I learned to fly way back in 1972, first soloing on May 3, 1971 at the Neodesha Municiple Airport in Kansas. I flew a Cessna 150 owned by a local doctor, later gaining my Private License on August 24, 1972. After that, I got checked out in a C-172. One of my memories is taking my Grandmother for her first airplane ride ever! My flying came to a temporary end in May 1973, when I went off to college, after having built up about 100 hours of flying time. Not until the spring of 1978 just prior to graduation did I start flying again, but I had a wonderful re-introduction to cross-counrty flight when I and two male buddies flew a C-172 from Lawrence, Kansas to Santa Monica, California and back.
I went to work with the Boeing Company in Wichita, the airplane capital of the world, and I joined their newly formed flying club. I was elected Safety Officer and, the year I left, was serving as Vice President. I got checked out in their C-152 and C-172, and over the next three years, added about 80 more hours of flying time to my logbook. I was just about to start training for my instrument rating - I had hoped to eventually become a certified flight instructor - when I decided to move to Florida for a job change. Sadly, my last flight as pilot-in-command was on May 23, 1981 in Wichita. Hard to belive that 25 years have gone by. When and how did THAT happen?! I sorely miss the thrill of powered flight, but if I am going to start building my own airplane, my dry spell will be nearing the end soon!
When I first got bitten by the bug to build an airplane, I was a kid. I read about the Thorp T-18 and Fly Baby, and I just knew that someday I was going to not only build my own airplane, I was going to design my own airplane, too. Well, age does tend to temper dreams with reality, and though I am an engineer, I do not at all feel comfortable performing an aircraft stress analysis. I know just enough about aerodynamics to get me killed! So, given my love of woodworking, and a fairly well equipped wood working shop, it seems only a natural for me to build a wooded aircraft. I know, many of you might say that wood aircraft are outdated, and that fiberglass, or at least aluminum, is the way to go. I understand that. Indeed, when I first start getting serious about choosing a design a few years back, I was drawn to the Cozy Mark IV, a scratch built fiberglass 4 seater. It had really good performance and was relatively inexpensive to build, but the thought of working with gallons and gallons of epoxy resins and rolls and rolls of fiberglass cloth just didn't appeal to me. I also considered the venerable T-18 that was the object of my childhood fantasies and the very practical Van's series of planes, but I really didn't want to face bucking thousands of rivits.
So, I narrowed my choices down to wooden aircraft. There is not a whole lot of two seaters to chose from, and even fewer 4 seaters, if there indeed are any. I did find a couple that might seat 3, with the third being a child, notably the Falconar F-12A. I liked this design as it was simple, strong and had good flying qualities for a simple private pilot like me. I even ordered a set of plans. I was even getting ready to start building it, when the wife, who I had not yet exactly given her blessing for me to proceed, said it was ok, if that was what I really wanted to do. She asked "Is that the plane you really want to build?" Well, uh. I muttered something like "this is a plane that is easy to build and I probably won't end up killing myself in it but......(and I got on the computer and showed her the Falco).....this is the plane I would really love to build." She said "Outstanding. Go for it." Well, ok, why not? Sure the Falco has higher performance than anything I have ever personally flown, but it is not THAT much harder to fly and people have indeed learned to fly in a Falco. And, the grace and beauty of the Falco, well, simply stirs the soul. It will be more expensive to build, but I am doing this over what will probably turn out to be a 10 year period, so why not? The Falco plans are being sold by Sequoia Aircraft Corporation. Their web site is at http://www.seqair.com/. Check it out! They also sell component kits to help speed the construction, but I plan on do as much as the building as I can on my own.
But, on October 26, 2006, I sent in my check to get the plans. I presume it will take a bit under 2 weeks to get them. The day before, I had ordered some Sitka spruce lumber from The Public Lumber company. They had some excellent prices for rough-saw spruce, which is the type of wood most aircraft are made of. It was about a third the price of fully surfaced aircraft-grade spruce I could find elsewhere. I didn't know what the quality of the wood would be, so my order was small, for two pieces of 1" by 8" by 5' lumber. If it turned out to not be aircraft quality, then I figured I could use it for cap strips, or it wasn't fit for even that, bird houses. Well, the wood arrived on Monday via UPS ground and this wood is excellent! It far exceeds the Military standard for certified wood, so I feel that I must honer the memory of this tree by building out of it a wonderful airplane.
Anyway, as time goes by, I hope to post updates and pictures of my progress, and to include links that I have found useful myself in contemplated the building of an airplane.
Let the journey begin!
An excellent web site for homebuilt aircraft in general is the Homebuilt Homepage . It is an index and reference on Homebuilt Experimental class aircraft and related information.
If you want to know nearly anything about aircraft engines , here is a great site put together by, I believe, Greg Travis.