Sunday 22 November 2009

John Shakes Shakes J1

Seen at Hood airfield, Masterton, late in the afternoon following the Vintage Aviator show last weekend was this little single-seater.
ZK-JGX is listed as a John Shakes Shakes J1. Apart from that, I know nothing about it.
Is it a local design, or built off an overseas-sourced plan?
Maybe Sir Minty will give us the benefit of his extensive knowledge.

2 comments:

  1. John Shakes modified / simplified a Druine Turbulent plan. U/c is aluminium from a Volksplane. Finished in 1996, John sold it to it's current owner, Mike Bennet of Carterton Nov 97.

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  2. Thanks for your confidence FlyerNZL! Pete Kirby got it exactly correct about ZK-JGX.

    But I thought I would post some more deatil about its builder John Shakes. John was one of a group of avtive AACA homebuilders in the Wairarapa in the 1970's and 1980's. He first built the Evans VP1 ZK-VPI (c/n AACA 97/1) which was first registered in August 1980 and was very active in the homebuilt scene. Hence the VP1 undercarriage on ZK-JGX. ZK-VPI was withdrawn from use in November 1999 but has since been restored to the register by V L Eade of Cheviot.

    John then restored Cliff Johnstone's Piel Emeraude ZK-CBH (c/n AACA 277) and flew it until it was withdrawn from use in July 2001.

    Then most recently he built "Johnny 1" ZK-JGX which has been based at Masterton since 1996.

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