The O-300 at 80SMOH is a peachy little engine, but frankly, the 170B is a bit pokey for x-c flying. I am considering the Franklin Conversion and will have an 80 hour O-300 Firewall forward for sale if I do.
What are your thoughts on the conversion? (sorry, I am not a purist, I am a also supercub driver who things mods are the ticket to making a silk purse from a sow's ear)...
I did a search and did not find much on the subject. I frankly (no pun intended) love the 170. I dont' want to sell it an buy a 180 or 185, I LIKE IT. However, if I need to "get a brain" let me know!
Thanks!
sj
1952 170B
Steve Johnson
Lake Waukomis, MO
Email: Steve (at) Supercub (dot) Org
The O-300 at 80SMOH is a peachy little engine, but frankly, the 170B is a bit pokey for x-c flying. I am considering the Franklin Conversion and will have an 80 hour O-300 Firewall forward for sale if I do.
What are your thoughts on the conversion? (sorry, I am not a purist, I am a also supercub driver who things mods are the ticket to making a silk purse from a sow's ear)...
If you fly Cubs, that's a good attitude to have.....
I did a search and did not find much on the subject. I frankly (no pun intended) love the 170. I dont' want to sell it an buy a 180 or 185, I LIKE IT. However, if I need to "get a brain" let me know!
Thanks!
sj
If you want to bit a 180, buy a 180. Why spend all this money on a 180 and end up with a 170. As it is the 170 is probably the most value/dollar.
No, it doesn't go as fast as a 225 hp Franklin conversion and it won't takeoff so quickly but what it does do it does very well and cheaply.
Besides, aren't there laws against defaciing national monuments?
Although I'll be the first to admit that the 170 isn't exactly an overpowered speed demon, I knew that going in. For the money spent on a first class engine upgrade, I'd buy a 180 instead, but that's just my opinion.
The bigger engines add to the empty weight, reducing useful load, because as far as I know no gross weight increase is available for this airplane. Plus, with the stock 42 gallons fuel, you won't have much range.
Most of the O-360 conversions have Javelin aux fuel. Flint tanks might be another option, I guess.
On the Association home page, click on links, and go to Matt and Holly's 52B "Punkin" site, he has converted to the 220 Franklin. From his testing, it looks like about a 20 knot speed increase, still slower than a 180. I'm sure he would be happy to answer questions about his experience...he has a very nice airplane.
From what I have read, the 210 hp Continental conversion seems to offer alot of bang for the buck...Blue out in California seems to love his. Fuel injected, too.
Whatever you do, keep that stock paint scheme, your airplane looks great! Russ Farris
The 170 is fantastic in so many ways (cheap to operate, wonderful/
light handling charachteristics, classic lines, very forgiving, easy to maintain, etc.). It has (1) and only drawback.... It's SLOW!
I've been slowly learning to just live with it. The positive attributes
I mention above make up for the relatively slow speed.....
When my airplane breaks (and that's a rare occasion), a hundred
dollar bill usually gets it going again. When a 180 or 185 breaks,
it's more like a $500 dollar bill to get it going again.
In any event, I'd be inclined to just sell a nice 170 like you have
and move up to a 180 (or whatever) instead of spending $30K+
to put a Franklin or 210hp Continental in it....
From the opinions on this board, it would seem there are plenty of
folks who would thank you for leaving the 170 alone (pass it on
to another person who will enjoy it as is). This is precisely what
I intend to do at some point in the future.... I will maintain my
170 in relatively stock form as well as I can, and when the day
comes that I simply have to have more speed (or payload or
takeoff performance or whatever), I'll move up and let someone
else enjoy the 170 for what it is for awhile.
Maybe you can get one of those cool new aeronautical diesel engines that run on JetA. You just have to convince one of the manufacturers that there is enough demand among 170 owners to justify the cost of getting the STC.
Bela...I think it has two drawbacks...slow and short on range, especially for IFR. The slow part wouldn't seem so bad if I could make it non-stop.
A fuel stop adds at least an hour to a trip, counting approach and climb. 55 gallons would be ideal, especially since I seldom carry much of a load.
Having said that, I'm keeping mine stock too, right down to the polished aluminum. After 50 years of continuous maintenance (no ground-up restoration) I think it's sorta special!
It's funny how you sometimes use an airplane differently than you thought you would. I assumed I'd do mostly local flying and some fly-ins. What I end up doing are 200 mile cross-countries to visit family, and trips to Florida. Probably only 10 percent of the 100 hours a year I put on 43A is local low and slow.
It's amazing how Cessna's marketing still works, after all these years. The 120/140 guys want a 170, the 170 folks talk about 180s and 195s...
As much as I love my airplane, if Jeff Michaels put his 1955 180 up for sale, I'd be very tempted. It's almost totally stock, polished aluminum with the factory turqouise paint scheme, big wing numbers - perfect! He even has the old Lear and Narco radio face plates over the modern avionics, just for shows. It's also one of the very few 180s I've seen with the original metal wheel pants.
