Behind The Scenes Restorations for the Restoration!
We took the props off the Martin several years ago and put them on a custom-built stand in the hangar at Valle. That stand was cobbled together from leftover surplus steel we found in the yard out back. The props will be one of the very last things we install, but they must go through a complete teardown, inspection and rebuild process before we reinstall them. The other player here is a mandatory AD note on all Hamilton standard props that recurs every 5 years. So, the trick is to time the prop rebuilds in a way that they are done in time for our flying schedule. That involves moving the props to the prop shop - my favorite being Historical Propellors, which is run by Keith Hironaka, who I have worked with for over 30 years. Keith is now training his nephew on the care and feeding (rebuilding) of these antique props. “Passing it down” is a key and essential part of all my efforts to rescue these old airplanes. I call Keith’s efforts “Tops in Props” and we’ll be delivering our props to them this fall.
I took a hard look at our prop stand there in Valle, and concluded it really isn’t stout enough to go cross country. Ages ago, I did this same process in Seattle, the last time we rebuilt old N636X. I was very fortunate to find a prop stand in the corner of Boeing field that was unused and rusting away. This, we secured -I think I paid $25 for it!- and we were able to wake it up. It transported the Martin props not once, but twice to the prop shop, once after the restoration, and a second time when we had the airplane in operation, to do the AD note.
When we moved to Camarillo, we got in bed with the CAF wing here, and we based the Martin at their hangar and ramp for many years. When I decided to retire the Martin, we had all the ground support equipment left over. This, I distributed to various museums. The prop stand was basically forgotten, and got stashed in a remote corner of the CAF facility. I visited the CAF in January this year, and was delighted to see my old prop stand still existed. Closer examination revealed the prop shafts were very badly rusted, and I concluded they were probably beyond hope.
I noodled the numbers on trying to restore the prop stand, and concluded I could build new “lie down” stands from wood cheaper. (We had just done this very thing for the Constellation project.) Enter Rich Whites, my next door neighbor, who I met after the big fires here in Camarillo nearly took our homes. I was soliciting all my neighbors to join a community effort to secure new insurance, and met Rich at his home- we got chatting, and he revealed he had a complete machine shop in his garage!
More importantly, Rich has a can-do, unsinkable, find-a-way attitude that is positively uplifting. His first project was to machine a custom insert for our Whiting Stand (that’s another story) I took him by the CAF to work on another airplane, and while we were there, had him take a look at the prop stand. To my utter delight, he concocted a plan to save the prop shafts. I asked the CAF if I could un-donate the prop stand, only to learn that they were about to load it up and take it to the scrapper! We raced home, borrowed a neighbor’s trailer, and had the prop stand in Rich’s driveway that evening. I am delighted to report the plan was a complete success, and we now have a road worthy, rock-solid way to move the props to and from the prop shop. Perhaps more importantly, the props can easily be moved around our shop until the day comes to install them.
~El Jefe
