Cessna Cub - The Ultimate Bush Plane? - Flight

hi i'm doug jackson and this is the badlands traveler at aka the cessna cub [Music] the badlands traveler is a custom-built airplane that's a combination between a piper super cub fuselage and a cessna 172 wing this frankenstein has taken the best parts of the super cub and the cessna and made it into an off airport short field takeoff and landing beast this is actually the second badlands traveler that doug is owned the first one was the yellow one that his neighbor actually purchased [Music] in this video we're going to strap a bunch of cameras on the airplane and then go have some low level flying fun in this amazing aircraft [Music] so let's talk to doug and learn more about the badlands traveler aka the cessna cub you know i guess i've always liked the big tires and never really thought of texas as being some place you would have a big tire you know machine and then met a couple of these guys local which you met on our last video and uh they kind of started um getting me interested in it and then i went to a fly-in up in south dakota a couple years ago and bought the yellow machine that we flew a couple year and a half ago it just kind of started progressing the more we flew around here the more we talk a couple of our guys here particularly one over in graham is named steve pierce steve is kind of the premier north american or continental united states super cub guy and i started flying with steve over on the brazos river and hanging out over there with him and another friend of his name tony from wichita falls and eventually the thing kind of started progressing to stole competitions and and why we don't have more in the continental united states and most importantly while we don't have one in texas anymore there used to be one down in llano and then it moved down to hondo and it was called the uh texas store roundup so i reached out to that guy and was visiting with him and he has kind of retired from doing it super nice guy and he told me all he you know all he knew and was very forthcoming with you know the pros and cons of doing them and through prodding from my friends and my racing background and watching the promoters that race our our off-road racing series i thought well you know this can't be that hard let's do a competition and i started making phone calls and within a week i had picked a location which turned out to be kgle gainesville up here just 50 miles up the road it all gelled the perfect location the perfect people i reached out to a couple of the competitors that are very well known in the stole world and asked them if they would come to an event and they said sure we'd love to come to texas and that all culminated and of course the lone star stole competition so that what started out is flying with a couple of friends you know a year and a half ago with the yellow airplane morphed into buying what you see here last fall which transitioned into flying with some these guys that stolen now we're you know knee-deep into the stole thing and planning a series for next year so it's kind of cool lone star stole was our first event and then our series our series is called national stole and that's nationalstowel.com and of course the whole covered thing has knocked us in out this year we just had to cancel the sodbusters event which is coming up our tentative schedule for next year will be an event up in the pacific northwest one in arizona one in minnesota one in the north carolina area one down in florida and then culminating in a national finals back in gainesville texas in the fall of 2021. everybody's welcome to compete i want that 17 year old kid with fire in his eye that took his daddy's 170 tour brought it out there and had fun you know we have there with a class for everyone literally everyone you know if you've got something you think is you want to get out there and compete in we've got a class for you we've got five or six different classes it's an awesome spectator sport they can come and camp we've got rv spots at all these places um or they can bring their airplane in camp it's just whatever they want to do if you guys remember from our first video we did uh what now year and a half ago i guess now i had what's called the badlands traveler and it was a one it was a super cub with cessna 152 wings on it clint beusnich he builds these things up in south dakota and uh when i bought the yellow one i told him he was he was actually had this one frame in the jig and i said i would like to have first rider refusal on an airplane so has it progressed and i saw how much i like the other one we started making changes to this one i'd give him feedback what i liked what i didn't like and i took delivery of it in september flew the yellow one back up there in september and picked up this one so this is a very similar airplane to the other one except for a couple of notable changes we changed up the suspension a little bit same travel but a little bit different geometry bigger tires we put 31 inch tires on this one and uh then we tricked out the inside that the fit and finish is a lot better inside and we went with uh one of the new garmin g3x touch experimental everything's in the panel your your pfd your mfd your radio your transponder it's it we even put autopilot in it uh your engine management system it's got video inputs i don't know if y'all can see it from here but there's a camera down here on the nose when i'm taxiing or landing on sandbars i can see if there's something in front of me and it saved me already a couple times i almost hit a tree uh that was sticking up it had not been that camera i probably hit it i believe this is serial number five or six so everyone clint bills is a little bit better just have to reach out to clint on his facebook page uh it's a clint busanich and then he owns a veteran exhaust you find veteran exhaust and reach out to him through there this airplane call it the cub killer and and that's jokingly of course there's it's it's it's still rooted in a super cub and i love the super cubs this one is a little faster because it's got the sportsman