N98P, the first Cherokee II to fly, has recently been sold and is heading to its new home in Idaho next week. I'm excited that it is going to a new home and am looking forward to seeing it get back in the air. 98P was built by Frank Kerns and was ready to fly before Stan Hall's own Cherokee, N63P.
While talking to the new owner he asked about the paint scheme. All the pictures I had ever seen of 98P from its first flights were black and white. However, longtime SSA member Bertha Ryan was mentioned in the article Stan wrote about his first flight in 98P. She was flying her kit built 1-26 on the same day. By the way Ross Briegleb was up that day in his BG-12. Quite a day for homebuilt soaring! Bertha had some old slides showing 98P and sent them to me. The first two show Stan (in the hat) and others after the first flight of 98P.
The following slide from Bertha was taken after Stan finished his first 5 hour flight in his own Cherokee, N63P. Very cool and thanks Bertha!
We did get some more work done on 53T on Sunday. I worked with the plane for a while getting the new trailing edge trimmed down to shape. It is looking good now. Bad news was that I managed to break a couple ribs in the process. Good news is that one of them was the new big rib which will be easy to replace. Not to mention it was a little oversized anyway. Also the existing rib that broke was the worst offender as far as being twisted from the airbrake return spring and now it will be much easier to get a nice looking straight rib in that location :) So now I know what will be waiting for me after the holidays.
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