Harry Holmberg discusses his Bellanca restoration during the November 2023 meeting at Chapter 54.
Chapter member Harry Holmberg, of Stillwater, loves flying his 1946 Bellanca Cruisair, according to the September/October 2024 EAA Vintage Magazine, which profiled the two in an extensive spread.
"It's good to fly; it doesn't have any quirks," he told the magazine. "When you do a power-off stall, it just kind of squishes down. I like pulling the power back and flying slow enough to just soar around under a cloud -- it just handles really well, whether you're flying slow or cruising cross-country."
"It'll do 162 mph -- that's the highest I've seen -- straight and level. It's happy cruising anywhere from 90 mph burning 5.5 gph. on up to 150 mph burning 9 to 10 gph. If I'm not going anywhere and just want to be off the ground, I'll cruise around 90 to 100 mph; it's very efficient," he said. "It has no tail wag due to those cartoonishly large [auxiliary fins] on the tail, so it's an arrow going straight through turbulence. The gear is manually retracted, and I usually crank it 33 turns up and down. It's real memorable that way; it's pretty hard to forget you're flying a retract!"
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