Invitation to Flying

The plane-owning Man-about-town is automatically the man-about-many-towns. The magnificent mobility afforded by his private plane has turned him into a nomadic wayfarer ready at the drop of a windsock to strap an airplane to the seat of his Italian silk trousers and seek his fortunes and his fillies on their home grounds, be they across the country, country or even ocean.

In your own personal sky yacht, it's no trick at all to lay plans for both skiing and swimming, a jaunt to both distant city and countryside, a chic desert resort and a bewooded mountain hunting lodge – all within the span of a single weekend. Exotic entrepreneurs such as oil wildcatters, engineers and ranch owners find a private plane almost indispensable to their lives – it allows them to get about quickly and efficiently during working hours and, in less time than it takes to bring in a gusher, they can be gushed over by their favorite young lady in one of San Francisco's smart bistros.

Personal plane ownership in the U.S. is climbing like a homesick angel; there are now over seventy thousand non-commercial planes (continued on page 53) in use, and no wonder: with more than six thousand airstrips dotting the countryside, only some six hundred are served by commercial airlines. The remaining off-route runways provide easy access to a whole new world of business opportunities and pleasure hideaways which groundlings and airline habitués must overlook completely or struggle to reach through more time-consuming means.

For instance, from Los Angeles it's only minutes via ozone to the Palm Desert Airpark, where you can practically do a half gainer from your aircraft into the swimming pool. An on-the-wing New York exec can leave after a day's empire-building from any one of the many airports serving the metropolitan area and in less than an hour taxi his flying chariot to the water's edge on Martha's Vineyard for a midsummer night's dream of a moonlight swim in the Atlantic.

More and more today, pleasure havens are taking into account their accessibility by air. A party-bound planeload alighting at Florida's Pompano Beach (continued on page 118) Flying (continued from page 53) airport need go no further than the airport grounds to find an eighteen-hole golf course, cocktail lounge and swimming pool. Within walking distance are yacht basins, deep-sea-fishing departure points and hotel accommodations.

And if these considerations don't offer incentive enough to make you turn plane owner, there is always the wonderful impression of interest and concern you convey to your girl of the moment when you reveal that you flew several hundred miles just to keep a date with her.

The plane fancier has a wide variety of excellent aircraft to choose from, and he can be airborne at prices ranging from those of a fine car to a sumptuous yacht. Wherewithal aside, what the plane is to be used for, and by whom, are the factors which will most influence choice. It might be a production model, or one of the luxury custom conversions tailored to personal taste. For the two-and four-place jobs, you'll find it to your advantage to have a pilot's license tucked into your billfold. In the larger planes, flying can be handed over to a professional to leave your air time completely free.

Thirty-two aircraft firms market more than eighty different models or conversions, but, as in the automobile business, American private plane output is dominated by a Big Three – Beech, Cessna and Piper. These manufacturers account for over ninety percent of all new private-aircraft sales.

Each of the Big Three produces a wide range of models. Others, like Aero Commander, with its high-performance, twin-engine model, or Mooney, with its sleek Mark 21 single-engine sports craft, aim for particular segments of the market.

For short business hops, or a weekend for two at one of the many resorts equipped with fairly short private landing strips, lightweight single-engine planes such as the two-place Cessna 150 or the new Piper Colt will cruise you along in traffic-free comfort at 115 to 120 miles per hour and set you down with room to spare. Other popular entries in the two-place category are the various models of the time-tested, flight-training-favorite Champion and the bubble-canopied, tandem-seated Aircoupe. Each offers something special to attract the plane-buying prospect shopping in the under-$10,000 price range.

For those who want to move up a notch to a single-engine plane with greater serviceability, range and speed, there are such models as the racy Mooney Mark 21, the Constellation-like Bellanca, Navion's five-place Rangemaster, the jaunty Cessna Skylane, the V-tail-trademarked. Beechcraft Bonanza, and the sharp-looking Piper Comanche 250. These, in the $15,000-to-$25,000 bracket for the basic airplane, put the urban man into the interurban class with style and zip.

