04:48 "If the thing was going to fly, it needed somewhere to mount the wings". You have to love a design philosophy like that.

Thank you for an important historical record. Well done.

The Airtruck was such a logical machine with all the bits in the appropriate places for it's intended job. I saw it flying in Dannevirke as a kid & it blew me away. Here I am at 72, living in Idaho & still flying weird shit!

What a wonderfully well researched record of a most unusual but capable aircraft.

Nice too see someone cares about our avation history, I'm 27 now, first found out about this ag Aircraft when I was 11 from a topdressing pilot. Found more information about again at age 13 after harassing the library at Pukekohe, they gave me The Topdressers book by G somebody, can't remember. Good on you for making a video of our lost aviation history, enjoyed it. Yours Respectfully Jake😉

Thank you for the time and effort to make this video on What I know as the " Transavia PL-12 Airtruk " due to unique look and the usage in film series of "MAD MAX" and specifically the " Beyond Thunder Dome" , in the USA as young pre-teen . You have captured and collected history that would have otherwise become lost to time as so much of history and unique products. The fact in just 5 years that 12,603 (as of October 31st 2020) people have watched this great documentary. You have paid forward a debt of knowledge and collective history of people who industry and actions have not been well documented and/or sadly deemed not worthy by governmental archivists to make such information part of the national library and archives. I imagine Aviation Museums are equally appreciative of your efforts.

I swear I truly love the Kiwis and Aussies for the names they give to some of their town's and landmarks they just have a way of rolling off the tounge that most countries failed at

Thank you for putting so much time in to produce such a good informative documentary. Thoroughly enjoyed it! from a young kiwi about to go on his first solo flight! cheers

You did a great job with this documentary. This is a plane that I have always liked since I was a small child reading about it in a old popular mechanics magazine issue.

This is worthy of screening on Netflix.

Thank you so much for the time and effort that you put int this wonderful video. Unfortunately much of this inspirational pioneering courage to create something from nothing is missing form our modern lives.Proud to be a Kiwi, though living in Sydney

John Carver Meadows Frost died young at 63, on his 64th birthday, now I understand, he went away to that island, far from everything, I looked for his peace of mind, he finally finished as it began, I will never forget flying saucers, they were created by human beings, he created one with Andreas Epp.

Saw the Airtruk at Te Kuiti in the early sixties when it was being built. Saw another topdressing on a sheep farm at Wharepapa in the 80s. Also recall seeing one at Kerikeri airport in the 90s.

I believe I need to add some comment in regard to the claims made by Shar Young about Jeff Young's involvement with the NZ built Airtruck. For the sake of others who read this post I agree there might possibly be no contradiction in what s/he has claimed as opposed to the video I produced about the manufacture of the PL11 aircraft ZK-BPV in Te Kuiti, New Zealand. The "problem" is with dates. I would like to see the DATES on those work documents Shar refers to where Jeff Young was doing major work on the PL11 Airtruck(s). I feel sure that they would almost certainly be AFTER Waitomo Aircraft Company ceased to exist and Geoff Young had moved to Gisborne, VIC., Australia in Jan 1965. Please NOTE JEFF Young and GEOFF Young are two different people with different qualifications. ALSO. A few facts that need to be recognized: JEFF Young was employed by Jack Worthington to do maintenance work on aircraft operated by Northern Air Services. This was because some time in 1960 Snow Bennett had told Worthington that Bennett Aviation could no longer provide the manpower needed to do maintenance on NAS aircraft. I might possibly be wrong, but as far as I know Jeff Young was never employed by Bennett Aviation nor by Waitomo Aircraft Co who built the two prototype PL11 aircraft. (Geoff Young has since confirmed that Jeff Young was never employed by Bennett Aviation nor my Waitomo Aircraft Company). GEOFF Young initially began work with Bennett Aviation in March 1960, and as Snow Bennett began to realize the qualifications and experience that Geoff had he began to look to Geoff for support. After Pellarini had walked away from the job Geoff Young took over all the design work. He eventually did get some help from Australian Civil Aviation Authority technicians, and also had discussions with Rolls Royce (in the UK) regarding his idea to re-design the PL11 and use a 600HP turbine engine instead of the huge and heavy P&W radial engine. The overhaul of the engine that was installed in PL11 #1 ZK-BPV had been done done by Aero Engine Services, Rukuhia (Hamilton airport) and Alf Coleman from AES was present the first time that engine was started after it had been installed in the PL11 aircraft ZK-BPV. PS: Geoff Young, the man I had worked with in 1960 on the manufacture of prototype #1 (ZK-BPV) has assured me that during the time he was involved with manufacture of PL11 Airtruck prototypes [March 1960 to January 1965] the Jeff Young of Northern Air Services was not involved in any way with the manufacture or modification of the two Airtruck prototypes. A few other bits of significant info' : It was probably sometime in 1960 that Luigi Pellarini effectively walked away from the PL11 job in disgust because the NZCAA officials did not seem to recognize his knowledge and experience in designing and building aircraft. By the time he had started on design of the PL11 Luigi had already designed and built several successful aircraft. After settling back in Australia Luigi Pellarini was instrumental in starting up the Transavia company and, working with Australian CAA, had approval for his PL12 design long before NZCAA gave approval for the NZ built PL11 in 1966. By that time (1966) Waitomo Aircraft Company had run out of money. The first PL11 prototype ZK-BPV was written-off when it crashed on 8th October 1963. The pilot Jack Worthington survived. Geoff Young was the engineer who was sent out to examine the wreckage - I have copies of some of the photos he took. And by that time he was well on the way with manufacture of PL11 #2 ZK-CKE which was completed Dec 1964. When Waitomo Aircraft ran out of money Geoff Young (and his wife) moved to Australia [Jan 1965] and all subsequent work done for Northern Air Services (now part of Rural Aviation, New Plymouth) was possibly done under the supervision of JEFF Young. But GEOFF Young had done all the necessary design work and supervised the manufacture and test flights of PL11 #2. He gave me copies of videos (from Super8 movie film) he had made of some of the test flights. I have also been told that PL11 #2 (ZK-CKE) was, for some time, used by Rural Aviation for aerial topdressing work (Pilot Don Ercegg). According to an Air Safety Network accident report, ZK-CKE was destroyed in a take-off accident on 1 March 1967 when the aircraft was being operated by Barr Brothers (Ardmore) and the pilot Richard Druce Tatham was fatally injured. Roger Young 27 Sept 2020

