I have a friend named Phil. Phil has spent many thousands of dollars over the last six years to teach me how to restore an airplane to flying condition. He did this in a very unusual way.

He bought a Piper Tri- Pacer that needed new fabric covering on both the fuselage and wings. Perhaps it could have flown safely for another season, but Phil and his mechanic friend decided to take it into the shop over the winter and re- cover it. In the spring, it would look sharp with its bright and shiny new skin.

Inevitably, there were structural repairs to be made once the plane was stripped to its bones. It was during this cut- and- weld phase that they decided to change the Tri Pacer back into its predecessor, a Piper Pacer, by reconfiguring the landing gear into a tailwheel arrangement. There is an approved modification procedure for this.

Perhaps unfortunately, there are other modifications that have been approved, and the few snowflakes of a winter project quickly turned into an avalanche of modifications, alterations and better- than- new repairs. For years now, Phil has told me that he is turning the corner on this project, and the plane might fly in a few months. I am still unable to decide if this sort of tenacity is a mark of character strength or an indication of a psychological disorder.

Phil's plane will be a prize winner, an example of mechanical perfection and sleek appearance. It will be a flying catalog of all the various modifications that can be made to a Piper Tri- Pacer.

By watching Phil from a distance, I have learned how to bring new life to an old plane. In repairing my plane, at each decision point, I thought of what Phil did, and did the opposite. Any part that measured up to minimum specifications was fair game for re- use or for replacement of worn parts.

My 1946 Commonwealth is the first plane that I have ever owned, and it spent 11 weeks in the shop while I made repairs in my spare time. Were it not for Phil, the plane might still be in pieces, because there are still many things that I would like to improve upon. I did what I needed to do, and will catch up on the rest in little bites when I have the time... and when I 'm not out flying it.

Phil has a last name, but to protect the guilty, I will not reveal it. I admire his dedication in transforming an old and rag tag airplane into a shining example of the genre. I thank him for helping me resist my own temptations to get in over my head with a big project.

It seemed to go on forever. Phil bought a rag- tag Piper Tri- Pacer one autumn, and decided that he and a mechanic friend would replace the fabric covering that winter. Their plan was that the plane would be ready to fly in the first warm breezes of the following summer.

Once the skin was stripped, there were more repairs to be done than they had counted on. There was nothing insurmountable, mind you, but there was enough to get them thinking.

An airframe overhaul is a journey down a road which has many forks; at each fork, Phil made the farsighted decision, and said "Yes I would like the airplane to have this feature"... and another six months was tacked on to the completion schedule.

When it came time for me to repair the plane I had just bought, I thought of Phil, and at every fork I said "Let's get the plane flying again and worry about the fancy stuff later".

I have a real plain Jane plane, and Phil has a showpiece. His plane is pictured above on a cold and crisp day in January 2005.