AOPA Pilot Magazine - March 2011 - 88

Marsh got a demonstration of a landing on Florida’s Lake Dora (above) before trying it on his own. The trick for the takeoff is to use the thumb (at right) to push the left engine slightly ahead of the right engine. At the halfway point, without stopping, allow the right throttle to catch up and continue forward with both full power, all the while simultaneously keeping the wings level with the ailerons.

Goat rope Preflight discussion included the term “goat rope” when describing how to taxi the Twin Bee on land. Landing at Florida’s Leesburg International Airport, I had little time to celebrate a smooth, well-coached crosswind landing of the tailwheel aircraft. (It turns out the Twin Bee is a docile tailwheel aircraft.) But, after the landing came the taxi. I got off the runway and onto the taxiway, but an S turn lay ahead—and I got stuck in it. Couldn’t turn, and couldn’t proceed without leaving the taxiway. Always-patient instructor Eric Weaver had to bail me out. It required differential braking and differential power from the two 180-horsepower Lycoming IO-360 engines—and an experienced pilot. Weaver is also the pilot who operated the aircraft for The Rum Diary. A little history All 23 Twin Bees ever built began life between 1945 and 1947 as single-engine Seabees. Their conversions to multiengine aircraft were done 20 years later. More than 1,000 of the Franklin-powered
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Seabees were built by Republic Aviation Corporation between 1945, when military and civilian orders seemed promising, and 1948, when the orders fizzled. Most returning servicemen decided not to continue flying. The single-engine seaplane was designed by a Republic Aviation test pilot and engineer with four names, Percival Hopkins “Spence” Spencer. During World War II, he made 134 test flights in newly built Republic P–47 Thunderbolts. The Twin Bee, like the P–47, is all bolts and rivets; heavy-gauge aluminum; and thick, forged parts. It’s built for warriors, not wimps. It should be no surprise that the Seabee, a name borrowed with permission from the U.S. Navy in the 1940s, began as the RC–1 Thunderbolt. United Consultants Corporation, headed by Joseph Gigante (now in his 90s)—later named STOL Aircraft and based in Norwood, Massachusetts— did all of the Twin Bee multiengine conversions. Gigante designed the conversion, resulting in today’s designation: Republic/STOL Aircraft UC (for United Consultants)–1. That’s now the aircraft

designation in my logbook for my most recent flight review. Great instructor, big airplane Walking up to the 10-foot-tall Twin Bee with its 43-foot wingspan was a little intimidating, but what’s up with the boxy cabin? I wasn’t able to find an answer, but during the early design phase the Seabee was named the Spencer S–12 Air Car Amphibian. Maybe Spencer was trying to make the airplane look like a car. To save costs, a great many automobile parts were used. Before my flight there was a two-hour ground school on multiengine theory and what Weaver calls “Bee-tricities.” I was doing so poorly on multiengine theory that AOPA Chief Photographer Mike Fizer gave up trying to videotape a correct answer and left Weaver’s office. I emerged later and told Fizer, “I passed!” Weaver, still at his desk, added, “Just barely!” The training manual refers to the forward-latching doors on both sides of the aircraft as “suicide” doors. (You can download a free copy of the manual at jonesairandsea.com.) That’s because

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AOPA Pilot Magazine - March 2011

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