start, run, stop and shutter position if I recall correctly. They were throttled with a pair of toggles on the power quadrant. The throttles were almost explosive as they were basically on/off. No such thing as partial power. They had an incredible amount of thrust and would drag the aircraft across the tarmac with the brakes locked. I flew it with one jet at 100% and the other shuttered and both recips at simulated feather and it maintained altitude fine. I was amazed that one tiny jet could carry the barn sized aircraft through the air.

All K models were converted B models and had anti lock brakes, angle of attack indicators and a few other upgrades.

There were four tanks-the 900 gallon nacelles behind the firewalls and a pair of 300 gallon external drop tanks. All four were on bomb racks and could be dropped by actuating the four guarded switches in the overhead panel turning the aircraft into a glider.

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 Post subject: Re: Fairchild C123 provider
PostPosted: 04 Nov 2021, 08:26 
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Username Protected wrote:
Thanks....i really enjoy his stories.

You 'owned' one? Very cool. I would have wanted to be your fuel supplier!

Care to share the story that goes along with why you needed C123? Sounds interesting.

Mark


OK

Luckily it had over 2,000 gallons of fuel in it when I purchased it. It was quite an adventure and a bit of a long story so I’ll start with how I acquired it and post more when I have time about surviving hurricane Andrew, prepping it for the ferry flight, the battles over ferrying it, flying it home just in time for the “Storm of the Century “, selling it, working with the new owners, seeing it being trucked up I95 recently etc. I’ll try not to bore y’all.

I was purchasing quite a few drug seized aircraft in the late 80s to sell or part out. They were all stored at Red Aircraft at KFLL. I had become friends with the guy that managed the seized aircraft and the FBO owner where they were stored. The C123K was a fixture there and had been parked for about 8 years. I had no interest in it as I knew it was out of my league. It finally was scheduled for auction along with a C-175 and an Aerostar. A couple days before the sale I got a call from my friend that managed the sales. He told me that not a single person had come for the inspection day for the 123 and I should consider buying it as it was likely going to sell “real” cheap.

I was good friends with Harry Doan, the Warbird collector, at my home airport of New Smyrna Beach. Harry had previously owned a C123K that he had sold to Barry Seal, later bought back and subsequently sold again to Southern Air Transport before being shot down dropping AK47s to the Contras in Nicaragua. I hung out at his hangar a lot and had coincidentally known Seal while working line service in Baton Rouge. I also became friends with James “Woody” Woodhall that worked for Harry. Woody had been a C123 crew chief and had served in Vietnam. I got to sit in Harry’s 123 during engine runs and Harry showed me the camera mount that was used during the whole crazy affair with Seal, the Sandinistas and the Cartel leaders. (By the way the Tom Cruise movie is 90% made up Hollywood BS). I lived next to the airport and heard the unmistakable sound of the 123 coming and going in the middle of the night numerous times during the period when Seal was using it and basing it on Harry’s ramp. Harry had told me about staying in his hangar apartment overnight trying to figure out what was going on after he learned their schedule patterns. Seal would always leave him cash along with a large tip to have it topped for the next mission. It was usually gone for two days and each time it arrived or departed a Lear and a bunch of government cars would be there to meet it.

I wanted to purchase the Aerostar and the Cessna at the Customs auction and I didn’t think I would have near enough money to buy the C123K nor did I have a clue what to do with it besides selling it to Harry. He would have known what I paid and probably not let me make much off of him. The sale was scheduled the day before Daytona Bike Week started and I knew Harry was not aware of it because he would have asked me to fly down with him. I used to fly his Baron with him to the Starman Bros. and other aviation auctions. We got along well because we had a connection in dealing with salvage as he got his start in military surplus salvage. He had a yard full of H19s and S58s and used to do rides for tourists off the Main Street pier. Harry made enough money on his bars, restaurants and the Main St. Pier during spring break and bike week to support his Warbird habit all year. He had 50,000 sq’ of hangar space packed with warbirds and projects.

Harry had recently purchased an Island with an overgrown airstrip in the middle of Crescent Lake. I used to go there with him on weekends and he hired a few of my employees to help clear the runway. I was managing it for him. I had been unsuccessfully trying to get him to sell me an abandoned fish camp with a dilapidated dock that fronted the airstrip. I had a Lake Amphib at the time.

The night before the auction I went by Harry’s house to drink some scotch with him. He didn’t bring up the auction so I knew he had not seen the C123 sale advertised. After a few drinks I asked him how much he would pay for a ferriable C123. He quickly answered “$100,000. if it was K and I had the money”. The “if I had the money” part was a ruse. He kind of reminded me of Mr. Hainey from Green Acres when negotiating-kinda looked like him too.

I presented a proposal to him. If I turned him on to one-and it was a “K” and he gets it for under 100K then he has to give me title to the abandoned fish camp on Bear Island or agree to give me 10% of the gross proceeds when the 123 sold-regardless of how much he had invested in it. If it sold at auction for over 100K and he still purchased it then I could eat and drink in any of his bars and restaurants forever and he didn’t owe me anything else. He whined a little but agreed and we shook on it. His wife Teresa was there and laughed at us.

