Experimenter is a magazine created by EAA for people who build airplanes. We will report on amateur-built aircraft as well as ultralights and other light aircraft.
Issue link: http://experimenter.epubxp.com/i/84816
Bill Keyes' S-51T eventually approach 1:1 (full size) scale. Is that what Jim Stewart did when he developed the Stewart S-51 in 1996? Did he design and build a man-carrying scale model of the Mustang that is approxi- mately 70-percent scale in size but 100-percent scale in terms of excitement? Bill Keyes of Louisville, Kentucky, thinks that's exactly what Jim did. Bill said, "If you have nothing around it to give scale to a Stewart Mustang, people sometimes have trouble telling it from the real thing. Especially those S-51s that aren't fully painted, so they show their aluminum structure and are using the Chevy V-8, as Jim originally in- tended. About 14 S-51s are currently flying with another 20 to 30 being built. Mine is the only one with the turbine engine." "If you have nothing around it to give scale to a Stewart Mustang, people sometimes have trouble telling it from the real thing." The Stewart S-51 is certainly one of the more ambitious homebuilt kits ever seen. For one thing, the Mustang is not a simple airplane to replicate because of its flow- ing lines, which required multiple stretch-formed skins. Also, when scaling an airplane down in size, there's not much you can do about scaling the pilot down. He is what he is, and the airplane has to be built around him. This design dif- ficulty is compounded by the fact that a 70-percent wingspan actually means the cubic area available for the pilot is less than half that of the original. So a full-sized pilot has to go into half the space. Bill said, "The only area that from a distance tells onlookers that this is a replica is the very slightly increased size of the canopy. Jim wanted this to be a two-place air- plane, but with a perfectly scaled canopy, there wouldn't be enough room. As it is, it's really only a one- and-a-half place aircraft. My son would fit at 14 years old, but not now at 22. And, of course, the pilot Bill Keyes 14 NO. 2/OCTOBER 2012