stole cuff up here it stalls it's a it's a your iconic 172 wing on steroids with the sportsman stole cuff that my buddy willie steen builds that cuff lowers your stall speed you hear numbers anywhere from eight to 12 miles an hour i don't know exactly what i'm running because the the airspeed indicator is not functioning there but i can glance down on a calm day and kind of figure out what it is based on gps speed and i'm in the upper 20s you know when i when it finally turns loose it'll cruise uh depending on how the whirlwind prop is pitched right now today we'll see 105 ish probably with both of us in there it's a hot day if i pitch it coarsely i can cruise 120 125. these are whirlwind make season they're called ground adjustable and you basically pull the spinner off you loosen eight bolts uh they've got a little wooden paddle that you put on you get the blades level put the little wooden paddle on there and then put a digital uh angle meter on it and set your pitch and i'm pitched right now about 11 degrees and i'll go down to about nine and a half for competition and up to about 12 and a half or 13 for like if i were going to go to idaho for instance we're thinking about going i'll pitch it for crews to go up there and when i get there i'll pull the spinner and reach pitch it takes about 15 minutes it's a fun airplane just to get up you know late in the afternoon and go check out the boats on the lake or fly down the river looking for wild hogs or you know whatever it's it's you can land it anywhere i literally if i have uh 300 feet at full growth i'm good i ran it at the stole competition just as an exhibition and uh had a 78 foot take off and 100 foot landings they're very com very very capable airplanes you know it's very few airplanes that will stall in the down in the 20s and cruise at 120 miles an hour and get in and out of 100 you know 300 feet probably the most amazing statistic on this airplane though is its carrying ability this airplane has a 2200 pound gross weight which is we based that off of what the wing was certified for 1080 pound empty weight so if you do the math the growth the useful load is 40 pounds more than empty weight useful load is 11 20. empty weights 1080. so i don't know where you're going to put it yeah you know but if you want to cut up a moose you know uh i guess you can carry it and not that we get many moose in texas but this is basically a super cub for all intents and purposes clint took a a a super cub fuselage modified it slightly used almost their identical tail feathers used their trim system and then put the 172 wing on it this is the fastest growing segment of aviation today carbon cub is just killing it you know husky and aviate husky which is my title sponsor they're building these really nice airplanes both of them sales are just amazing right now you know everybody that's getting into this segment of aviation is finding out that people are hungry to people get tired of asphalt you know and they want to get out and and be able to land anywhere and even if you live in the city and just want to go hit your buddies you know like my grass strip right here and these are perfect all right well then now you ready to go fly i'm ready to go fly let's do it yeah with that uh carbon fiber prop i mean it just returns probably one seven flat board yeah i'm gonna shut this and we'll shut this one and take off okay so your a heart is getting aligned now your synthetic vision is coming up yeah your engine everything's on your engine over here yeah i have to dodge a lot more this morning hopefully they know to get out of the way i'd imagine well [Applause] yeah we yeah he's off i'm coming out this one that doesn't take off quite as short as that one does oh really um it's a little heavier right it's close but i think you know same guy flying both of them that one would probably win yeah quick run up here [Applause] all right you ready i'm ready let's do this okay here we go oh man yeah i didn't take much runway at all there now i mean about the time the tail started flying we got off the ground yeah yeah pop a little bit of flaps [Applause] doug's neighbor took off behind us and was flying in his original badlands traveler hey it's nice to do this kind of early it's not too hot up here right now and you know today just we're having some good weather this week it's of around 90ish which protects us in july i'll take that absolutely i imagine i mean unless you're doing a real long cross country or something you normally just stay pretty low on these right oh yeah 2 300 foot's all you ever want to be you know that's where all the we see all the country so we can toggle through there's a sectional map yeah when you're seeing traffic on it too uh there's your airport waypoint in formation your flat plan if you've got one your weather and uh weather data train data traffic and there's that video input oh wow that's cool and then there's just in all your information and there's your engine instrument and inside the engine you also have fuel calculations yeah fuel burn and stuff and then you go full screen like that and then you touch this bar up here and there's your autopilot so and is it got uh like ads b weather on it is that what it is yeah it's a dsp with it that's correct yeah that's pretty neat yeah very functional yeah it is i love these little panels you know it's real clean everything's in one and super cheap for aviation wise i total avionics bill for this airplane for everything you see including the uh uh wiring harness from from stein aviation was 18 000. is that a certified version or is that experiment that's experimental and that's the cost of one of the radios in my 340 now [Applause] it's amazing i mean it could be the same like if they were to that same system put in a certified airplane to be three times the cost uh at least you up over here keith i am pretty good visibility in this thing you know it is yeah so we're doing about 105 is that knots or miles an hour that's miles an hour yeah yeah true is 110 right now so so here's allison farms uh this is my buddy's place all right i'm on the left downwind