Arrow Sport

Arrow Sport
Arrow Sport of 1927 at Lakeland, Florida, in April 2007
General information
Type	Sports plane
Manufacturer	Arrow Aircraft and Motors
Designer	Sven Swanson
Number built	ca. 100
History
First flight	1926

The Arrow Sport is a two-seat sporting biplane aircraft built in the United States in the 1920s and 1930s.

Design and construction

The plane was designed by Swen Swanson and it was of largely conventional configuration with tailskid undercarriage, but was interesting in that the pilot and passenger sat side by side in the open cockpit, and because as originally designed, the fully cantilever wings lacked interplane struts – the upper wing attaching directly to the top of the fuselage. This latter feature proved so alarming to many prospective pilots that the manufacturer later supplied N-type struts that were of no real function other than to allay the aviators' fears.

Variants

• Sport – Two-seat sporting biplane, powered by a 60-hp (45-kW) LeBlond radial piston engine.
• Sport 85 – 85 hp Leblond radial, extra four degrees of dihedral on lower wing. ^[1]
• Sport A2
  • Sport A2-40
  • Sport A2-6060 hp (45 kW) LeBlond radial engines
  • Sport A2-66
  • Sport A2-90 Tangerine
  • Sport A2-100100 hp (75 kW) Kinner C-5 ^[2]
• Sport Pursuit (renamed Sport K in 1935) – Improved version, powered by a 100-hp (75-kW) Kinner K-5 radial engine.
• Sport V-8 (renamed the Model F ) – Two-seat monoplane version, powered by a converted 82 hp (61 kW) Ford V8 automobile engine.
  • Sport M – Model F with a 125 hp (93 kW) Menasco C-4 Pirate engine. ^[3]

Surviving aircraft

An Arrow Sport A2-60 at the Udvar-Hazy Center.

Arrow Sport at the Lincoln Airport, Lincoln, Nebraska, USA

Nine biplane Sports remain registered in the United States as of 2020, mostly in museums and private collections, ^[4] including:

• a Sport Pursuit (N8181, serial 432) preserved in the terminal building of the Lincoln Airport in Nebraska, Arrow's city of manufacture, and owned by the Nebraska State Historical Society.
• a Sport (N530A, serial 304) preserved at the Dakota Territory Air Museum in North Dakota. ^[5]
• a Sport A2-60 (ex-N9325/G-AARO, serial 341) preserved at the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C. ^{[6] [7]}
• a Sport Pursuit (N853H, serial 412) is on display at the Western Antique Aeroplane & Automobile Museum in Oregon.

Specifications (A2-60)

Data from American airplane specifications ^[8]

General characteristics

• Crew: 1
• Capacity: 1 passenger
• Length: 19 ft 3 in (5.87 m)
• Wingspan: 25 ft 10 in (7.87 m)
• Height: 7 ft 5 in (2.26 m)
• Wing area: 183 sq ft (17.0 m²)
• Empty weight: 900 lb (408 kg)
• Gross weight: 1,346 lb (611 kg)
• Powerplant: 1 × LeBlond 5D radial engine, 60 hp (45 kW)

Performance

• Maximum speed: 100 mph (160 km/h, 87 kn)
• Cruise speed: 85 mph (137 km/h, 74 kn)
• Stall speed: 30 mph (48 km/h, 26 kn)
• Range: 200 mi (320 km, 170 nmi)
• Service ceiling: 14,000 ft (4,300 m)

See also

Aircraft of comparable role, configuration, and era

• Warren CP-2

References

Notes

1. Popular Aviation: 15. July 1931.{{cite journal}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
2. "Zenith Z-6-B". Aero Digest. September 1931. p. 68.
3. Trade-a-Plane: "1938 Arrow Sport M"
4. FAA Registration Query
5. Ogden, Eloise (December 1, 2017). "North Dakota residents rebuild and model biplane for museum". Seattle Times .
6. Ogden, 2007, p. 572
7. Smithsonian: "Arrow Sport A2-60"
8. Aviation January 1932, pp. 47, 50.

Bibliography

• "American airplane specifications" . Aviation . Vol. 31, no. 1. January 1932. pp. 47–51.

• "Zenith Z-6-B". Aero Digest. Vol. 19, no. 3. September 1931. p. 68.

• Ogden, Bob (2007). Aviation Museums and Collections of North America. Air-Britain (Historians) Ltd. ISBN   978-0-85130-385-7.

• Taylor, Michael J. H. (1989). Jane's Encyclopedia of Aviation. London: Studio Editions. p. 81.

External links

• Arrow Sport A2-60 – National Air and Space Museum
• Arrow Sport – Aviation History Online Museum