Dennis,
Interesting comparisons. I've got a friend who owns a Taylorcraft L-2. I've always thought the swiveling rear seat was interesting, but figured it was built for very small people.
I was not aware of the design changes in the airplanes you mentioned - however, they sound like they degrade performance rather badly, so, in a rational world, they would be worth less than the civilian airplane.
But, who ever said aviation was rational?
(Can you imagine how good the pilots had to have been to fly those off of roads and farm fields in Europe doing the things they did with the horsepower they had available? Wow.)
Sliding the thread a little further from the topic, it's interesting to compare the "L" airplanes of World War II with their minimal power and "just give us something we can use as quickly as possible" design philosophy with the Cessna L-19 from less than ten years later in Korea. While the L-19 was designed and thrown together in a matter of days when the Army put out a "build us something yesterday" letter, it was not an off the shelf airplane converted for the military as was the later O-2 and the earlier Pipers, Aeroncas, Stinsons and Taylorcraft (yeah it used a lot of Cessna 170 parts, but it was a new design). It has a very large, comfortable cockpit, a boatload of power and delightful handling (although the stick is about six inches longer than makes sense).
The last I saw L-19s were demanding high five-figure prices and while I like flying them a lot and have a ball with the 60 degrees of flap, for that kind of money I'd get a Cessna 180 or 185 rather than having the cachet of owning a "warbird" in which I can only carry one passenger and cruises about 20 knots slower than a 180 on the same fuel burn.
Best regards,
Rick
