EAA-143 Aeronca Glider Project
The glider will look like this
The glider looks like this now
Take a close look at the second photo. At first glance you might miss it; in the background you will see the tube frame fuselage for an Aeronca motorized airplane. This is the basis for the EAA 143 Aeronca Training Glider project.
The Aeronca training glider was used during WWII to train military personnel in preparation for flying gliders. Two-hundred-fifty-three were built and delivered to the Army, several were delivered to the Navy.
The EAA-143 project, under the supervision of project leader Joe Miller, started working on this project in early 2011. The fuselage was recently trucked to Baltimore from Texas (thanks to Ulf Grabowski) and will be stripped and repainted. Certain modifications and repairs will also be incorporated: vertical stabilizer resized to a larger (and rectangular) version, third pilot seat added along with third stick and rudder pedals, and various sections repaired or replaced due to hanger rash or weather exposure.
Some of you will ask, "Why?" After all, it will take lots of work to build an actual airplane from this humble beginning. The answer is simple, in Joe Miller's own words, "It will be the only one in existence." Yes, somehow, this piece of history has been lost, and EAA-143 under Joe's guidance will resurrect the glider, a modern day mythological form of the Phoenix.
Current activity includes the following:
Project management-Joe Miller
Wing rib fabrication-John Kraft and Leo Drescher.
Tubing tabulation for fuselage extension-Dick Weger
Documentation sorting-Mort Sachs
Historiographer and photographer-Alan Gilmore, that's me :-)
My goal will be to provide periodic updates to this blog, hopefully weekly. Check in Sunday evenings, I will try to get each weeks update on this site by 6:00 pm.
Thank you for stopping by. I hope you enjoy following this one-of-a-kind aviation project!
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