On Sun, 22 Jan 2006 09:44:18 -0500, "Jean-Paul Roy"
wrote:

Corky, could you tell us how successfull you were with your Ford engine.

Curious

Jean-Paul

Successful in what sense? I got it running and was just beginning my
testing of the engine when I had a kind of revelation, and sold
everything, and all aviation related tools and building materials I'd
accumulated.

The only real reason I was building the airplane was so that my wife
and I could, upon retiring, tour the area and the US at our leasure.
But she just can't fly for long without experiencing lots of pain from
the lowered pressure on her ears. Not to mention her tendency towards
air sickness.

I was at a point where the next steps in the construction would have
been pretty expensive. I had to blast and paint the fuselage, wire it
and cover it. I then had to buy and install all the necessary
instruments and deal with the cooling system for the engine. Then I
had to paint the fabric. I figured that I still had another $5,000 to
$10,000 I could put into it before it was ready to fly. Plus, then
I'd need hangar $space and in$surance. All for an airplane I'd be
mostly flying by myself, to take me to various $100 hamburger
destinations, once in a while when the weather was nice.

It just didn't seem worth it, so I sold everything last summer.

The engine went to a builder of a Bearhawk, the fuselage/wings went to
an A&P from Florida, a guy who wanted something he felt was mostly
already constructed as he's 65. So everything went to a good home.

I can't stand not building something though so I'm back at it, but in
a different venue: I'm building a cedar strip canoe. My wife and I
got out on the Connecticut River last summer in a friends beater canoe
and she powerfully pulled her weight paddling all day. Her comment
was "I can do this," and "we could bring the dogs too". We have two
dogs who don't like being left alone.

Additionally, paddling canoes means you aren't burning fossile fuels
for your entertainment, although you do burn some getting to where you
put in.

Once that's built, I'm looking at building a smallish day sailer. So
in terms of building something, I'm having a good time.

I'm also turning to woodworking to work on the house. One of the big
pluses is that I get to buy new machines, heh heh.

Corky Scott