Marquart MA-5 Charger
| {{Infobox Aircraft Begin
| name=Marquart MA-5 Charger | image=EAA_1987_Grand_Champion_Marquart_Charger_built_by_Remo_Galeazzi.jpg | caption=Remo Galeazzi's Grand Champion Marquart Charger }} {{Infobox Aircraft Type | type=Homebuilt aircraft | national origin=United States of America | manufacturer= | designer=Ed Marquart | first flight=October 1970 | introduced= | retired= | status= | primary user= | more users= | produced= | number built= | program cost= | unit cost= | developed from=Marquart MA-4 | variants with their own articles= }} |
Design and development
The MA-5 Charger was designed and developed by Ed Marquart with the first prototype being built and flown by Daniel W. Fielder Jr. at Flabob Airport. It is an all-new design based around Marquart's single place homebuilt biplane, the MA-4. The aircraft was designed to perform mild aerobatics. Marquart sold plans for scratch building the aircraft, no kits were manufactured.{{cite journal|journal=Private Pilot|date=August 1973}} For a number of years, Ken Brock offered kits of the metal brackets utilized in the construction of the Charger's wings and fuselage.
The aircraft uses a welded steel tube fuselage with doped aircraft fabric covering. The wings use wooden spars and ribs. The biplane uses conventional landing gear and has two tandem open cockpits. The wings are constant chord and swept 10 degrees.{{cite journal|journal=Air Progress|date=December 1971|page=19}}
The first prototype took seven years to build.
Since Ed Marquart's death in 2007,{{cite web|title=Ed Marquart, Flabab Airport pioneer dies|url=http://generalaviationnews.com/2007/07/20/ed-marquart-flabab-airport-pioneer-dies/}} the plans have been placed in the public domain, and are available as free PDF files via the Marquart Charger MA-5 website, or the Charger groups on either Facebook or groups.io (formerly Yahoo).
Operational history
In 1982, Jim Smith's Marquart Charger won Grand Champion Plans-built Aircraft at the EAA AirVenture Oshkosh airshow.{{cite web|title=Jim Smith's Grand Champion Marquart Charger|url=http://www.oshkosh365.org/saarchive/eaa_articles/1982_10_09.pdf}}
In 1987, Remo Galeazzi's Marquart Charger won Grand Champion Plans-built Aircraft at the EAA AirVenture Oshkosh airshow.{{cite web|title=Remo's Champion Charger|url=http://www.oshkosh365.org/saarchive/eaa_articles/1987_10_07.pdf}}
In 1991, builder and pilot Dave Davidson became the oldest pilot to fly solo across the Atlantic in his Marquart Charger at the age of 70. The aircraft was retrofitted with two drop-tanks mounted between the landing gear.{{cite journal|journal=Flying Magazine|date=November 1991}}Biplane Adventures by Dave Davidson (out of print, no known ISBN).
In 2009, Mark Gilmore's Marquart Charger won Grand Champion Plans-built Aircraft at the EAA AirVenture Oshkosh airshow.{{cite web|title=Gilmore Marquart Charger|url=http://www.oshkosh365.org/saarchive/eaa_articles/2009_10_06.pdf}}
In 2015, Ken Orloff's Marquart Charger won "Grand Champion Plans-built Aircraft" at EAA AirVenture Oshkosh.
Specifications (Marquart MA-5 Charger)
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References
{{commons category|Marquart Charger}}
{{reflist}}
External links
- [https://marquartcharger.org Marquart MA-5 Charger website]
Category:Aircraft first flown in 1970
Category:Single-engined piston aircraft
Category:Aircraft with fixed conventional landing gear