What to get as a good first car

[Ian Curtis]

Originally Posted by Akash Rastogi

Ian I thought you're just going to fly planes everywhere?

Working for Boeing in Everett is one of the few places this is actually conceivable as there is an obviously an airport on site. All you'd need is to live close to another airport, or have a grass strip in your backyard (obviously the best option). Unfortunately, the weather in Seattle isn't great, and my kind of airplane isn't exactly well equipped for instrument conditions. (I like old planes, see my profile picture) Flying from Paine Field to Everett to Boeing Field in Seattle if you had a meeting there would be a definite possibility I think, especially since Puget Sound traffic was in my experiences this summer pretty universally awful.

And if you are inquiring about my airplanes, I want a Piper Cub, then a Stearman, then hopefully one day a T-6. DC-3 would be a dream... but you need a *very* deep pocket book to fly one of those for fun.

There is a long list of homebuilts and replicas too, most notably a Pietenpol Air Camper, and I've always though the world needs another Sopwith Triplane, since it inspired the Red Baron's Fokker Dr.I and only a couple replicas have been built. My Model A friend from above likes to try and talk me into building an early Caudron biplane. He's also got a Klemm Kl26a (link is for a Kl25) in the works, which will be the only one of its kind when it is finally finished. He went through a pretty epic struggle to get the original drawings from the FAA and he got me into airplanes, so I think it would be a nice tribute to have one. The flying characteristics are pretty legendary too, supposedly the stall speed is around 20 knots (25 mph). The Klemm was also the first airplane to fly around the world (it was obviously not non-stop, and the guy took ships across the oceans).

/backontopic

[Wetzel]

One thing I didn't see mentioned was to get insurance quotes after you narrow the field down to a few. Insurance costs can vary a lot between different models for not always obvious reasons and have a big impact on total cost of ownership.

Wetzel