What I Know (So Far)

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Category: Quickheads BLOG

Published: Saturday, 15 September 2007 09:39

Written by Dan Yager

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Rhonda Cooper - Beloved wife and Faithful Navigator perhaps?

In an effort to have people on the internet and Quickie Community help me track down the previous owners of N920MR, I'll list here what I know so far.

I found out about the plane through an eBay ad hosted by a guy named Bob Moelhencamp.  I was talking to him via e-mail, but was eventually outbid by Tom Caya.  However, the time between Tom winning the auction and coming to pick the plane up was too much for Bob to bear.  To make a long story short, Bob gave me the contact information for Tom and we were soon wheeling and dealing.

Come to find out, Tom was relocating, and couldn't take the plane with him, so he needed to get rid of it.  We met up near Detroit made the transaction, and I drove it home on a trailer attached to a rental SUV. 

There just happened to be a crisis where I work in the office closest to Tom that week!  Which meant I had most of my expenses paid! 

When I got back home and got settled, I looked at the data plate in the cockpit which has the following information:

EXPERIMENTAL - AMATEUR BUILT AIRCRAFT
MODEL: Q2
SERIAL NO: 2751             EMPTY WT: 602
DATE OF MFG: 30 SEP 91   GROSS WT: 1000
ENGINE: REVMASTER         HP: 64
BUILT BY
MARCUS F. COOPER III
(ADDRESS IN AZ.)

On each side of the cockpit was a name, Marcus Cooper on the pilot's side, and Rhonda Cooper on the passenger's side.  In addition, the registration number (N920MR) was painted on the airplane in several places.

This was about all of the information I had to start working with.  So being the computer guy that I am, I started typing all this into Google.  Before long I saw that "N920MR" was listed on the builders section of http://www.quickiebuilders.org/  That showed the builder to be Mark Gardener, and it listed his phone number and e-mail address.  It wasn't long befor I got a call back from Mark, but he hadn't recieved a Bill of Sale either.  So that made at least four people (including myself) who had decided to purchase the plane without the Bill of Sale ever entering into the transaction.  I asked Mark who he bought the plane from, and he replied that it was a "firefighter from Miami."  Hmmm?  He said he'd get back to me if he could find the name.

Next, I turned to the FAA. On their website they have a N-number look-up tool located here:

http://registry.faa.gov/aircraftinquiry/NNum_inquiry.asp

When I typed 920MR into the search box, it gave me the following warning:

Yeah, tell me about it!  At any rate, below the warning was a link that said continue.  So I clicked it.  According to the FAA database Marcus Cooper sold N920MR to a corporation called Kirk Enterprises, in Miami.  This is good because it at least links to our "fire fighter from Miami."  However, when I type Kirk Enterprises into Google, the majority of the links refer to Star Trek! Dang!

However, cross-referencing Kirk Enterprises in the FAA Database turns up two other airplanes that this party has owned:

Luscombe 8A Registered as N71109 and
Cessna 150J Registered as N50918

The Luscombe registration was the most recent (2001) so I'm thinking by doing some further digging on that plane, I might be able to come up with the name and phone number of a real live person.

Well I guess we'll see.  I'll keep you posted.

So far the "chain of ownership" looks something like this:

Me (Dan Yager)
Thomas Caya
Bob Moelhencamp
(Perhaps a few more Owners)
Mark Gardener
(Perhaps a few more Owners)
Kirk Enterprises Inc., Miami, FL
Marcus F. Cooper III (The Manufacturer)

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