Warbird Information Exchange

Hi

Can anyone help? I would like to know ownership details for a Porterfield Collegiate Registration no. NC25577, pictured in CA in the forties on the Abandoned Airfields website. A search of the FAA database draws a blank. Is there an online resource that I can use?

TIA

From the Porterfield type club:
http://porterfieldplane.ning.com/main/s ... ?q=nc25577

Airknocker

Thanks, I have seen that, but I appreciate your taking the trouble to reply. I am surprised that there is no database of historic N-numbers, though I guess that would be a big task to compile.

You know the N-number, so if you can find the S/N, you can order the aircraft records on CD here: http://aircraft.faa.gov/e.gov/nd/
This costs $. (used to be $10/aircraft)
I checked Aerofiles on N25577 but the registration database there doesn't have it listed.
If you are positive that the Porterfield in the photo is N25577, (I can't be certain the third number is a "5"), Tom Porterfield posted he thought the S/N would be 677. I've tried several S/N's in that field on the FAA records ordering page, to no avail.
The FAA records that have not been digitized must be physically retrieved. Once they are retrieved, they are digitized and the paper copies are destroyed.
It doesn't matter to the FAA if the paper copies have famous signatures on them, the paper is destroyed!
It is possible that no one has ever requested the records for N25577 using the modern system in place. The correct S/N must be known and used to order the records.
The records on the CD are the registration and airworthiness records. From these you will have the chain of ownership. These records are simply whatever paperwork was ever submitted to the FAA during the course of an aircraft's history.
Let us know what you find out.
Good Luck!

Try the list from Aerofiles:
http://aerofiles.com/regs-25.html

Here is a possibility.

The entire registration database was available as a downloadable file on the FAA's website. A rather large one to be sure, but manageable. I downloaded it myself once but no longer have a copy.

www.archive.org (the Internet Archive, aka The Wayback Machine) may have copied it. You'd need to go back to a version of at least 5-6 years ago, before the triennial purge of inactive records began.

By far aerofiles.com is the very best for pre-WWII U.S. registry. For Europe, Australia, New Zealand, Canada and South America use Golden Years of Aviation - Register index - Airhistory.org.uk
www.airhistory.org.uk › reg_index

The U.S. Civil Aircraft volumes 1-9 by Joseph Juptner are also a good source. I looked up Porterfield but since there were so many made, they did not list the NC numbers. Try contacting the Antique Airplane Association as they may be able to help as well.

Thanks for all your responses, plenty to go on there.

I'll let you know how I get on.