Dorrance Lance

N

NC86786

New member
Does anyone have any contact info for Dorrance Lance, the fellow who put the Ford V6 in his Cruisair? He used to have (still has?) a private field in NJ, but the phone number (908-534-2972) listed on an internet search for the field gets a supermarket meat counter.

I'd appreciate any help anyone here could give me.

Thanks.
 
I have no idea who he is or how to reach him but it would certainly be interesting to see how he did it and to learn how he got it approved.
Gary
 
As I recall from the article, Gary, the Ford engine addition was part of a total restoration and could well have fallen under the 51% rule.

Jonathan
 
I heard he was puting a ford in it ,but never heard if he got it sighned off. It takes more than an engine change to qulify for an experemental. Unless he was working towards an STC for the plane. my understanding was that he made it wider and changed a few other items. :lol: :lol:
 
As I said, I believe he performed enough stuff on it to get that Experimental sticker (51% or whatever), Randy. There was a thorough article on this in the Newsletter a few years back, but I'm still unpacking from my move and can't find it.

Gary:

I think a great rumor would be that he added JATO pods so that he could get out of EXTREMELY short strips...or added a rocket engine as that fellow did with his airshow WACO biplane :)

I believe Ford experimented with jet turbine cars many years ago. That would be cool for a Cruisair don't ya think?

Jonathan
 
"Whitey" Lance's airplane is officially a home-built replica and does indeed run a Ford V-6. It was "built" many years ago and flies well. He flew in to one of our Fly-Ins several years ago to show it.

Jonathan: The turbine car was a Chrysler, and (unfortunately) I remember it too well. They built about 100 of them and loaned them to drivers by lottery. They looked pretty cool for the times (early 1960s) with the obligatory tail. After a one-year trial, they took them all back and presumably destroyed them. Check this out: http://www.turbinecar.com/images/Lehto/newbook.htm

Regards,
 
I saw one at the New York World's Fair back in 1964.

I was a young teen, just getting ready to get my drivers license.

The car was pretty snazzy - lots of chrome and fins like Robert mentioned.

Also sounded pretty impressive when it ran.

Way Cool, at least to a 15 yr old kid.

(Also saw the original Carousel of Tomorrow that Disney now has in Tomorrowland down in Disney World

And a "demonstration" of nuclear fusion.

And a demonstration of communications via the new laser technology.)

Dave York
 
Hey I am working on a total resto and am concidering taking it to the home built market any body have advise on meeting the 51% rule I will be doing home built wings most likely with mods to airfoil tail along with new cowl and lycoming 150 hp up front.
 
I have considered building a New Classic. I'm on the downhill streach of an RV-8, and prior to deciding to buy a Cruisemaster, I was thinking about getting blueprints for a Culver Dart from their historical association.
Actually a Bellanca would be better. Unfortunately, Bellanca doesn't seem to want to sell the prints for the Cruisemaster. That means you would have to 'reverse engineer' one like the Soviet version of the B-29.
Anyway, I think you get my point. These cool old designs were made from readily available materials that can be worked with skilled hands but not overly complex proceedures. And they perform very well!
In the end, you would exchange a lot of 'up front' labor for freedom to alter without FAA blessing, because you are the manufacturer.
The other route is to find an IA that will 'take you on as an aprentice'. Mine charges $35 / Hr. He does not have to be there for all of my work, and I feel strongly that he is worth what I pay him. I've even paid him more than he asked because he shorted his hours, and I felt that I really learned some important stuff while doing a cylinder job on the O-300 in Wifey's C-172.
PS; How about a radial powered Cruisemasteroid that looks like a 14-9 on steroids? The possibilities!!!
 
N8021C;
The FAA is changing the experimental rule regarding use of certified aircraft parts in homebuilt planes. For example, the use of Piper Cub wings on a Breezy will no longer be permitted. So this might effect your intent to move your cruisair to Experimental. You may end up with a restricted version, Like Exibition or Flight Test where you can only use it for the intended purpose, and not general use as a personal aircraft.
 
The thought of an M14 on the front of a 14-19 is stimulating..........Dave Maytag did that on a Helio H-250. As far as I could tell, It worked out OK. Ideas?
 
Dan;
I'm not sure of the fuselage scale to the diameter of the M-14 cowl.
I always thought the Yak 18T kinda sorta looks like a radial Bellanca Cruisemaster, but it's bigger.
I also like the look of those two Fairchild 45s @ Crest. (one now). Although PIREPS indicated that they were somewhat slow.
I suppose a Cruisemaster with the correct stringers added to the fuse, and a semicircular cut from the bottom of the windshield might be getting it to look right...The power available from the M-14 is right in the ballpark.
For the Cruisair, a smaller radial would seem better to me, like the Australian Rotec.
Late WWII radial fighters sometimes had narrow fuselages or side ducts to let the exhaust and engine heat out with minimal drag, so the Bellanca just might be a good with the same. Or maybe a more traditional bump cowl?
I had been thinking about using the basic Bellanca concept for a homebuilt, and incorporate 'improvements' that seem apropriate. Kind of like Neil Lafrance's Culver Cadet STF. He offers plans, but I don't know how much interest he has gotten for them.
I'm just a sucker for the look of the cabin top, windshield, wings, tail, flight characteristics, etc.
I hope this plane I'm buying works out, so I can get over this fantasy and get to the real thing!
 