In the meantime, I'll continue to lavish time and money on 43A, and watch the scenery slowly go by (except for those 50 knot tailwind days!)
Steve,if you already have a Cub (super or otherwise) so you have the low/slow/STOL covered, and are looking for a cross-country machine,maybe you should sell the 170 and buy an older Bonanza. Or Mooney. Or Commanche.Or Grumman. Or RV.
The 170 is a great all-around airplane. Especially for the fiscally challenged. For the kind of flying I like to do it works real well.However,if the money was not a factor,I'd have a 180 in a heartbeat. It's just like a 170,only more so! Unfortunately the money IS a factor for me. So I own a 170,the "poor man's Skywagon". It does everything I need to do anyway,just not quite as quickly or as heavily-loaded.
If I could afford 2 airplanes,it'd be wise to have 2 that compliment --not duplicate-- each other,like a DC-3 and a PA-11 ( my favorite combination)to cite an extreme example.
If you want to keep the 170,there are some things you can do to improve the cruise without sinking big bucks into a big engine. Lighten it up as much as possible and clean it up aerodynamically,including improving the baffling. Then hang a coarser pitch prop on it.
I know of 2 different guys,no make that 3, who claim to have done this to ragwing 170's and achieved 130 mph plus cruise speeds at 2450 rpm. Never flown with any of them,though,so cannot verify their claims. The 170 book has a couple pretty good articles on clean-up mods.
If your need is just more speed forget the big engine because the 170 will never be fast compared to other planes. Eric has it right, find a significantly different plane from the Cub. Like the 195 on ebay right now would be my choice. I'm going to the Lyc O-360 because I love the 170 and need more power for high and hot operations. I don't need fast. Plus I got a good deal on the FWF.
The Franklin is a sweet engine to fly behind. Almost turbine like smoothness and tons of power. My only drawback with it is that it makes the 40 more horsepower than the Lyc O-360 with the same displacement by using a 10.5 to 1 compression ratio instead of 8 to 1 on the Lyc. I find that a bit high being an old 195 Jacobs driver. That is about 6 to 1!
I appreciate all of your comments. I was not destined to be a 170 owner until I was talking to someone who wanted to sell theirs... I do like the plane, and I really need x-c reliability more than I need speed. Even though the O300 is low time (80 hours), 28 of those hours were accumulated over the last 10 years prior to me owning it. I have doubled the time on it in less than six months.
The 170 (at least my mostly stock one) is too fancy pantsy for any of the stuff I like to do in the supercub. I'd have to put on bigger tires, sling mud at it, and make the N numbers even smaller..
The bonanza, mooney ideas are all good, but there is no STC for moving that annoying nosewheel in back where it should be...
sj
1952 170B
Steve Johnson
Lake Waukomis, MO
Email: Steve (at) Supercub (dot) Org
Steve,
I changed the pitch on my ragwing to a 53 from a 49. I fly by myself most of the time (lightly loaded) and a good mix of cross country and just bumming around. The acceleration and climb loss was noticeable but not debilitating--I still fly comfortably off all the grass fields I typically use in the area. I did pick up about 10kts of cruise, from 95 to 105--which is what I wanted (it did pick up my fuel consumption too!). I wouldn't mind an extra 10 gallons of fuel, but I can only sit for about 3 to 3 1/2 hours without a break so putting in a Javelin tank or extra wing tank on the port (left) side really isn't cost effective for me.
We still need to get together sometime--my plane is getting a couple things done right now and I fly to Colorado next week, but maybe after that.
Bill, I don't know what a ragwing 170 tank costs,but I'm sure it's cheaper than doing the Javelin mod,if ya ever decide you do want more fuel capacity. More elegant solution too,in my book,no extra plumbing ,pumps,gauges,etc. A large part of the job would be recovering the wing,so naturally the best time to consider adding the tank would be at recover time.
I don't know if the 4th tank is a standard LH tank with the cap opening sealed,or what. I've heard that the ragwing tanks were just 120/140 tanks,so they just added a second one to the RH wing for the extra fuel capacity ( 12.5 gallons) the bigger engine required. I guess the part numbers would tell the story,if I really wanted to find out.
Sj, I'd recomend talking to a few guys that have the Franklins, that might make your decision a little easier. It will easily out perform a stock 180 (use full load aside). It will cruise faster, climb faster, and get off shorter. As far as fuel consumption it will go up buy about 2 gallons an hour, however the extra speed more than makes up for it. You actually end up gaining about 100 miles of range. It does move your CG forward and it does add weight, their are always some draw backs to anything. I know of guys that have sold there 180's to buy (220) 170's because they perform better. I'm sure I'll get brow beat for this post but I guess I'm not much of a purist. I'm a cub driver also so I know where you are coming from. More power ARRRG! ARRRG! ARRRG! Bigger faster stronger!!!
Shawn
