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/378679
EAA Experimenter 35 ends for us. My 90-year-old house always seemed to have a new demand every few weeks, and house projects are much like plane projects—they will take twice as much time and money as you expected. Early progress on the build was in fi ts and starts. One weekend I might get two or three steps done, or mostly done, but would leave out one or two things that I wasn't 100 per- cent sure of. Do I place the locknut on now, even though I'm pretty sure it will have to be removed for a later step? How can I be totally sure that the control cables are not rubbing against that bolt inside the main tube? What do I do if a rivet shaft didn't fully pop of ? I had no one to turn to for these basic questions. I joined EAA for a year when I fi rst became a pilot, but at that time, I remember scanning each monthly magazine thinking, I'm never gonna build a plane. None of this stuf is relevant to me. My membership lapsed before I ever understood all that EAA had to of er, and long before I bought this kit. So I muddled along, making what seemed and felt like very little progress. Thoughts began to creep in that I would never get this done, and this was going to be an expensive lesson in learning my limits. Friends who knew of my project would ask excitedly in the beginning about my progress. As time dragged on, and they could see the disappointment on my own face every time they made an inquiry, the questions became fewer and fewer. Then, in late 2005, a stroke of luck occurred. A pilot friend mentioned in passing that he thought EAA might be able to help, as he recalled it had some sort of program for builders. I looked into it immediately and was soon a member and con- nected with a technical counselor who lived about 30 miles away. He enthusiastically came out a few times to of er sugges- tions, guidance, and help. The biggest benefi t was the mental boost, as he convinced me that I was much farther along than I realized, and that I could absolutely fi nish this project. Right around that same time, Jim and I became friends. He had his private pilot certifi cate and wasn't necessarily thinking about building. He just loved all things aviation and was fi nally at a place in life where he could start to indulge that passion. He would often just drop by because he wanted to work on the kit, which of course spurred me to drop what- ever non-plane thing I was doing. With the help of Jim and a second tech counselor, we soon got to the stage of covering and painting. This process alone could have sucked up a few hundred hours, due to my lack of experience and my sometimes perfectionist tendencies. Soon it dawned on me that I had no need to build the prettiest Chi- nook +2 in the world. It just needed to be safe and airworthy. Jim and I did the best we could with covering and painting, but my plane will never win any awards. As this progress was being made, my life had taken a few more turns over the five years to this point. I left my teach- ing career to become a physician's assistant. During that training and the first year I was in practice, I had no time to consider anything related to plane building. As if this weren't enough of a time suck, I had convinced my wife (and myself ) of the need to move from Pennsylvania to Oregon. A cross-country move is a bit more complicated than a move across town, and again, plane work got bumped ever further down the list. The day after Memorial Day 2007, we loaded a 27-foot Penske truck with as much of our stuf as we could, but not before fi rst carefully placing the plane, with a wing lying along either side, secured and padded as best I could. I still have a twinge of guilt that I never got to give Jim any fl ights in the project with which he helped so much. After getting to our new home, the plane spent the fi rst year or so in a much larger two-car garage. Project depres- sion had set in, as I thought about the absurdity of having to truck an almost-completed airplane across the country. Now that the plane seemed to be at the "90 percent done, with just 90 percent remaining" phase, how would I ever fi nish it? I was in a new town with no aviation friends yet, and I wasn't even sure of what I needed to do to make this plane fl y. If I was lucky back east with meeting Jim and the EAA technical counselors, I hit the lottery with living in Corvallis, Oregon. We are just 22 nautical miles from Independence air- port where an incredibly active EAA chapter resides (Chap- ter 292). I was soon connected with Ernie, tech counselor and builder extraordinaire, and general all-around go-to man for everything from plane building to fabric work to beekeep- ing. Ernie had specifi c things he suggested I do (or redo, in some cases), and I had the wisdom to defer in all cases to his judgment and experience. The delays at this point were now due to my budding awareness that this homebuilt plane would soon be airwor- thy, and would therefore need to be fl ight tested. I had good stuf , but not the right stuf . There was no way I was going to test fl y this thing! Ernie, fortunately, had someone in mind. I don't think there is anything Robin couldn't do in a plane. If the wings fell of and the engine died, Robin would know exactly what angle to hold his hands out either window to get just enough lift to land the plane safely. On a beautiful September 2010 morning, after an aile- ron control cable fi asco that called into question my entire build (and a story for another day), Robin made the fi rst fl ight. With Ernie, my then-wife Julie, and I standing by on the ramp, we watched as this plane did exactly what a plane was supposed to do. I couldn't hold back the tears even if I wanted to. A few days later, I made my fi rst fl ight in 7048A. My wife and I split a few months later (nothing to do with the plane), which took some of the joy from the whole process as she was the one who fi rst encouraged me to become a pilot. Friends, careers, time zones, and marital status all changed over this tumultuous decade, but the one constant was this plane. With the help of all these people, and the EAA, I'm still fl ying and thinking about the next project.