wrote:
On Mar 9, 6:23 pm, Dudley Henriques wrote:

The one I flew didn't have the later rudder capability. Never flew the Alon.

I did. It had rudder pedals, but there was little rudder response.
The airplane was uncomfortable and noisy, but it flew easily, and
outperformed our 150s on ten less HP. Took off shorter, climbed half
again as well, and cruised faster. Much sleeker than the 150, but had
no baggage space to speak of.

Dan
I remember the performance was good, even for the earlier Ercoupes. I
guess it was a combination of it's looks and the mass production
capabilities of Cessna and Piper that kept it from becoming more popular
than it did.
There are still a few flying.
The real legacy for the Ercoupe I believe has to be that the airplane
opened up the world of aviation for the physically challenged. I
remember one fellow on our field who arrived almost every Sunday if VFR
to stick his crutches into his Ercoupe and fly off for some flyin or
hamburger joint somewhere. I can still see the smile on his face when he
crutched on into our flight office, sat down, and joined in the "war
stories" we always seemed to have going on in there.

--
Dudley Henriques