Convair Model 111

The Convair Model 111 was a small experimental utility aircraft that Convair began developing in 1945 from the Gwinn Aircar, a private aeroplane designed to be safe and easy to fly whose surviving example had been donated to Consolidated Aircraft, the old employer of its designer Joseph Gwinn. The 111 closely resembled the Aircar but had cantilever monoplane wings in place of the biplane layout, and a pusher propeller driven by a mid-fuselage 65 horsepower Continental A-65 engine. Nicknamed the Pregnant Guppy, it showed low rudder authority, poor directional stability and engine cooling problems in ground and wind-tunnel tests. Convair persevered until supplying replacement engines and driveshafts for the ones damaged in testing became uneconomic, and once testing stopped the aircraft was scrapped.