And about that name Cleo... given by the wife of the previous owner. It's rather silly thing to admit to, but it was probably the biggest reason that I'm now an aircraft owner. Cleo was the name of a cat I once knew - easily my most favorite cat I ever met. If it wasn't for the name catching my eye in the ad, she would have been just another Tiger ad among the many I've looked at and passed over. Once the name did get my attention, I started noticing the plane had most of the modifications and other things I was looking for in a Tiger: a GNS430 (even though I'm still rather partial to VORs and airways, which I filed for the entire trip back), the Sensenich prop, among other things. The 1978 vintage also suited my interests.
Tigers have been built in three periods - about 1300 were made in 1975-1979 by Grumman American before they shut down. American General made about 200 in 1991-1993. Most recently, Tiger Aircraft managed to put out about 50 before shuttering. Besides being more in my price range, I figured by the time they punched out 800 of them, they probably had a good idea what they were doing.
So now N28819 (AA5B-0838, aka "Cleo") is tied down at her new home in San Diego. She performed wonderfully on the long trip across the country, and I expect I'll have many more trips with her to come. Needless to say, her name is going to remain Cleo.
| Cleo at home |
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But before all those many trips will be the Dreaded First Annual... The FAA manadates that every aircraft be (by some descriptions) mostly disassembled for inspection every 12 months. The first time with a new mechanic is always bound to uncover new and different things for repair. It would have been better to have a few months before the inspection is due, but for Cleo, it's due this month. In order to be done by Christmas, that means probably next week. Stay tuned, I'll probably have some words about that experience.