Beech Starship

[slammer]

The Beech Starship was a GREAT aircraft. I understand many have gone to the scrap yard but one person is committed to keeping them flying. I believe he owns two and even bought all spares from Raytheon. Anyone out there know who he is?

Thanx,
Slammer

 

[falcon20pilot]

I believe there are 4 still flying. I saw one on the ramp in Henderson, NV last fall and talked with the pilot - it was the one that they just bought and is based in Tulsa. I think it was 45FL.

See the following web page.

http://www.bobscherer.com/Pages/Starship.htm

 

[On Your Six]

I've seen one at SNA quite a bit. Beautiful aircraft.

 

[The_Russian]

I have some time in NC-28. I thought they were going to keep it flying. It seems as though they sold it to someone in Austrailia and they mothballed it. Too bad.

 

[BoilerPilot]

Starship

I know of one owner who has two flying one on the N registry and one on the X registry because there was an airworthiness thing with the FAA and Raytheon. Both are very nice airplanes. I also think he has one for parts and you are correct one of the owners bought the parts inventory.
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[badlander45]

Saw one at KASE a month ago, it looked as if it had not flown in a very long time.

 

[Piper877]

I know of one owner who has two flying one on the N registry and one on the X registry because there was an airworthiness thing with the FAA and Raytheon. Both are very nice airplanes. I also think he has one for parts and you are correct one of the owners bought the parts inventory.​

Wasn't someone messing around with taking the props off and making it a jet? I thought I heard that for awhile. That's one aircraft I'd love to have in my logbook.

 

[Captainjerky]

Starship and Spaceship One

There was a special on Rutan and Spaceship One on Discovery a while back. They featured the guy whose Starship was the low-alt chase plane. This might be the guy who bought the extra planes, because they mentioned he had enough spares to last quite a while. I think he might be affiliated with Rutan now. If Rutan has anything to do with that aircraft, his planes will probably fly forever and be faster than most jets... Too bad Beech didn't want to support those planes, though, it was a great design that was attacked by the FAA in typical fashion...

 

[CA1900]

It was a beautiful airplane, I'll grant that, but I wouldn't call it a "great design" by any stretch of the imagination. Any airplane that had to have that many vortex generators stuck to the wing just to make it fly needed a little more work in the wind tunnel before it was ready for production.

The pusher-turboprop arrangement also made this thing very loud on the outside, with the exhaust blowing through the blades. (Ever blow into a fan? Of course you have... ) The 2000A widened the exhaust pipes a little bit to try and solve the issue, and I guess it helped a bit.

Neat concept, and nice to look at, but not terribly well executed, and absurdly expensive (almost $5 million).

 

[Swass]

Leading the carbon fiber tech edge is expensive.

 

[CL600Pilot]

Neat concept, and nice to look at, but not terribly well executed, and absurdly expensive (almost $5 million).

I've flown almost 25% of the Starship fleet with most of my time being in NC-47.....it's a great airplane, it does have some design issues and the performance didn't end being as great as planned due to several reasons (initials F.A.A.). It ended up being more expensive than planned but I wouldn't call it 'absurdley' expensive.....new King Airs are going for almost $6 million. A freakin' Bonanza is going on a million dollars these days - that's absurd.

 

[400A]

I flew a large portion of the fleet as well. I always enjoyed it as long as the A/C did not fail. It would NOT cool off at altitude like a King Air will. One thing you had to know as a Starship pilot, you were not just a pilot, you were also a tour guide. We had some guy in Liverpool Nova Scotia pull a gun on us because he thought we were a UFO!

One of the things that was strange to me was the difference in speed between the serial #'s. I saw a 30 knot spread in speeds among various aircraft. NC-9 was the fastest that I flew. It was also the most reliable. As long as you kept it flying, it would go and go. NC-18 was grumpy and stunk to high heaven. It had some mold issue due to the fact it would hold water in the belly. NC-13 was also a grumpy one, and now sits in BHM over by the war-birds.

I see Western Aviation has NC-50 for sale right now.

 

[Propnose]

The Beech Starship was a GREAT aircraft. I understand many have gone to the scrap yard but one person is committed to keeping them flying. I believe he owns two and even bought all spares from Raytheon. Anyone out there know who he is?

Thanx,
Slammer

If I am not mistaken, it is Rutan that you are thinking of.

 

[Propnose]

I've flown almost 25% of the Starship fleet with most of my time being in NC-47.....it's a great airplane, it does have some design issues and the performance didn't end being as great as planned due to several reasons (initials F.A.A.). It ended up being more expensive than planned but I wouldn't call it 'absurdley' expensive.....new King Airs are going for almost $6 million. A freakin' Bonanza is going on a million dollars these days - that's absurd.

I agree with you that a million dollar bonanza is beyond rediculous!
Can you tell me what kind of problems the FAA had with the Starship? Was it in regards to certification or something? I would have loved to fly one of those!

Thanks,

Prop

 

[CL600Pilot]

If I am not mistaken, it is Rutan that you are thinking of.

Not Rutan....as a matter of fact, one of the things that is brought up in one of the recent shows is that Rutan had never even ridden in one until this guy that owns them took him for a ride. I think Rutan's group maintains the airplane for the guy now.