Warbird Information Exchange

With a better purse, maybe Wildfire and some of the other custom-built racers (wasn't Matt Jackson or someone working on some Sea Fury parts with an F-86 tail?) once again become more viable? Wasn't there a weight limitation imposed recently that excludes lighter weight aircraft and/or homebuilts from the Unlimited class?

I think the weight restriction is related more to safety than any exclusion purpose. If a mustang gets slammed around behind a sea Fury, and I have seen some bad situations as a result, can you imagine an NXT hitting that "bad air" as the announcers call it? Would be like putting a Cessna behind a 747.

Joe Scheil, I really enjoyed reading your post. And you're right, the thread has deviated somewhat from my initial query! But I don't mind as it's nice to read about the sport on WIX and from very diverse viewpoints.

I respectfully disagree about the lack of history. The airframe - dare I say the dataplate? - has a Reno history dating back to the early days, not to mention the minor matter of Steve Hinton's world speed record made a few weeks (days?) before the RB-51 was lost. Researching more about racers and speeds it really is fascinating to learn, as you mentioned, that the RB-51 in its ultimate configuration isn't likely to be a match for the current Superstangs. Even in her final race she was fairly well behind Sumthin' Else for most of the way.


Shockwave, spearheaded by Darryl Greenamyer. New fuselage and centresection, Sea Fury outer wings, Sabre (or Fury?) empennage. I don't know if Matt was involved there but he was in another project called the Jackson/Cornell Racer or American Spirit, spotted about 7-8yr ago in the Bear Cave.


Still is. 2017's rules have a minimum empty weight for Unlimiteds of 4,500lb. I had a look yesterday as I had a fantasy about a Hughes H-1 rounding the pylons but she'd be too light.

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Zac in NZ
#avgeek, modelbuilder, photographer, writer. Callsign: "HANDBAG".
https://linktr.ee/zacyates

"It's his plane, he spent the money to restore it, he can do with it what he wants. I will never understand what's hard to comprehend about this." - kalamazookid, 20/08/2013
"The more time you spend around warbirds the sooner you learn nothing, is simple." - JohnB, 24/02/22

Good looking airplane...


R77------623 by Neal Nurmi, on Flickr

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Neal Nurmi

---Wingman Photo---

Good photo- hadn't realized it was that far along.

http://www.airliners.net/photo/Untitled/Cornell-Jackson-American-Spirit/1187070?qsp=eJyrVkrOzytJrSgJqSxIVbJSSsxJKs1V0lEqSCxKzC1WsqqGiHimKFkZGVqamNTWAgDBGBDZ

Photo taken 10 years ago in Ione, CA.

To be fair she wasn't running all that well the whole week, at least her speeds weren't showing it compared to what she had done before. I agree though that the RB-51 probably would not be competitive against the likes of Voodoo or Strega or the Bear. Would sure add some spice back in Czech Mate and Dreadnaught territory though.
I think maybe a little faster than PM, but I am a huge RB fan.

Thanks Leo, when I was watching the ABC footage of the race on YouTube I wondered if something was slowing her down.


There are also shots from 2012 and 2014 (misidentified as Shockwave) out there if you know where to look. Also some info from Matt on it from 2006. I was wondering if maybe Rod Lewis had bought it.

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Zac in NZ
#avgeek, modelbuilder, photographer, writer. Callsign: "HANDBAG".
https://linktr.ee/zacyates

"It's his plane, he spent the money to restore it, he can do with it what he wants. I will never understand what's hard to comprehend about this." - kalamazookid, 20/08/2013
"The more time you spend around warbirds the sooner you learn nothing, is simple." - JohnB, 24/02/22

To stir the pot a little more, while getting back to the notion of aircraft built specifically for racing, a few thoughts on money.