I got an envalope of pictures last week, and although I would have liked more, the ones I got looked pretty good.
The problem is that the airwothiness cert was lost by the AP / Seller's rep. The FAA has been petitioned for a replacement, and we are waiting on that.
I start my days off from work pretty soon, so we might get some time to go see it and check the progress.......
 
There's no right or wrong to this sort of thing really. From a purely practical point of view who can fault swapping an unsupported engine of low power for one with parts a plenty and more horsepower? Forgive me, though, if I am more impressed when I see a Waco 10 with an OX5 fly into Blakesburg, more deeply admire a Fairchild 24W with a 165hp Warner on its nose, and feel more than a little let down when I see a '29 Great Lakes with a Ranger on the front of it, posing as a Menasco.

Mostly I feel for a venerable machine dragged through the air with all manner of added cubic inches it probably wasn't expecting, Were I a Fairchild 24W who'd received an MP14 nose job, I'd be terribly confused, not to mention the probable identity crisis I'd likely suffer. I'd wonder, "Why, oh why, have you done this to me? I get the part about pulling out the radios with their vacuum tubes that look like props from Forbidden Planet, ten pound transformers oozing thick black goo, beer can sized capacitors, and heat sinks the size of Kansas, but what the hell have you done to my FACE?!"

I saw the photos of that Ford powered Cruisair. Read the description of all the stuff the guy went through to create this Franken-Bellanca, pondered it all, considered it thoughtfully, and came to the reasoned conclusion that THIS GUY IS A FARKING WACK JOB! What was the conceivable firing order of this fellow's neurons?

Please, someone, anyone, for the love of Jack Knight's heroic heart, help me understand what power of whimsy drives an otherwise rational human brain to beat to quarters at the mere notion of putting an antique or classic aircraft into the OPEC Hall of Fame? Is it the same impulse of delight that drives people to bolt chromed monoliths of piston power onto Model A automobile frames? Is it the same discombobulation of sensibilities that drives people to pay money for cloth pictures of dogs playing poker?

Aren't there better avenues for this sort of thing...Harmon Rockets, Thunder Mustangs, those egg shaped Legends? And, God rest his soul, Jimmy Franklin's rocket powered Waco doesn't count: it was an airshow stunt plane, I loved it, and - unlike most airshow gimmick rides - it made me laugh...in a good way.

:D :) :lol: :wink:

Jonathan
 
You all are forgetting that not everybody has the budget to fly but a addicted to it just like you. I am an antique fan love to here a waco or travelair with a wright and short stacks fly. My reality is that fuel is way expensive parts just sore and my income and family obligations require me to think how can I keep an old odd plane in the air. I understand completely where he was coming from. I am going to take my old 14-13 back in time install an o-290 and only a center third seat like the 14-9s and change it enough with new wings built new tail and FWF with new cowl built from scratch make the 51% rule. This is because I can't hardly keep my old Pacer flying. Nostalgia is great but practicality is paramount in this day and time.
 
I'd hoped that the parade of smilies at the end of my post would let folks know I was KIDDING for, certainly, I do NOT have the means to obtain, much less maintain, any airplane that occupies the featured row at Blakesburg. Heck, my backside is still sore from the pain of keeping the Lycoming O-435 on my 14-19 running, much less an OX5. And if I had a hankering for one of Mark Frederick's F1 Rocket hopped up RVs, I couldn't afford that either, even if I had the skills needed to build one.

I merely imagined an M14 hanging from the nose of a 'Master, found the notion amusing, and took it from there :)

Jonathan
 
Well,
I found this web page about care and feeding of the Russian M-14p radial engine.
http://www.iac38.org/m14p.htm
All the sudden you can realise why flat engines have become so popular. They just run so well and require so little in special care and handling.
GM Bellanca always used the best and newest engines he could get, (with the possible exception of the O-435, but given the other choices maybe it was the best at the time).
Once again the way JMB did things is hard to beat. Can be done, but how can we think of everything, the 'big picture' so to speak.
 
At the time, GMB said he chose the O-435 because it did not have the operational limits of the Continental E series. The Lyc could run all day at its max RPM setting. I think it may have been a choice born of plenty of cheap military surplus O-435s. The company was clinging to solvency at the time. In fairness, the O-435 was overbuilt and may have seemed like a good choice. No one could have known that it would have been orphaned whereas you can still find plenty of parts for the E-185/225 today. Plus, at the time, Lycoming's factory CHT redline was 475 degrees. Thus this installation, that runs horribly hot no matter what you do with the baffling, probably did not alarm pilots of the day, any more than that 1200 hour TBO which was considered just fine at the time.

The reasoning doesn't matter now. You either live with it or do what many have done and swap out that old Navy engine for the Continental O-470 of the -2. I've put enough money into mine that I could have done exactly that. I just can't give up that original, stately, smiling nose though. Anyone who thinks their aircraft choices are rational needs psychotherapy anyway :)

Jonathan
 
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