Why not, the DC-3 has done just about everything else.

[Chantry]

[Chantry]

The space shuttle has been retired and the production run of the Boeing 747 is supposed to end in 2022, but the DC-3 keeps on flying.

'While nations fall and men retire,

and jets go obsolete,

The Gooney Bird flies on and on

at eleven thousand feet.'

 

[Charlie Harley, #14153]

I could see that. 
 

When the last C-17 is flown to the bone yard, they’ll shuttle the crew back on a C-47 or C-130. 

[Subdeacon Joe]

 

 

 

[Sedalia Dave]

Wonder which one will be flying the longest. The DC-3 or the B-52?

[Abilene Slim SASS 81783]

2 hours ago, Sedalia Dave said:

Wonder which one will be flying the longest. The DC-3 or the B-52?

Interesting question. What I think about is the B-52 requires government money to keep flying, but the Gooney continues to be profitable for private enterprise on its own after 85 years. 

[Chantry]

2 hours ago, Sedalia Dave said:

Wonder which one will be flying the longest. The DC-3 or the B-52?

The DC-3 easily.   The flying life of a B-52 is between 27,000-30,000 flying hours on the air frame before they are sent to the boneyard.

 

As of about 5 years ago (the last time I really did the research) there were DC-3's with over 90,000 flying hours on the air frame and there was at least one DC-3 with over 100,000 flying hours on the air frame still doing the air show circuit.  The biggest problem is the engines, parts are getting hard to find and the price to rebuild the original radial engines keeps going up.

 

There is a company taking DC-3/C-47 air frames, overhaul it to the point it is considered a brand new air frame per FAA standards and put turbo prop engines on it, which both increases the DC-3's performance across the board while decreasing operating costs.    Link:  https://www.baslerturbo.com/overview.html

 

Not bad for a 86 year old design that will probably be flying after most of us are dead.

 

 

[Subdeacon Joe]

2 hours ago, Sedalia Dave said:

Wonder which one will be flying the longest. The DC-3 or the B-52?

 

Flying?  Or in government service?

[Forty Rod SASS 3935]

8 hours ago, Charlie Harley, #14153 said:

I could see that. 
 

When the last C-17 is flown to the bone yard, they’ll shuttle the crew back on a C-47 or C-130. 

Or BUFFY.

[Chantry]

10 hours ago, Subdeacon Joe said:

 

Flying?  Or in government service?

Still the DC-3,  if Wikipedia is accurate (and I think it is for this subject) there are DC-3/C-47 still in active government & military service.  Even today there is no aircraft that can carry the same payload, get into short airfields including dirt & grass and do it at a lower operating cost.  And the icing on the cake is that a DC-3 is very easy to fly, the only time the DC-3 is hard to handle is if you lose an engine on take off.  

[Del Rio Pete]

DC-3 travels to Haiti.  Lands on grass strip in central Haiti.

[Doc X]

8 hours ago, Chantry said:

the only time the DC-3 is hard to handle is if you lose an engine on take off

As long as the pilot remembers to get the tail up quickly on the take off run and keep it up on landing as speed bleeds off. Tail down the DC-3's design blocks most of the airflow to the rudder making directional control difficult. There have been a couple of accidents with inexperienced newer pilots recently because of this. 

[Chantry]

Some random facts and stories:

 

In 1939 90% of ALL air commerce in the United States was flown in a DC-3.  Apple, Amazon & Wal-Mart wish they had that much of monopoly.

Russia flew Lend Lease C-47's and licensed copies of the C-47 into the 1980's in the rural areas of the Soviet Union.  Douglas never got paid for the licensed copies.

 

A C-47 that had flown "the Hump" was at a Chinese airfield when it was strafed by Japanese aircraft.  There was no damage to anything vital, but it was full of holes (the story says a 1000 holes).  The Chinese ground crew patched the holes with canvas and glue and the pilots took off to fly back to India.  During the flight back the SC-3 passed through some rain which caused all of the patches to fall off.  When they landed in India, their commanding officer told the pilots they could hear the plane coming 50 miles away with all of the air whistling through the holes.

 

An AC-47 "Spooky" gunship caught a Vietnamese company in the open and opened fire with all three 7.62 mini-guns.  The patrol that was sent out the next day to investigate only found  what they described as "slush" where the Vietnamese company due to the damage the mini-guns had done.   The AC-47's are credited with defending 6,000 villages, bases and outposts and the only thing the NVA feared worse where the B-52's.

[Cold Lake Kid, SASS # 51474]

My first flight in a multi-engine was a DAK, (for Dakota, as we called them, when I was around 5.

Prior to that, and later, all my flying was done with my Mother and Dad in his Super Cub and later a Stinson.

I keep seeing a turbine engined around here, flying out of Uplands Airport.

I hope I can get over to the General Aviation section of the airport and get a close look at it sometime and talk to the pilot or the mechanics.