August 2019 - Maybe My Last Airplane

Last month's saga continues:

A most welcome note from the northern reaches of Indiana ... an airplane once thought sold was available once more and was I still interested? The capital letters flew from my keyboard: Y E S !! And with that I was on an airliner to Indiana. 

There was a blizzard the first time I talked to someone about the airplane; this time it was heat and thunderstorms that all but washed out the county fair that was going on but the rides were ridden, the 4H ribbons were won and the Queen was crowned. The Queen also raises champion turkeys. There's nothing like rural Indiana. Solid people, honest people, in a place where old fashioned craftsmanship is the measure of a man.

The airplane is one I fell in love with about 15 years ago at a little fly-in in Florida. The owner/builder spent winters there and showed it to me with well-justified pride. He was a tool and die maker, had his own good sized company after starting out with a pencil and an easel in his living room. He was a hard worker and judging by the quality of workmanship in this airplane, likely the most meticulous airplane builder whose work I have had the privilege to admire.

Stoddard Hamilton Glastar

Sadly, the owner/builder passed on but I will thank him every time I have a chance to fly and work on this airplane. The  paperwork hurdles from the inner workings of the FAA were something else again; conflicting information abounded.  In the end I decided if I could wait all this time for what I believe could be my last airplane, I could surely wait a little longer.

Here it is, the end of August and I've been tracking the progress of the FAA Aircraft Registration Branch online. Every day they post their progress by the date paperwork was filed and finally my day arrived! I was joyous. Triumphantly, I searched my N-number only to be confronted by a notice that my airplane's status was questionable. Phone call to FAA: what's going on? I had copies of all the paperwork on the computer screen in front of me - it was all there and correct. The lady I spoke to was very nice and after digging further said the problem lay in a missing Bill of Sale from the executor to a person whose name rang no bells at all - there was no such person in the chain of ownership. A call to the title company with this news caught them completely by surprise but after a lot of back and forth the problem was rooted out and fixed. A simple clerical mistake could have thrown me back to the end of that 4-6 week line but for a persistent title company representative and a service oriented FAA examiner. I finally have clear authority in writing on an FAA form to operate the airplane until my hard copy registration comes or 120 days and that's ok by me.

Now: It's time to FLY! But . . . . .

Wouldn't you know it? It looks the same for the whole week. Thank heaven for little things that can be played with in the interim.