Civilian T-34C s

[JOMiller]

Last week I asked about PBYs. Now another question.
How many T-34Cs are in civilian hands and where are
they? I know I can look on the FAA site and check N
numbers. How can I get a list by type? Just the Chraley
model, not the Alpha or Brave.

Help,
Owen

[mustanglover]

Last week I asked about PBYs. Now another question.
How many T-34Cs are in civilian hands and where are
they? I know I can look on the FAA site and check N
numbers. How can I get a list by type? Just the Chraley
model, not the Alpha or Brave.

Help,
Owen

FAA database shows 10 total registered T-34Cs.

California - 1 (T-34C)
Colorado - 1 (T-34C)
Texas - 2 (T-34C)
Idaho - 1 (T-34C-1)
Illinois - 2 (T-34C-1)
Kansas - 1 (T-34C-1)
Mississippi - 1 (T-34C-1)
Washington - 1 (T-34C-1)

http://registry.faa.gov/aircraftinquiry ... C&PageNo=1

[JOMiller]

WOW! Didn't know of that resource.
Thanks much!

Owen

[JohnB]

Yes, that's a great resource.
However, you always have to remember that many of those aircraft are projects or just "paper". planes/data plates.

[ChrisK48]

The two in Texas are owned by a community college district, so they are probably maintenance trainers.

The one in California belongs to NASA.

[ChrisK48]

Here's the one registered in Colorado. It's actually a T-34B that was converted to one of two YT-34C prototypes.

[ChrisK48]

One of the ones in Illinois, N4020P, has an expired registration.

The one in Kansas belongs to Beechcraft.

[Speedy]

Man, I SO LOVED flying the Turbo Weenie. That would be a really fun plane to fly around on the warbird circuit these days....especially if you removed all the 'de-tuning' stuff that the Navy put on the PT-6A to lengthen service life.

[JohnB]

I'd think you'd be able to most of a "C" by taking a "B" and putting a PT-6 on the front.
Take it to Rocket engineering who convert Bonanzas, Dukes and Pipers to turbines, They'd probably have it done in a week or two. .

[Fouga23]

I wouldn't do that without looking at the wingspar first. Wasn't the C spar strengthened?

[Speedy]

Yes, there were actually a LOT of internal and external changes made to the Charlie airframe. Not as simple as hanging a PT-6A on the nose of a B. It wasn't an entirely new airframe, but it had updated empennage (bigger dorsal fin, tandem ventral fins, large horizontal stabilizer fillet), strengthened fuselage and as Fouga23 pointed out a much beefier wing spar.

Even at that, if I were to get one of the retired Navy Charlies out of the boneyard it would probably require a pretty hefty teardown and rebuild. We were pretty hard on them.

[p51]

The one in California belongs to NASA.

NASA has more than just one, but the number of them escapes me right now. I could call a pal of mine at Armstrong to check how many they currently use. Many people have no idea the amazingly varied airplane types that NASA still flies.

[Robbie Stuart]

I believe the first, & may be the only T-34C sold directly from Beech to a civilian was a T-34C1, N6922S, S/N: GM-89. I was Chief Inspector at the Beechcraft shop at KPDK, & through special arrangement by our aircraft salesman, whom was also the location manager; the aircraft was sold to Marshall Haas/Haas Publishing.
Haas had a flight department based with us at the time with several aircraft. I don’t think Marshall was a pilot as he always had his pilots flying him around. Each time the T-34C went up his Chief Pilot was up front. The aircraft had been a demonstrator, & flight test aircraft for Beech, in fact I had another corporate pilot customer that had accumulated many hours in the aircraft when he worked for Beech in Flight Test.
IIRC, Haas publishing became distressed, & the T-34C was sold to another customer of mine Dallas Shelton. Dallas always seemed to be a real sharp pilot, a successful businessman, he had owned a Beech Duke for many years, & then had bought a new King Air C-90A from us. I never flew with Dallas in the T-34C, but he seemed to know what he was doing in the other aircraft.
In 1995, Dallas decided to take the T-34C to Oshkosh for Air Venture. The day before he planned to leave, he came & asked me if I wanted to go. Our shop was busy at the time, & on that short of notice, I couldn’t take off. I think he asked the line guy that topped off the airplane later that day, & he could not go either. Dallas finally got in touch with a pilot buddy of his, & he was able to go. The next day August 1, 1995 at 1040 CDT the aircraft crashed killing both men in route to Oshkosh. They were in IMC, & flamed out. The NTSB listed probable cause as, “the pilot's failure to maintain an adequate fuel supply, and his failure to maintain airspeed”.
D-amn shame, two good men lost, one of whom I had known for a long time. I have always wondered, had I been on board what I may have done that would have changed that outcome?
Robbie

[ChrisK48]

The one in California belongs to NASA.

NASA has more than just one, but the number of them escapes me right now. I could call a pal of mine at Armstrong to check how many they currently use. Many people have no idea the amazingly varied airplane types that NASA still flies.

N819NA, which is 160945, has gone back to the Navy/Marines.

(Not my photo, so I don't want to link it in.)

https://www.flickr.com/photos/jackmcgo210/16480093748/

[T J Johansen]

Another 'civilian' T-34C that went in with the loss of both occupants was the Beech demonstrator N2067A which crashed on May 29, 1983 at Mildenhall AFB in the UK.

Photo of the plane here:
http://www.abpic.co.uk/popup.php?q=1328202

Accident brief here:
http://aviation-safety.net/wikibase/wiki.php?id=166875

Video of the accident here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lxc3Bh1YzfM

Several other T-34Cs came through Europe with N#s years ago on their ferry flight to Indonesia.

The T-34C is actually a quite cool airplane. Only seen one once, at Breckenridge in 1991.

T J