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The 1931 Gee Bee Senior Sportster Y NR718Y is on display at the Fantasy of Flight located in Polk City Polk County Florida U.S.A.
1931 Gee Bee Senior Sportster Y NR718Y was built for E.L Cord Corporation as a test bed for it's Lycoming division for 215 HP, Lycoming R-680 engines.It was later purchased by Art Knapp who hired designer Bob Hall to engineer installation of a Wright Whirlwind, a new windshield and landing gear fairings. The aircraft was raced in 1933 Chicago International Air Races.Florence Klingensmith flew the aircraft in the feature race, but unfortunately a large piece of fabric came off of the inboard section of the right wing, she flew off of the course for a distance, and apparently stalled the aircraft and tragically died.
1932 Gee Bee Super Sportster R-2 NR2101 on display at the Fantasy of Flight in Polk City Polk County Florida U.S.A.
The Gee Bee Model R Super Sportster was a special purpose racing aircraft made by Granville Brothers Aircraft of Springfield, Massachusetts. Gee Bee stands for Granville Brothers.
The 1932 R-1 and its sister plane, the R-2, were the successors of the previous year's Thompson Trophy-winning Model Z. Assistant Chief Engineer Howell Pete Miller and Zantford Granny Granville spent three days of wind tunnel testing at NYU with aeronautical engineering professor Alexander Klemin. The aircraft had a very peculiar design. Granville reasoned that a teardrop-shaped fuselage would have lower drag than a straight-tapered one, so the fuselage was wider than the engine at its widest point (at the wing attachment point). The cockpit was located very
far aft, just in front of the vertical stabilizer, in order to give the racing pilot better vision while making crowded pylon turns. In addition, it turned out that the fuselage acted as an airfoil, like the 'lifting-body' designs of the 1960s. This allowed the aircraft to make tight "knife-edge" turns without losing altitude. It was, in effect, a Pratt & Whitney R-1340 engine with wings and a tail on it.