Building airplanes

September 14, 2015

Flight Report: The Phenom 300 Business Jet

Flight Report: Phenom 300 Business Jet The Phenom 300 Business Jet is Embraer’s latest production aircraft (Legacy 450 just passed certification and sales should begin soon), and has shown great success in both aircraft sales, and aircraft performance. Both the Phenom 100 and Phenom 300 are part 23, single pilot certified, jet aircraft. I am not…

February 12, 2013

Bob’s Wings

Bob’s Wings Saturday a contingent of friends and fellow builders descended upon Bob’s T-hangar to assist in the permanent installation of the wings on his beautiful RV-10. Although there were twice as many people as needed it was fun to see everyone together on a sunny, but cool day in early February. It only took…

January 8, 2013

I want to build another airplane

I want to build another airplane It seems like around this time each year I get the craving to build another airplane. It must have something to do with the long winters up here in Ohio. This affliction even affected me during the last winter of building my RV. In spite of the fact I…

January 2, 2013

Building my RV-8: the video

Building my RV-8: the video This is just a small sample of the thousands of photos taken during the construction of my RV-8 aircraft. I plan to write a series of posts regarding the milestones and notable encounters during the build. Check back for those. For now here’s the video set to music by Tommy…

December 16, 2012

RV-8 cockpit tour

RV-8 cockpit tour The video below is a basic cockpit tour of my RV-8. This airplane has an IO-360 200hp engine with inverted fuel/oil and a Hartzell constant-speed prop. It first flew August 13, 2011. It is equipped with an Advanced AFS3500EE EFIS, Garmin 696 moving map GPS, GNC-300XL IFR GPS/Comm, GTX 327 transponder, and…

December 12, 2012

Does building or restoring an aircraft make you smarter?

Does building or restoring an airplane make you smarter? For the sake of the argument lets consider “smarter” as a tangible enhancement in problem-solving skills. After building my RV-8 I pondered this very subjective question. Part of me felt like the almost 5 years of daily construction have translated into better logic and reasoning skills,…

November 2, 2012

What’s in a name?

Naming Contrary Mary How did my RV-8 come to be called ‘Contrary Mary’? Early in the construction of my RV-8 I needed to decide on a paint scheme. I wanted something that would pop, the traditional white base with some kind of accent strip(s) wasn’t going to cut it. Lots of RV-8 has pseudo-military paint schemes so…

September 29, 2012

The Fokker Triplane: My Secret Obsession

The Fokker Triplane: My Secret Obsession Ok I have a confession. I’m in love with another airplane besides my darling RV-8 and I’m not entirely sure what to do about it. It started innocently and impulsively. I was strolling through Kitplanes and came across a company selling plans for a full scale Fokker Triplane….thus my obsession began….