Festival Flypast 2016

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The afternoon of Sunday, July 24 brought very changeable weather to Red Lake that was literally sunny one minute then raining the next.  There was some doubt if the flypast would go ahead as the aircraft taxied out around 5 PM and another downpour occurred just as they were organizing for take-off.  Fortunately it cleared enough for the group to depart southwest bound over Howey bay in windy conditions.  A large right circuit followed as they flew over Centennial park then low and fast going north over the bay to the delight of the crowd.  A second pass followed, then landing back at the take-off area.  This was the line-up;

Chimo Air Norseman CF-JIN in the lead.

Trout Lake Lodge Norseman CF-ZMX.

Chimo Air Norseman CF-KAO.

Chimo Air Cessna 180 CF-SMS.

Viking Outposts De Havilland DHC-2 Beaver C-GGMB.  (piston)

Excellent Adventures De Havilland DHC-3 Otter C-FBEO with ‘original’ 600 HP Pratt & Whitney R-1340.

Amik Outposts De Havilland DHC-3 Otter C-FHXY with 1,000 HP PZL engine.

Chimo Air De Havilland DHC-3 Turbine Otter C-FODQ.

Superior Airways Cessna 208 Caravan C-FYMT on amphibious floats.

A Beech 18 was also planned to participate but had to cancel due to the inclement weather in the greater area.

A big thank you to the pilots and all involved who faced the challenge and put on an exciting flypast to cap off the fun for this edition of the Norseman festival!

Metal Makeover

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In simple terms, the Norseman airframe is mostly made of steel tubing with a wood wing structure and fabric covering. Over half a century ago there were a couple projects that changed this to metal being primary like the aircraft designs that followed the Norseman.  Today only light sport/utility airplanes use the “rag and tube” and wood is a foreign material for critical components, so the Norseman is truly from a different era.

Perhaps even the focused Norseman enthusiast is not aware that a prototype Mk VII was flown in the early 1950’s. It had metal wings and empennage, was stretched 3 feet and retained the same Pratt & Whitney R-1340 engine. However, this derivative never achieved certification so never went into production and the sole example was destroyed in a hangar fire at Fort William, Ontario in November 1957.

The other project was more straight forward and involved metallizing the fuselage skin of serial number 224 and using a metal wing instead of wood and fabric.  This was developed by C. R. Ursall of San Antonio, Texas, but once again only a single example was produced.  In 1967, this metal Mk VI came to Canada and was registered as CF-UUD.  Another interesting feature unique to UUD is the oversized cargo door on the left side and the removal of the corresponding right door, thought to be for keeping structural integrity.  Forward to the 1980’s and UUD’s metal wing was transferred to the metalized fuselage of C-FOBE, serial 480 and thus it became the only metal Norseman in the world until a crash at Birch lake on July 3, 2004.

A few other Norseman have had their fuselage skin changed to metal, but they are currently not active, so the “all metal” Norseman is no longer flying and CF-UUD is thought to be the only metal fuselage Norseman flying today.  All this to say that UUD (serial 224) was recently sold at auction, deleted from the Canadian register,  and has returned to the United States to be reborn as N164UC.

IMG_0544Above photo taken on April 19, 2016 at Red Deer airport, Alberta.  Now N164UC, note removal of aft cabin windows and wheel/skis.

 

NORSEMAN SALE!!!

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Ever dreamed of owning your own Noorduyn Norseman?  The seller is motivated to find a new home for either CF-JEC or CF-GJN.  Contact Ryan Berryman, 587-433-2972, now.

Airworthy Norseman

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At the bottom of the page titled About the Noorduyn Norseman, the airworthy list has been recently updated and shows 16 active airworthy Norseman in the world today. While this number is down, there are many restorations ongoing and the warbird community of Norseman appears to be growing. The largest single customer for the Norseman was the United States Army Air Force during World War II accounting for approximately 83% of total production!

As a private owner/operator the type is rather expensive to fly and commercially a handful continue to shuttle between northern lakes.  Keep ’em flying!