Typical of this class of plane is the Piper Comanche 250 with its roomy cabin capable of comfortably seating four captains of industry or two pleasure-bound couples (or any variation thereof). The steerable nose wheel (practically all private planes made today are three-wheelers) makes for solid, easy ground handling, and when you push the throttle to the instrument panel, you're starting to bore holes in the sky with 2900 pounds of cargoed airplane capable of taking you from Los Angeles to San Francisco in just over two hours. It has a service ceiling of 20,000 feet, more than ample for over-the-weather travel. With automatic pilot as optional equipment, the Comanche 250, with its 1600-mile maximum range, provides effort-free nonstop flight from New York to Chicago. The instrument panel of the Comanche 250 is arranged for center mounting of all the navigation and communication equipment you may care to tack on. Retractable landing gear reduces drag and heightens the styling of an aircraft that knows how to mix pleasure with business.

If you have weekend trips to that lakeside hunting retreat in mind, where you and one, two or three companions can get away from it all, take a good long look at the Lake LA-4 – the only single-engine amphibian produced in the United States. It will take you from the pressures of the city to a secluded lakeside lodge at a speed of about 130 miles per hour. With cabin room for four, the LA-4 is a practical business craft Monday through Friday with a rugged versatility that transforms it into a pack-Pegasus for whatever weekend delights you have in mind. The LA-4's basic machinery will set you back $26,500, and you can instrument it up from there.

For the skyfarer who thinks getting there is half the fun but who wants to be sure of getting to the other half quickly, without worrying about the vagaries of weather (which sometimes cramp the style of the single-engine plane), there are a welcome number of light twins with capabilities of crosscountry junketing – or even transatlantic trips for the sky-wise flier.

With speeds in the 200-plus-mph range, the light twins can use airstrip runways only a few hundred feet longer than required for large single-engine craft. The second prop, found on the likes of a Piper Aztec or Apache, a Beechcraft Baron or Twin Bonanza, or a Cessna 310F, gives your plane the wherewithal to fly under instrument weather conditions or embark on night flights when you are on your way to adventure. Acapulco or Anchorage are within range of the Westerner's light twin. And, if you live in the East and want to follow water skiing in Fort Lauderdale with snow skiing in Vermont, just gas up and go and you're there in a matter of hours.

The many sociable setups optional with most light twins give you the opportunity to make an in-transit wingding out of it. In the Cessna 310F, for instance, five different seating arrangements that pamper personalities (as well as posteriors) are available. One provides a studio couch behind the pilot's seat, allowing an in-flight forty winks for anyone who has to conserve his strength for the activities – vocational or vocational – waiting at the other end of the flight plan. A curtain can be drawn to divide the cabin into two sections, leaving the pilot to concentrate on maintaining his course and his passengers to concentrate on their own pursuits.

This swept-style twin will climb at the rate of 1800 feet per minute to a service ceiling of 21,000 feet. At 10,000 or above, you'll need oxygen, and the 310 has provisions for installation along with enough radio and instrument gear to take you on any flight route or to any terminal area you choose.

The 310F carries a basic price tag of $62,500. For maximum service you'll want to add communication and navigation radios, rotating beacon, auto-pilot and possibly some other accessories, which will put the plane in the neighborhood of $75,000. But the business and pleasure you find in this neighborhood are worth it.

If you are the gregarious type who likes plenty of company when you're on the move, you'll want to go on to the bigger light twins in the Aero Commander or Beechcraft Super G18 class. Here you'll have six to nine seats at your disposal with a sumptuous choice of interior arrangements, all including more than a modicum of cocktail-partytype room. Price tags on these show the fine feathers of the birds. You are climbing into the $100,000 and up altitude to take you as far as you want to go in equipping and customizing the aircraft to suit your individual whims.

Probably the most exotic personal airplane on the American scene is a French import, the Morane-Saulnier MS760. Pure jet, the 760 is the fastest personal plane in the air today. With speeds up to seven miles a minute, you, your playmate and another pair of kindred spirits can make any spot in the country your playground. You can leave Chicago after closing the office on Friday and be in New Orleans for hours of Bourbon Street jazz that evening. For conveniences such as these, be prepared to invest over $200,000.

