I love the PT22. Lots of character in a small plane. At our AF museum here there is one that was suspended from the ceiling for years. Now that the museum is redoing their displays, they have taken it down and temporarily placed it on the floor of the new hangar building. It looks exactly like the one on the AOPA cover.
Since I teach aircraft structures classes down there I get a lot of time to walk around the PT22 and examine it close up. Its looks, from the outside, that it is ready to fly.
I would love to do a thorough inspection on it with the goal of getting it airworthy. I bet it would not take much because it really is a small simple aircraft. I don't think the museum would part with it though.
One of this VAF's own, Martin Hone, an RV-6 builder, is doing just that. His 'Space Walker RR' build pictures look fantastic. The Spacewalker itself is a long time well proven design and a natural for a radial engine of which Rotec's 110hp R-2800 or 150hp R-3600 are two of the best. Using fuselage formers the Spacewalker can easily take on the beautiful lines of a PT-22 or STA for that matter. Depending on how authentic you would want your 'Ryan' to look, even it's unusual looking landing gear can be reproduced or bought prefabricated. Here are some links if your interested...
