What Plane Should I Buy? Triple-Engine Edition

Challenged

Challenged

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There's the Ford Tri-Motor, there's the Falcon 7x. Are there are a bunch of other three-engine airplane options? *Edit* Yes there are, but not sure if any are reasonable for someone of normal airplane ownership means. Some sort of tri-motor cri-cri?
 
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If you're into classics, you can't go wrong with the original "three-holer." Either the 727-200 (or -100 if you don't need the extra volume and you want the "sports car" version). Now you will have to hire someone to sit sideways behind you to turn the heat down or up, depending on how you feel. Based on my experience, that's once every 90 seconds. Also be sure whoever is sitting in the right seat slides their chair back with extreme force at the exact moment I'm trying to pour a cup of coffee so I spill all over my crosswo... important paperwork.

If you want something more modern, go the MD-11 route. You'll save on having a flight engineer and be able to control your own damn temperature.

Personally, I've never met anyone who has flown the L-1011 and not gushed over that plane. That's what I would get.
 
Slip a Garmin 345 in there and all done.

So, would that be a $10,000 hamburger if you took it out on a Sat morning?
 
Technically 5 engines at start up, but mostly 3 engines.

599041main_EC77-8852_full.jpg
 
WDD said:
So, would that be a $10,000 hamburger if you took it out on a Sat morning?
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I think the fuel + engine fund would make it more like a $50,000 run. And getting in/out of CGE (Cambridge, MD for those who don't like to look up airport identifiers) for breakfast at Katie's would be a challenge.

Some other highlights:
"Two Class NEW airline interior installed 2017" So new interior. Nice. My wife will like that.
"2017 OWNERS SPENT ABOUT $5,000,000 TO BRING EVERYTHING UP TO DATE AND TO INSTALL Airline interior. Has only flown about 100 hours since then" Only 100 hours... hmm.. hope there isn't cam corrosion due to sitting too long.

And the engines seem to be pretty high-time. I'll have to check with our A&P to see what the overhaul cost would be. We would probably look to do a field OH rather than ship them back to.... holy hell - Pratt & Whitney???
 
MD-11 would be my pick.
 
Deelee said:
And the engines seem to be pretty high-time. I'll have to check with our A&P to see what the overhaul cost would be. We would probably look to do a field OH rather than ship them back to.... holy hell - Pratt & Whitney???
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Huh? Those engines are very low time.
 
Yeah the joke was comparing them to a single piston engine aircraft. But I guess for a turbojet they are low time.... I actually have no clue what is high or low time on those aircraft.
 
Deelee said:
I think the fuel + engine fund would make it more like a $50,000 run. And getting in/out of CGE (Cambridge, MD for those who don't like to look up airport identifiers) for breakfast at Katie's would be a challenge.

Some other highlights:
"Two Class NEW airline interior installed 2017" So new interior. Nice. My wife will like that.
"2017 OWNERS SPENT ABOUT $5,000,000 TO BRING EVERYTHING UP TO DATE AND TO INSTALL Airline interior. Has only flown about 100 hours since then" Only 100 hours... hmm.. hope there isn't cam corrosion due to sitting too long.

And the engines seem to be pretty high-time. I'll have to check with our A&P to see what the overhaul cost would be. We would probably look to do a field OH rather than ship them back to.... holy hell - Pratt & Whitney???
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A couple notes about this one. It's a Valsan, so the original pod engines were replaced with the higher thrust engines from an DC-9/MD-80. They had to disable the thrust reverser on the #2 engine, but they installed hydraulic reversers on the pods instead of the standard pneumatic ones. It's a little rocket ship with those engines. We used to use them on our South American routes at some of the higher altitude airports down there, and also we'd use it a lot for Denver.

I was trying to see if I could find the S/N of that plane to see if I had flown it, but I couldn't find it anywhere. There weren't too many of those made. I'd snap it up before someone else gets to it.
 
Sluggo63 said:
There weren't too many of those made. I'd snap it up before someone else gets to it.
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I'll check with my partner to see if we want to maybe add another aircraft to our LLC. Anybody else want to go in? Probably need a third or fourth to pick this one up. You would also have access to an Arrow when it is someone else's week with the 727.

Not sure how this would work with our insurance, though.
 
Sluggo63 said:
A couple notes about this one. It's a Valsan, so the original pod engines were replaced with the higher thrust engines from an DC-9/MD-80. They had to disable the thrust reverser on the #2 engine, but they installed hydraulic reversers on the pods instead of the standard pneumatic ones. It's a little rocket ship with those engines. We used to use them on our South American routes at some of the higher altitude airports down there, and also we'd use it a lot for Denver.

