| June Meeting The next meeting will be held Wednesday, June 28th at 7:30 PM in McElmurry Hall.
The program for this month’s meeting was not available at press time. See you there.
From the Left Seat Well,
once again we have dodged another hurricane bullet. What is really
amazing is that as I am writing this, it is only the 14th day into the
new season. Don't worry though, this year, after living here most of my
adult life, I finally broke down and bought a generator. That should
ensure that we remain untouched. At least until it no longer works, in
which case you should move to Ohio. We
had a very nice RV fly-in at Airport Manatee on the 12th. Gene and his
new chapter did a great job. A few of chapter 180's members were also
present. Come up and support the new chapter if you get a chance. They
do the cookout the second Saturday of every month. We will make sure
that we schedule our cookouts on other dates. Now that the summer is
here, we are due to have one. I
have not been approached by anyone in the chapter who is interested in
our RV8 kit. If you might be, please get a hold of one of the officers
and make them aware of your interest. I have been contacted again by
the gentleman from the VNC chapter. I told him that our members have
first choice. Nothing new on the legal front. I will let you know as soon as I hear something. I
will not be here for the next meeting. Janet is dragging me away to
Alaska. Chip will fill in, and I am sure he will have an unbelievable
program. Please don't forget to support Young Eagles. Blaise Minutes of the May Meeting President Blaise Pierson opened the meeting at 7:32pm with the 'Pledge to the Flag'. 19 members and guests were present. Blaise
reported on the recent Mid-Atlantic Fly-in at Lumberton, NC. He was
very disappointed with the lack of participation from our members at
our chapter project of tie-down sales and rentals there. Blaise said
many possibilities are open to the chapter at future events such as
T-shirt sales, but more members must volunteer to help out. The
new EAA chapter at Airport Manatee is having a cookout June 10th, and
Blaise asked the chapter to show up and support the new group. An RV
group is having a meeting there as well. In September, the RV group has
a trip to Pensacola planned. On June 6th, a new departure pattern at SRQ takes effect. Efforts are still being made to
restore local control of airspace to the SRQ tower. The airport is in support of that effort. The
chapter decided to put Dave Bothe's RV-8 kit up for sale to chapter
members for 60 days. Rob Brooke and Blaise will provide photos and
details for the newsletter and chapter website. Jim
Ellis announced the completion of his RV-9A and thanked everyone who
helped on the project. He also thanked the chapter for the use of the
tools in the chapter Tool Library. He is hoping to make the first
flight soon.
There has been no news
on the dispute with Sun 'n Fun. A discussion among the group of possible outcomes followed that announcement.
Tool
Committee Report: Rob Brooke has completed an inventory of the tools.
Everything was accounted for with the exception of some small drill
bits. Additional items have appeared since the last inventory. He asked
for a meeting of the tool committee.
A break for refreshments brought by Vance Noles was followed by the 50/50 drawing.
Blaise closed the meeting at 8:52pm.
Respectfully submitted,
Rolf Bostrom, Secretary
David Bothe’s RV-8A Kit Rob Brooke As
all members of EAA Chapter 180 now know, David Bothe’s unfinished RV-8A
kit has been donated to the chapter. It has been decided to offer the
kit for sale for the benefit of the chapter but the right of first
refusal should go to the members of the chapter. This offering is made
via the chapter newsletter and will be kept open to chapter members
exclusively until September 1, 2006. Thereafter, if no members of the
chapter wish to purchase the kit, it will be offered for sale to the
public. Description:
The
kit is a Vans RV-8A (tricycle gear) Quick-build kit. It consists of the
entire set of airframe (fuselage, wings, empennage) kits and the
“finishing kit” which comprises the canopy, windshield, landing gear,
wingtips, wheel pants, gear leg fairings, cowling and spinner. Also
included is an engine mount for a Lycoming O-360. The cowling is set up
for a 180 HP, carbureted engine. In addition, communications and
transponder antennas are fitted. Except for a few engine instruments,
no instruments are included.
The
airframe is about 90% constructed and all parts required for completion
of the airframe are included. Also included is a purpose-built
“rotisserie” which is used to support the fuselage and permit it to be
rotated for ease of construction.
The
kit as received from the manufacturer is valued at $30,000, which
includes the value of the kit and the cost of shipping. In its present
almost-completed condition, the value is much higher. The airplane is
for sale at $30,000, FOB Sarasota-Bradenton Airport. If any of the
chapter members are interested in purchasing the kit, please contact
Blaise Pierson or any of the chapter
My Trip to
Airbus, Or, “Charging a Machinegun Nest with an Unloaded Rifle” Mike Weed Following is a little travelogue of my recent voyage to the Airbus facilities in Toulouse, France.
In the future, I shall always preface any reply to a question from the executive secretary with “why are you asking?”.
It
seems that Airbus and the equivalent of the NTSB in France were not
happy with the performance of our product on the new A380 aircraft.
