General History

The Great Depression was tough on the aircraft industry, especially the sale of luxuries like the small sport planes the Granville Brothers built in Springfield, Massachusetts. The decision was made to build and enter a racer in the Cleveland Air Races in hopes that prize money could help support their dwindling sales. The first racer, engineered by Bob Hall, and built by the Granville Brothers (hence Gee Bee) began in July of 1931. In less than 6 weeks “The City of Springfield” made its first flight at a cost of less than $5,000. The Gee Bee would be flown by expert pilot, Lowell Bayles, and won every race it entered, including the Shell speed dash at 267.34 mph and the famous Thompson Trophy pylon race! They more than recouped their original investment.  

The success of the “Z” model was short lived however. Bayles had a larger 750 hp engine installed and was going to make an attempt at the World Land Speed Record. On December 5, 1931 at the Wayne County Airport in Detroit, Michigan, only 106 days after its first flight, Bayles came speeding in to the timing gate when, within a matter of seconds, the right wing came off and the tumbling Gee Bee hit the ground, erupting into a ball of flames! Bayles was killed and the reputation of the Gee Bee as a killer airplane began.

Personal History

This aircraft was meticulously constructed by Jeff Eicher and Kevin Kimball in Mount Dora, Florida.  Since there were no original drawings for this aircraft, a lot of research went into notes and old photographs to make it as accurate as possible. Airshow pilot Delmar Benjamin made the first 12 flights. He is well known on the air show circuit for his act in a reproduction of a later Gee Bee R-2 racer. After the initial test flights, Jeff and Kevin approached Kermit to see if they could display it at Fantasy of Flight, as they had no desire to fly it. After walking by the aircraft in the hangar for 6 months, Kermit decided that it really filled a gap in the collection and made a deal with Jeff and Kevin to purchase it.  They were glad with the decision (maybe this was their original strategy), as the aircraft would now go to a good home and be flown by someone with the skill to safely fly it.

Only one other Gee Bee “Z” replica has ever been built.  It was modified with longer wings and fuselage in an attempt to make it fly better and was used in the movie the “Rocketeer”.

Kermit Comment

I  flew this aircraft twice before deciding that I really wanted to know what caused the original aircraft to crash. Having some experience with wing flutter before, I suspected that it might have been the cause. I lost several friends because of it and, after reviewing the film footage of the original crash decided not to fly the aircraft again until it was tested. In the early 1930’s nothing was known about flutter. It was the racing aircraft of the time that started to push the boundaries where flutter began to be a problem. Leon Tolve came down before and did some work for me on aerobatic aircraft. Leon, who was now almost 90, had been one of the primary flutter experts that tested all of our aircraft during World War II. After several days of testing at Fantasy of Flight, he determined that the aircraft had a definite wing flutter problem above 240 mph.

To make the aircraft safe to fly, a specific amount of balance weight will have to be attached to each aileron spar at a specified location. These external weights will be mounted protrude beneath the wings and allow the aircraft to fly safely at speeds well over 300 mph. Solving one of aviations mysteries, we now know what happened to Bayles and the Gee Bee “Z”, as he was estimated to have been going over 300 mph when the wing came off!