Dreams do come true!

I have been lurking on this forum since I was 15 when my family moved back to AK and my dad bought a Super Cub. I believe I officially joined when I was 16. I had always been into aviation, but Cubs immediately fascinated me and I was hooked. When I was 18 I went in on a 65hp Taylorcraft with my brother, that plane taught me more about the art of flying than anything else. I ended up selling it my last year in college because I needed the money for a commercial fishing boat, which ended up allowing me to buy a F-19 Taylorcraft the following year. After my first daughter was born we decided we needed more seats so we bought a Pacer and sold the F-19. Both Taylorcrafts were great airplanes and I will always love them. The Pacer has been a great plane, it is so useful flying our family around while still being a capable man off airport plane that I don’t see myself ever selling it. As much as I love the Pacer, the dream for the last 18 years has been a cub. Hardly a day has gone by where I haven’t thought of it. We have been saving our pennys and today was the day it all paid off. I’m super thankful for all the help I’ve had along the way from my family, and for this community that helped inspire my passion for off airport shenanigans, and last but not least to SJ for creating and maintaining my absolute favorite forum! I haven’t got to fly her yet, insurance will go on tomorrow but the wx is supposed to be cruddy all week. Hopefully we get a break and I make it out for a quick flight!

Edit: I don’t know why the pictures are upside down, they are right side up on my phone :roll:

Congratulations! That's super exciting, and wonderful that you finally realized this dream!

As for the pictures, I know that when I email pictures off my iPhone, I often have to edit them - otherwise they'll show up upside down. A silly process and maybe I'm doing it wrong, but I rotate the picture 90 degrees four times until it's upright again, then slightly crop the picture. At that point they attach upright.

I remember your time with the Taylorcraft (s) as I too have had one for years and read your posts on another forum. I think I am well over 1000 hours in various models of Taylorcraft and just finished the build of my clipwing. For years, I kept a 85 hp BC12-D on my 700' strip. It's cool to see your dream (and hard work) realized. I have a Javron PA-18 on order for my next build and am darn excited to get it in the air as well. The guys at the New Holstein fly-in cost me a bunch of money this year.
Dan Gervae is on here and is a long time Tcraft guy that also just built a really cool Cub. Small world.

That is awesome! Thank you for sharing! BTW, iPhones don't follow the old standard for metadata in pictures, so the orientation info that the (old) site software uses sometimes can't interpret it correctly. I actually have a patch that is supposed to fix this but it does not always work.

sj

Super cool! And you are correct. This site is the best of them. There are more knowledgeable people on here about (not just Cubs) than anyplace else!

SJ said:

BTW, iPhones don't follow the old standard for metadata in pictures, so the orientation info that the (old) site software uses sometimes can't interpret it correctly. I actually have a patch that is supposed to fix this but it does not always work.sj

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That's how you can tell when someone is left handed. Volume buttons face up for standard iphone picture orientation!

Congratulations! That's a great plane and I'm sure you will build many memories with your family in it

Thanks everyone. I forgot to add that my wife (whose 5’ 0” on a bad hair day) is excited to fly again. She claims she can’t see over the panel of the Pacer AND reach the rudder pedals. Here’s another try at uploading a picture.

Congratulations!

Great looking plane, but you need to be very careful with that color scheme lest you be confused with being Tom Ford.

On second thought, when you do an just tell them you are Tommy Boy!

Keep the pictures coming please.

alaskadrifter said:

Thanks everyone. I forgot to add that my wife (whose 5’ 0” on a bad hair day) is excited to fly again. She claims she can’t see over the panel of the Pacer AND reach the rudder pedals. Here’s another try at uploading a picture.

View attachment 58178

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Congrats, had mine 7 years now and had way too much fun. My wife was the same with the Pacer, SJ put his hand in front of her face while she was in the pilot seat and told her "No Data". She flies the Cub on occasion but is pretty excited about the new to us 182A if I would ever finish putting it back together.

Congrats on the new bird! It was fun to see mention of an F19 Tcart, that was my first airplane. I always said it had a built in instructor, and the lessons it taught me are still with me, 30+ years later. I still think of her, and if I ever end up on a residential airstrip, I will look for another one.

All the same, that Cub will serve you well. Have fun!

John