Post by flyjoe180 on Sept 15, 2007 10:56:37 GMT 12
Well, they may not end up in museums but some people are keen to preserve the lesser-loved airliners.
New life for Link with the past
By PHIL CAMPBELL - Rotorua Review | Friday, 14 September 2007
A $3000 Trade Me bargain last year has become a head turner at Reporoa.
As if the stock of fancied Scottish Highlands cattle are not enough, Garry Soden has gone further - a disused Links aircraft he bought last year sits in a paddock of his 10-hectare farm south of Reporoa, but about a 10-minute drive from Taupo..
Transported from Hamilton Airport in two stages - the wings and the fuselage - Mr Soden's buy is being turned into a sleepout for his children and guests.
Commissioned in 1981, the Fairchild Metro Liner SA227 flew for Air New Zealand until its run ended in 2001.
Mr Soden is restoring the 19-seater, deliberately built one seat short to avoid the aviation requirement necessity of a hostess for 20 passengers or more.
Why hoard an aircraft?
"He's always been keen on planes," Mr Soden's wife, Leonie, says. "He loves them."
When I said I flew in one of these things between Wellington and Blenheim in 1998 to a Marlborough Ranfurly Shield rugby reunion, Mr Soden asked the date: it was July 27. "I'll be able to find out from the plane's log books whether you flew in this plane," he said, indicating that so few of these cigar-shaped aircraft flew NZ skies.
The Link adds to other eccentricities on Mr Soden's farm. On entry, two or three lamp posts reduced in height by three quarters of their original size are planted beside a fence line, along with an ancient hayrake and other disused farm implements, a fireplace stretching it seems several metres in height.
Beyond the Scottish Highlands cattle, which feed in the same paddock as the aircraft, is his 1860s house, transported two years ago from Tirau.
In the middle of aircraft restoration, Mr Soden hopes to re-connect propellers so that they rotate, with added blade safety measures, in the Reporoa breezes, adding authenticity to the finished product.
A tri-angular chassis, for safety reasons, anchors the craft.
The interior of the cabin and the cockpit are being restored, as near to original as possible.
"It is a part time hobby, but when I first saw it, it was not a pretty sight," Mr Soden said. Photographs he produces support the view.
And the price? Seems cheap. "The $3000 value is in the aluminium in the plane - it cost $1000 to shift it here from Hamilton," he said.
For many years, though, it had lain unloved. From the photographs, it resembled the disjecta membra of a massive slug.
An ex-Air NZ pilot had bought it in 2001. When lodged with Trade Me, Mr Soden had to fend 50 other bids. He secured it because of his plans for restoration. At the time, Air NZ showed interest, also, but only as scrap.
According to log books, it flew all over New Zealand and made the news when it ran off a runway in 1996 at Gisborne (and flew again).
"Though there is not much room inside the craft," Mr Soden says, "the pilots liked flying them because they were fast."
Now what could be termed preloved is being loved all over again. "I want to restore it as much as I can but it will never fly again," he says.
Maybe. But positioned in a paddock at Reporoa, it will soon be ready for take offfor the curious.
www.stuff.co.nz/bayofplenty/4202121a6014.html
New life for Link with the past
By PHIL CAMPBELL - Rotorua Review | Friday, 14 September 2007
A $3000 Trade Me bargain last year has become a head turner at Reporoa.
As if the stock of fancied Scottish Highlands cattle are not enough, Garry Soden has gone further - a disused Links aircraft he bought last year sits in a paddock of his 10-hectare farm south of Reporoa, but about a 10-minute drive from Taupo..
Transported from Hamilton Airport in two stages - the wings and the fuselage - Mr Soden's buy is being turned into a sleepout for his children and guests.
Commissioned in 1981, the Fairchild Metro Liner SA227 flew for Air New Zealand until its run ended in 2001.
Mr Soden is restoring the 19-seater, deliberately built one seat short to avoid the aviation requirement necessity of a hostess for 20 passengers or more.
Why hoard an aircraft?
"He's always been keen on planes," Mr Soden's wife, Leonie, says. "He loves them."
When I said I flew in one of these things between Wellington and Blenheim in 1998 to a Marlborough Ranfurly Shield rugby reunion, Mr Soden asked the date: it was July 27. "I'll be able to find out from the plane's log books whether you flew in this plane," he said, indicating that so few of these cigar-shaped aircraft flew NZ skies.
The Link adds to other eccentricities on Mr Soden's farm. On entry, two or three lamp posts reduced in height by three quarters of their original size are planted beside a fence line, along with an ancient hayrake and other disused farm implements, a fireplace stretching it seems several metres in height.
Beyond the Scottish Highlands cattle, which feed in the same paddock as the aircraft, is his 1860s house, transported two years ago from Tirau.
In the middle of aircraft restoration, Mr Soden hopes to re-connect propellers so that they rotate, with added blade safety measures, in the Reporoa breezes, adding authenticity to the finished product.
A tri-angular chassis, for safety reasons, anchors the craft.
The interior of the cabin and the cockpit are being restored, as near to original as possible.
"It is a part time hobby, but when I first saw it, it was not a pretty sight," Mr Soden said. Photographs he produces support the view.
And the price? Seems cheap. "The $3000 value is in the aluminium in the plane - it cost $1000 to shift it here from Hamilton," he said.
For many years, though, it had lain unloved. From the photographs, it resembled the disjecta membra of a massive slug.
An ex-Air NZ pilot had bought it in 2001. When lodged with Trade Me, Mr Soden had to fend 50 other bids. He secured it because of his plans for restoration. At the time, Air NZ showed interest, also, but only as scrap.
According to log books, it flew all over New Zealand and made the news when it ran off a runway in 1996 at Gisborne (and flew again).
"Though there is not much room inside the craft," Mr Soden says, "the pilots liked flying them because they were fast."
Now what could be termed preloved is being loved all over again. "I want to restore it as much as I can but it will never fly again," he says.
Maybe. But positioned in a paddock at Reporoa, it will soon be ready for take offfor the curious.
www.stuff.co.nz/bayofplenty/4202121a6014.html
