Rare Bear

Rare Bear

"Rare Bear" is a highly-modified Grumman F8F Bearcat that dominated the Reno Air Races for decades. One of the major modifications involved installing a more powerful Wright R-3350 in place of a Pratt & Whitney R-2800 engine that is standard for a Bearcat. Rare Bear won the gold unlimited race in Reno, Nevada.

"Rare Bear" has also set many performance records for piston-driven aircraft, including the 3Km World Speed Record (528.33 mph (850.26 km/h) set in 1989), and a new time-to-climb record (3,000 meters in 91.9 seconds set in 1972, breaking a 1946 record set in a stock Bearcat). [ [http://www.RareBear.com www.RareBear.com] —"Lyle Shelton's "Rare Bear" [Note that Shelton's claim to be the "fastest propeller-driven aircraft in the world" does not acknowledge faster turboprop aircraft such as the Russian Tupolev Tu-95 "Bear" bomber. Other sources credit "Rare Bear" as the fastest "piston-driven" aircraft.] ] [ [http://www.aerospaceweb.org/question/performance/q0023.shtml www.AeroSpaceWeb.org] —aircraft speed records] [ [http://www.airrace.com/New%20speed%20records.htm www.AirRace.com] —speed records from archives of the Society of Air Racing Historians]

The original owner of the "Rare Bear" and its racing team was Lyle Shelton, but in late 2006 both the plane and the team were sold to Rod Lewis. Recent accomplishments include finishing the Reno Air Races in 2004 and 2005 with the gold medal in the unlimited gold race. The pilot for those two championships was John Penney. In 2006 the Rare Bear was piloted by Ron Buccarelli. For the 2007 Reno Air Races, the Rare Bear was piloted by John Penney finishing with the gold medal.In the 2008 Reno Air Races Rare Bear, piloted once again by John Penny suffered a huge setback. In a heat on Thursday, Rare Bear was forced to mayday out of the race when 11 gallons of oil mysteriously disappeared out of the engine in flight. Penney made it to the Unlimited Breitling Gold race and was in 2nd place when he was forced to mayday once again, this time trailing smoke. While Penney made it down safely, it is currently unknown how much damage was done to Rare Bear. [ [http://www.rgj.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080915/EVENTS05/809150345/1321/NEWS www.rgj.com] —2008 Reno Air Race report]

References

External links

* [http://www.rarebear.com/ The "Rare Bear" official web site]
* [http://www.dpdavisproductions.com/ Champions of the Air: "Rare Bear" DVD. Produced by dp Davis Productions]


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