As a barrier to future custom racers, it is common for people to talk about the expense and rarity of airframes in building/operating a top flight Unlimited racer. It's a specious argument. Have a look at the classic car auction scene. There is more than enough money out there to bankroll the wildest ideas in air racing. Compare the cost to build a P-51 from scratch, versus purchasing a top of the line Lambo, or McLaren, or Rolls, or Ferrari, Bugatti, etc. That's to say nothing of the money spent on classic muscle or racing hardware. The money is there, it just needs someone with enough love of aviation. Folks are decrying the lack of new highly modified racers, but what about Galloping Ghost. Setting aside what went wrong, it was intended to be exactly what folks are saying never happens any more.

Of the folks who love air racing out there, have a question for you. Would any of you, upon winning say $50,000,000 in the lottery, contact Rod Lewis and ask to buy Rare Bear. If he said five million, would you balk? I'm 55 years old. Fifty million means I could spend a million per year for 50 years without considering investment interest. I could spend two million per year for 25 years. How much does one need to spend and where to spend it?

For me, it would be an easy decision. Spend 10-15 million to race for ten years, and only spend $750,000 per year for the next 45 years after that. How often do people win $50,000,000 in the lottery, surprisingly often. Not saying any of them are aviation enthusiasts, but rather the path to being able to build Reno racers is open to a significant number of folks.

As to the arguments about parts availability, that too is moot. You can have any of these things built. A groups in the UK built a complete 1930s Auto Union from scratch, including the engine. Heck, there is/was (not sure their current status) a group in Australia building four liter Austin Healey six cylinder engines from scratch. If someone can find the money to do that, building Merlins should be easy. Cast and machine ten of the most desirable engine blocks, and the project will pay for itself.

If the right person wants to go racing, building a Tsunami, or RB-51, or whatever else, is certainly not cost prohibitive. What John Sharp did with the NXT, someone else could do on a larger scale using a Merlin or R-2800. It would probably want to built from metal for the weight, but that's doable too.

I actually really love this whole post. To begin with, the lottery idea has me laughing. A couple of my friends and I buy powerball tickets every week specifically with the intentions of fixing Reno LOL. Buy Riff Raff make it full race and give it to Hoot to race for me, buy Goldfinger tear the scoop off and make a GG replica painted like the black Miss Foxy Lady, and get a couple rare warbirds to race as stockers in the field. Only takes one ticket to win. It's actually pretty surprising that out of all the people winning let's even say 20 million (which is incredibly low for a powerball), nobody has won and done something to help Reno. Think about the 200k fans that attend, the friends that they know that would spare them some cash, and then all of the other Reno fans that don't attend! That's getting close to 5-600k and none of us have won!!! Of course not everyone buys tickets LOL, but the chances are high. I still don't understand how a guy like Rod can not want to bring the Bear racing. Everyone knows he has endless piles of cash and Reno really isn't THAT expensive... once you have the plane that is...

Well, there it is. That's exactly what is wrong with the majority of the thread...200k attending? Not a chance. They have worked their butts off to get 60K back into the stands TOTAL for the entire week. Until 2016, the last 7 or 8 years the races lost their *ss each year, and only happened because the casinos bank-rolled it to get customers. I believe 2015 was the first year they even barely exceeded breaking even. There aren't going to be 250k purses for anybody at this rate. Sponsors put up money for the advertising benefits of the event- and the current staff have done an outstanding job of providing modern demographics and charts that had never happened before. It's going to be a long road back.

As for the question on the IF 1 series, can't remember ticket numbers, but last year in most places they sold out...and had a few thousand extras sitting outside watching over the fence. They are on the upswing.

As for winning the lottery...I wouldn't go near Bear. I'd hand Thom the money to get PM put back together with the sort of mods he'd love to do.......and then openly taunt Mr Buttons to bring Voodoo back to play.