After a month or so of trench warfare, someone had to rush the
machinegun nest. The folks up in mahogany-row put their heads together
and decided that a sales guy and a development engineer should do
nicely, the sales guy to ensure that the engineer didn’t talk too much,
and the engineer to ensure that the sales guy didn’t set the plane on
fire.
Apparently
the smarter engineers in the department have just not got around to
getting a passport. Since I had one, I was christened “expert since
10AM” and travel plans were made. Keep in mind that until the afternoon
they told me I was going, I had never touched or seen this piece of
equipment. I had a cram session of about four hours before being sent
off to see the angry customer. No worries! "You'll do fine!" (that’s
the unloaded rifle part).
Since
buying airline tickets four days before a flight gets you some great
rates, our tickets were only $6,478….each. My total expenses were
$8,786, and I didn’t buy a single meal. So, for about $20,000 plus two
guys salaries for 10 days, I installed one jumper wire and a resistor
(well actually, I conned an Airbus tech into doing it) and for some
reason everyone back here is telling me what a great job I did. Hey,
you should see what I can do for $100,000! (five resistors if my math
is correct.)
My
traveling companion, William the sales guy, is a South African who
shares a common interest in WWII aircraft, so we got along well. Plus,
he paid for all the meals. I also learned some new phrases like “we’re
stuffed” (meaning things are not good), and “bloody”. He also knows all
the ins and outs of international travel and airports and things like
how to parse your items for minimum customs hassle (I think I was the
“mule”). While separating out my test equipment and clothes into my
carry-on and checked bag in the blistering parking lot of SRQ, I got a
taste of things to come when I was descended upon by a great horde of
love bugs. The flight was from Sarasota to Atlanta, and then to Paris,
then to Toulouse, which is in the south of France. The company did
spring for first class and business class for the flights, so on the
eight-hour transatlantic flight we got the big seats. I felt bad for
the folks in cattle class, but not TOO bad.
At
customs in Paris, William declared our specially modified do-hicky that
we were carrying over for the new Airbus A380. The customs folks were
trying to figure out what to do and who to call and talking in strange
tongues. Since we had a plane to catch and they were in no hurry,
William started explaining that if we didn’t get to Toulouse, the A380
would not fly, as this was a very important piece and required for
flight. When he started saying that he was not going to be responsible
if it didn’t fly, implying that they would be, they suddenly decided
that they didn’t need anything more from us. (He didn’t mention that
the flight
would be around September). I was sitting over to the side and when I
opened up my briefcase, a love bug crawled out. My shoe slowly covered
the beast and dispatched it before William and I ended up in quarantine
for a month. As it turned out, more than one of the little lovelies
survived the journey and may well be on the way to spreading joy
throughout France. My little gift.
The
Airbus facilities sprawl over an airport about the size of Tampa Intl
and they are building new hangars to support production of the huge
A380 double-decker. A really big operation. We shuffled back and forth
testing in one lab and then analyzing in another, then modifying in
another with each lab being about a mile apart. I did get to sit in a
couple simulators, which made our French sales representative very
nervous (it’s a simulator for crying out loud!), but I didn’t get any
flight time in them. Later we were doing some testing in a brand new
ATR turboprop on the ramp and powered up the panel. I was in the pilots
seat and she REALLY got nervous when I punched the button and flipped
the switch to power down the systems. The ATR folks were very nice to
work with and seem to be happy to be getting new orders for their
planes. They almost went under after that little icing incident in
Illinois(?) and when fuel was cheap. They gave me a little tour of the
production line, but it was a bit quiet, as they had run out of wings.
Seems the supplier was giving production priority to Airbus. Sort of
takes the heat off of us, ya know? I said I might be able to whip some
up (they might look a lot like RV wings), but I guess another
department handles wings. I
was not allowed to take my camera inside the facilities, so all I can
offer is some stock photos and some outside shots. I did get to see the
“iron bird” for the A380 and the A320; stationary simulators for most
of the models; the avionics labs for most models and the A380, which is
where we spent most of our time; the acoustics lab and ventilation lab,
where they mock up and test various duct configurations to measure
noise levels etc. Very interesting stuff. There were three (amazingly
quiet) A380s flying test flights and a couple Belugas’ bringing in
parts as well as one An124. The hangars are huge. I was trying to find
out it they had a surplus store, but didn’t get anywhere with that. I
also jokingly tried to barter for the neat Thales standby EFIS system
for the A380, but lost a bit of interest when I saw the size of the
control unit. Plus, it was a 115 VAC, 400 Hz system. Drat! That won’t
work in an RV! The engineers I was working with were quite surprised to
find out I was building my own plane. We
were having so much “fun” we extended our stay two days. Unfortunately,
we were so busy we didn’t have time to get a tour of the Airbus
production line or do much “tourist” stuff. Being in the south of
France made Paris, Normandy, Bastogne and other WWII sites I would like
to see out of reach. P.S.
I swear I had nothing to do with the fuselage wiring and the A380
production delay that was announced days after our return. Really, I
swear! |