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bulding a kitplane maybe Van's RV9A --- a good idea ?????



 
 
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  #1  
Old September 3rd 03, 12:59 PM
Flightdeck
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default bulding a kitplane maybe Van's RV9A --- a good idea ?????

Chris,

I have helped build fiberglass, tube and fabric, wood and fiberglass, and
all aluminum kits and "plans built" aircraft. Regardless of the
construction method there is one thing that stands out about the process of
"home-building" and that is Commitment. Commitment, of course, means
emotional and mental dedication. However, it also means a financial and
time investment.

When it comes to designs that are "cross-country cruisers" there is a
financial advantage in building your own aircraft if you consider the
performance to expense ratio between the cost of the home-built and the cost
of a relatively new "factory" aircraft. If you are going to use the
aircraft for just hopping around a local area in search of the perfect $100
breakfast or lunch, then there are times when an investment in an older
factory produced aircraft might cost less than the investment in one of the
higher performance kits. The RV-9/9A with the least expensive engine still
out-performs a C-150/152, but may cost more to build than the purchase of an
older model 2-seater.

I have assisted with the construction of three of Van's designs. The first
was an RV-3 and that was before he was using CNC processes and most folks
were still building their own spars. At that time I could have given you a
list of "gripes." However, the RV-6A and the RV-8 kits I have been/am
involved with are amazing for the quality of the kit and the documentation.
Both of the latter aircraft were ordered as "fast-build" (a relative term)
kits and the things came out of the crates looking like airplanes already
and the cost differential between the basic kit and fast-build was minimal.
How minimal becomes more apparent as you start logging your actual building
hours.

Hours. If you are single, living alone, and don't need to hold down an
actual job, building the aircraft is strictly YOUR project. If you have
any vocational commitments or family commitments, then the project is
actually a group affair. Even if other members of your family don't get
involved in the actual construction process, their support (and an
understanding of our particular obsession) is necessary if the process is
going to be a "happy" experience.

Maybe you are naturally a very "balanced" person, however most of the folks
I know really immersed themselves in the project for the first few months
after receiving their kits. The folks who actually were able to "keep a
happy home", make steady progress without big gaps in activity, and finish
their kits in a reasonable time eventually figured out that it was a good
idea to "do a little bit each and every day" rather than try to maintain a
frantic pace at the expense of the rest of their lives.

Life can throw curves at you that can slow or stop progress on your
aircraft. In the worse case, you may have to sell what you have. In this
case, having one of the Van's design kits means that it is much easier to
sell (without a big financial loss) your project.

Even if you order a "fast build" kit there is still a ton of physical work
to do and a lot of time -and money- will be spent on obtaining all of the
"system" components. The engine and instrument panel/electronics can be
ordered so complete that they are almost "drop ins" . However, buying that
level of completeness can really put a serious pinch on your purse. If you
have the budget to do that - great - but many folks need to space out the
purchase of all of that stuff and that means planning and searching time.

It has been my personal experience that spending the money to buy everything
(including the "optional" stuff) on Van's tool list is a very good idea.

Building an aircraft can be so time consuming that you tend to trade current
PIC time for building time. Even though the RV-9/9A is designed to make the
transition from a light GA aircraft into something with a little (lots more
with a Lyc 360) performance improvement an easy process - make the time to
stay current.

Along the entire process, you will need to keep the people at the
Luftfahrt-Bundesamt happy.

I know that this didn't give you the "negatives" about the Van's designs you
asked for, but your final statement of "P.S. Maybe I only hope that somebody
prevent me from doing a homebuilt." indicated you were still uncommitted and
might benefit from some additional "gray hair" information.

If you go into a project like this with your eyes open and a strong
commitment, then flying an aircraft you have built with your own hands is an
incredibly satisfying experience.

Best of luck,

J

"Christoph Brehm" wrote in message
...
Hello all !

Since some month I studied literature and looking at websides (EAA, FAA,
Buildersides) about homebuilding a plane, a lot of information out there
an something hardly to understand if you are the first time in this
stuff. But at the end of that process I decided that building a plane
could be the right way to get a new plane with good performance low
maintenance cost and so on.

The next step was to decide which kit is the best for me, I think there
are more then 750 different kits on the market and it is not easy to
find the right one. After reading some good information about
decsion-making I started from the beginning and than I decided a
kitplane from Van's aircraft could be the right one for me.

Therefore in the last day's I spent a lot of time reading all
information about Van's aicraft I could get mostly from the internet and
from buildersides ( I also checked the NTSB for Information) because
here in europe you are not able to get magzines about kitplanes with
maybe some more objektive information.

There are a lot of very good RV buildersides with many pictures and text
about costs time and tipps. But after a while I wondered a bit because
there is nearly nothing bad to read about Van's aicraft kitplanes on
these sides. Everything is matching good, not really a problem with the
construction planes or manuals, seems always easy to build, fly always
with excelent performance and so on. All those sides are sponsored by
Van's ?? I can't belive that ?!!?