I was trying to see if I could find the S/N of that plane to see if I had flown it, but I couldn't find it anywhere. There weren't too many of those made. I'd snap it up before someone else gets to it.
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Cool!

Lightly loaded what kind of takeoff and landing field length are we talkin about, assuming sea level standard conditions
 
Tantalum said:
Cool!

Lightly loaded what kind of takeoff and landing field length are we talkin about, assuming sea level standard conditions
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Good question. I couldn't even hazard a guess anymore. I don't have the manuals in an electronic format (I don't even think we ever had 727 manuals in pdf form). My paper manuals are in a box in my storage unit. I have to run there this weekend. I'll see if I can dig them up and get you an answer.
 
Sluggo63 said:
Good question. I couldn't even hazard a guess anymore. I don't have the manuals in an electronic format (I don't even think we ever had 727 manuals in pdf form). My paper manuals are in a box in my storage unit. I have to run there this weekend. I'll see if I can dig them up and get you an answer.
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Cool! Thanks. I've read that Boeing envisioned this plane as a good short field performer, and I've heard of them being flown into short 5K' (or slightly less) runways.. but I'd be curious how well a privately owned lightly loaded 727 would handle

SMO for example is something absurd now like 3,500 ft. Could a 727 get in and out of there assuming 10 people and the minimum of fuel for a 30 minute flight? <- for example.
 
skier said:
Junkers Ju52
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This has my vote, it has that cool steampunk look, more so than the tri-motor


Love the wooden yoke and the BMW emblem on it!
 
Tantalum said:
Cool! Thanks. I've read that Boeing envisioned this plane as a good short field performer, and I've heard of them being flown into short 5K' (or slightly less) runways.. but I'd be curious how well a privately owned lightly loaded 727 would handle

SMO for example is something absurd now like 3,500 ft. Could a 727 get in and out of there assuming 10 people and the minimum of fuel for a 30 minute flight? <- for example.
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I'll see if I can come up with an answer for you, but large transport category performance data isn't really like small GA airplane performance data. For example, in my current aircraft, I have no idea what my takeoff roll is going to be. I know my V1, Vr, V2 speeds and I know my "stop margin" which is how much runway I'll have left in front of me if I reject at V1. I know what my climb gradient is going to be. Other than that, the computer does its magic and if I can't safely takeoff, it won't give me numbers.

The 727 might be old enough that the performance manual may be more in-depth than newer airplanes and I'd be able to get that data.
 
Tantalum said:
I found it!

View attachment 87806
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The three-engine test bed was N9999W, the original PA-32 prototype. If I remember correctly they had the prototype's original 250 hp O-540 in the nose, and a couple of 115 hp O-235s in the wings, increased during the flight test program to O-320s. Recall that this was during the time when Cessna was selling a lot of C-337s, so weirdness in a light multi-engine airplane was not necessarily considered a bad thing.

The project evolved into the PA-34-180 with two 180 hp O-360s, and still with fixed gear and the PA-32 tail group. Performance must have been abysmal. The next prototype had retractable gear and 180 hp engines; then in succession came the larger vertical tail, and finally the 200 hp engines as on the initial production Seneca.
 
Gotta love an aircraft built by the Airworthy Aircraft Company - and it's a tri-motor. But never built. Sad

Airworthy
Airworthy Airplane Co (George Antolchick & Frederick H Jolly), Chicago IL.

Terrier 1928 = 3pCM; three motorcycle engines. "Semi-bat wing." POP: 1 [X88E] c/n 1-T. Letter from Jolly to CAA 11/15/28 cancelled the license "since the plane never has been finished." http://www.aerofiles.com/_ab.html Scroll down, down, down.
 
Nobody said Falcon 900 yet? That's my "If I become a billionaire" plane.
 
Challenged said:
There's the Ford Tri-Motor, there's the Falcon 7x. Are there are a bunch of other three-engine airplane options? *Edit* Yes there are, but not sure if any are reasonable for someone of normal airplane ownership means. Some sort of tri-motor cri-cri?
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Not any more. The owner of the museum where I volunteer has gone on a tri motor binge. He has had one of the four or five remaining airworthy Ford Trmotors for a number of years. He supplemented that with the last remaining Bushmaster and has a Stinson Trimotor. He wants to get a WWII era German Trimotor, but I don’t know if that deal is coming together.
 
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