Robert Snow

[Colonel]

But imagine if you suddenly woke up in 1900. What airplane would you build?

Me, I'd build a Piper cub. Tube, fabric and wood. So much stuff to "invent"
like an opposed air-cooled direct-drive four cylinder engine (O-200 or O-235 clone)

Then, onto aluminum riveted construction with cantilevered wings. I'd stick
with an air-cooled radial engine (Wasp clone).

Ever notice you can just look at old airplanes, and know there's something wrong
with them? They're not going to fly well? Just the size of the vertical fin ....

Hell, if you woke up in 1950 you could save the entire homebuilt industry a half
century of wasted time and start building RV's. Riveted aluminum and a Lycoming.

[David MacRay]

Apart from not being able to get Charmin, I could get along pretty good in 1692 or 1900, whenever.

1950 would be even better, particularly knowing what I know now.

I could likely get a fairly high paying job and buy a nearly new Champ.

Imagine how much better an already great NORDO flight in a tube and fabric plane would be then.

A guy could build a pretty terrific 1932 five window Ford too.

Even McDonalds would be better.

[Colonel]

Freiburger just built an all-metal 1931 Model A in Dulcich's garage in Bakersfield and ran 8's in the quarter.



No turbo, no nitrous, no supercharger - just cubic inches and a couple of Holley's.

The thing about flying Back In The Day™:

1) no GPS. No moving map. No data base. No satellite navigation. Just a map.
2) no Wx. No radar. No internet. Just your eyeballs.
3) no ANR. Just deafness.
4) no headsets w/boom mikes and intercoms. Just yelling.

People reminisce about the Good Old Days and whine about a "lack of progress"
in aviation, but they wouldn't like it. Hell, what about data logging engine monitors?!
They've revolutionized maintenance and diagnosis. Try that without an SoC. They
draw ONE AMP, dude.

People are so spoiled. They expect an SoC with more computing power than a
Cray X-MP for pennies that don't consume any power, and monster data storage
(local and remote) and unlimited data bandwidth with brilliant high-res displays.
All of the above has to be portable, reliable and cheap.

[Squaretail]

But imagine if you suddenly woke up in 1900. What airplane would you build?

Me, I'd build a Piper cub. Tube, fabric and wood. So much stuff to "invent"
like an opposed air-cooled direct-drive four cylinder engine (O-200 or O-235 clone)

Then, onto aluminum riveted construction with cantilevered wings. I'd stick
with an air-cooled radial engine (Wasp clone).

The problem being that you would have to invent the things to build those things. And probably invent some of the things to build those things, and by the time you were done with making tools to make tools to make tools, you might be in time to make the cub at the end of your life when it actually showed up. If two wars and primitive medical technology didn't get you in the mean time. I mean your fantasy of going back in time assumes you go with a lot of data and tools to start with, and by the time you do that much packing and preparing all the fun is gone out of it. I mean to build the cub, you have to figure out how to make steel tubing of sufficient quality. Then of quantity. Then invent welding.

If I could go back in time, I wouldn't waste time building stuff, I would just go back to periodically enjoy the things that were already there or the things that aren't here anymore. I'd go watch a lot of concerts. I would also stash a lot of things for future me to find and sell, so I could fund my time machine research.