Another entry into the private, pure-jet field is the Procaer Cobra F400 going into production in Milan, Italy. Scheduled for July introduction, the single-engine two-seater boasts light-plane handling characteristics with a cruising speed of almost 300 miles per hour. It weighs only slightly over a ton and can stay aloft for three hours without refueling. If advance ballyhoo is to be believed, it should make an interesting addition to the infant personal pure-jet field, and a harbinger of many more imports in the future.

If you are considering a plane in the MS760's price category, a remanufactured model such as the On Mark Marksman may have some luxury features appealing to you. The Marksman is a remanufactured Douglas B-26 – a service-proved combat bomber, sporting the lush, plush look and convenience of an expensive sky yacht.

"Remanufactured" is a deceptively unglamorous word. The fully pressurized cabin of the Marksman can be accoutred to mirror the dash and daring of the owner, with built-ins ranging from splendidly-appointed bars to under-the-seat tape recorders to full hi-fi rigs. Tables, lounge-chair seats and smartly-styled couches are available to give your airplane the look of your penthouse pad or executive suite. A powder room and galley complete the home-away-from-home picture. Models of the Marksman start at just a shade over the quarter-of-a-million-dollar mark.

There is very little interior customizing in the single-engine and light twin categories, though cabin details arevaried enough in standard production models so that even the most design-conscious prospective plane owner should find one to his liking. But when you get into the heavy twin area of the Fairchild F-27, the DC-3, Martin and Convair, customizing the interior from airline configuration to individual taste is accomplished in an endless variety of ways. You name it and it generally can be yours from any one of several custom interior firms, such as Horton and Horton in Fort Worth, Texas, which specialize in strato-styling. They'll give you everything from flying wine cellars to E1 Morocco-type zebra-skin seating. Moving into this league will take you out of the personal-flying airplane stage, since you need a second pilot in the right seat.

Although not yet as developed as fixed-wing aviation, helicopters provide flexibility and other advantages for the hip exec who is more concerned with mobility in a limited range than chasing far-flung horizons. The distance range of personal helicopters available today hovers around the 200-to-300-mile mark with speeds in the vicinity of 100 miles per hour, but practically any hideaway provides a getaway field. One important breakthrough toward making the helicopter an important part of a modern man's plans was made last summer when the Cessna Skyhook became the first rotary-wing aircraft to be certificated for flight under instrument conditions. The swingingly-styled Skyhook could be a portent of the shape of whirlybirds to come.

The helicopter goes where fixed-wing flying machines simply cannot. An office parking lot or roof, a country-club lawn, a secluded resort, a romantic strip of palm-fringed beach – all become your point of arrival or departure in a helicopter that can take you from pad to pool to polo match with casual ease.

The two-place Brantly helicopter at about $20,000 is the lowest priced of any yet certificated. Hughes' two-seater 269A is in the same price range at $22,500. From there you move up the line to the four-place Hiller E4 at $70,000; Bell's 47J at $72,500 and Cessna's Skyhook at $79,000. The type of flying you plan to do will dictate what accessories you install.

Maintaining your personal plane at a convenient airport will cost you no more than garage space in Gotham if you stick to the single-engine or light twins. Hangar space can run from $7.50 a month at fields such as Half-Moon Bay south of San Francisco, to $25 to $50 a month at fields in other parts of the country. Much depends on facilities available and the type of airport; some, like Airport City, between San Jose and San Francisco, are self-contained and unrestrained resorts in themselves.

No longer is personal flying a thing apart – dangerous, daring and only for a favored few. (Remember Roscoe Turner, Wrong-Way Corrigan and Wiley Post?) What was once an arduous business has become a happy amalgam of pleasurable profit-making and profitable pleasure-seeking. No matter what plane strikes your winged fancy, the downright exhilaration, practicality and versatility which private flying affords will convert even the most conservative landlubber into a live-easy devotee of personal planemanship.