NAVION NAVION G

The Navion Rangemaster G is the developed Navion: a 260 hp fuel-injected Continental, a fixed enclosed cabin with a side door in place of the sliding canopy, five separate seats, and tip tanks giving 108 gallons and a genuine 1,200-nautical-mile range. That range is the point and it is exceptional for a piston single. About fifty Gs were built at Harlingen, Texas before Hurricane Carla destroyed the factory in September 1961, and the G-1 that followed in 1962 is the same aircraft with smaller, redesigned tail surfaces — the one airframe change inside the string. The Rangemaster H, built in small numbers from 1968 after the American Navion Society bought the rights, has the 285 hp IO-520 and is a separate designation. The registry's three manufacturer names for the same aeroplane — Navion, Ryan and North American — reflect who held the certificate when the record was made, not who built it.

The enclosed cabin costs the Navion its most distinctive feature and gains cabin space and quiet. The 260 hp engine finally gives the heavy airframe adequate power — 165 knots and 1,100 fpm rather than the original's laboured performance. Production was sporadic across several owners and only a few hundred Rangemasters were built, so parts come through the type club and specialists. For long-distance flying at modest cost it is genuinely competitive with far newer aeroplanes.