No information out there about people wo kicked the whole crap in a
corner, because nothing fit's at all, all parts are skew, not enough
information in the manual, to difficult to build for a non aircraft
mechanic ?!?!?

Don't missunderstand me ! from the information I have I like these
aircrafts from Van's and the way you have to build them, the material
and so on. But there must be something bad about them out there ?????

Is there anybody who could give me some objektive information maybe
about the RV9A or the Van's Kitplanes at all ?????

I would be very thankful about those information

kind regards and thanks a lot in advance

Chris

P.S. Maybe I only hope that somebody prevent me from doing a homebuilt
;-)



  #2  
Old September 3rd 03, 11:20 PM
Christoph Brehm
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default

Hello !

Many thanks for that absolute excellent and well-gounded statement !
Ithink this will help me more in decision making about homebuilding than all the
stuff I read before !

Again many thanks

kind regards

Chris


Flightdeck schrieb:

Chris,

I have helped build fiberglass, tube and fabric, wood and fiberglass, and
all aluminum kits and "plans built" aircraft. Regardless of the
construction method there is one thing that stands out about the process of
"home-building" and that is Commitment. Commitment, of course, means
emotional and mental dedication. However, it also means a financial and
time investment.

When it comes to designs that are "cross-country cruisers" there is a
financial advantage in building your own aircraft if you consider the
performance to expense ratio between the cost of the home-built and the cost
of a relatively new "factory" aircraft. If you are going to use the
aircraft for just hopping around a local area in search of the perfect $100
breakfast or lunch, then there are times when an investment in an older
factory produced aircraft might cost less than the investment in one of the
higher performance kits. The RV-9/9A with the least expensive engine still
out-performs a C-150/152, but may cost more to build than the purchase of an
older model 2-seater.

I have assisted with the construction of three of Van's designs. The first
was an RV-3 and that was before he was using CNC processes and most folks
were still building their own spars. At that time I could have given you a
list of "gripes." However, the RV-6A and the RV-8 kits I have been/am
involved with are amazing for the quality of the kit and the documentation.
Both of the latter aircraft were ordered as "fast-build" (a relative term)
kits and the things came out of the crates looking like airplanes already
and the cost differential between the basic kit and fast-build was minimal.
How minimal becomes more apparent as you start logging your actual building
hours.

Hours. If you are single, living alone, and don't need to hold down an
actual job, building the aircraft is strictly YOUR project. If you have
any vocational commitments or family commitments, then the project is
actually a group affair. Even if other members of your family don't get
involved in the actual construction process, their support (and an
understanding of our particular obsession) is necessary if the process is
going to be a "happy" experience.

Maybe you are naturally a very "balanced" person, however most of the folks
I know really immersed themselves in the project for the first few months
after receiving their kits. The folks who actually were able to "keep a
happy home", make steady progress without big gaps in activity, and finish
their kits in a reasonable time eventually figured out that it was a good
idea to "do a little bit each and every day" rather than try to maintain a
frantic pace at the expense of the rest of their lives.

Life can throw curves at you that can slow or stop progress on your
aircraft. In the worse case, you may have to sell what you have. In this
case, having one of the Van's design kits means that it is much easier to
sell (without a big financial loss) your project.

Even if you order a "fast build" kit there is still a ton of physical work
to do and a lot of time -and money- will be spent on obtaining all of the
"system" components. The engine and instrument panel/electronics can be
ordered so complete that they are almost "drop ins" . However, buying that
level of completeness can really put a serious pinch on your purse. If you
have the budget to do that - great - but many folks need to space out the
purchase of all of that stuff and that means planning and searching time.

It has been my personal experience that spending the money to buy everything
(including the "optional" stuff) on Van's tool list is a very good idea.

Building an aircraft can be so time consuming that you tend to trade current
PIC time for building time. Even though the RV-9/9A is designed to make the
transition from a light GA aircraft into something with a little (lots more
with a Lyc 360) performance improvement an easy process - make the time to
stay current.

Along the entire process, you will need to keep the people at the
Luftfahrt-Bundesamt happy.

I know that this didn't give you the "negatives" about the Van's designs you
asked for, but your final statement of "P.S. Maybe I only hope that somebody
prevent me from doing a homebuilt." indicated you were still uncommitted and
might benefit from some additional "gray hair" information.

If you go into a project like this with your eyes open and a strong
commitment, then flying an aircraft you have built with your own hands is an
incredibly satisfying experience.

Best of luck,

J

"Christoph Brehm" wrote in message
...
Hello all !

Since some month I studied literature and looking at websides (EAA, FAA,
Buildersides) about homebuilding a plane, a lot of information out there
an something hardly to understand if you are the first time in this
stuff. But at the end of that process I decided that building a plane
could be the right way to get a new plane with good performance low
maintenance cost and so on.

The next step was to decide which kit is the best for me, I think there
are more then 750 different kits on the market and it is not easy to
find the right one. After reading some good information about
decsion-making I started from the beginning and than I decided a
kitplane from Van's aircraft could be the right one for me.

Therefore in the last day's I spent a lot of time reading all
information about Van's aicraft I could get mostly from the internet and
from buildersides ( I also checked the NTSB for Information) because
here in europe you are not able to get magzines about kitplanes with
maybe some more objektive information.

