Beechcraft Baron 58 (oz16980)

About this Plan

Beechcraft Baron 58. Radio control scale model. Wingspan 85 in, wing area 975 sq in, for 2x .40 engines.

Direct submission to Outerzone.

Quote: "I have maybe one of the last copies of Bud Caddell Beechcraft Baron 58 plans. I just had them scanned at Office Max. I have gotten many plans from you guys so my way of giving back. I have to send you another email with other plans file as they are big.
Tim Cobb"

Update 4/9/2026: Added article, thanks to Pit.

Quote: "Baron 58: the regal twin. By Bud Caddell.

World War II is over! You'd hardly know it though, what with all the WWII aircraft flying around in model form. I've built so many of them, I just about forget that paint dries any way but flat.

All of that ended one day al a local airport. Around the corner of a building, with only the tail showing, was my next project. I didn't have an idea what it was, but I knew it had to be the most perfectly proportioned rear end (on an airplane!) I'd ever seen. As I neared the corner, the AFT fuselage came into sight, then the trailing edge of the wing. As each bit and piece came into view, it got better and better. I really had the hots to model it.

I rounded the corner - oh no, it's a twin. Well, In the 200 foot walk from first glimmer to full view I had decided I was going to build it. I didn't know how, but I was! Until then, my total experience with twins was seeing a B-25 fly at a meet three years ago. I never forgot the sound.

At the same meet, I was flying an olive drab FW-190 and almost put it into the ground by trying to fly a branch on a damn oak tree in the background - that camouflage works too well sometimes! After that experience, I got to looking around for a 'cheerful' airplane (that's anything but dark green). However, I kept looking for cheerful warbirds and, when you get down to it, they just don't make cheerful warbirds, do they?

Meanwhile, back at the airport, I went Into the office and got the factory address, wrote them and quickly discovered that the Beechcraft folks up in Wichita are good ole boys. Would you believe, they have 1/20-scale drawings of about every airplane they've built? They're just for us modelers at $2.00 a copy.

The Model 58 is an outgrowth of the original Baron. It's a little longer here and there, and altogether a prettier bird than its predecessor. An aviation writer refers to it as 'stately' and that pretty well says it. It's not a big airplane, even though it seats six people. It has 30 square feet less wing area than a P-51. It cruises at something like 230 miles per hour.

I decided on a scale of 2.25 in to the foot; this works out to be almost 1,000 square inches. Big is not only beautiful, it flies a whole lot better. My 58 weighs 15 pounds and has a 34 oz wing loading. That may seem heavy, until you learn that the 12 in to the foot Baron has a 92 lb wing loading! If you build them big, you have scale effect working for you.

Of course, the bigger they get, the fatter the fuselage - the Baron's is almost nine inches wide. My fuselage looked Ilke a pregnant porpoise. I was sure I had messed up the dimensions, and it looked terrible right up to the time I cut the windows out and got the no and tail cones in place. Instant Pretty!

The only deviation from scale is that the full-size Baron has 4° positive in the tail, and 4° positive In the wing, with 4° washout. This seemed like a bit much, so I opted for +2°, +2°, with 2° washout I guess if you can't be smart it helps to be lucky, because I couldn't have asked for a better set up when I got to zero on the countdown.

I'm going to assume that you are highly motivated to build a Baron - you'd better be, cause it took me the better part of a year (on and off) to finish the prototype. The plans are impeccable; and Pat Hollock has drafted them to near-micrometer accuracy. There are plenty of sketches and isometrics to guide you through the questionable areas..."

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