Beech Starships headed for the boneyard

[Johnny_L.A]

AOPA ePilot is reporting:

The Beech Starship wowed the crowds when it first appeared at Dallas Love Field during the National Business Aircraft Association convention
in 1983. Now it appears that the Starship, a marketing disappointment, is playing to a packed house once again–if you can call an Arizona boneyard a packed house. Some of the 53 sleek composite, canard-design airplanes, powered by two turboprop engines in a pusher configuration, were sold. Now the remaining Starships are showing up at Evergreen Air Center located on Pinal Airpark at Marana, Arizona, according to a source who spoke on condition of anonymity. A lot of planes go into the Evergreen storage center, but very few ever come out. Most slowly lose their usable parts and finally just fade away. Raytheon Aircraft officials would not comment on the appearance of the Starships in Arizona. It appears some Beech 1900 regional aircraft are headed to Arizona as well. At least they’ll have family with which to spend their parting-out years.

Too bad. The Starship is a nice-looking aircraft. IIRC, it suffered from weight-gain during its development and never reached its expected potential. I think that people with the wherewithal to buy one probably opted for jets instead of the turboprop.

Sure, it was expensive and didn’t perform better than other aircraft in its class; but I applaud Raytheon for making the effort. With Cessna building airplanes that were designed in the 1950s, Piper’s offerings dating from the 1960s, and engine designs that have their roots in the 1930s, it was refreshing to see such a “radical” design.

[Gatopescado]

Hi Johnny!

Major Hijack here: What’s your best guess on the value of a 1950 CJ3A with 70’s 304 V8 and running gear?

[Mooney252]

When I lived in Chicago, a tool & die company there had one at Palwaukee Airport. The design would just take your breath away.

A picture of one:
http://brunton.cottagesoft.com/starship.gif

[Berkut]

Webshots - Wallpaper / Screen Savers

Webshots - Wallpaper / Screen Savers

Beautiful airplane. I wonder how cheap I could get one, it would make a great treehouse for my nieces (I could never afford to fly it).

I really wish there were a little more innovation in GA aircraft designs. I know certification is expensive, but I think the consumers would reward it. Part of the reason the Starship was so heavy is that the FAA didn’t have much experience with composite aircraft, and it had to be way overbuilt.

I know the “new design” aspect had a lot do to with my employer spending 5 million dollars on new Diamonds rather than 50 year old “new” Pipers.

[Zenster]

Great shots of a really pretty bird there, Joey G. Sad to think that such an attractive craft will be absent from our skies.