The Biplane Forum

Changing the tailwheel and tailspring on smith mini, old one was 3/4” and new is 7/8” diameter. Trying to make a new saddle bracket for increased diameter of new spring, and I’m not getting the results I want. Used a carburizing flame to bend 1”x1/8” 4130 strap around 7/8” tubing in a jig, and the difficulty I’m having is getting a nice bend to make the second ear/flat.

I’m assembling an S1S, and I was missing the top cowl and hinges. I have the bottom and side cowl pieces. The airplane was modified by “Cadby’s Custom Crafts,” and mods include a “Custom nose bowl” and a “Custom streamlined cowling.” Does anyone have details for those mods?

I found a factory S1S top cowl, channel and hinges. The channel and hinges appear to line up, bu...

I’m building a standard Skybolt on the wrong side of the Atlantic Ocean but I don’t want to put the wrong engine in it! I’m fortunate enough to have logged 75 hours in N3HW “Yellowbird” and I’ve decided a six pot Lycoming is compulsory. I’m going to need some help from you guys in the US - could I have a “show of hands” from any owners of a Skybolt with a 540 up front? It needs ...

Rebuilt or core, I'm interested. Need one for the O-290-D2 on my Starduster SA100.

No hurry...if this post is still here, I'm still interested.

Hi all,

A few years ago, I replaced my original Christen belts with Hooker double lap belt harnesses (single ratchet… should have done double but read somewhere that doesn’t fit… silly!). They’re excellent but I wouldn’t mind them being lower on me… more on lap and less on stomach. The steel tubing under the seat going fore and aft is much lower diameter so I attached t...