Twin Rebuild Project Update

Twin Rebuild Project Update Contributed by General Manager BGen (Ret’d) Greg Matte, CD, PhD

Last month our President, Colin Williamson, announced that the VFC Board of Directors had carefully examined a number of proposals pertaining to fleet renewal, focusing on the provision of a reliable twinengine, multi-IFR solution to the beleaguered problems we’ve experienced with our Piper Twin Seminole over the last 18 months. The unanimous decision was to proceed with an in-house rebuild of a Beechcraft Travel Air 95 under the expert supervision of our PRM and his AME team.

By way of an update, we have secured WCB from a private Canadian owner, and are having the plane shipped to us from Penhold, AB. It will have arrived at the VFC by the time you read this article. Coincidentally, our PRM (Murray Palmer) actually flew WCB many times whilst he was employed with Buffalo Airways out of Yellowknife and Hay River, NWT. As such, he knows the plane well. We’ve also secured a couple used sea containers that will assist in storing parts of the aircraft as the rebuild project gets under way, and also purchased an old metal lathe that will be instrumental in fabricating some of the nuts, bolts, fasteners and other items that

will be necessary as the rebuild progresses.

As Colin mentioned last month, the end-result of this rebuild project is that the VFC will witness the transformation of a non-airworthy 1960 aircraft into a fully airworthy, Transport Canada certified training aircraft with a zerotime airframe, engine and propeller hours. In addition to a half-glass cockpit, the plan includes adding a longer, more aerodynamic nose as well as anti-icing features (wing boots, propeller deicing, and windshield de-icing). All in all, this rebuild project will transform an initial $30k investment into an aircraft that will likely be worth over $450k.

Given the significant reduction in normal flying operations due to COVID-19, the timing for this rebuild project couldn’t be better. We’re very fortunate to have a team of 4 licenced AMEs (with a 5th on the cusp of getting his AME licence), as well as a fully certified, in-house, engine overhaul capability on the Lycoming 360 (which we’ll install on the Beechcraft, and which exists on our Cessna fleet). Given that we’ve reduced the fleet to only 4 Cessnas being fully insured for flight

(to save in our insurance costs), this also greatly reduces the amount of time that our AME’s will need to spend on repairs and inspections on the Cessnas for the next while. Furthermore, over the course of the past eight months, our PRM undertook a comprehensive inspection on the entire Cessna fleet so as to baseline their individual conditions, while also proactively addressing previously undetected maintenance issues.

Consequently, the AMO team will be able to focus on this rebuild so as to complete it with minimal delays over the coming months. Furthermore, our PRM is concurrently undertaking the necessary steps to update our MCM and MPM documents as a major step towards bringing the plane into airworthiness status and ensuring it’s certified for flight training operations. The end result will be a shiny “new” and reliable training platform for our members. We’ll keep you posted on the progress of the rebuild each month via the Patrician.