How does the L8 compare to the C140 derived from it?
@Capitaine the Luscombe is a semi aerobatic art deco masterpiece with very strong construction, the Cessna 140 is a fine aircraft but just a mere Cessna :)
I’ll offer my opinion 
The Luscombe 8 was an innovative, pure successor to the Monocoupes that Don Luscombe was earlier behind. It’s therefore a little tricky, sporty as something with as little as 65 HP can be, but it’s an original: mostly metal, flat engine that doesn’t leak or require much service, side by side closed cockpit, pressure cowling etc, things that we now see as normal. And it flies in a way that was reminiscent of a Monocoupe, with stiff, narrow main gear and stick controls. Cessna, being anything but dumb saw the value and built a direct copy, but more refined in its detail design and made with everyman in mind, so more tooled-up for production, a bit more forgiving to fly, yoke versus stick, less sporty.
Thanks for that very nice write-up Silvaire.
It piqued my interest since a friend of mine bought HB-DUC, a C-90 powered 8A in pristine condition, now stationed on my field. I wouldn’t want to go into oldtimers again, but those Luscombes sure are cute.
I owned a C140 for a while (and flew it coast to coast in the USA), they are pretty mild mannered aircraft although with a C85 the mountainous parts have to be planned quite carefully. I’ve not had the pleasure of flying a Luscombe.
I did my coast to coast trip when I already had on the order of 1000 hours, so I had plenty of XC time by then, but even so it was an adventure and I learned a lot from it. I think for low hours pilots there’s a tendency (usually from other people) to think that a long VFR cross country is some hugely terrifying pioneering activity that a low hours pilot has absolutely no business doing, but that’s just miles from the truth: in reality, a really long XC flight is just a collection of shorter XC flights, and the aeronautical decision making is just the same. The FAA deems you capable of this the moment you pass your checkride. It tends to be the “other crabs in the bucket” that try to pull you down.
