VIKING of the MONTH
October 2005
"Miss October"
N9578E is a 1976 17-31ATC owned by Joe Farrell
This Viking is based in Willimantic, CT (IJD)
Ahhh...that sweet smell of leather!
Joe writes: “I fell in love with Vikings when I was 13 years old and saw a feature on them in Flying magazine. I was a normal (well, ask some of my friends there!) kid growing up in a single parent family in northern New Jersey; flying was something I dreamed about and the Viking just looked so sexy. That and the performance, and wow! I was hooked.”
”Fast forward to mid 2004. I was a 2 year private pilot with an instrument rating putting around the east coast in a 1965 Cherokee 180 that I owned with an absentee partner - I got the best part of that deal. I was about to come into enough money to safely purchase and maintain a Viking; the world, along with ASO.com and Trade-a-Plane, was my oyster as I began my search. I came up with N9578E, or as we now call her, Emily (after one of my nieces who is every bit as pretty as her aeronautical namesake!), advertised online by Ernie Arredondo, who became a good friend as a result of our purchase of 78E.”
”I was looking for a Turbo; we knew we'd be flying her to the midwest to see my in-laws and would be buying a vacation home 'somewhere' in the southeast, so getting up high was important to me since we could not only get good true airspeeds with a turbo, but also get into mid and high teens where from about November through April meant nonstop 4 hour legs home. Similarly, we could go UP to get out of icing conditions if they were inadvertently encountered, along with all the other positives of maintaining full manifold pressure to the low flight levels. I saw 78E in photos and she was gorgeous; a relatively new paint job, and the tan leather sold my wife, Lynn, who loves it to this very day, and relatively low time engine with strong compressions and a few recent Miller annuals from her Texas owner. 78E also has built-in O2, a Garmin 430 coupled to the autopilot and an audio panel with stereo inputs that allow us to listen to the iPod when ATC isn't vectoring us around in the New York area. ANR headsets seem like a must for Vikings; the engine gets really quiet when you get over 15000 ft since all of the exhaust is being channeling to the turbos to keep the manifold pressure up!”
”So, over the course of a couple of months Ernie and I worked out a deal, Miller did an annual as a pre-buy and I set out from Connecticut to pick her up. I received an hour or so of transition and training from Cody at MFS and launched out of Plainview for Connecticut on a deteriorating VFR day, which improved greatly as I flew eastbound, over nighting at my in-laws house at MLI. I got 78E home that next day and landed into a departing snowstorm in New England; that had just cleared out as I came in to, thankfully, a dry and clear runway.”
”Lynn and I, and my son Doug in the picture of us in front of Emily, have flown 78E to Moline, all over the northeast and into the South, to our newly acquired vacation home in Beaufort, SC. We can usually make the 700nm trip from the 3400ft strip in Beaufort home to Connecticut nonstop with decent winds and 65% power above 10000feet, given the improving true airspeeds. My usual cruise until avgas hit $4 a gallon and above was at 70% power and about 15.5 gph, and now at 65% flows are closer to 12.5, so that’s a big reduction in the hourly DOC.”
”All in all I love this airplane. 78E received her airworthiness certificate on my 17th birthday in 1976, which seems rather fortuitous and gives me lots of good karma I guess. Lynn, Doug and I take her out at least once every couple of weeks for a spin and get down to Beaufort once every month or so for a long weekend, so she gets used regularly and flies like the sports car everyone claims her to be.”
Joe can be reached at:
joefarrell1@comcast.net
Picture YOUR Airplane Here!
Send me photos and some history about your Viking, and I'll place it on this page for all Bellanca Fans to see! Snail mail photos to: 3741 N. Forgeus Ave, Tucson, AZ 85716 (all photos will be returned promptly)...or e-mail .jpg files to:
Vikingdrvr@att.net
Previous "Vikings of the Month"
N 1285R...Don Ames' 1972 Turbo Viking
N 93570...Larry Smalley's 1973 17-31A
N 39819...Jim Howell's 1973 17-30A
N 4081B...Tom Binder's 1975 17-31ATC
N 4052B...The DeFoe's 1976 17-30A
N 28067...Craig Gifford's 1979 17-30A
N 6578V...James Gryder's 1970 17-31ATC
N 93554...Troy Foster's 1974 17-31ATC
N 110CB...RJ Lint's 1974 17-30A
N 6639V...Michael Waiwood's 1970 17-30A
N 147PH...Ron Bianchi's 1974 17-30A
N 7379V...Bob & Bette Nixon's 1969 17-30
N 7358V...Troy Foster's 1969 17-31TC
N 8811V...Jeremy Reiley's 1971 17-30A
N 9996V...Lee Moore's 1971 17-30A
N 14732...Lynn Walker's 1975 17-30A
CFMJT...Eric Hansen's 1974 17-31ATC
N 4101B...Peter Knize & John Sullivan's 1974 17-31ATC
N 8229R...Bill Dudley's 1972 17-30A
N 4851V...Carl Fleece's 1968 17-30
N 7300V...Lee McGee's 1969 17-30
N 8281R...Victor Catalanotto's 1972 17-30A
N 228CM...Curtis Hannay's 1973 17-31ATC
N 8842V...Richard Dews' 1971 17-30A
N 28058...Rex Warren's 1978 17-30A
N 77TV...Tim Averett's 1977 17-31ATC
N 9782E...Walt Peasley & Greg Treager's 1977 17-30A
N 4062B...Russell and Rusty Viers' 1975 17-31ATC
N 4935V...Hal Schroeder's 1969 17-30
N 8229R...Bill Dudley's 1972 17-30A
N 14798...Earl Gault's 1974 17-30A
N 39862...Craig Schwab's 1973 17-30A
N 8231R...Mike Carr's 1972 17-30A
N 281SV...Fred Olson's 2000 17-30A
N 28055...John Hartnell's 1979 17-30A
N 327CP...Jeff Baker's 1973 17-30A
N 6712V...Tom & Laurie Cox's 1970 17-30A
N 8813V...Bob & Bette Nixon's 1971 17-30A
N 5683U...Dean & Demita Crofford's 1973 17-30A
N 4137B...William Bruu's 1975 17-30A
N 73KP...Ross Seabrooke's 1973 17-31A
N 200EB...Frank Waltman's 1978 17-31ATC
N 89EL...Don and Shirlee Shapansky's 1989 17-30A
N 8862V...Mark Rooney's 1972 17-31ATC
N 28022...Frank Ayers' 1978 17-30A
N 93710...Tom & Dee Null's 1973 17-31A
N 14696... Dewey & Darla Elsik's 1974 17-31ATC
N 93634...Jim Sinke & Barbara Rose's 1973 17-30A
N 7383V...Dave Hetrick's 1969 17-31
N 76604V...Clifford Kidd's 1970 17-30A
N 4744V...Gregg and Bonnie Watts' 1967 17-30
N 28039...Phil Lancaster's 1978 17-30A
N 4703V... Dave & Janet Taylor's 1967 17-30
N 39899...Ron & Deanne Gerber's 1973 17-30A
N 4863V... Phillip Mason's 1968 17-30
N 7304V...Mark Jones' 1969 17-30
N 6650V...Bill Stark's 1966 17-30
N 7341V...Tim Patterson's 1969 17-30
N 198V...Dan & Jennifer Baumgartner's 1969 17-30
N 6645V...Dwayne Mitchell's 1970 17-30A
N 77FE... Dave Leonard's 1972 17-30A
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