Experimenter is a magazine created by EAA for people who build airplanes. We will report on amateur-built aircraft as well as ultralights and other light aircraft.
Issue link: http://experimenter.epubxp.com/i/142883
T h e H o m e b uil d e r s o f S C A L ED C o m p o s i t e s Read any aviation magazine, and sooner or later you'll come across a description of EAA AirVenture Oshkosh as "the mecca of homebuilt aviation," if not of aviation altogether. It's a hackneyed phrase, but for many, particularly those who keep the faith by making the hajj (pilgrimage) to Oshkosh at least once in their lives, it's not misplaced. That said, there's another spot to which the "mecca" sobriquet applies even more accurately. Like its Arabian namesake, it's a place where true believers dwell to follow their calling. Like its namesake, it was merely a little-known village until the arrival of a prophet; and, like its namesake, it can be reached only by those willing to cross an inhospitable desert. Burt Rutan's Catbird is now owned by Zach Reeder, a SCALED engineer from Texas, and Jim Reed, who hails originally from Kansas. The place in question is Mojave, California, a scruffy little town of some 4,000 hardy souls in the high desert a couple of hours north of Los Angeles. The prophet was, of course, Burt Rutan. He'd become familiar with the area while working as a flight test engineer at nearby Edwards Air Force Base (AFB). Nearly 40 years ago, after a stint in Kansas refining the flying qualities of the controversial BD-5 (which, whatever its other shortcomings, ended up with absolutely delightful handling), Burt decided to develop, test, and market a new homebuilt design of his own. Drawn by many of the same factors that led the Air Force to base their "right stuff" flight operations at nearby Edwards AFB, including wide open spaces, perennially good weather, and a dearth of other air traffic, Burt chose Mojave: an unassuming highway and railroad junction that offered the added attraction of a big World War II airbase on which shop and hangar space could be rented dirt cheap (with emphasis on "dirt"). As could housing in Mojave. Nick Sheryka's custom carbon panel for his Sonex Waiex. A radio-controlled aircraf fun fy at a morning break. L-R—Shalom Johnson, Cameron MacLachlan, Doug Hofman, Scott Schultz, Nick Sheryka, Stephen Polonchak, Michael Tribuno, Zach Reeder, and Brian Maisler. 22 Vol.2 No.7 / July 2013 Almost immediately, exciting new designs began to flow from what was then called the Rutan Aircraft Factory (RAF) in Building 13 at the Mojave Airport; and his new all-composite VariEze not only put RAF on the map but also gave the homebuilding movement as a whole the impetus that the BD-5 had promised but only partially realized. As with the real Mecca, it wasn't long until hopeful disciples—other aircraft homebuilders—made the pilgrimage across the desert. Soon an entire cottage industry had sprung up in Mojave. Mike and Sally Melvill, who'd already built a beautiful example of Burt's first (wooden) design, the VariViggen, came to work at RAF; down the ramp, Tom Jewett and Gene Sheehan, with Burt's blessing, spun off a two-place version of his tiny Quickie design. It wouldn't be too long until Burt's brother Dick, starting from a design sketched by Burt on a paper napkin from a Mojave café, would begin building the Voyager in which he and Jeana Yeager would fly, nonstop and unrefueled, around the world.