2008 Archived Updates

January 7, 2008

We will provide a detailed report of flight test results some time when we aren't up to our eyeballs with work.  For now we are very pleased to report that preliminary results are excellent.

February 5, 2008

This is a follow up to the short post in January.

The testing breaks down into three categories of results:  Things that are just fine, things that need fixing and things that need tweaking.  Tweaking is just stuff that needs to be adjusted.

The list of tweaks is mercifully short and includes such items as the need to change a breather tube that got kinked, etc.  The list of things that need fixing is even shorter at one item.  As is typical in pushers and as most of us predicted we didn't get enough engine cooling in flight.  This is backward from what often happens which is that a pusher will cool in flight but gets hot on the ground.  We spent quite a while on ground cooling and had that nailed down, but of course our opportunities to test in-flight conditions have been in short supply.

Thankfully many smart people have been down this road before and we are able to phone them up and ask questions.  The Jabiru folks have been very helpful and the support from our engineers has been excellent.  We threw away everything from the 1st generation cooling setup and we are installing a plenum system.  For those you who have seen the cooling on a Velocity, this is quite similar.  We will let you know how it goes.

Some folks have asked why we aren't upset about the cooling hassle.  The answer is simple: compared to what COULD have been wrong with the plane, a very common and predictable cooling problem barely shows up on our emotional radar.  A good friend of ours has spent a couple of years and lots of money trying to chase down an abnormal stall situation on his prototype.  He has gone through 50-plus design tweaks and hundreds of hours of analysis.  And he's still not sure what the problem is.  Compared to that, we'll take the cooling hassle any time.

The absolute black-of-night boogey man nightmare for any small project like ours is to have an OML problem.  OML stands for Outer Mold Line and is in essence the outer shape of the fuselage, tail and wings.  Once your molds are made OML is carved in stone and the only way to change it is to make new molds from scratch, which would have been the end of our project.  This is why we paid to have the aero analysis done by Dave Lednicer at Analytical Methods.  If he says the aero is good, it's good.

But just because the computer says it will fly nicely doesn't mean we didn't make a mistake somewhere along the way, so when the big day came all we could think about was how does it feel?  And so when Len came back down and told us about the cooling, we didn't care.  All we wanted to know was about the feel . . . and it felt good.  Len's words were: "Field of view is obviously excellent.  Cockpit noise is surprisingly low.  No chatter or whistling.  Engine noise is low.  Stability is very good.  The controls felt good, it's a pleasure to fly."  Honestly, we almost fell over when he said this.  A few of us may have gotten a little choked up.

We should have the new cooling setup ready for a new round of taxi testing in another week or so.  Mostly we're just making fiberglass ducting right now, which one can only do so fast.  In the mean time folks report that they like the photos so here are a few more just to tide you over.

July 20, 2008

Wow, when we go a long time between updates, we go a LONG time!  But the reasons are mostly positive--we've been flying the plane quite bit and making very good progress moving through flight test.

Everyone who has flown the plane likes it a lot.  It handles well and is very stable.  As we have progressed through flight test we have been making minor modifications to various systems with the goals of improving the ease of construction as well as simply implementing better ideas as they occur to us.

Most of these mods aren't visible and are somewhat boring (an entire post about venting the fuel sump would not keep anyone on the edge of their seat).

We have found time to play with little unnecessary things like putting a video camera in the cockpit (click here to see the first super-crappy video).  We have since moved the camera mount to avoid the obstruction--back seater's head--but we haven't had the camera back in the cockpit since then.  It's been mounted on the tail to record in-flight tuft testing.

Another thing that has occupied our attention lately has been the proposed change to the FAA 'major portion' rule, otherwise known as the 51% rule.

For those who are not aware, the FAA has been reviewing the 51% rule for some time.  The reasons for this are simple: 1) the rule was somewhat unclear on several items and needed clarification and 2) there were folks out there who were obeying the letter of the rule but definitely violating the spirit and intent of the rule.