I told him to meet me at his Hangar at 8 AM and I would have his Baron ready. I didn’t give him any details until we pulled up and I parked next to the 123 at FLL. He looked at it briefly and we walked through it. It was as nice or nicer than the one he previously owned. I borrowed a car from Clay at Red Aircraft and drove to the port where the sale was held. The two aircraft I wanted went first and they brought more than I wanted to pay. Then the 123 came up and only brought an unbelievable $11,500. I, Harry and everyone else there were dumbfounded. I was pissed at myself because I was sitting there with 30K cash in my pockets. To add insult to injury my friend that ran the sale came up to me with a furniture dolly stacked with file boxes while Harry was settling up in full with the little bit of cash that he had brought for the required “deposit”. The boxes were full of the “just found” complete set of records for the 123 from day one. Both of the R2800-99Ws were low time (one with less than 100 hrs) and both of the J-85s were also very low time since “new”. US Customs initially followed up to Harry and tried to rescind the sale so things probably worked out for the best due to Harry’s clout. I wasn’t on the best of terms with Customs at the time and they would have probably squashed me by re-seizing it or something.

Sadly, we lost Harry when he went of the end of the runway in his Skyraider at the Tyco air show a month or two later. Harry’s widow Teresa called me soon after and knowing about our deal asked what I proposed. She told me that some of Harry’s friends were telling her since there was nothing in writing with me that she should just sell it to them. We agreed on a price that was a few times what he paid for it and I was OK with it.

Here is a previous post pasted from the “stupid things you’ve done thread” about my first attempt to taxi it (I should have quit while I was ahead):

Not to hog this thread (I could fill pages here) but the last story reminded me of another similarly stupid thing that I did but on a larger scale. I purchased a Fairchild C123K that had been sitting for 8 years. It was parked opposite a PBY Catalina at the Ft Lauderdale International airport. I was over anxious to run it up and taxi it in prep for a ferry flight. I had someone calling the checklist for me the first time. After I started both recips he called “turn off aux hydraulic and check pressure” which I did. As I moved forward I checked the nose wheel steering with the tiller wheel and then subsequently tapped the brakes to check them. I did not know that the aileron deice boot pump that also pressurized the main hydraulic reservoir (to prevent the high up engine driven pumps from cavitating) was inop. Unbeknownst to me the engine driven pumps then cavitated and the nose wheel steering went dead as I was initiating a hard 90 degree turn so I pressed the brakes. Right to the floor! Turns out that they were on an accumulator that gave one application and I had already used it up testing them! Meanwhile I was moving quickly straight towards the parked PBY directly in front of me. My last resort to prevent a catastrophic collision was to lift the power levers and reverse the props to attempt to stop. One of the untested IOC motor was stuck and the other functioned so the left engine throttled up in reverse pitch hard while the right throttled up in forward pitch hard. With a very loud 4000 HP roar the aircraft pivoted with the nose gear full 90 degrees left in a second! The only thing I could do was pull the mixtures and shut the mags off. The 110 ft wing span beast spun 270 degrees in an instant. It happened so fast and when it slowed I was afraid to look out as I thought there would be PBY nose shrapnel from the 13 ft diameter prop everywhere. Luckily the Rt wing went over the Catalina cabin striking the prop dome while the spinning prop barely missed the nose. The aircraft finally came to a stop just before contacting my truck and trailer with jacks on it. After riding out hurricane Andrew chained to the I-595 overpass with a Cadillac parked in the back I had an epic battle with the FAA obtaining a ferry permit and ferried it home to New Smyrna, refurbished it and sold it.


Great story! Do you know the current whereabouts of this aircraft?

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 Post subject: Re: Fairchild C123 provider
PostPosted: 04 Nov 2021, 12:21 
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Location: 13FA Earle Airpark FL/0A7 Hville NC
Aircraft: E33/152A
The Registration # is N681DG. 681 is the serial # and DG is for Darryl Greenamyer. It was named “Chubby Boy” and labeled as such on the panel. Harry’s was “The Fat Lady”. Greenamyer had purchased it (likely in Honduras) from the government to use in the B29 “Kee Bird” salvage attempt chronicled below. Rumor has it that it is the second one he purchased as he crashed the first one attempting a single pilot take off from a narrow jungle runway in a cross wind in Honduras. They were there supporting the Contras. I can see how that could happen with the narrow gear and huge wing span. We got sea legs working on it in the wind when parked. A normal takeoff is at least a 3 hand operation with the nose tiller wheel, power settings and separate jet throttle switches. You could not let go of the ailerons and the steering wheel was on the left side of the control yoke. For some reason Greenamyer sold the aircraft and used a Caribou instead. I regret never reaching out to him to get the story from him.

https://youtu.be/mPQ6KRXvYtI

Shortly after Greenamyer sold it the aircraft was seized, at Opa Locka I believe. It was loaded up with some appliances, a small motorcycle and miscellaneous items that were still in it when I bought it. I was told that it was seized for falsified export paperwork and that it was likely going to one of the drug cartels.

