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1976 IO-540 Skybolt ($36k)

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brooksmershon

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Location
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1976 Steen Skybolt. Based at KLMO (Vance Brand, Longmont Colorado)

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Last flown upside down today. Will continue to fly once or twice a week minimum throughout the summer, intending to compete in Sportsman. However, I want a light S1C and am ready to part with this to be ready to buy one.

Just came out of significant weight reduction campaign that saw leather trim delete and overall freshening up of avionics, interior weight reduction and cleaning, and other misc. odds and ends like new AN hardware all around, new rubber engine mounts, etc.

I have one task left in my Summer refresh and that is replacing the Lord mounts and all landing gear AN hardware as that would give me a warm and fuzzy feeling. Probably uncessary, but I will be doing it as soon as I get the lifting help I need. All flight control and trim bolts were already replaced to remove slop. Tailwheel (and the wheel) already totally replaced, all new AN hardware. Hoping Jamie Treat will help me out with the heavy lifting despite his slammed schedule.

Stits fabric / Durathane paint in very good condition, original logs, no damage history. Sliding canopies & open cockpit windscreens included. Aircraft 403 TT, IO-540-J4A5 ~450 SMOH, 250 hp. Teflon fuel & oil hoses, B&C oil filter adapter, Bendix mags, Christen inverted system, Hartzell HC-C3YR-4, ~240 SPOH. Solid flange. 29 gal internal fuel. Cleveland brakes.

All excellent compressions last condition inspection. Flown ~200 hours since 2015 under previous owner. Dry climate Denver CO saved the engine, and previous owner replaced all firewall forward hoses since 2015. Flown 35 hours since this past Christmas under me and 140+ landings.

Full flight controls & toe brakes both cockpits. FL760, KT76A. Position lights, strobes, very clean uavionix echo ADSB installed and performing perfectly (ADSB in and out, just connect to airplane wifi), landing & taxi light holes, cockpit lighting. Currently have removed old landing/taxi lights and would replace with lighter units.

New master/starter solenoid, battery 2020. Currently reverted to open cockpit :)

New Alaskan Bushwheel Scott 3200 replacement, new tire. All new assembly basically, black from the factory.

Vetterman exhaust. People look when you start up. Everyone knows what my plane sounds like. Half the fun of the plane is operating a 6-cylinder engine with a little blue prop lever attached to it.

The plane has been competitive in Colorado in Sporstman with the previous owner Mike Arensmeyer. It's not light, but it flies perfectly straight and has the engine to tractor it's weigh around.

Plane needs to be reweighed as I pulled out 35+ lbs of stuff in the last month (including going to open cockpit from the double slider).

It is a brute that does a great job as a cruiser and it is solid enough to hold up to Sportsman acro if desired. It does have higher stick forces than a Pitts, and is frankly more stable and sure footed in turbulence than my RV-6 ever was. The big heavy propeller up front is a gyro that lends itself to sport aerobatics and cruising and is a bit too much heft for my liking now than I'm regularly flying Sportsman routines.

Selling to buy the lightest and cleanest single seat S1C I can find. I purchased this plane end of 2019 and loved taking up passengers and learning to fly a blind biplane, but I now want a lighter single seater for more bang for my buck per sortie.

Long story short, I'm happy flying the plane, but now is the time to prepare for snapping up the lightweight single seat wonder that I now want.

Who should buy this plane: someone who wants an open cockpit cruiser that makes 6-cylinder fun and doesn't mind higher stick forces of a bigger biplane. Someone who wants to share a biplane with a friend for less than $100k. Someone who pushes the weight scale for a single seat Pitts and wants the Lamar Steen sized cockpit of a Skybolt.

Who should not buy this plane: someone who thinks this plane will take them through Advanced in IAC. Not the right tool for the job. It is a Dodge Hellcat in handling compared to a Mazda Miata, and now I want a Miata.

Condition inspection DUE October 2020. Turn-key ADSB compliant, ready to go right now.

Asking 36k OBO.

See boulderpilot.com for more details about me. Delivery in U.S. negotiable.
 

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