It is the second situation that has produced a potentially catastrophic result.  Because of a few bad actors, the FAA has proposed rewrites of large parts of the rule in what amounts to a ban on certain types of airplane kits.  Like ours.  Specifically, the proposed new rule specifies that the builder must fabricate at least 20% of the airplane from "raw stock" which they helpfully identify as things like "lengths of wood or tubing."  Here is the exact text from  the proposed rule:

"An aircraft assembled from a kit composed entirely of completely finished prefabricated components, parts, and precut/predrilled materials is not eligible for an experimental amateur-built airworthiness certificate.

(3) The major portion of a kit should be composed of raw stock, such as lengths of wood, tubing, extrusions, etc., which may have been cut to an approximate length. A certain quantity of prefabricated parts, such as heat-treated ribs, bulkheads, or complex parts made from sheet metal, fiberglass, composites, or polystyrene would also be acceptable, however—

(a) The kit must still meet the major portion requirement, and the applicant must show to the satisfaction of the FAA that the completion of the aircraft was not simply an assembly operation."

The problem here is that is exactly how most modern kits are made these days--assembly operations.  And until now, that's been just fine.  Not just our kit, but almost all kits on the market for the last 20 years.  Looking at Van's for example, all of their skins are precut and predrilled.  Their complex weldments are out of the box, etc.  Existing kits, again such as Van's, are grandfathered.  So all of the 'assembly operation' planes available now are acceptable, but if this new rule takes effect there won't be any new ones.

Why is the FAA proposing to set experimental aviation back 50 years, to the days of wood ribs and welded tube fuselages?  Again, a few bad actors abused the living bejeezus out of the existing rule.  That is not in dispute (well, the bad actors may dispute it, but we don't).  But here is where things break down: Rather than enforce the existing rule, the FAA decided a whole new rule was needed.

This is akin to saying "There were some people speeding on the highway last night, we should decrease the speed limit" whereas a logical response would be "There were some people speeding on the highway last night, we should ticket them to keep everyone else safe."  In other words; if they were breaking the old rules they will just break the new rules.  And in the mean time the rest of us pay.

What can be done?  Well, for starters the FAA has only given a 30 day comment period (the comment period is more usually 180 days or 90 days . . . 30 days is rare).  So if you want to influence this, you need to contact your federal-level politician to see if he or she can be sympathetic.  Click here for Senate and click here for House.  You can also comment directly to the FAA (click the link and BE 100% RESPECTFUL).  Also contact the EAA and let them know you are concerned.

Beyond all that drama  . . . see you at Oshkosh next week!  We're in the same place as usual--booth 406 in the North Display area.  Just a reminder, that is the display area just south of warbird parking and east of the the forums pavilions.

Stay safe.

September 2008

Back from post-Oshkosh vacation, and yes--we really needed it.  There are a number of things cooking at the moment--new wings, electrical system upgrade (going to dual bus) a new engine cowl and many other things.  Once we get some projects further along and have interesting photos we'll post them for you.  In the mean time, here are some random shots from Oshkosh 2008.

As always, a HUGE thank you to all of the folks who came by our booth to give us encouragement and say hello.  Working on a prototype airplane is not a very social activity, so it means a lot to us to finally come out into the world and find that folks are happy to see us.  A special thanks to the members of the Yahoo group that took the time to introduce themselves--it's nice to put faces to names.  If you aren't a member of the Yahoo group, you should be.

NOTE that we're using a new photo gallery feature.  It makes posting photos much easier on this end.  You do not have to close a photo to view the next one--when the gallery is open you can click on the RIGHT hand side of a photo to advance to the next, click on the LEFT to go back to a previous shot.

October 2008

How is this update a pseudo-update?  Because it is just a link to an interview Steve gave a few weeks ago.  And as an aside--the folks who subscribe to the Yahoo group got this update last week.  So if you don't subscribe to the Yahoo group, you might want to think about it.  The link to subscribe is on the Contacts page.

Here is the link to the interview: September newsletter interview