MADD Max beyond thunder dome brought me here , thanks!

What an amazing video. Thank you. I never knew that history. I grew up with beavers and dc3’s spreading super in Gisborne and my father was the only ag helicopter pilot on the east coast from 1968 in the early days following on from the late Frank Mettner. As a kid I’d hang out at the aerodrome crawling over old R series Bedford loaders and waking up to beavers howling off the runway heading to the next job.

Great and nice job and flying one PL12 and the last AT300 and have 3 more in parts. CAVU ... Dennis

Very cool....Cheers Brett

Very interesting, thanks for sharing.

NOTICE from Copyright holder for this video: - Please feel free to download this video and send links to other interested persons. I recently watched a documentary video about the birth and development of "Aerial Topdressing" in New Zealand [video entitled "The Super Pilots"]. It is a well produced documentary and covers several of the unsuccessful attempts by various companies to manufacture aircraft specifically for Aerial Topdressing in New Zealand. It does mention the Australian built Transavia PL12 Airtruk but not even a whisper about this courageous attempt by a small team of "Kiwis" [ie: New Zealand citizens] to manufacture the PL11. I take this as a deliberate attempt to delete this project from the annals of NZ aviation history. Even the wonderful MOTAT [Museum of Transport and Technology] in Auckland NZ used to have a magnificent scale model of the PL11 in their display. But this has been removed and replaced with an ex-Barr-Brothers Transavia PL12 . I want the world to know that there once was a small team of "Kiwis" who had the courage to attempt what you see in the video I have placed here. Roger Young PS: On one of my visits back to NZ - possibly 2008 - I did see some parts of the tail section(s) of PL11 #2 (ZK-CKE) in a private museum at Tirau, near Rotorua. There was also a drawer with many of the blueprint drawings that were used to manufacture those two aircraft [ZK-BPV and ZK-CKE]. To the best of my knowledge these are the only remaining bits of "hardware" still in existence of PL11 #2. Unfortunately the bloke who owns the museum didn't have any idea how to assemble these bits of the airplane or how he should put them on display. They are NOT on public display with all the other interesting stuff he has there. You have to ask specifically to see the "remains" of PL11 Airtruck ZK-CKE. The Museum owner told me that ALL of the bits from PL11 #1 [ZK-BPV] went to the scrap-metal merchants before he could get his hands on them.

Great video. Shame on the NZ government for taking years to issue the airworthiness certification. Disgusting!

You can always count on government to help ruin a good product and a mans dreams.......

Still a couple flying in NSW that I know of, still a good spreading machine

I flew in ZK ELL with Nigel Arkley 1980s :)

Was it this aircraft or an Air Jeep or... ??? that played a role in the "Mad Max" series?

The Aeronautical Engineer mentioned was Jeff Young- Not GEF.

John Carver FROST great ingenier

Same as Australia government with no faith local product

YOU! 👉 me? 👈 You... You have a plane. I have? Uh huh. It might just save your life. It will?

need to go back to school i see

so this is click bait