Bell Helicopter Textron AH-1 COBRA
N517SF is a Bell Helicopter Textron AH-1 COBRA, a rotorcraft with turboshaft engines (a helicopter or multicopter), built in 1980. It has 2 seats. It is registered to Celebrate Freedom Foundation INC, a corporation in West Columbia, South Carolina. The registration is valid: it was issued on February 24, 2011 and expires on February 28, 2030. It holds an experimental airworthiness certificate for exhibition, dated October 21, 2011.
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Flight history: where it flew in the last seven days · follow it on the live map
Aircraft
- Maker
- Bell Helicopter Textron
- Model
- AH-1 COBRA · all AH-1 COBRAs and related versions
- Built of
- aluminiumThe airframe is aluminium: sheet metal over a riveted frame, the way most aircraft have been built since the 1940s. This is how the Bell AH-1 family is built; the FAA does not record construction for each aircraft, and the type certificate data sheet is the authority for this one.
- Serial number
- 80-23517
- Type
- RotorcraftFAA type of aircraft code 6 (the FAA's broad category for the airframe). Every aircraft with this code · All codes
- Power
- TurboshaftFAA type of engine code 3 (what powers it, as the FAA classes engines). Every aircraft with this code · All codes, 1 motor · Lycoming T53L-703 · 1400 hp
- Seats
- 2
- Year built
- 1980
- Transponder code
- A67D06 (octal 51476406)
Registration
- Status
- Valid registrationFAA registration status code V (whether the registration certificate is in force). Every aircraft with this code · All codes
- Certificate issued
- February 24, 2011
- Expires
- February 28, 2030
- Last FAA action
- October 7, 2023
- Airworthiness
- ExperimentalFAA airworthiness class code 4 (the kind of airworthiness certificate it flies under and what it is approved for). Every aircraft with this code · All codes · ExhibitionFAA certificate purpose code 3 (the kind of airworthiness certificate it flies under and what it is approved for). All codes · October 21, 2011
- FAA region
- SouthernFAA region code 7 (the FAA regional office that handles the record). All codes
- FAA record id
- 00423189
Owner as the FAA publishes it
- Name
- Celebrate Freedom Foundation INC
- Type
- CorporationFAA type of owner code 3 (who holds the registration: a person, a company, a trust or a government body). Every aircraft with this code · All codes
- Address
- 2533B Airport Blvd
West Columbia, SC 29170-2142
Owners can ask the FAA to withhold their name and address from public files. When they do, those fields are blank here as well. How that works.
Documents on file 0
No bills of sale, loans or other documents are indexed against this tail number.
Connections how N517SF links to the rest of the register
- Bell AH-1 20 registered
- Bell Helicopter Textron 191 aircraft on the register
- Built of aluminium · as the model family is built; the register does not record it per aircraft
- Lycoming T53L-703 13 aircraft with this engine series · 1400 hp
- Celebrate Freedom Foundation INC 5 aircraft in the fleet
- West Columbia, SC 35 aircraft registered in this town
- South Carolina 3,111 aircraft registered
- FAA orders naming the Bell AH-1 2 airworthiness directives
- Approved modifications for the Bell AH-1 1 supplemental type certificates
The whole map of how records connect · these connections as data: /graph/aircraft/N517SF.json.
Records check free · 1 to understand · 4 clear
The public federal record on N517SF, read the way a buyer, lender or insurer reads it: FAA registration, prior tail numbers keyed on the serial number, reuse of the tail number, recent registry filings, and the NTSB accident record under this and every earlier registration.
Valid registration to Celebrate Freedom Foundation INC, a corporation, certificate issued February 24, 2011, expires February 28, 2030. No fractional interest recorded. [1]
The airworthiness certificate on file is dated October 21, 2011, 31 years after the 1980 manufacture year. A re-issued certificate commonly follows export and re-import, a rebuild, or a return to the register after cancellation. The cause is documented in the FAA aircraft records file, which the full report obtains. [1]
No earlier tail number is recorded against serial 80-23517 for this model in the deregistered file. [2]
No other airframe has carried N517SF according to the deregistered file. [2]
No bills of sale, loans or releases have reached the registry in recent weeks. The index covers only recent filings; older liens are in the records file. [3]
No NTSB investigation records located under N517SF. CLEAR means the query ran and returned nothing, not that nothing ever happened. [4]
These live in the FAA aircraft records file (every document ever filed against the aircraft) and, for larger aircraft, the International Registry. Part of the full report.
AD compliance against the logbooks and flight-activity reconciliation are researched layers of the full report.
- FAA Releasable Aircraft Database, master file, file of October 23, 2026. registry.faa.gov/
- FAA deregistered aircraft file (part of the same download), file of October 23, 2026. registry.faa.gov/
- FAA document index: registry documents received in recent weeks, file of October 23, 2026. registry.faa.gov/
- NTSB aviation accident database (CAROL), records through September 30, 2026. data.ntsb.gov/carol-main-public/basic-search
This automated check reads the public federal record. Nothing here is a legal opinion, an appraisal or a statement about the aircraft's condition; a CLEAR line is a statement about the searched record, not the aircraft.
Source: FAA Civil Aviation Registry, Releasable Aircraft Database, October 23, 2026. See this record on the FAA site · This record as data