Tabla de contenidos para November/December 2024 en KITPLANES

I PROBABLY SHOULDN’T admit this, but some features that come with the latest electronic flight instruments have left me a little, um, disinterested. Until I try them, that is. A good example is the concept of “safe glide” or even autoland. Garmin introduced both concepts a few years ago, though the full-autoland idea is more recent and limited to high-end aircraft where the system can control the engine directly. Not at my pay grade. The more common version is what Garmin calls Smart Glide and, more recently, Dynon rolled out what it calls Emergency Glide. They work similarly: When commanded, they set up a controlled descent to the nearest viable airport and let the pilot concentrate on other things. To be honest, I was a bit meh about them as safety…

I ORIGINALLY DESIGNED my SR-1 race plane with a single wing tank. I subsequently decided to add a header tank for several reasons. First and foremost, the wing tank is wide and flat; the wing has almost no dihedral and a very shallow sump. Although I incorporated flapper doors between the outer left/right bays and the inner bay, I was concerned that uncoordinated flight at low fuel levels might unport the pickup and result in the engine quitting. (It would be nice to preserve slipping as a landing maneuver option for the pilot, but this is also exactly when you don’t want an engine out, especially in a plane with a poor glide ratio and high landing speed.) I also realized that adding a header tank would provide enough fuel to…

HOW MANY AIRPORT FRIENDS does it take to reattach the wings to a Van’s RV-6? Realistically, probably three. However, here at Sacramento Executive Airport (KSAC), word tends to spread like wildfire and before you know it, the whole squad is there to help. This includes “the boys.” Stan Lawrence, Bruce Walters, Kerry Richburg and (the late) Hal Pattenaude plus Zach Lauzon, my boyfriend. In early summer of 2024, the six of us managed to get the wings mounted and bolted on in only 3 hours. When we first removed the wings, Stan had created handles to attach to the outside wing rib for easier maneuvering. These were still attached so he and Bruce were able to easily pick up each wing from the wing stands and slide them into their…

ONE OF THE MOST enjoyable and useful “tools” available to anyone considering building or buying an Experimental aircraft, or even any general aviation aircraft, is membership in a local chapter of the Experimental Aircraft Association. These are usually located at any airport large enough to support its own community. I happen to be a member of two such chapters, one at my home airport and one at our vacation airpark property. Both are unique in their activities and traditions that reflect their locations and membership demographics, yet both adhere to the criteria established by the EAA for chapter operation. One of the primary objectives is supporting those members involved with E/A-B but all are welcome who share an interest in flying. Almost all chapters support the Young Eagles program and…

WHEN THE FAA INSPECTOR or DAR (Designated Airworthiness Representative) arrives to award you your airworthiness certificate, it’s likely that everything will go smoothly, right? After all, you’ve followed all the checklists and performed your due diligence. It might not go well. Reports of certification success are all over the map. Why? For a pittance, EAA sells a comprehensive kit for certifying your Experimental aircraft. It contains detailed instructions, forms, placards and checklists. If this is your first build and you’re not using it, you’ll spend more time getting all the details together. Success insurance, right? Maybe not. Here are the top reasons for certification failure. Paperwork When I went to training to become a DAR, one thing was emphasized repeatedly. Paperwork. It has to be perfect. When I say perfect,…

ALL AIRPLANES ARE a compromise of one sort or another. Models that fly slowly with great confidence aren’t usually fast. Fast airplanes are usually fond of runway. We love aircraft with generously sized cabins, but that aspect also takes a cut into performance and the result is likely to weigh more. Is any given design too slow? Just add horsepower, except that involves yet more weight just to do that plus you’d better plan to carry that extra fuel your more powerful engine desires. Depending on where you dine, lunch may be reasonably priced but it’s never free. The trick, of course, is to find the balance. For Kitfox, the solution, while still keeping a sharp eye on that everelusive sweet spot of performance and intended function, is simply three different…

YOU AND YOUR AIRPLANE KIT deserve a comfortable workshop area for the many days of building that lie ahead. If you are a first-time builder or are considering an aircraft kit purchase, one of the very first questions you may be asking yourself is, “Do I have enough space to build this thing?” The two popular choices for most builders are to either utilize available space at home or to build in a hangar at the airport. Everyone’s situation is different so there is no “one size fits all” here. For example, let’s be jealous of those who live on an airport property as their building and flying all take place in the same location! For many of us, the ideal workshop location is in our home. This may be…

