Category: General

So I had wanted to take one of the SportAir workshops prior to starting my project, but I was unable to make any of the local ones, and didn’t have the ability to travel for a weekend class.  Ended up getting the training kits from Vans and figured it out as best as I could.  I did make sure I stopped by the workshop area and visited with some experts at SunNFun to make sure I wasn’t too far off and walked away with an axle wrench project.  🙂

Today I got an e-mail that there are going to be a few workshops at Manassas Airport (KHEF) in early September.  Perfect!  While I would love to take the sheet metal class just to reassure myself, I honestly think my time (and money) would be better spent on the Composite class.  I did the 1 hour workshops at SunNFun, but looks like this will be much more detailed and helpful as I look at the fiberglass work in the near future.  Excited to learn more skills that I can use on my airplane and hope to make some new friends along the way!

So I’m totally behind on getting my videos edited, but still making lots of progress on the build.  (So much in fact that I think I’m working faster than my budget will allow).

Currently I have assembled and match drilled both elevators and have them disassembled for deburring.  Local weather is not allowing me to have long build sessions in the Garage due to high temps and high humidity, so I think for the next week it’s just going to be 10-15 min sessions at a time so I don’t overheat.  I really don’t have the desire to install an overpriced AC in my garage.

Looking ahead I have another tube of proseal on order and planning out what is needed to get my parts cleaned up, deburred, primed, and ready for dimpling / assembly.  Mostly trying to do all the proseal on the Elevators and Trim Tabs in one go.

I’m also looking ahead at the tail cone and storage of parts.  I’m quickly running out of wall and ceiling space, so trying to come up with solutions.  either by removing some of my overhead storage to make room for the tailcone, or making a crate to put the tailcone in to protect it if it’s going to live on the floor.   Also looking at budget to determine when I can order the wings to minimize “down time” waiting for them to be fabricated / delivered.  Still hoping to have them delivered in early January if possible.

Wow, what a week.  Got back yesterday from Sun N Fun and awaiting the delivery of my Empennage Kit.  First off I had a blast at Sun N Fun.  I ended up spending most of my time over in the Workshop area learning a whole bunch of new techniques (Not all of them pertain to my RV-10).  Really didn’t walk away thinking I was doing anything really wrong on my practice kit, but got some tips on how to maybe make some of my things better.  Also realized that even some of the small dings will disappear when painted.

Learned a lot at the Electrical workshops, even if I won’t apply a lot of those things for a while.

Vendors booths were kinda crazy!  Tons to see.  I really didn’t even know what questions to ask or which vendors I needed to talk to.  The parts booths were amazing.  I’m sure I’ll be bringing a a shopping list next year!

The only down-side was the e-mail I got this morning letting me know the RV-10 was flown back to Oregon after Sun N Fun so I will not be able to take a DEMO flight.  This is very disappointing as I didn’t even take the time to sit in it while at Sun N Fun since I was scheduled to fly it on Wed.  Oh well.  Life happens so this means I’ll just have to work on my Empennage on Wed instead!

Off to experience Sun N’ Fun. I’m excited to meet a bunch of rv builders as well as learning everything I can that may help my build. Also got the call from the shipping company. Delivery of my kit is scheduled for Monday. Looks like I’m going to have a very exciting 2 weeks of fun.  Hopefully my wife doesn’t leave me!  

Decided to post an intro on the VAF site and already have a lot of feedback. Besides my cousin, also have a few other A&Ps that are interested in coming over. Can’t beat that!  Even had my post make it to the front page (even with a small autocorrect error. Oh well). 

Hopefully I have everything I need to get through the first half of the empennage kit and will do my best to take lots of photos. Debating doing the whole YouTube thing like Jason Ellis, or just a time lapse.   I may give YouTube a shot but sure I’ll feel like a fool doing it.