The Boeing 727-200 Airplane Home

Alien54 writes "As seen at AirplaneHomes.com: 'We are offering a B727-200 aircraft for reuse as a home. It is our intention to deliver and set the airplane up on a column and bearing arrangement so it weathervanes. We have tried to define what we consider a "basic" airplane home. This project has all the complexities of a normal home and we will try to deliver and install it to the buyers needs, within the following limitations.' Be sure to also check out the owner's flight manual for more technical details."

Comments

Lift?

[bpb213]

During high winds, wouldnt the natural lift of the wings put stress on the column holding it down?

Finally, there's a use for these junk planes

[SexyKellyOsbourne]

Out in California, there are mammoth junk yards of nothing but a century of airplanes gone to waste. Many are used for movies, stripped for spare parts, and so forth, but it's good that they're finally being used to provide shelter.

However, $300,000 is a bit steep, though it's a nice novelty item. Instead of selling them to the eccentric, the planes out in the junk yards of California should be given away converted into homeless shelters and low-income housing using the company's swivel technology.

Re:Finally, there's a use for these junk planes

[WhaDaYaKnow]

Out in California, there are mammoth junk yards of nothing but a century of airplanes gone to waste

Uhm, actually I went searching for these and could only find one in California: Mojave. True, it's gotten a bit busy after 9-11 but they don't have _that_ many planes. The largest one is in Arizona.

However, $300,000 is a bit steep

The auction says: This is the first of its kind and has been drastically reduced from the normal sales price of $295,000.

Instead of selling them to the eccentric, the planes out in the junk yards of California should be given away converted into homeless shelters and low-income housing using the company's swivel technology.

Yeah, I'm sure the owners of those planes would love that idea. FYI: these aircraft still contain parts that can be used, which is the sole purpose of keeping them around. A majority of aircraft however is just mothballed until better times come around. There are times it's not economical to operate them but that doesn't make them worthless. Even if they'd give away the fuselage, who would pay for (a)removing all sellable parts (b)transportation (c)the swivel system (d)the interior??

In other words, plenty of Karma Whoring but nothing substantial to say.

Looks fishy!

[Anonymous Coward]

Domain Name: AIRPLANEHOMES.COM
Registrar of Record: TUCOWS, INC.
Record last updated on 16-Oct-2002.
Record expires on 16-Oct-2003.
Record Created on 16-Oct-2002.

Is it just me?

[Apreche]

or is that picture obviously photoshopped?

I got it from a hairdryer. . .

[Betelgeuse]

Is anyone else entertained by the fact that this is made available by "Max Power Aerospace, Inc."?

Re:Pay with PayPal!

[seizer]

To be honest, if I had that kind of money, I might be more inclined to buy a functioning MIG 21 ;-)

Re:Pay with PayPal!

[echucker]

From their FAQ-

Does Russia still have this site as a target?
NO. This Atlas-F Series was finished before the SALT (Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty). The Russians knew these sites were already obsolete and decommissioned.


After a bit of digging around at SiloMan's coordinates page, it appears that that particular site is just off of Route 3 near Clayburg, NY, and can be seen in a 1995 aerial photo on Terraserver.

Other uses too...

[babbage]

Ya know it's funny, not two weeks ago I was talking to a friend's dad, and he came *this close* to convincing me that we should start the restaraunt chain of the twenty first century. The twentieth century, as older readers will recall, had these things called "trains", and for some reason it was popular to convert old train boxcars into diners. Huzzah! Now we can take those California scrapyards full of B-17s and 747s and turn them into a chain of restaraunts.

The cool thing would be that all your expense goes into ambience -- go for that classy old Pam Am style, and maybe have the maitre 'd wear a leather jacket. If the food sucks, hey, so what, your customers will be expecting that anyway -- as long as they're being charged less than a hundred bucks for the experience of getting out alive with a full stomach, they'll leave happy.

Dammit it could work, all you need to do is find places in or near major cities & you could start a chain to rival Hard Rock Cafe or Planet Hollywood. Zoning laws could be an issue, but hey in that case just stay out of New England at first -- I know of placed in Smyrna Tennessee & Florence South Carolina that would be happy to help get you started...

tee hee :)

And before anyone goes knocking these people for being crackpots to sell airplane homes (hey, I think it's a fun idea but I know damn well I could never talk my fiance into it :), check out their last auction: 2.1 million dollars to sell an ICBM silo home. Yow!

Other ideas? I snoozed, I lost

[r2ravens]

I used to live in Kingman, Az. There is a large airport there that was used during WWII that has long runways. There was also a company at the airport that flew decommissioned planes in and stripped all saleable parts. There were always more than a dozen planes there.

I had the idea back then that I might be able to buy a stripped fuselage for the scrap value. Never did find out how much that would be, but I had some ideas about how to use one of them as a home. I would like to have been able to buy one of the widebodies. I never thought about putting one up on a post to swivel, but the following are two ideas that I had.

First, I thought that I might coat the exterior to prevent corrosion, remove all wings and stabalizers and bury it. Not completely, but about 80 - 90%, just enough so that I could put skylights along the length of the top. Using an L-1011 for example (interior dimensions of 18' x 135'), would give over 2400 square feet of living area not counting any of the below-deck stuff like luggage, galley, or storage areas.

It would already have bathroom facilities (well, toilet and sink anyway, you'd have to add a full bath somewhere) and a heating/cooling system. The 18' width would also give more options for the layout of rooms and other divided areas. This would be earth-sheltered and since (I believe) these are well insulated, it would not require much heating and cooling.

Entry would be through a stairwell down to any entry door one would choose, or, with the right lot, maybe the terrain would provide for a ground level entry with the rest of the structure earth-sheltered. I figured that it could be done for not much more than a conventional home.

The second idea was a little more involved but would make for a real artistic curiosity. Purchase the aircraft including wings and all stabalizers. Purchase a piece of land which is a hillside, preferably which breaks on two sides. Land of this type is somewhat less desirable than a flat piece which is easy to build on so it would likely be cheaper. This might be hard to visualize, but I'm no artist, so the concept is only in my head. This will all make sense at the end of the description.

Make most of the living space of your home inside the hill, underground. Hollow out living areas, make sure it is supported just like a horizontal shaft mine - think NORAD but without the bomb shelter capacity (unless you've got a lot of money burning a hole in your pocket.)

The primary shaft would be on both sides of the hillside and then another perpendicular to the first shaft. Cut loose the front section of the fuselage with the cockpit and put it in one end. Cut loose the tail with the vertical and horizontal stabalizers and put in the other end. Have a doorway out of the perpedicular shaft and anchor one of the wings (appropriate one) at the door and supported horizontally out into the air away from the hillside.

The end result is to have it appear that the entire aircraft is imbedded in the hillside. The wing is a patio, the cockpit could be a breakfast nook and the tail could house the bathrooms and heating/cooling equipment, etc. If the terrain were right, you could even have a pool partially shaded from the sun under the wing.

I had the idea back in a time when the feds weren't under republican control, so I figured I might even be able to get a National Endowment for the Arts grant or maybe even a National Science Foundation grant to defray some of the cost, as this would be much more costly than the first option.

Well, /. is about sharing ideas, so if you've got the resources, have at it. Just be sure to post some pics and an URL. If someone actually does this I sure would like to see it - either option.