The clean, simple cockpit boasts a 1938 Taylorcraft tachometer, to which Ken added his
personal touch. A friend gave him the mag switch from a J- 2 Cub.
Oshkosh, where his handsome Time Machine was awarded a
Bronze Lindy in the Homebuilt Plans category. N34KP has since
won a handful of local EAA chapter awards, including Best of
Show and Best Experimental–Plans Built.
FLYING THE PIET
;e Model A Pietenpol is basically a docile aircraft, lacking in
any particular bad habits. Ken built his with the standard
Pietenpol wing and observed, “It barely stalls. You can have the
tail wheel on the ground and the mains a foot above the ground,
and eventually that wing stalls. ;en it falls to the ground—ker-
plop! Eventually I learned that you have to land the airplane
pretty flat. It has a very short takeo; run, which is usually
about 150 feet in this airplane. It’ll come o; the ground at 25
mph, but you want to let it get up to about 55 to 60 mph on
climb-out.”
As far as flying with the Model A engine, Ken shared that
one item is especially important. His engine has a Model B car-
buretor, and its carb heat runs continuously. “It’s absolutely
necessary. On a real humid morning, there’s a steady stream of
water coming o; the carburetor, and it’s very cold—it flies back
PIETENPOLS “EXPERIMENTAL” FOR ;; YEARS!
Bernard Pietenpol of
Cherry Grove, Minnesota,
was born in 1901. He was
a self-taught engineer
and a member of EAA
Chapter 100 in Rochester.
Aviation historian and
author Chet Peek, in his
book The Pietenpol Story,
described Pietenpol’s
vision of an easy-to-
build, inexpensive
airplane: “It hadn’t happened overnight…Bernard had designed and
built four di;erent planes, had bought and flown a Curtiss Jenny, but
none satisfied him. His fifth e;ort, later christened the Air Camper,
finally met his expectations. Because of its unique design, it would
o;er a;ordable flying to hundreds of aspiring young airmen during the
Great Depression. Before the decade was out, the name Pietenpol
would be enshrined forever in the annals of sport aviation. The
Pietenpol saga had begun.”
Chet also shared his viewpoint of that saga: “There were dozens of
homebuilt designs published in the 1920s, some grossly unsafe, some
just not practical. For example, hundreds of Ed Heath’s Parasols were
built, and although fairly safe, they would only fly one person—and a
small person at that. Other designs, such as Corben, Gere, and Long,
were published, but not widely accepted. Pietenpol’s Air Camper design,
by contrast, was eminently practical and met the needs of those harsh
economic times.;It was cheap and could be built by inexperienced hands
with simple and available tools.;The wood needed could be obtained in
any town lumberyard for a few dollars.;The engine, from Ford’s new
Model A, could be found in any junkyard; it was reliable and parts were
available.;You could mount a variety of engines, such as Ford, Kinner,
Velie, and later, Franklin, Lycoming, Corvair, or the ever-popular
Continental A- 65.;The plans were easily modified to meet the builder’s
whim. It carried two people, making it useful for flight instruction and
passenger hauling—thus producing an income.”
Small in stature, the Air Camper measures 17 feet 8 inches from nose
to tail, has a 29-foot wingspan, an empty weight of 620 pounds, and a
maximum takeo; weight of 1,040 pounds. Its top speed is 100 mph,
with a stall speed of 35 mph and a 500 foot-per-minute climb rate.
Builders and pilots alike haven’t yet ceased to be enamored by this
80-year-old design. Chet, speculating on why it has remained so pop-
ular, reflected that the primary reason may be simple economics. “The
owners who flew their Pietenpols to Oshkosh this summer agreed that
it is still possible to build a Pietenpol for under $10,000—half the cost
of any competitor.
