Restoration Hardware

A quiet demeanor does not keep Frank Ramos from being widely known throughout Northern California for his collection of Ranger engines. Furthermore, he will modestly decline any notion that he has said or done a thing to deserve the unofficial title of "the best carburetor guy out there."

Ramos, one of six children raised by his widowed mother during the height of the Depression, loved to build and fly model aircraft. The display of youthful enterprise and beautiful workmanship led him on an extraordinary journey.

In 1942, Ramos and a boyhood friend were flying model airplanes in an open field. Unexpectedly, a man drove off the road and out to where they were standing. "Do you two boys want to hear something?" he exclaimed, opening the car door so they could better hear the news. Propelled into a world changing faster than they were, they absorbed the news sweeping across the country--Japan had just bombed Pearl Harbor.

Ramos was 18 years old and went to work at an engineering factory building scale and life-sized models of aircraft designed for the war. Upon learning that the draft board wanted to recruit every available young man for the service, Frank joined the Army Air Corps, where he flew throughout Europe on milk runs in the nose cone of a P-38.

While his primary job was to preflight and prepare allied aircraft for war, Ramos came down with what would be the first of four cases of malaria. The sickness brutally consumed both his strength and health. Ramos realized that in order to remain around the aircraft he loved, he would need to work on aircraft accessories, which included generators, reverse-current relays, magnetos, and especially carburetors.

After the war, Ramos returned to Oakland, California, joining throngs of job-seeking veterans in need of work. Reciprocating engines powered the fleet of DC-3s operated by United Airlines, where starting pay for a mechanic began at $1.05 per hour. Feeling that he did not have much of a chance among the crowds of well-educated job seekers, his anxiety heightened as he listened to the woman interviewing a multitude of applicants. However, it dawned on Ramos that many of the questions relating to mechanical aptitude were fundamentally irrelevant to the job. "Do you know how to work on engines?" the interviewer inquired. Frank took matters into his own hands: "Ma'am, the questions that you're asking won't keep an airplane flying. I know how to work on the things that make engines work; carburetors, reverse-current relays, and generators." The flabbergasted interviewer did not have an opportunity to continue. Ramos heard a low, rumbling voice out of the back room: "Hire him."

Ramos went to work for United's H.J. Only, learning the majority of what he continues to do to this day. Mr. Only was impressed with Ramos and decided to start his own business, a carburetor shop at the Oakland Airport, repairing and tuning pressure carburetors for the DC-3s, -4s, and -6s that were a large part of the airliner fleet serving the country during this era. The company changed its name to Avatech, an accessory shop that served the San Francisco Bay Area for 55 years.

The focal point of Ramos's love for engines centers on his profound respect for the engineers who conceived an idea on a piece of paper and brought it to life as a piece of mechanical equipment. The passion that began more than six decades ago has developed into a deep reverence that endures to this day. Visiting his world of hangars and aircraft at Sonoma Valley Airport in Schellville, California is a walk through the war years and back into the golden age. Captivated by engineering genius, Ramos is a voracious reader who nourishes the sense of a lingering stewardship, a responsibility to preserve the engines and components packing the floors and walls of his hangar shop.

A collection of Ranger engines crowds beneath the wing of his early model Fairchild. Sitting on his desk is a packet from Germany filled with photos of an aircraft appearing more kite-like than real, a Rumpler, or more poetically named, "Flight of a Dove" airplane. A phone call from a German museum found Ramos first doubtful, then incredulous. The restoration of the Dove needed more than wind beneath her wings. She also needed an engine to fly, an inverted Ranger engine. Such a project suits Ramos perfectly.

Working on aircraft comprises the repayment of an enormous debt for Ramos, a debt of gratitude for those who dreamed of such ingenious components. "Me? I'm just a fruit picker," he said. "I didn't think these things up. Take the Mr. Beeches or the Mr. Cessnas. Those guys were incredible. To have dreamed up these things and made a successful enterprise that changed the world? Those guys were the greats in my book."

Walking past a line of carburetors, Ramos cannot help but note their simplicity and engineering. "They work like a charm when they're tuned. They're easy. Folks just don't know what they have in their hands when they get rid of stuff like this." In the hands of Frank Ramos, they once again become all that they were designed to be. -- By Sherry Ditmer