Ted's plane and 'the voice'

RV-building acquaintance Ted Chang had his first flight last week in the RV-10 he built.



Today, Ted reported on Facebook, he had an in-flight fire, four miles from the airport and had to make an emergency landing.

It's a testament to Ted's flying ability that he was able to land safety. But as a builder it sure gives me pause. Am I up to responding to a similar emergency? Am I building properly? Is that fuel line too close to something?

There's still a long way to go before my plane is finished, but there is a creeping doubt that is making its voice heard.

Roadblock

The baffle project is like driving in traffic: Stop and go. After about 70 hours of work, it gets pretty tedious.

But the baffle work is primarily done on N614EF and over the weekend I cut the oil cooler bracket out and fabricated all the strengthening mechanisms on the outside corner, which seems to be the area that cracks. It took many hours to get it just right, so I was excited on Sunday when I fit it all back onto the plane.

Rut-ro...

As you can see the bottom nutplate is hitting the cooling fins on the cylinder. This is not good, and certainly not acceptable. Moving the cooler higher isn't an option because it'll impact the cowling and the engine mount tube.

I've made a lot of good progress on the plane lately, but this has stopped everything in its tracks while I figure out what to do. Griding some of the cooling fin away? No, I don't want to do that to a perfectly lovely engine.

Move the cooler? Maybe, although I don't think the firewall has a lot of options to it at the moment.

One idea I'll consider is maybe adding another spacer -- it'd have to be almost .250 I would think -- to the outside corner, cutting the flange of both the oil cooler baffle and the baffle it attaches to, rivet in some angle, rivet some .063 onto that and re-drill the connecting holes, effectively moving the oil cooler back 1/4", but I'm not sure that will do the trick on a vibrating engine. And, it's a major pain in the neck since it means ordering a bunch of new parts.

Building an airplane is fun.

Update 9:21 p.m. 4/18/11 - On the advice of both Mahlon Russell at Mattituck Teledyne and Ken Scott at Van's, I drill out the lower nutplate and covered the hole and will go with two bolts on the right side.

The Van's instructions with the baffle kit are very contradictory here, so I'll pass this along for people who haven't go this way before.

The main problem in this location is the pre-punched parts that come with the Van's baffle kit and the optional oil cooler doubler. The doubler is prepunched and has three holes for the bolts on the right side. OP-27, the drawing, shows only two.

There's also a brace that goes in the front of the oil cooler doubler/baffle area. This is also pre-punched and is supposed to match the pre-punched holes across the top of the oil cooler cutout doubler.

If you do as I did -- take Van's advice and wait to do the oil cooler brace until the baffling is done -- you'll likely end up in trouble, at least if you do the oil cooler cutout and drill for the doubler. You'll have to drill out the top row of doubler rivets because the brace's holes won't line up with them. The brace can only go in one way, but the location of the oil cooler could be any number of places.

So do the oil cooler cutout, match drill the oil cooler doubler with the exception of the top row of rivets, fit the brace, backdrill the five or six holes through the the brace, the baffle, and the cutout doubler.

You'll also want to leave the most-aft rivet hole unriveted on the horizontal angle/stiffener on the #4 cylinder baffle because if you rivet this, you'll find it hard to fit the brace for final drilling.

Also if you use a .125 angle to beef up the corner, you'll probably have to abandon one of the holes in the doubler since it will interfere with the angle.

It's still for sale

You've now got about 150 hours less work to do on N614EF as I've been working on it for the last six weeks in the spiffy, heated hangar. I'm stuck on the baffles at the moment but trying to work through it. The electrical is just about done (have to make up the mag P-lead and get cranking on the Grand Rapids EIS 4000 engine monitor. Still have wingtips to do. But it's nearing completion.

Why don't you buy it?

With friends like these...

For a time today, it was like American Chopper at Ami Sela's hangar, where N614EF is getting more attention than she's had in quite awhile.

(Left to right:) Brad Benson, Adam Youngman, Pete Howell, and Devin Pearcestopped by today to help. Pete made the large oil cooler fit around the engine mount and beefed up the aft baffle. Devin, who knows engines, solved the Lightspeed controller problem by fabricating a new bracket and moving the existing location forward one hole. Adam was able to get the prop extension off (which I need in order to put the prop on), and Brad fit the tail empennage fairing. I, meanwhile, took about 9 hours today to drill a stinking pass-through hole in the firewall (for the filtered air box emergency air cable). I really hate drilling stainless steel.