That's a typical thought that a lot of people have about so-called "rich" people. Just because somebody has a lot of assets and may be worth a lot of money doesn't necessarily mean they have the discretionary income to give to "money pits" such as air racing. Don't get me wrong, I love Reno Air Racing and support it fully, but there is no way you can break any where remotely close to even at the Unlimited Gold level in the top echelon. Yes, Rod has a lot of money, but there is a lot that we don't know about him. Do we know all of his personal finances, perhaps how many people or family and friends that he is supporting, or the donations or things he does for charity, etc.? Most billionaires tend to not talk about how they help people out who are less fortunate than them. I know Rod is heavily involved in charities. Is this the case with Rod - I don't know - but you can't assume that just because he is wealthy that he has the discretionary income to afford an unlimited racing budget. For example, Rod just recently went through a divorce and lost about 1.5 Billion USD. That is nothing to sneeze at. Now, he is worth a little more than 1 Billion USD. Is that enough to race with? Sure, but we don't know about his other expenses, investments, debts, etc.

Rod Lewis came at a time when Mike Brown suddenly got pissed at RARA, left the Reno Air Races and sold all of his warbirds and retired to Hawaii. There was a huge void, and Rod Lewis filled that and provided a significant amount of support and airplanes to fill the fields in the various Unlimited classes. One could say that he effectively "carried" the Reno Air Races, or at least was a major contributor to the success of the Reno Air Races during the late 2000's when RARA was potentially facing a "slump" if he hadn't participated otherwise. When RARA "takes someone for granted" like they seem to have done with Rod, it doesn't take a fool to realize that nobody likes being taken advantage of, especially multi-billionaires. I'm guessing that is one factor, plus his divorce, and the Bear's constant problems and lack of success recently, that seems to have sucked the energy out of his motivation to participate in Air Racing the last few years.

So, I disagree with the statement that he has "endless piles of cash". We don't have access to his financials and balance sheets and thus can't make those kind of definitive statements. With all of his investments, holdings, and charitable contributions, he may, in fact, be hurting financially. I don't know, but we certainly can't rule out that possibility.

I would venture a guess that if RARA treated all Unlimited owners/pilots a little better that people such as Rod Lewis would come back in droves. A large part of that equation is money as mentioned earlier. Unfortunately, everything revolves around big sponsorship. Without that, there is no Reno Air Racing. We must face reality and realize that the average American - outside of specialized "niche" aviation groups - have little to no interest in Unlimited air racing. It's something that's not relatable to the average person. Most people don't fly or have airplanes - therein lies the problem. At least with NASCAR, every spectator/fan has a car and has driven a "fast" sports car of some type, so they can relate to the thrill and adrenaline of speed and car racing. So, that, in my opinion, is the fundamental difference why NASCAR is ultra successful and Reno Air Racing is not.

This is why Dr. Brent Hisey hasn't been back with "Miss America"

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remember the Oogahonk!
old school enthusiast of Civiltary Warbirds and Air Racers

Let me phrase what I said a bit differently. Who are the top Unlimited guys at Reno... Tiger, Button, Thom, Rod... Who has the most money? And most likely A LOT more? I guess it comes down to passion for the sport. Thom got screwed for the showline cut and RARA offered no sympathy. He is dedicated to the sport and wants to come back. I know there are technicalities to it, but give me one instance that you know of specifically where RARA told Rod to pound sand. Rod realistically has nothing to complain about other than the lack of praise he got for keeping Bear and 232 for a handful of years. Do I appreciate him "filling the void" as you say? Hell yea I do, but look who was racing this year, and they aren't flaunting 40-50 million of pristine warbirds in their hangar back home. Disagree if you like, but the writing is on the wall, Rod can race he just doesn't want to.

The only writing on the wall is that you don't have the faintest clue as to what you're talking about. I can forgive ignorance to a degree, sometimes we don't all see the same information and get the same memos, but you're going over the top with your assumptions. Rod Lewis has his hands full with other "issues" at the moment, I'm not going to spread details about the mans personal life, but its enough to affect his current activities.