Recent content by crusty old aviator

1:3 is the most efficient ratio in fluid dynamics (unless you throw in the psi principle, fibonacci, etc., but that’s for Jay at Pax Scientific to explain). That’s why the Questair and the Strojnik and Kolb designs are so efficient. Watch Mike Arnold’s video, Why it Goes so Fast, on youtube...

...or you could use titanium tube.

60”, or 152 cm. Butts are getting bigger and people with fast food addictions, thyroid disorders, and type II diabetes shouldn’t be discriminated against. Employing the old 1 to 3 ratio of fluid dynamics, a 5’ wide ride will be 15‘, or 4.6m long. Need a longer fuselage? Widen it out to 6’...

There’s a Canadian homebuilt amphib that was designed and built in the 60’s, IIRC, called the Blue Teal. She was listed in Janes. Ken Gamble, in Ontario, owned her for several years before someone noticed her and agreed to his price, some time in the early 80’s. She was similar to the Taylor...

The film of the Spectra was shot on the Indian River, off Merritt Island, in the same location where an even better amphibian, the Airshark, would be test flown less than two decades later...another wicked cool amphib that should have had many more examples built.

Ol’ Vern sure moved around a lot: he was either way ahead of his time...or local creditors.

A friend of mine, still kicking at 97, had a full set of Taylorbird plans that he asked me to sell for him in the summer of 18: they sold wicked fast on Barnstormers, so maybe we’ll be seeing another one at the fly-ins... This same friend, who was a Ham-Std engineer and had owned a succession of...

No, that’s a pretty reasonable price for durable vinyl. There’s some goomer on eBay asking $85 for one!

Have you checked with EAA HQ’s librarian in Oshkosh? They have a pretty good plans library. At the very least, they could take photos of the plan sheets and email them to you.

Be careful with reducing your tube OD! 1/2” is pretty small unless it’s sliding through a roller fairlead every 2’, like in many Euro gliders. Use 2024-T3: it’s much stiffer (and more expensive) than 6061-T6, and you’ll want to paint the outside and ACF-50 the inside, as 2024 is also less...

I get my vinyl prop decals from Monte Chase at Notplanejane.com. They’re pretty good and don’t cost a wing and a main...

George Ritz’s geodetic low wing could be built for under $2K, if you can find drawings for it, and a HF 22hp Vtwin could push it around.

Did it stop due to lack of sales, or the pandemic?

I was interviewing for an engineering job at an aerospace outfit with the goomer who would have been my boss. When I mentioned that I had my A&P, he just dismissed it, saying there was no relevance. I stood up, told him that my life was too short to waste any of it working for such a...

One of the first things they told us at A&P school, in 1980, was that the US Dept of Labor classified A&P’s as “semi-skilled labor.” That’s a pencil-necked bureaucrat for you: doesn’t understand what he’s evaluating, so he puts it in the middle of the pack and moves on to the next baffling job...