The Bowers Fly Baby is a homebuilt, single-seat, open-

cockpit A cockpit or flight deck is the area, on the front part of an aircraft, spacecraft, or submersible, from which a pilot controls the vehicle. The cockpit of an aircraft contains flight instruments on an instrument panel, and the controls th ...

, wood and fabric low-wing

monoplane A monoplane is a fixed-wing aircraft configuration with a single mainplane, in contrast to a biplane or other types of multiplanes, which have multiple wings. A monoplane has inherently the highest efficiency and lowest drag of any wing con ...

that was designed by famed

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

aircraft designer and

Boeing The Boeing Company, or simply Boeing (), is an American multinational corporation that designs, manufactures, and sells airplanes, rotorcraft, rockets, satellites, and missiles worldwide. The company also provides leasing and product support s ...

historian, Peter M. Bowers."Bowers Fly Baby 1A"

Museum of Flight The Museum of Flight is a private Nonprofit organization, non-profit Aircraft, air and Spacecraft, space museum in the Seattle metropolitan area. It is located at the southern end of Boeing Field, King County International Airport (Boeing Fi ...

Seattle, Washington Seattle ( ) is the List of municipalities in Washington, most populous city in the U.S. state of Washington (state), Washington and in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. With a population of 780,995 in 2024, it is the List of Unit ...

, retrieved June 7, 2022

Development

The

prototype A prototype is an early sample, model, or release of a product built to test a concept or process. It is a term used in a variety of contexts, including semantics, design, electronics, and Software prototyping, software programming. A prototype ...

Fly Baby first flew in 1962, becoming the winner of the

Experimental Aircraft Association The Experimental Aircraft Association (EAA) is an international organization of aviation enthusiasts based in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. Since its inception, it has grown internationally with over 300,000 members and nearly 1,000 chapters worldwide. ...

's 1962 design competition.Plane and Pilot: ''1978 Aircraft Directory'', pages 135-136. Werner & Werner Corp, Santa Monica CA, 1977. Variants include a

biplane A biplane is a fixed-wing aircraft with two main wings stacked one above the other. The first powered, controlled aeroplane to fly, the Wright Flyer, used a biplane wing arrangement, as did many aircraft in the early years of aviation. While ...

version called the Bowers Bi-Baby or Fly Baby 1-B, a

floatplane A floatplane is a type of seaplane with one or more slender floats mounted under the fuselage to provide buoyancy. By contrast, a flying boat uses its fuselage for buoyancy. Either type of seaplane may also have landing gear suitable for land, ...

version, and several dual-cockpit designs by various builders. Bowers also designed a side-by-side two-seat version he called Namu II, but few examples have been built. Over 500 Fly Babies have been completed to date, with numerous still flying worldwide and an active network of builders and owners. It is built from plans and was designed to be constructed in a garage using only basic hand tools, by a person of average "home handyman" skill in 1962. The plans consist of over one hundred pages of typewritten instructions and dimensioned drawings. After Bowers' death in 2003 the plans were unavailable for a time. Starting in 2007 they were back on the market, sold by the Bowers family.Bayerl, Robby; Martin Berkemeier; et al: ''World Directory of Leisure Aviation 2011-12'', page 97. WDLA UK, Lancaster UK, 2011. ISSN 1368-485XTacke, Willi; Marino Boric; et al: ''World Directory of Light Aviation 2015-16'', page 103. Flying Pages Europe SARL, 2015.

Design

To win the 1962 Experimental Aircraft Association (EAA) Design Contest, Bowers designed the small plane to meet EAA's criteria for a low-cost, folding-wing airplane that was easy to build and fly, and could be towed or trailered. The Fly Baby was designed to be a very simple aircraft. For example, the fuel gauge is a stiff wire attached to a float poking up through the gas cap (a common application in the 1930s and 1940s, as seen on Piper and Aeronca light aircraft). The structure is of aircraft-grade spruce and plywood (Bowers did not advocate skimping on the quality of structural wood), covered with doped aircraft fabric.