here i don't know where it's at you know i'll just walk here that's on your i'm gonna left downwind so just look up your wings a couple fields but i'm not sure exactly which one i'll watch it all right there's the windsock right there yeah yeah it's kind of yeah i mean you're pretty close in on a pattern in one of these i guess yeah yeah that's the one thing i had a hard time teaching keith he's used to three mile finals let's do it right come on yeah it's more like 300 meter or 300 yard finals yeah or just turn over the threshold so uh the guy that owned this place he had a what are you doing i'll just still stop and go you can come home um yeah nice and slow at 40 miles an hour there and that's probably you probably could have you know yeah i i didn't wheel down yeah um oh i got water in my penile tube it will go right here yeah you don't need much runway with this huh yeah it gets off the ground faster than it can land is that or sooner is that what it is about the same they're close they're close all right here we go about 30 about 30 knots or 30 miles an hour yeah i only had one notch of flaps that's pretty great and i mean as far as like services with these giant tires i mean you probably don't want to land on concrete right now we try to avoid it because it you know those tires are about eighteen hundred bucks a piece right and uh it stops them off you know yeah [Applause] but i mean you can land up i mean pretty pretty rough terrain with these tires i guess you can land on uh yeah you know i'd say uh i mean i've landed on you know rocks you know yeah as big as your fists are better and it's uh so the main thing you got to work you gotta remember you got a little tail wheel back there right you know so you got to remember it's back there and we're trying to protect it all you can but yeah the tires you know they'll take a lot you know flying low all the time you do have to watch for birds i guess huh yeah birds count you know birds probably not gonna kill you a tower will kill you you know i like to see in all the beautiful places out here man there's it's amazing how many big homes are around it you would never know existed out there the plan for the day was to fly over to lake bridgeport in texas we'll just fly up the river low level and it real it makes some really cool video yeah with the rock quarries here you'll enjoy this when i was a kid we sneaking out here fishing a couple of these one up it's called the big hole yeah it's uh probably 250 foot deep at least [Applause] hey keith are you behind me off your left wing about three four miles okay where i'm going over right now over these rail cars look at this tunnel that goes under and uh over to the other side over the quarry pit but that's about sparking as far as i can see okay i won't do a couple circles here and let you catch up he lining up the lake cool yeah i didn't know they've done that [Applause] and this is the one nice kid they call this a blue hole and uh we just think over here fishing it it's you know they haven't used it for a long long long time obviously how's the water quality in that though oh it's you can drink it i mean it's you know you can see the bottom of it there's great big fish in there so you're driving down the highway here you'd never know that if you run off the road you'd climb it 200 feet to your death you know yeah right right now say that the shoreline right now head to the shoreline yeah i got you [Applause] so this is wise county park this is a kind of an iconic place where people come out here and camp [Applause] put their boats in yeah hi keith uh let's uh get kind of farmed up here terrain terrain pull up pull up don't forget that high line over there nearby i see right now thanks okay look at this yeah oh wow yeah you got some red i might have turned her off she's telling you to pull up yeah so you go in here to your terrain hit menu that'll inhibit that get that turned off [Applause] there yeah this is pretty cool here yeah yeah we dropped we drop right down on the order almost feels like i'm in a boat yeah the other badlands traveler joined up with us over the lake [Applause] it's really pretty up here now your back camera will catch him on it yeah it's good and i got my little hand i got my phone here if i need it okay i'm gonna follow you and i get some video behind you so just just fly up the river and hold that out too and i'll come right behind you this is really fun just like evenings you know just back here do this [Applause] there's [Applause] it was pretty fun flying low level over the lake but it's one of those things you need to be familiar with the area to know where all the power lines and hazards are if you're going to be flying that low traffic after flying over the lake for a while we headed back to doug's home airport all right so this is you here again yep we're on low pass here down the runway make sure that the mowers are gone right yeah there they go they're scattering that flies [Applause] it's got a g-major built in if you pull it up it'll pop up here all right let's go ahead blue super cubs uh bass turn final here and i'll let you go roll out he's gonna turn off [Applause] traffic oh bounce down a little bit it's alright he's big ol suspension yeah it'll take it no problem well pretty cool this is uh definitely uh it's a fun little toy oh yeah absolutely all right well doug thanks sir yeah it's a yet another one of your toys to fly it was splash yeah yeah it's really fun flying those things make me want to get one for sure yeah well one of these days you need to all right we'll do it all right thanks man well thanks again for watching another episode of flying doodles really appreciate it please click that like button and subscribe and if you want to go fly sometime send me an email and let's check out your plane

Channel: Flying Doodles

Views: 155,315

Keywords: flight, flying, airplanes, private planes, flight vlog, pilot, pilot vlog, cessna, mooney, piper, mezroa, bush plane, stol, stol airplane, take off, landing, soft field landing

Id: BihkfV0OL88

Length: 23min 56sec (1436 seconds)

Published: Sun Aug 16 2020