With today's accumulated hours, the project passed the 2,400 hour mark.

Moving day

Since the plane project went on sale, there hasn't been much interest, while there has been much interest in seeing it sold -- if it has to be -- as a flying airplane. So some RV friends stopped in a few weeks ago and said we should move it to a heated hangar, and it might be easier to get people to pitch in to get it flying.

So we found a heated hangar in the next row over at South St. Paul. Today was moving day...

That's my son, Patrick, doing the honors.

I'm in the process of coming up with a "to do" list. It's far from complete, but here's what I've got so far.

ELECTRICAL
 Order shielded 18 AWG
 Order insulator boots (3x small 2x large)
 Install left MAG switch
 Install right LIGHTSPEED switch
 Fabricate left mag P Lead from switch to mag
 Run 18 AWG wire from mag switch to ground tabs
 Run 16 AWG Alt. field wire and spliace to Vertical Power (wire coming from VP)
(Follow bottom upper motor mount turbe, between engine cylinders and intake tube)
 Install insulator boots as required
 Adjust alternator to proper belt torque and safety wire
 Double check to be sure you used a doubler at the engine ground nut plate on firewall.
 Mag switch off: Test for 0-10 Ohms between wire terminal and airframe
 Mag switch on: Test for infinite resistance
 Starter button activate: Hear start relay activate and +12 volts at end of DISCONNECTED starter cable.
 Lightspeed Install details to follow

GRAND RAPIDS EIS-4000 CONNECTIONS
 Check to make sure there’s no problem running probe wires in same penetration as P Lead
 Figure out how to tap into tach on Lightspeed or use tach drive on engine.
 Fuel pressure gauge line to firewall. Connect to EIS
 Oil pressure connection to firewall
WINGS

 Install left and right Whelen nav/strobe lights in tips
 Install tips
 Find and order close tolerance bolts for rear spar attach point (GATCO?)

FAIRINGS ETC.
 Order intersection fairing from Van’s
 Empennage fairing
 Gear leg fairing
 Main Wheelpants
 Nose gear intersection fairing
 Nose fairing
INTERIOR
 Install canopy and replace the stupid quick-release
 Fabricate guides on roll bar into holes L/R
 Install upper canopy lock/secure mechanism
 Install struts (All hardware already installed)
 Reinstall canopy forward limit stops
 Figure route for FAB emergency air cable and install to panel.
 Replace cheap plastic vents. Add screens to vent inflow.
PROP
 Remove prop extension.
 Install prop on prop extension (Mike Hilger might be able to help here)
 Install on engine.
 Check prop extension to crankshaft gap (within 1/16“).
 Torque prop bolts properly
 Safety wire prop bolts.
 Check for proper prop track
 Spinner assembly and installation

ENGINE COMPARTMENT
 Baffling
 Calculate route for servo-to-flow divider line, order or fabricate line.
 Order fire sleeve to install on oil pressure gauge line. Change Adel clamps accordingly.
 Figure out manifold pressure line install.
 Engine breather line.
 Install and secure heat ducting.
 Oil cooler install. (Current hoses may be too long)
 Fabricate tray on firewall for GPS antenna
 Purchase and install antenna firewall passthrough for GPS.

WHEELS AND BRAKES
 Safety wire calipers
 Install brake fluid and test
 Consider replacing nose gear axle “puck”
 Think about “jack points”

COWLING
 Oil door installation
 Install inlet ducts
 Glass around front corners for better fit
 Finish surface for painting.

Plane for sale

On a wall in the hangar of the RV-7A project, a dry-ink board indicates the number of hours I've worked on it so far -- 2,339 2,429 2,742. Another 30 or so hours, and the plane will probably fly.

I need you to put that 30 hours into it. N614EF -- the RV-7A project -- is for sale. I no longer have the means not only to finish building it, but to fly it when it's done. I'm hoping you do.

This has been a pay-as-you-go project with the exception of the engine, but I now need to pay down the debt on it, and sock some money away for anticipated medical bills that continue to increase in the family at a particularly alarming rate.

