Convair 106 Skycoach

The Convair Model 106 Skycoach was an experimental four-seat light aircraft, designed and built by the Stinson Division of Convair at the end of World War II.

Design and development
The Model 106 was a four-seat cabin aircraft with a pusher engine, fixed spatted tricycle undercarriage and twin tail booms flanking the propeller. The three passengers and pilot sat in a cabin in the fuselage nacelle, which also housed the pusher 230 hp Franklin 6A8-225-B8 six-cylinder horizontally-opposed piston engine, driving a cooling fan and pusher propeller.

Flight testing was carried out at San Diego, but performance was found to be unexceptional, comparing very poorly to the contemporary Beechcraft Bonanza, which could cruise at 165 mph on only 165 hp. With a maximum speed of only 142 mph the Model 106 was hopelessly outclassed and Convair abandoned development, scrapping the sole prototype, (regn. NX40004, msn. 1), in 1947.