Wipaire, Home of The Floats, MMAG 2007 Visit

MMAG Report: During the Summer of 2007, the MMAG had the exclusive pleasure of visiting the Wipaire facility located at Fleming feild Airport (KSGS) in South St. Paul, MN. Having been able to fully tour the facility and meet with key indiviuals, we obtained a very detailed and informative two day introduction to the creation, maintenance and support of aircraft floats, as well as the rich history of Wipaire, Inc., a highly specialized aviation company.

Ben Wiplinger founded Wipline, Inc., (now known as Wipaire, Inc.) in 1960. Ben began working in aviation in the 1940’s converting military aircraft to civilian executive aircraft at Fleming Field. This modification and repair business, known as “Wiplinger Aircraft Service” brought him into contact with floatplanes. After seeing room for improvement in existing aircraft floats, and being denied a dealership for the existing brand, he was compelled to design his own. He designed and built his first set of floats in 1960 and “Wipline” was born.

Ben sold his first set of floats to Ontario Central Airlines in 1962. Many innovative ideas went into these new floats including a patented process for replacing large quantities of rivets with a structural film adhesive greatly reducing water drag and assembly time. He eventually designed a landing gear retraction system that remains the standard of the float industry to this day.

Ben’s son, Bob, eventually joined in the effort, recognizing the need to provide quality maintenance for customers’ floats and aircraft alike. As an aeronautical engineer, he also made contributions to continuing the quality design reputation of Wipline. In 1974, all float manufacturing and aircraft servicing operations came together as Wipaire Inc.

Over the years, Wipaire has developed a full line of aircraft floats for all sizes of aircraft from a Piper Cub to a DeHavilland Twin Otter as well as over 100 Supplemental Type Certificates for a variety of useful aircraft modifications.