I put the kit up for sale years ago -- around the time I was working on the wings -- but I pressed on in the hope I could get it done, increase its value, and sell it as a flying airplane, getting my investment into it back. That no longer is an option.

This is what I call a "working man's" airplane. It's not a show plane by any stretch of the imagination. But I believe it's well built and its progress has certainly been well documented.



Here are the particulars on the plane, which is very much built to plans (update 10/14/11 - updated to reflect recent work):

RV-7A
- wings attached.
- Canopy completely finished but not presently attached.
Engine: Mattituck TMX IO-360 - vertical updraft (New: $24,000)
Configured for fixed-pitch prop by plumbed for constant speed ($2600)
Plane Power 60 amp internally regulated alternator
One mag, one Lighspeed electronic ignition. Wiring not done.
(Update 11/14 - First engine start here)

Instrument panel - VFR (About $10,000)
- Dynon D100
- Vertical Power VP-50
- Grand Rapids EIS 400 engine monitor
- ICOM A210 radio (antenna installed on belly)
- Garmin 327 transponder (antenna installed on belly)
- 406 mhZ ELT (antenna on top)
- TruTrak wing leveler - servo in right wing
- Backup altimeter and airspeed indicator installed and plumbed
Interior: Flightline interior seats and interior package (not yet installed)
-- Hooker Harness 5-point belts
Prop: New Sensenich fixed-pitch prop. Not yet mounted.
Vetterman exhaust
-- False floors with soundproofing

WHAT NEEDS TO BE DONE

- I've started installing the fuel lines but haven't finished.
- The engine monitor connections
- Oil lines
- I've started on the baffle kit but I'm only on page 4. Done.
- I have an oil cooler but I'm not sure it's compatible Oil cooler fit but not yet mounted.
- The cowling is fitted and drilled but I haven't done the oil door or done the cosmetic work. Pinholes filled. Ready for primer.
- The wing tips need to be installed. The wires for the Whelen strobes are already run and panel connections made.
- Wheel pants and leg fairings and empennage fairing not completed.
- Soundproofing of the firewall (I've made rough templates but all the conflicting information on VAF has made me wait)
- Filtered airbox mods and installation for vertical updraft (a blank .063 bracket is already cut, in order to move it slightly to the right)

There are no used parts anywhere on the airplane.

The plane is currently housed at KSGS -- Fleming Field Airport in South St. Paul.

I don't really have a set price at this time, though I'm thinking around $70,000.

Please, no tire kickers or people who want to look at it just because you think you might someday want to build an airplane. I don't have that kind of time to waste.

(Want to help me? Please print out this flyer and post at your FBO)

Update 12:34 p.m. Aug. 30 - It's official! My wife has lost her job and, yes, the plane is still for sale. I've actually put another 250 hours of work into it since this was posted, so my original estimate of how much was left to do was off by a few hundred hours. Now, there really is not much left to do and it's about ready for an engine start. The price is the same but once the engine starts, it jumps to $75,000 and once it's got an airworthiness certificate and its test period is flown off, it goes to $80,000.

Stuck in flyover country

I haven't posted much lately. It's winter in Minnesota. You have almost no chance of getting a good day to fly. My currency at the FBO expires on Sunday and while I have a plane reserved for tomorrow, it appears to be too crappy to fly.

It's too cold to work at the hangar. I'm too broke to make any progress on the plane.

I need motivation. This new video is a start. Just a start.

Fun with fuel lines

Some years ago, I wrote an essay on determining when "good enough" is good enough on your RV airplane-building project. In matters of firewall forward, however, it's very difficult for a novice airplane builder like me to know when good enough is good enough.

For the last week, I've been building a couple of fuel lines for the RV-7A and I thought things were going OK until I asked a question on Van's Air Force regarding firesleeves. That's when someone noticed that I'm using aluminum fittings.

We went back and forth and I learned that:

-1- Aluminum fittings shouldn't be used.
-2- Aluminum fittings can be used.

Then today came the question about the route my fuel line is taking. See, the problem is I'm building a nose-gear airplane and there are extra "tubes" on the engine mount for a nose gear plane. You people with tail draggers have it easy. See destination, route to destination.

I, on the other hand, have an additional maze to get through.

