FEATURED STORY

Getting out of the rut Sometimes it's difficult to get "reconnected" to your RV project, once you get disconnected. It happens to a lot of people, most recently to Lorin Dueck (not shown above, by the way) who posted on Rivetbangers.com this week, " I spent most of the summer with my 13 year old son - who I only get see for a few months each year. Now that he's back with his mom (on the other coast) - I'm having a hard time adjusting.... I hear my wings calling ... and the engine is mocking me..." The answer to these things can usually be found in the wisdom of Tony Bingelis, "an airplane project is not perishable; it will not spoil." But here's a message to EAA chapters. Sure, flying Young Eagles is important, but your roots are in homebuilding. So why not put more effort into builder motivation flights, because -- as this thread points out -- it's a sure cure.

Never to old to build a plane
Phil Rogerson turned 70 on Thursday and suffers from chronic lymphocytic leukemia, currently in remission, and had extensive surgery for melanoma in 2005. He takes radiation treatments, and must go periodically to Tampa for further testing and monitoring. He also just finished building an airplane His first one was a 6A. (Fernandina Beach News Leader)

Profile: Ray Chaplin
In South Carolina, three RVs were born in Ray Chaplin's 25 x 50 foot workshop -- an RV-6A, an RV-8, and an RV-7A. (Chapter 242 newsletter archive)

"A canopy kit with an airplane thrown in"
Canopy, canopy canopy. Sometimes it feels like it's all you're building, right? For slider builders, Dan Baier has some detailed tips and deviations that might help. (RV Builders on Yahoo)
Related links:
Canopy (Phil's RV-7 project)
Canopy (Vincesrocket.com)

Shield termination techniques
Bob Nuckolls of AeroElectric Connection takes you ""through the mechanics installing and daisy chaining multiple shield pigtails together. (AeroElectric archives)

The 51% rule update
With mounting concern that some builders-for-hire and commercial providers are performing too much of the aircraft-building tasks when assisting clients, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) on September 6 assembled the first meeting of the Amateur-Built Aviation Rulemaking Committee. Van is on the committee. (EAA)
Related links:
51% rule saga continues (RV-10 List thread)

RV-12 to get glass panel
Van's Web site has posted the latest report on the progress of the RV-12, the model that will fly under the light-sport category (LSA). "This is far more avionic/instrument power than our other demonstrators have. In fact, the RV-12 will be our only airplane with an attitude instrument," Ken Scott said. (More)

OTHER NEWS

Builder motivation video
OK, how'd he get those shots under the fuselage?
Related video:
Basement extraction
RV first flight

GA accident rate up
Aviation fatalities from all sectors dropped a bit last year, according to preliminary figures released this week by the NTSB, while GA deaths were up slightly. (AvWeb)

Weather to go
Mostly deals with convective activity and pleads for more PIREPS. (FAA Aviation News)
Related link:
Wings course: Thunderstorms and ATC.

Van's donates tail kit
Land of Enchantment raffle grows by leaps and bounds. (LOE)

Near miss
A Minnesota pilot has a close encounter with a glider after he took his eyes off a scan for only a second. Non-RV. (EAA Chapter 25 newsletter)

WD-415 weldment alert
RV-10 builders: check the trim cable attach brackets. (Multiple)

Reno Air Races
An RVer provides text and images. (VAF)

Mike & Linda Lewis fly Young Eagles
RVers have flown over 300 kids (EAA 227 newsletter)

FLYING STORIES As we continued along, it got a little darker, and the forward viz dropped a bit, but the side vis was still good. As we passed Aberdeen, SD, we got into an area that was a real dark grey. I decided to give it 30 seconds to improve, as it had in other areas, where we just had to get around a cloud and things would be better. Instead of getting better, we got some good rain coming down. . Tim Olson, MYRV10.com

Wrestlemania!

I wasn't looking forward to this part. Namely trying to the get the ribs clecoed to the tank skin. Doing the leading edge skin to the ribs was pretty tough, but it looks like the tank skin is even thicker than the leading edge skin, which will make it more difficult to work with. I figured that the most critical clecos to get in first would the first ones on each side of the skin at the forward most position. So I decided to bring the mountain to Mohammad and used Aircraft Adhesive (duct tape) to bring the skins down to where I could easily put in the first cleco in the ribs on each side. In this picture, I put the first row of clecos in on the top side of the tank skin. (Smitty on Smitty's RV-9A has a step-by-step guide)

ARCHIVES See a list of previous RV Builder Hotlines organized by date and subject. (Go)

PICTURE OF THE WEEK You build a bunch of components at different times and eventually you put them together and hope they fit. Is there anything more gratifying when mounting the tail than seeing the laser light split every tooling hole on the F-712 bulkhead, split the bearing between control horns and bisect every tooling hole on every bulkhead all the way forward?