I’M DRAWN TO THE SIMPLE, low-cost end of the airplane market. The first airplane I bought plans for was the Evans VP-1. The first airplane I started building was a Pietenpol Air Camper. Aeronca Champs were an early favorite in the store-bought category, and remain so. My first flying lesson was in an Aeronca Chief and I couldn’t have been more excited. The panel was so simple, the radio so weak, the fabric so worn, the compression so low. Granted, it wasn’t a stellar example of the breed, but it was $8 an hour, wet. It taught me many things in our one hour together, like how to land at a controlled field using light signals. I’m five decades older than when I budgeted paperroute income between flying lessons and…

AIRPLANE DESIGN IS inherently an iterative process. As we have already seen in our discussion of configuration layout, the airplane as finally built is virtually never identical to the first initial configuration. With the initial layout of the airplane complete, the design process moves on to a series of calculations and analyses to determine its weight, performance, stability and control. The level of sophistication of these analyses varies from project to project and may run the gamut from relatively simple, classical analyses to higher-order tools like full-configuration computational fluid dynamics (CFD). It’s also at this stage that subscale aerodynamic testing, either in a wind tunnel or using RC models, begins. It’s likely that these tests and analyses will reveal some shortfalls or things that could be improved by adjusting the…

IT IS CALLED THE GOLD LINDY, a 7-pound statue of Charles Lindbergh that is awarded to the absolute best kitbuilt aircraft at AirVenture every year. Every Gold Lindy is inscribed with a quote from Charles Lindbergh: “Progress and quality are inseparable.” Those are not just inspiring words on a gold plate. Every judge at AirVenture uses them as a guide star, searching for aircraft that are not only beautifully built but are also innovative, pushing the boundaries of design and performance. Darryl Hudec, the man who was awarded the AirVenture 2023 Gold Lindy for his stunning and beautiful F1 Rocket, did not set out to win that award when he began construction in 2018. Looking at his impending retirement from a career as a Southwest Airlines 737 captain, Darryl concluded that…

THE FOCUS IN my previous article came to a screeching halt with the tire/wheel/brake assembly progress as I decided to use 29-inch Desser tires that were backordered. It was also decided that the best way to mount the Beringer axles to the Zenith main gear is to swap the predrilled main gear for an undrilled gear so I can make it match the Beringer bolt pattern. Sometime in the near future, I plan to make a trip to the Zenith factory to swap the main gear and pick up some customized parts along the way. While waiting on several other manufacturers for quite a few pieces of this elaborate puzzle—things like suspension parts, axle parts, hardware and even tires—I have been keeping myself involved with the build by tackling other…

THIS MONTH’S HOME SHOP project is a bead breaker for separating stubborn tires from rims. Here’s the backstory: It was a routine 10-minute flight to fill up with gas for the weekend. (My airpark community does not have fuel facilities.) I taxied to the self-serve pump and shut down behind a local gassing up a beautiful vintage Cessna. A few minutes later he took off and I pushed my Jabiru into position. Moving a Jabiru around on flat ground is easy. You push the tail boom down to wheelie the nose gear and you can steer it around on the mains into almost any position. After filling up, I pushed the Jabiru away from the pump and hit the portapotty. In the 20 minutes or so between shutting down, fueling…

STARTED IN 1997 by Eric Whyte and Erik Anderson, the AirVenture Cup offers its own twist on the traditional point-to-point air race. Namely, it is not run in a straight line, but in a series of straight legs forming a circle. This allows participants to end up where they started, reducing logistical headaches and easing the transition from AirVenture Cup on Sunday to hopping down to Oshkosh for AirVenture proper by Monday. Still, this is a cross-country race covering 430 miles, so something more reliable than thumbscrew power settings and the-world-ends-in-20-minutes fuel consumption are required. Lately, Sport pylon racers saw that simply pulling back the loud lever could make them good cross-country racers as well, so a majority of the faster Sport folks joined the already multi-class AirVenture Cup this…