Anyway, once the aluminum fitting vs. steel fitting debate petered out without a declared victor, the route I took for the fuel line is faulty because my original plan to clamp it to an engine mount is faulty.

Perhaps it doesn't matter in the short term because once I put the firesleeve on, a lot of the slack I depended on to allow me to clamp it (a fuel line needs flexibility because the engine is going to be shaking) disappeared.

So regardless, I've got to build a new fuel line and, frankly, the money is used up and that pretty much kills progress until spring. God love ya, Christmas shopping season! Oh what the heck! It's too cold to be building airplanes anyway.

Here's a video that shows how things are:

Making your own fuel lines for your RV airplane

If you've not yet worked significantly on the firewall forward portion of your RV airplane project, let me warn you: fuel and oil lines are unbelievably expensive. I learned that lesson the hard way: Buying the stock fuel and oil lines based on Van's drawings.

There are too many engine combinations (mine is an IO-360 from Mattituck with vertical updraft) to make buying stock fuel lines worthwhile. Even if you could get them to fit on your engine, you'll likely be making some concessions to efficiency -- and maybe even safety -- to get them to fit.

It's possible, of course, to have your fuel and oil lines custom built, and certainly there are plenty of RVers out there with enough money to build their airplanes merely by writing checks. I am not one of those people, however, and I strongly believe in the basis for building your own airplane: recreation and education. I've learned so much from building my RV-7A so far, that I enjoy the challenge of understanding how things work.

(Read more on RV Builder's Hotline)

Test flight videos

It seems like an eternity ago, but it was only a few short years ago when the sight of an RV-related video online was the sort of thing to make me drop what I'm doing. There were few of them.

Now, they're everywhere and the thrill is mostly gone. They're not that great to begin with and seeing a shaky out-the-front-window view of an RV simply isn't enough to provide substantial builder motivation for me anymore.

There are exceptions, and this week Matt Dralle, who runs the RV List (still the best place to get good archived RV-building information, because the search engine actually works), has uploaded a couple of well-done videos from his RV-8 test flights.

Here's part one:



And here's part two:



Well done, indeed.

Does it motivate me? Sure, it does. The problem is it's 17 degrees out at the hangar this morning, and I'm in one of those stretches when every task runs into some roadblock.

I got a bunch of orders from Van's (baffle kit and hose-making kit) and Aircraft Spruce (hardware) the other day so I thought I'd finish up getting the starter cable secured around the engine as it makes its way to the firewall.

That ended when I realized I didn't have the right sized Adel clams (DG-5) to secure it to the aluminum prop oil line (I don't have a controllable prop, but I've got the system configured for one to preserve resale value). Last night I started creating "fake" fuel lines (using plastic tubing from Ace Hardware) only to realize that I need a straight fitting instead of a 90 degree fitting. I bought some steel fittings for the engine to connect the oil cooler hoses but when putting one in, I accidentally bashed the threads for the flared fitting nut on one. So now I have to order another 45-degree fitting.

I ended up taking a bathroom break and walking up to the terminal. Both bathrooms were out of toilet paper.

That's a sign to go home and watch football.

RVator's Log - December

Doug Weiler, who heads the RV builder's group in the Twin Cities, is a fine writer and does a great job of issuing the group's quarterly newsletter. It's been more than 10 years since I joined the group and, you know, there really aren't a lot of newsletters -- including EAA chapter newsletters -- that are so consistently published, let alone continuously published while maintaining high standards.

You can find it here.

How to build your own airplane

The RV airplane's baffling kit arrived in the mail yesterday, along with the fuel lines and tools I need to build my own fluid lines in the airplane. But it's 36 degrees out there and I don't have much heat in the hangar and I'm having a hard time getting motivated to work on the airplane.

If only I had a book to read in the meantime:

Running AOPA is a pretty good gig

I work for a non-profit whose president is regular skewered for making too much money, so I bring a different perspective to the question of reasonable compensation for a president of an advocacy organization.

That said, 14.5% pay increases for AOPA's top executives, including more than $1.8 million for the horrendous Phil Boyer, before he mercifully retired, is stretching the bounds.

AVWEB has the story, but unfortunately buried new president Craig Fuller's salary deep into the story. It's about $500,000, which is a lot of money, but is not unreasonable for a CEO.

Still, it will be worth popping some popcorn and watching the AOPA membership reaction, given that annual dues were just raised to $45.

