Beaver Tails, Neil Aird and Extended Engine Mounts

Neil Aird is the creator and driving force behind www.dhc-2.com, the website for Beavers.  We use it all the time to look up the history of aircraft.

Neil has information that you can't get from the FAA and Transport Canada databases, and, when somebody phones to ask us about a modification to a Beaver, his website is usually the first place we check.  His pictures are worth a thousand databases.

Neil has a blog: http://www.dhc-2.com/Current%20Blog.htm  It isn't all about Beavers, just almost all.  Check it out.  While you're there, have a look at the post for May 15,2011. We were delighted to see one of our old favorite aircraft, N272PA, featured in a Breitling Ad, with Wayne Gretsky in the background.  Bill found 272PA in Colombia, brought it back to Canada and rebuilt it.  We almost rebuilt it again after a particularly ugly landing at the Spit one day, when it tried to swap ends and T-boned a boat.

Neil's website features great pictures of Beavers at the top of the index page; the banner pictures.  He changes them frequently.  This week, 3 of the 4 Banner Beavers have the Holmes Extended engine mount. It's getting so people don't notice them or comment on them anymore. But I noticed, so I stole the pictures. My apologies and thanks to John Caswell who took the pictures of N2400F and C-GBZS at our hangars and Chip Porter who took the pictures of Misty Fjords beautiful N7336.  I added a couple shots of CF-GYJ in our hangar, one with C-FMOI in the background, as they both have the extended mounts.  Those photos are by Bob Kobzey.