Aileron An aileron (French for "little wing" or "fin") is a hinged flight control surface usually forming part of the trailing edge of each wing of a fixed-wing aircraft. Ailerons are used in pairs to control the aircraft in roll (or movement aroun ...

controls are push-tube,

elevator An elevator (American English) or lift (Commonwealth English) is a machine that vertically transports people or freight between levels. They are typically powered by electric motors that drive traction cables and counterweight systems suc ...

controls are a combination of push-tube and cable, the

rudder A rudder is a primary control surface used to steer a ship, boat, submarine, hovercraft, airship, or other vehicle that moves through a fluid medium (usually air or water). On an airplane, the rudder is used primarily to counter adverse yaw ...

is cable-controlled. Although it is not intended for intense

aerobatics Aerobatics is the practice of flying maneuvers involving aircraft attitudes that are not used in conventional passenger-carrying flights. The term is a portmanteau of "aeroplane" and "acrobatics". Aerobatics are performed in aeroplanes and gl ...

, the Fly Baby can reportedly be flown through spins, simple loops, and barrel rolls. The Fly Baby's wings fold up against the

fuselage The fuselage (; from the French language, French ''fuselé'' "spindle-shaped") is an aircraft's main body section. It holds Aircrew, crew, passengers, or cargo. In single-engine aircraft, it will usually contain an Aircraft engine, engine as wel ...

enabling it to be stored in a single-car garage or a car trailer. The wings can be folded or unfolded in about 15 minutes. The airplane was designed to be stored in a garage and towed to the airport on its own gear. In practice, most owners use a trailer or keep their Fly Baby hangared at an airport. The

landing gear Landing gear is the undercarriage of an aircraft or spacecraft that is used for taxiing, takeoff or landing. For aircraft, it is generally needed for all three of these. It was also formerly called ''alighting gear'' by some manufacturers, s ...

is fixed and unsprung. The main landing gear struts are made of laminated wood with a steel axle. The only shock absorption comes from the tires themselves. (Some have been modified from, the original design, to use shock-absorbing, spring-steel landing gear legs.) Hydraulic wheel brakes are usually fitted. The aircraft was designed to be powered by a 65-horsepower (48 kW) Continental A-65

piston engine A reciprocating engine, more often known as a piston engine, is a heat engine that uses one or more Reciprocating motion, reciprocating pistons to convert high temperature and high pressure into a Circular motion, rotating motion. This article ...

taken from a

Piper Cub The Piper J-3 Cub is an American light aircraft that was built between 1938 and 1947 by Piper Aircraft. The aircraft has a simple, lightweight design which gives it good low-speed handling properties and short-field performance. The Cub is P ...

. Engines of up to 100 horsepower (75 kW) have been fitted, including the Continental O-200 and converted Corvair automotive conversions. While the instrumentation installed is up to the builder, most Fly Babys are equipped for

visual flight rules In aviation, visual flight rules (VFR) is a set of regulations under which a pilot operates an aircraft in weather conditions generally clear enough to allow the pilot to see where the aircraft is going. Specifically, the weather must be better tha ...

(VFR) only. An electrical system is optional; many Fly Baby owners hand-prop the engine for starting, and use a handheld radio. Some of the components used, such as the fuel tank and engine, were designed to be taken from the Piper Cub, which were cheap and plentiful in 1962. Even today, the total cost of construction can be under

US$ The United States dollar (Currency symbol, symbol: Dollar sign, $; ISO 4217, currency code: USD) is the official currency of the United States and International use of the U.S. dollar, several other countries. The Coinage Act of 1792 introdu ...

10,000.

Variants

;Bowers Bi-Baby :A Fly Baby can be converted to a biplane Bi-Baby in less than one hour by adding the struts and upper wing to the existing aircraft (if the fittings were built in) or it can be built as a biplane version from the start.

Regulations

United States

In the

United States of America The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 contiguo ...

the FAA categorizes the Fly Baby as an Experimental Amateur-Built aircraft. It also fits the FAA's specifications for a Light Sport Aircraft and can be flown in the US by pilots holding a Recreational Pilot or Sport Pilot certificate.

Canada

In Canada the Fly Baby may be built as an amateur-built aircraft or as a basic ultra-light aeroplane. It may be flown with an Ultra-light Pilot Permit or higher aeroplane licence.

Specifications (Fly Baby)

References

External links

{{commons category, Bowers Fly Baby
Photo of the prototype Fly Baby in flightDigitized Bowers Fly Baby Model 1A Builders Manual
at The Museum of Flight Homebuilt aircraft 1960s United States civil utility aircraft Light-sport aircraft Low-wing aircraft Bowers aircraft Single-engined tractor aircraft Aircraft first flown in 1962