Warming up for Wings and Wheels at Kaipara Flats

There is a Wings and Wheels event happening at Kaipara Flats airfield tomorrow, hosted by the Rodney Aero Club and the Waitemata Vintage Car Club, and the weather forecast is great!  There were a few interesting vintage arrivals today ahead of the event tomorrow:

Stan and Gilly Smith's Piper J 3C-65 Cub ZK-AIR was an early arrival.

And their Auster J5 ZK-DBU had arrived on Friday.

Next in were 3 Tiger Moths - Alan Coubray in his and Martin Farrand's Tiger ZK-ATM2, from Whitianga.

Then Peter Ryan in ZK-AUE from Matamata..

Followed by Kermit Ryan, also from Matamata, in ZK-BLM2.

ZK-BLM2 tucked up  in the hangar with Jim Schmidt's Tiger ZK-CCH.  There are 5 Tiger Moths hangared on the field tonight, as well as the Cub and the Auster, which is a pretty good effort.

Rangiora on Friday the 17th.

Initially assembled here at Rangiora in September of 2011 - the Ibis Magic GS-700 ZK-MGC c/n GS-05-08-700-69 has recently been delivered to its new owner Wayne Wilson after attention at Custom Aviation at Taieri.
Four of our five examples are now based is this area.

The early story of the NZ Ibis Magics can be seen HERE

About to depart after a fuel stop is the Vans RV-7 ZK-TEZ c/n 73885 as listed with Gary Julian of Whataroa.

It now carries addition trail markings.

See an earlier photo HERE

Below two shots of the Cessna 182D ZK-MJP c/n 18253552 of Malcolm and Morgan Price

Pic above shows it in loose formation with an avian friend.

And below the companion breaks up and away.

Newly Refurbished Robertson B1-RD ZK-RSN

I was interested to see that Robert McNair recently registered his refurbished Robertson B1-RD microlight ZK-RSN recently, and now David Wilkinson has supplied a photo of it.  David has recently been flying the B1-RD and loving it - no doubt quite a change from his One Design and Pitts!

ZK-RSN (c/n 1S036) was registered to Rob McNair on 23/11/23 and Rob told me that restoring the microlight was a big job as all of the 6061 aluminium had to be replaced due to corrosion and Rob sourced all original tubing from the US.  It is powered by a Rotax 503 engine.  

The original B1-RD was a 2 seater that was registered ZK-STU (MAANZ/283) to Alan Stewart from Taupiri in October 1984 and was registered until May 2001.  Rob has restored it as a single seater.

Thanks to Rob McNair for the information and to David Wilkinson for the photo.

Curtis P40E ZK-RMH gone - Update

Back on 11 March Dave Paull posted that the very historically significant Curtis P40E Kittyyhawk ZK-RMH had been cancelled from the register on 1 March 2024.  You can refer to that post HERE

The Kittyhawk is now owned by Kennedy Air Service Pty Ltd of Gunnedah in NSW as VH-AK4:

This photo of it flying in Australia recently is taken from the Pacific P-40s Facebook page.

Rans Outback ZK-YAW at Rangiora update

At last ! I got a reasonable photograph (albeit still inside) of the Rans S-21 Outbound ZK-YAW c/n 0520018 as captured at Rangiora today 11-05-2024.

This was registered to Paul Brydon of Hamilton on 19-07-2023 and I believe based at Te Kowhai.

Paul is now based out near Oxford and I first noted YAW at Rangiora late last year.

It will receive some vinyls shortly.

Paul has previously operated the Micro Aviation B22J ZK-XAM2, the Best off Skyranger Swift        ZK-JAY, the Zenith CH601 XL ZK-JRL and the Aeroprakt A-22LS ZK-SAJ2.

However John Wagtendonk was on the spot at Rangiora on 06-01-2024 and captured ZK-YAW.

Todays photo (14-05-2024) from Aaron Murphy shows ZK-YAW in action at Rangiora.