The salaries of Washington are simply too incomprehensible for "normal" (that is, outside of the Beltway) people. Yesterday, for example, I found out the very excellent airport manager at South St. Paul airport (KSGS) has been laid off by the city council, in order to "save" $40,000.

I doubt the City Council considered what's involved in running a small airport, including managing fuel sales and keeping tenants happy, especially on a field that houses both Wipaire and Ballistic Recovery Systems. They're going to divide up his duties among three city departments, none of whom -- as far as I know -- knows anything about running an airport.

Yesterday, I heard some old-timers grousing about the move. A week ago they were grousing about government getting too big and needing to cut taxes.

I doubt they've made the connection yet.

The engine in earnest

I hung the engine on N614EF more than a year ago, but now that the cowling is -- mostly -- done (structurally speaking ), I'm trying to get going on serious work to get the engine all hooked up.

Yesterday I spent a ridiculous amount of time getting the ground strap from the engine case to the firewall hooked up. I wanted to make the power line from the contactors to the alternator but two things cropped up -- I can't find any of the paperwork (or wiring) for the alternator (which I put up last winter), and I've noticed some builder sites are running a #8 wire, and the instructions call for a #2. I'm going with the #2, but don't have the connectors for the wire. More ordering. More delay. More shipping.

So today I'm adding on some fittings for the oil case which will attach hoses to and from the oil cooler. And, of course, I ran into problems.

Here's one:

 

This calls for a straight fitting, but I have the right angle oil filter adapter on this IO-360 engine from Mattituck. What should I do here? A 45 degree fitting?

I also installed this 45 degree fitting on the other oil connection. But it's unclear how I "clock" it. Which way should it be pointing?

I also looked some more at the fuel line from the pump to the fuel servo. On a 7A, there's VERY little room to run the thing, especially with a vertical updraft engine. I need to figure out how close to the heat shield on an exhaust, the fuel line can come.

Start. Stop. Start. Stop.

Slowdown season

Building an airplane in flyover country, I imagine, is like the exchange rate for the dollar. I've put 2,315 hours into the project so far, which I started in July 2001. I'll bet 2,315 hours in other parts of the country are equivalent to half that.

Part of that is my refusal to adjust too much of the rest of my life to the demands of building -- lately my vice is season tickets to the Minnesota Timberwolves because I can hang out with my adult children, which beats airplanes any day -- but part of it is the reality of the seasons, especially in an unheated T-hangar.

From the moment the hangar door opens for the first time in April (usually), an airplane builder in the north hears the clock ticking. Winter is coming and there's lots to get done before it does.

I was fortunate this year that it stayed warm fairly late into the year, so I was able to get most of the structural work and some fiberglassing accomplished on the cowling.

But this morning it's 28 degrees and my building list includes things like "pack up all the paint, epoxy, and fluids and move them back to the warmth of the house," lest they be destroyed by freezing.

My hangar has a bit of a problem with flooding, because of the way the city graded the ramp. In the winter, the melting snow on the roof ends up flowing back into the hangar and then freezing. Fortunately, we have the American Reinvestment Act doing its good deed. Because of the "stimulus," there are road-construction signs everywhere, each weighted down with sandbags.

So I liberated a couple from the clutches of big government the other day and put them along the bottom of the hangar door. Sadly, this mean that I can't open the hangar door until next spring.

For the first time in months, I sat in the hangar (I stop on the way home from work each day) and wondered "what can I do?" There was nothing to do because I'm now transitioning to engine plumbing and orders from Van's and B&C hadn't arrived yet, and I also haven't ordered the things I need to start making the various hoses I need to make. This is the transition period when one switches from "airplane building stuff that you should do in the warm weather," to "airplane stuff you can do in cold weather" mode.

I also failed -- again -- to pick up 5 gallons of diesel that powers the kerosene heater. A builder's workshop needs to be comfortable, especially when it's mostly metal and cement.

Eventually, I'll get back on an even schedule and a good list of things that can be done when it's cold at the hangar, but this usually takes a few weeks of re-evaluating where I am in the project.

So here I sit in the warmth of Casa Collins, pouring over increasingly frayed airplane plans, coming up with that list.

This weekend I hope to attack the project again. But first I have to get the snowblower ready.