For Paul Heckman, and anyone else who likes Tri-Pacers, I've always had a fondness for them Yesterday at Whitman S94

I did my primary training in a TriPacer 55 years ago. I thought then and still do now it was a fabric covered brick with an engine. In slow fight you can move the yoke stop to stop with no roll response. The wings must have no washout.

I am curious why you are fond of them. Their period appearance perhaps?

I've always thought Pacers looked really nice, but Tri-Pacers are far to the other end of the appearance scale. If ever there was a case study in what looks right for landing gear placement....

When I was a kid, my dad had a couple different Tri-Pacers. There’s something cute and quaint about them.

Shortly after I got my first grown-up job, I was looking for the cheapest path to airplane ownership and considered Tri-Pacers as the 150hp variant is on par with a 172 in performance.

There was an airport acquaintance selling a decent one for $19k (circa 2013 maybe). I’m 6’2” and unfortunately couldn’t sit in it without my head tilted about 45 degrees.

Too bad because I’d still like to fly in one again sometime.

I don't Know Dean, they were just always around, when your a Kid, and You Like Airplanes, some just Grow on Ya In the sixties, our Richland WA, Airport (RLD) was a Busy Place, Gliders, Skydivers, Planes Buzzing around all day, quite a Large number of Planes I could go out there 15 days in the Summer, see the same Planes, and look them over, like I was seeing them for the first time

It grows on ya though Phil

There is a Fellow on BT, named Kent Wyatt, I hope he sees this thread and Posts a Photo of his Tri Pacer He spent an insane amount of money restoring it, maybe the most Beautiful one the Planet

They're ugly-cute, like a pug. One interesting thing, the 150hp Tri-Pacer with standard 36 gallon tanks is one of the very few small 4-seaters that can legally carry full fuel and four FAA standard 170 pounders. (give or take a couple lbs.) 900 lb useful load.

Dad rebuilt a J3 cub when I was pre-kindergarten, but he never got to fly it because some kids set fire to the airport and it went up in smoke. It was not insured and, by then, Dad had more children than stripes on his sleeve in the RI Air National Guard. So we ate a lot of bean soup and there wasn’t much hope for Dad getting another airplane… until Uncle Pete got a little careless with his tie-down procedures. In a stoke of generosity, considered uncharacteristic of Uncle Pete, Dad became the owner of a 135 HP 1953 Tri-Pacer that had been flipped by the wind.

Dad had it flying by the time I was in second grade. I passed my PPL in it at 17, which made me as much of a babe-magnet as I can ever boast. The door had a habit of opening on takeoff, which meant I could close it heroically. By then we were living in south Florida and, as I strolled across the North Perry ramp toward the airplane with one of those babes and a couple of her friends, she said “Which one is it? I hope it’s not that ugly blue one!” It must have met some minimum standard as I now realize that I have been with that same babe for 50 years.

Thanks Sidney! They do descend like a crowbar with the power off, but that means there's no porpoising on landing. You can put it where you want it. I've landed in 20+ crosswinds and flown my family of 5 from NM to MI and back with nary a hitch. The guy who sold it to me flew us out to a dirt road near Albuquerque, drove id through a shallow arroyo, and took off again - never done a touch and go like that before.

Fine utility airplane. Not much for looks, I agree, but function and reliability has its own kind of beauty.

Very nearly bought one for $4,500 in the early 70s. Basically, the main reason I didn't was that it was pink with purple trim (had just been recovered with Ceconite and painted), my least favorite color combo.

Dan

Ah, come on Dan, it’s a great color combo on a Jumpsuit. For a woman.

I always thought they were pretty sporty looking as taildraggers. An acquaintance had a PA-20 with the engine upgrade that was a lot of fun to fly around the area. I got a ride in it a couple of times and I remember it flying like most planes of its era. Lots of adverse yaw and poor control harmony and would make a sloppy pilot look bad, but rewarding if you learned to fly it properly. With the big engine it would get off the ground quick.

He had it because he had foolishly sold an older 182, thinking he really needed/wanted a plane that was better suited for off-airport work. Instead he found the useful load was lacking and his wife didn't like sitting hip to hip on long trips, and there aren't a lot of places in NY you can land anyway. They sold the Pacer and then I lost track of them since they weren't coming around to the airport anymore. They'd been talking about moving to Florida, and I suspect they did that and then bought another plane.

Ah, come on Dan, it’s a great color combo on a Jumpsuit. For a woman.

Now you’ve done it Eric, reminded me of another war story. Out of North Perry, with about 15 hours of total time, I did a cross-country with my instructor up to Pahokee. I remember doing touch&goes on the 1500 foot runway in Pahohee which, after my approach and landing looked like it was gonna run out, but that’s not really relevant. When we got back to North Perry the winds were gusting pretty good. Passing about 200’ the instructor pointed to my airspeed and said watch your airspeed which had gotten down to probably below 55 MPH so we fixed that and I thought we had 60+ but probable inattention prevailed after that, because from about 15 feet in the air, we came crashing down to the runway. On the way down only my hands were on the flight controls but on the way back up after the bounce, I still remember the surprised look of my instructor as he joined me on the flight controls; we were back up there 10 to 15 feet in the air with even less airspeed. So this time when we came crashing down, it stayed on the ground and we had a definite broken bungee. The tower asked us if we needed any assistance and the instructor pilot said no and taxied us to the tie down with the left wingtip just inches off the ground.

So I called my dad with the good news that I was still alive, and the bad news that I had broken a bungee. So bungees were cheap, and we installed a new set, but somewhere along the line we looked for other damage and the nose wheel was bent forward. After that discovery, this landing was looking to be a very expensive one. Enter that Pacer thing. At that time, circa 1973, it became the fashion to turn TriPacers into Pacers, which probably delivered a return on investment because I agree with the assertion that the result is a better looking airplane. It was my impression that there was only one guy doing the modification, and he happened to be somewhere in central Florida. It turns out that he was tripping over nosegears in his shop and was only too happy to unload one for $80.