Sport Pilot Talk

Doss79 · Joined: 30 Jun 2008 Posts: 17 Location: San Antonio, Tx

Hey all,
I found a 1946 90hp J3 Cub that is still occassionally flown by a local farmer. He recently loaned me all the logbooks for this airplane. I also had a supercub driver check out the cub (he's not an A&P) before I actually call up a mechanic to do a pre-buy.

According to the logbook, the last annual was done on Oct 2007 and the plane was certified to be airworthy.

What bothers me is that aircraft logs are kind of sporadic in the late 1940s, and then some missing dates in the early 1980s. In other words, not every year is documented until 2001. From 2002+, I have records of annuals and repairs diligently documented.

Is this normal? I have no experience in this...I'm not a pilot, yet. I'm hoping to buy this plane for training. Is the missing data leverage for price negotiation?

Jeff Tipton · Joined: 26 Nov 2006 Posts: 74

The missing years could be the result of the aircraft not flown between those missing years, which is not all that uncommon. Check the logbooks for any torn pages from the logbooks. This might indicate something being covered up.

The main concern would be that all Airworthiness Directives (AD'S) have been complied with, how much time on the engine since its last overhaul and when was the last overhaul. Has it been flying regularly since the last overhaul.

Finish up with when was the last cover job completed, what type fabric, and was it installed using the correct process throughout the cover job. IE are all the materials compatible with each other.