Schroeder "Dragontail" Goodyear/Formula One racer

[walter]

Will appreciate if anyone can ID this pusher.
Said to be intended as Formula 1/Goodyear racer early 1950s.

 

[Retrofit]

Re: ID needed of pusher racer

It seems to be the OWL P.A.R. Special dated 1950
"The P.A.R. Special (Parks Alumni Racebuilders) was designed by Georges Owl and built by Bob Short, Errol Painter and him in 1950. It was the second pusher to appear at the All American Air Maneuvers. It also raced at Detroit and Chattanoga. It was clocked on a closed course at 180.9mph and at Detroit qualified at 179mph in 1950 but did only 176.44mph at Miami, FL in 1950. Brakes were applied in pushing forward on the stick. The wing had variable incidence for take-off and landing. The front wheel had limited steering. Art Beckington was the pilot. It was dismantled in early 1960 and Al Trefethen bought some of the parts and with his son made the Mace-Trefethen "Seamaster" by adding a fiberglass float in 1967".
Span: 20ft ; Lengh: 20ft;
From: "Goodyear & Formula 1 Air Racing-Vol 1" by Robert Hirsch

 

[walter]

Re: ID needed of pusher racer

Hi Retrofit
That was my initial thought also.
Please see attached 3-view/photo and there are so many (small) differences that I started to doubt and to be honest I still doubt it is the PAR.

 

[Retrofit]

Re: ID needed of pusher racer

You are right Walter.
Too many differences compared to the PAR Special.

 

[walter]

Re: ID needed of pusher racer



Just found out that I never advised that the pusher was ID`d by "Moses03/Moze" as the Schroeder Dragontail Goodyear/Formula One racer. The aircraft (N60298/Race # 50) first flew 1949/1950 and was lost during trials on 2 August 1950.
Kevin, sorry for my oversight :-[ :-[

 

[hesham]

From Ailes 4/1950,

an artist drawing.

 

[fortrena]

The following may perhaps be if interest...
https://ingeniumcanada.org/channel/articles/do-you-remember-joan-trefethen-i-do-i-do-part-1
https://ingeniumcanada.org/channel/articles/do-you-remember-joan-trefethen-i-do-i-do-part-2

 

[BillRo]

Definitely the PAR. Formula One race planes are constantly modified, plus Bob Hirsch's # views are not always perfect. There have been other pusher racers but this one is quite distinctive with it's cruciform tail. Pix from Hirsch's book.

 

[Sundog]

The variable incidence wing is definitely interesting. Nice looking plane.

 

[hesham]

From Flying 1953-1.

 

[Retrofit]

Photo of the Schroeder "Dragontail" Race #50 (registration N60298) from "Experimental Light Aircraft & Midget Racers", John Underwood & John Caler, Aero Publishers Inc 1958.
Note: Paul Schroeder of Fort Worth designed another racer , the "Rarebird II" #17 (registration N16N) in 1953 (same source).

 

[sienar]

 

[riggerrob]

Definitely the PAR. Formula One race planes are constantly modified, plus Bob Hirsch's # views are not always perfect. There have been other pusher racers but this one is quite distinctive with it's cruciform tail. Pix from Hirsch's book.

I would call that a "Y" tail since it is basically a "V" with a vertical fin added on the bottom.
OTOH cruciform tails (see Aero Commander 112) generally have flat horizontal tails or perhaps only a little dihedral in the horizontal tail.

 

[skipatrol]

I'm willing to be wrong about this, and I certainly would not claim that race planes aren't often modified to the point of being unrecognizable.
I am familiar with the massive number of airplanes that are registered as Cassutts, but are effectively one-offs with very little Cassutt left.

However, here are my reasons I don't think the Schroeder Dragontail is an evolution of the PAR Special;


1) The timeline
- The PAR Special was first flowin in January 1950[1][2]
- The Dragontail was also listed as 1950.[3]
- The Dragontail was listed as destroyed in testing 8/2/50[3] *Of course "destroyed" could mean that it was hauled off and reworked. ` This is before 1962, so finding a report on this will be hard.
- The PAR Special raced from 1950-52[4]

-That isn't much time for such big modifications, considering this was a personal project. I also don't usually see people swapping names for their airplanes back and forth very often.



2) The PAR Special was chopped up and reworked into the Mace-Trefethen Seamaster
-I don't see any Dragontail DNA in that one, but it would have been modified a lot.

3) I don't see any evidence of variable incidence in the Schroeder Dragontail.


4) This is probably the biggest one, I can't find anything connecting Paul Schroeder to the PAR Special, St.Louis, McDonnell or any of the people involved in the Mace-Trefethen Seamaster.


Also, [3] shows the PAR special as having been reworked into the Trefethen TRW Special, I can't find any information on that one at all.
It may just be an alternate name for the Mace-Trefethen Seamaster.

I think the thing that would really settle this is finding the accident report for the Dragontail from 1950.

One way or another I think we can all agree that's a pretty bird.



[1]https://www.1000aircraftphotos.com/Contributions/Cieslak/10058.htm
[2]https://www.aerofiles.com/_pa.html
[3]https://www.aerofiles.com/_sa.html
[4]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PAR_Special#cite_note-SPORTAVIATION-2

 

[sienar]

The two are most definitively unrelated designs. They showed up to the same race!

Timeline of the Dragontail design. First mention in Aviation Week, referring to it as the Cook Cleland and Art Williams design.

A month later, still a Cleland-Williams design but its been under construction for over a year by Schroeder;

End of 49, some details on the Dragontail and PAR special;

Photos of both in the same issue of av week;

Description of the PAR. As a side note Larry Reithmaier is a pretty big name and him developing a midget racer is new to me.

PAR with augmentor exhaust

 

[Scott Kenny]

View attachment 807617

That is a very strange propeller thrust line.

 

[sienar]

More PAR Special






Expired Ebay auction;


And last but certainly not least, a write-up about the design by George Owl himself, with a nicely drafted 3-view to boot