It changed hands about 5 times after I owned it and was again seized in South Fl., apparently in a sting operation. Wally Fisk owned it for a while and had removed the jets and installed them on his other 123 “The Cat House”.

The Hagerstown Air Museum had purchased it at auction and was preparing it for a ferry flight. I believe that it was built in Hagerstown. About a year ago I was driving south on I95 and was very surprised to see it coming up the interstate on a caravan of oversized load trucks. I never imagined that it would be feasible to truck the aircraft. I called the museum and they told me that it was almost ready to fly and they had Don Whittington run it for them. It got the typical stack fire during the start but they had a large firewall panel removed. The fire ignited the years of oil residue that had built up behind the firewall and did some structural damage before they got it out. They are hoping to restore it to airworthy condition. They sent me the pics posted below. There is another airworthy 123 in Pa. named “Thunder Pig”. It played “The Fat Lady” in the movie “American Made”


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Last edited on 04 Nov 2021, 16:06, edited 1 time in total.

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 Post subject: Re: Fairchild C123 provider
PostPosted: 04 Nov 2021, 12:40 
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Very interesting, I'm familiar with the K model languishing at TICO and thought perhaps it was the same one.


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 Post subject: Re: Fairchild C123 provider
PostPosted: 04 Nov 2021, 13:28 
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Username Protected wrote:
Very interesting, I'm familiar with the K model languishing at TICO and thought perhaps it was the same one.


That one belongs to the now defunct “Air America Foundation”. It is pretty much junk. Before the founder died I donated a huge inventory of new 123 parts to them that I got from Venezuela. They cut up there B models when they learned they were used in operation Ranch Hand spraying agent Orange in Vietnam. They were contaminated. Unfortunately I sold mine before I acquired the inventory. I had about a dozen QEC engines and a couple shipping containers full of new parts. I sold a lot of the parts to Wild Bill in Alaska. Unfortunately he later died in one of his 123s near Denali. That one was previously used in a number of movies including Conair when the Reddicks owned it. They mounted a forward fuselage section to an operational school bus chassis for the never ending crash scene. I sold a number of nose gears and actuators to them as they kept failing on them.

I just watched the YouTube movie again that I posted the link to above. I’ll bet the crash story Darryl was telling in the tent was the previous 123 crash. Apparently it was in Panama not Honduras. I was just remembering what Harry Doan had told me and he knew him.


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 Post subject: Re: Fairchild C123 provider
PostPosted: 04 Nov 2021, 14:00 
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I saw the K model at Tico fly at the annual airshow there in the early 90's. At that time, there was a fairly extensive spares/rotables package with that aircraft,including QECs.
Not sure what happened to all that, but as you said, she is in poor shape now. Many K models were sprayers.


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 Post subject: Re: Fairchild C123 provider
PostPosted: 04 Nov 2021, 14:02 
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I remember seeing that airplane sitting in FXE when I worked there. Always thought it looked like a neat airplane.


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 Post subject: Re: Fairchild C123 provider
PostPosted: 04 Nov 2021, 15:32 
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There was one based at Houston Hobby in the early/mid '80s. Any idea where that one ended up?


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 Post subject: Re: Fairchild C123 provider
PostPosted: 04 Nov 2021, 18:57 
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Username Protected wrote:
There were four tanks-the 900 gallon nacelles behind the firewalls and a pair of 300 gallon external drop tanks. All four were on bomb racks and could be dropped by actuating the four guarded switches in the overhead panel turning the aircraft into a glider.

Chase originally designed it to be a glider!

One of the USCG graybeards told me that it was the only aircraft type that flew as a glider, recip, jet and turboprop. Also apparently the first jet transport flown by USAF.

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.Wentworth_85x100.JPG.
.ei-85x150.jpg.
.MountainAirframe.jpg.
.avionwealth-85x50.png.
.blackhawk-85x100-2019-09-25.jpg.
.airmart-85x150.png.
.headsetsetc_Small_85x50.jpg.
.Foreflight_85x50_color.png.
.planelogix-85x100-2015-04-15.jpg.
.stanmusikame-85x50.jpg.
.wat-85x50.jpg.
.AAI.jpg.
.concorde.jpg.
.wilco-85x100.png.
.lucysaviation-85x50.png.
.chairmanaviation-85x50.jpg.
.Wingman 85x50.png.
.aviationdesigndouble.jpg.
.boomerang-85x50-2023-12-17.png.
.jandsaviation-85x50.jpg.
.shortnnumbers-85x100.png.
.kingairacademy-85x100.png.
.jetacq-85x50.jpg.
.avfab-85x50-2018-12-04.png.
.aircraftassociates-85x50.png.
.midwest2.jpg.
.kadex-85x50.jpg.
.ssv-85x50-2023-12-17.jpg.
.dbm.jpg.
.traceaviation-85x150.png.
.aeroled-85x50-2022-12-06.jpg.
.blackwell-85x50.png.
.cav-85x50.jpg.
.kingairnation-85x50.png.
.saint-85x50.jpg.
.camguard.jpg.