VH-ABZ Fairchild 24K
(c/n 3314)
Another of
my personal favorites. This photograph was taken at Moorabbin in
1957. Below are
two earlier
shots of it. Photo No.2 depicts the aircraft in its
original livery, while the Frank Walters
shot at No.3 shows it immediately post war
named 'Pegasus.I', still with
spats, and with standard
Fairchild
livery for new F24s
built subsequent to 1946. Finally, a contemporary shot of
it by
Phil
Vabre at the 2006 AAAA Fly-In at
Narrandera. .Notice the absence of
spats on my shot
above.
Most owners dispensed with
them, especially if they
were operating from muddy fields, since mud
would accumulate
under the spats with, sometimes, rather interesting (ground loop)
results. With
today's almost
universal hard runways, the problem went away. VH-ABZ did its war
service "bit"
as
A36-2. It was originally imported (ex NC20637) in November
1938.
.