The Swearingen SA-226T Merlin Changes Assignments at BAS

Posted by Clinton McJenkin on Jul 28th 2026

The Swearingen SA-226T Merlin is now in the BAS turbine hangar and entering disassembly. This is a complex business turboprop with a deep aircraft-family history and plenty of systems to work through carefully. As BAS moves through the airframe, individual components will be identified, photographed, cataloged, and added to inventory according to the details available for each item. The final parts list is still being developed, so buyers should watch the BAS store as confirmed Swearingen Merlin inventory begins moving into circulation.

Swearingen SA-226T Merlin Enters Disassembly at BAS

Some airplanes slide neatly into a category.

The Merlin brought its own toolbox.

The Swearingen SA-226T belongs to a pressurized twin-turboprop business-aircraft family built through years of serious design evolution. It has the purposeful stance of an airplane that expects every inch to earn its keep. Turbine power, retractable landing gear, pressurization, a high tail, and a tightly integrated airframe all point in the same direction: this was an aircraft built around the work, not the brochure.

Now one has entered the BAS turbine disassembly hangar. Its role as a complete aircraft has changed, but the airplane still carries a broad inventory of components, assemblies, controls, hardware, and aircraft-specific pieces that may support operators and shops maintaining the remaining Merlin fleet.

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NEW ARRIVAL IN THE BAS TURBINE HANGAR

Swearingen In Disassembly:

The Merlin Was Engineered Into Existence

Ed Swearingen’s path to the Merlin did not begin with a clean sheet of paper. It began with a long sequence of modifications to the Beechcraft Twin Bonanza and Queen Air, known under the Excalibur name. Swearingen kept refining the idea until it became a separate aircraft, and the first Merlin prototype flew on April 13, 1965.

The family moved through several propulsion and configuration changes. The original prototype used piston power. The Merlin IIA introduced PT6 turboprops, followed by the TPE331-powered Merlin IIB. This was engineering by iteration, but nobody involved was merely rearranging the furniture. Each step pushed the airplane farther from its starting point and closer to a design identity of its own.

That identity became much clearer with the SA226-T branch.

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Confirmed Parts Recovery From This SA-226T

Parts recovery will be added here as the aircraft is cataloged. Individual components will be photographed and listed according to the identification, documentation, and condition details available for each item.

Key Equipment Noted From This Merlin

(x2) Garrett TPE331-10UA-511G engines
Dual Nose Wheel
BF Goodrich Main Wheels (X4) 3-1357-1
Landing Gear struts and Actuators
Dual Collins FD-112V
Flight Director’s Dual Sperry C-12A Compass Systems
Garmin GTN-725 GPS/MFD
Dual Collins Pro Line II Coms with CTRL’s 20’s
Dual Collins Pro Line II Nav’s w/ Ctrl 30’s
Dual Collins RMI-30
Dual Garmin GTX335R Mode S Transponders
Garmin GDL-88 ADS-B In/Out Datalink
Dual Collins MKL-30 Marker Beacon
Collins DME-40 DME
Collins ADF-60A ADF
Collins ALT-50A Radar Altimeter
IDC Encoding Altimeter
IDC Altitude Alerter
Dual Baker M-1035 Audio Controls
Bendix M4-D Autopilot
Honeywell RDS-86 Radar w/RDS-861A RT/Ant. Note: Radar Controlled by Garmin GTN-725 GPS/MFD
Starter generators, Hydraulic Pumps, Governors
(x2) Hartzell HCB-3TN-5G Propellers with T102DNB-4R Hubs
9 place Interior
- Pilot/Co pilot seat
- Toilet
- 6 Passenger seats
- Headliner and carpet replaced in 2015
Oxygen masks
Control Surfaces (HAIL DAMAGE)

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A small aircraft parked on a tarmac with hangars in the background.

Swearingen SA-226T:

The SA-226T Was the Big Step

The SA226-T Merlin III entered production in February 1972 after the earlier Merlin IIB run. It brought new wings and engine nacelles, new landing gear with two wheels on each leg, a redesigned tail, and a longer nose with room for baggage and avionics. The horizontal stabilizer moved high onto the vertical fin and used a trimmable arrangement more commonly associated with jet aircraft.

Those were not light cosmetic updates. They changed the structure, systems layout, proportions, and working character of the airplane.

The SA226-T also shows how closely the Merlin and Metro programs were connected. Much of the wing, landing gear, tail, and nose architecture came from the Metro design work underway in the late 1960s. The Metro stretched the concept toward commuter service, while the Merlin remained on the business-aircraft side of the family. Different assignments, plenty of shared engineering.

That relationship matters in the parts world. The aircraft is not simply a cabin wrapped around two engines. It is a dense network of mechanical, electrical, environmental, flight-control, landing-gear, propulsion-support, and cabin systems. When one enters BAS disassembly, the useful story reaches far beyond a short list of headline components.

Aircraft landing gear on a tarmac with a small animal nearby.

The Swearingen Merlin:

More Capability, Same Good Manners

A model designation tells us the aircraft family.

It does not tell us every item installed in the airplane.

Engines, propellers, avionics, instruments, accessories, controls, cabin equipment, and other systems can change during an aircraft’s working life. That is why BAS will build this SA-226T recovery from the actual airplane and the supporting documentation available for it.

As disassembly progresses, components will be identified by their actual data plates, markings, installation, and records. Individual listings will show the photos, identification details, traceability information, and terms available for that specific item.

No brochure archaeology. No inventory fortune telling.

The airplane in the hangar gets the final vote.

Airplane cockpit with numerous controls, gauges, and screens displayed.

Swearingen Merlin

Useful Complexity, Properly Organized

The SA-226T is the kind of aircraft that demonstrates why turbine disassembly is a systems job.

The value does not sit in one dramatic corner of the airplane. It is distributed through major assemblies, accessories, controls, panels, actuators, instruments, hardware, and the small model-specific pieces that can hold up a maintenance project when nobody has one available.

BAS is built for what comes next. Recover the components that make sense, identify the actual items, document them clearly, and turn one complete airframe into searchable inventory for owners, operators, and maintenance shops.

The Merlin’s work as a complete aircraft has changed.

Its usefulness is about to become much more distributed.

Interior view of a private jet with seating and wood paneling.

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Clinton McJenkin

Sales & Marketing Director
BAS Part Sales

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