Newly Minted Vans RV 7 ZK-MNT at Waipukurau 12-5-2024

The Central Hawkes Bay Aero Club hosted their annual Dawn Raid at Waipukurau on Sunday 12 May and there was a great turnout of around 60 aircraft.  Most have already been covered here but one was wearing a new registration:

ZK-MNT (c/n 70334) was up from Masterton where it is based.  It was damaged in a take off incident in Northland a couple of years ago and was repaired by Northland Aviation at Whangarei.  During its time there it was re-registered as ZK-MNT on 11/9/23.  Thanks for the photo Jordan.

But if it looks familiar it is.  It it the "old" ZK-DES3 which was imported into New Zealand by Des Barry back in November 2010.  It is photo'd above taking off from North Shore on 24/2/13.
 

Hughes 369D ZK-IMT at North Shore Today 13-5-2024

I had reason to be down at North Shore airfield this afternoon when the racy sound of an approaching Hughes 500 got louder until he alighted at the fuel pumps.

It was the Hughes 369D ZK-IMT which has been registered to ZK Leasing Ltd of Auckland since 31/3/23.  While we were both at different fuel pumps, I was getting Avgas and he was in for Jet A1.

A brace of Caravans at Paraparaumu.

 Lord Nelson noted two Cessna 208 Caravans at Paraparaumu today.

The Cessna 208B Super Cargomaster ZK-MLO2 c/n 208B1125 was delivered to Air Pak Express SA, Spain on 11-05-2005 as EC-JHI. From there it went onto the German Register as D-FAAF from April 2009 and spent time with Skydive Flyzone. Its German registration was cancelled in April 2022 for it to become N208FF with Tarco Aircraft Funding LLC of Fort Lauderdale, Florida and then to Merlin Labs of Boston, Massachusetts from 30-11-2022.
Mentioned previously Here.
As such it ferried via Honolulu and Apia on 26-05-2023 and into Auckland on the 28th. 

It became ZK-MLO2 on 07-06-2023 with Merlin Labs NZ Ltd on 07-06-2023.

The Cessna C208 Caravan 1 ZK-EAV2 c/n 20800659 was registered new to Evander Aviation as N874ET on 17-09-2019 and was passed over to Gateway Air Center of Merced, California from 15-10-2019 for ferrying to New Zealand.

This ferry flight departed Eisenhower Field at Wichita, Kansas for Independence on 02-11-2019. Then on to Colorado Springs and Merced on the 13th. The run to Honolulu was on the 21st and then to Faleolo, Samoa on the 23rd and into Auckland on the 24th.

The US ferry registration was cancelled on 27-11-2019 and it became ZK-EAV2 on 03-12-2019 with Evander Aviation Ltd at Wellington.

Helicopters at Mechanics Bay Yesterday 11-5-2024

Yesterday I was instructed to be on taxi duty down to Auckland (and return) for the NZ Ballet matinee so I had a couple of hours to kill.  What to do?  Drive down to Mechanics Bay to see what I could see:

HeliMe's Airbus EC 130 T2 ZK-HIJ5 was parked out.  It is branded as an ACH 130 which is the Aston Martin bespoke model with the leather interior and jazzy colour scheme.

Then the same company's Agusta Bell 206B ZK-IEL2 arrived with passengers and was later pushed into the hangar.   Both helicopters have appeared on the blog previously, but Mechanics Bay is quite photogenic so I thought they were worth another post. 

Beech Super King Air ZK-RSQ

 The Beechcraft 200C Super King Air ZK-RSQ2 /n BL-148 was recorded at Wellington today by 
Allister Jenks.

This aircraft was first noted in August of 2004 listed as N36948 with Raytheon Aircraft Corporation of Wichita, Kansas with a change to Wells Fargo Bank Northwest NZ at Salt Lake City, Utah from 28-12-2004.

This was cancelled on 25-04-2005 for it to become F-OIQL with Air Archipels, a subsidiary of Air Tahiti.

Above -  F-OIQL - an Aircraft Com photo.

It ferried into Napier from Nuku'Alofa, Tonga, on 18-03-2023 and became ZK-RSQ2 on 04-05-2023 with Skyline Aviation Ltd.

Above and below. At the Execujet Aero Service facility at Wellington Airport early this afternoon.

Its close cousin ZK-PLK in the left of the shot below and the Falcon 50 N115MF c/n 330 lurks in the hangar.

                                                          On climb out from Wellington.

On the bottom left of the photo is the roof of the 'leaning tower'.