There are a lot of very good RV buildersides with many pictures and text
about costs time and tipps. But after a while I wondered a bit because
there is nearly nothing bad to read about Van's aicraft kitplanes on
these sides. Everything is matching good, not really a problem with the
construction planes or manuals, seems always easy to build, fly always
with excelent performance and so on. All those sides are sponsored by
Van's ?? I can't belive that ?!!?

No information out there about people wo kicked the whole crap in a
corner, because nothing fit's at all, all parts are skew, not enough
information in the manual, to difficult to build for a non aircraft
mechanic ?!?!?

Don't missunderstand me ! from the information I have I like these
aircrafts from Van's and the way you have to build them, the material
and so on. But there must be something bad about them out there ?????

Is there anybody who could give me some objektive information maybe
about the RV9A or the Van's Kitplanes at all ?????

I would be very thankful about those information

kind regards and thanks a lot in advance

Chris

P.S. Maybe I only hope that somebody prevent me from doing a homebuilt
;-)


  #3  
Old September 7th 03, 12:19 AM
RAMBLER444
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default

Building your own aircraft is a great thing to do if you have the time and your
not in a big hurry to fly , as in my case I`ve gone through the same thing that
your doing and as of right now I`m still up in the air about it , the way
things keep going by the time I build a craft get engi9nes and all that stuff
on my budget , I can`t afford one but I m still looking and maybe I`ll find
what wi9ll fit me and my wallet but I`m also looking into buying a store bought
plane again it has to do with time and money that`s all the help I can be
because I`m still just a confussed as you ok but keep the faith see ya
Charlie
  #4  
Old September 7th 03, 06:08 AM
Del Rawlins
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default

On 06 Sep 2003 06:59 PM, Jerry Springer posted the following:


RAMBLER444 wrote:
Building your own aircraft is a great thing to do if you have the
time and your not in a big hurry to fly , as in my case I`ve gone
through the same thing that your doing and as of right now I`m still
up in the air about it , the way things keep going by the time I
build a craft get engi9nes and all that stuff on my budget , I can`t
afford one but I m still looking and maybe I`ll find what wi9ll fit
me and my wallet but I`m also looking into buying a store bought
plane again it has to do with time and money that`s all the help I
can be because I`m still just a confussed as you ok but keep the
faith see ya Charlie



If I had waited to have everything perfect and all the ducks lined up
in a row before starting to build my RV-6 I would have never started
it or even finished it. If you want to build an airplane you well
figure it out, but there is never a right time to start building. The
one good thing about some of the popular kits is the fact that you
can buy them a kit at a time and spread the financial part of it out.


The time to start building an airplane is right now. I started mine
knowing full well that there would be interruptions, but I'm that much
farther along than I would be if I had waited. Since I am building from
plans, I didn't have a lot of parts to store, just a few boxes of wing
ribs and some steel parts. My total materials investment so far is
probably way less than $1000. One nice thing is that during the period
when I couldn't build, kits for the Bearhawk became available, so I can
accelerate the project rapidly should I feel the need. I probably won't
since I am having a lot of fun scratch building.

----------------------------------------------------
Del Rawlins-
Remove _kills_spammers_ to reply via email.
Unofficial Bearhawk FAQ website:
http://www.rawlinsbrothers.org/bhfaq/
  #5  
Old September 7th 03, 05:18 PM
RobertR237
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default

In article et, Jerry
Springer writes:


If I had waited to have everything perfect and all the ducks lined up in
a row before starting to build my RV-6 I would have never started it or
even finished it. If you want to build an airplane you well figure it
out, but there is never a right time to start building. The one good
thing about some of the popular kits is the fact that you can buy them a
kit at a time and spread the financial part of it out.

Jerry
First flight on my RV-6 July 14,1989



Sort of like having kids, if you wait until you can afford them it will be too
late and you will be over the hill. Building is a big, long term project so
get started and for the most part, finance as you go.

Bob Reed
www.kisbuild.r-a-reed-assoc.com (KIS Builders Site)
KIS Cruiser in progress...Slow but steady progress....

"Ladies and Gentlemen, take my advice,
pull down your pants and Slide on the Ice!"
(M.A.S.H. Sidney Freedman)

  #7  
Old September 8th 03, 04:41 AM
RobertR237
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default

In article ,
(Snowbird) writes:


Sort of like having kids, if you wait until you can afford
them it will be too late and you will be over the hill.


Oh, hush

Sydney (OTH parent of 3 yo)



Gee, did I hit a nerve?

Believe, it is the voice of experience and the reason I only have one child,
although I tell everybody that I stopped with one because the first one was
perfect and I didn't want to spoil my record.


Bob Reed
www.kisbuild.r-a-reed-assoc.com (KIS Builders Site)
KIS Cruiser in progress...Slow but steady progress....

"Ladies and Gentlemen, take my advice,
pull down your pants and Slide on the Ice!"
(M.A.S.H. Sidney Freedman)

  #8  
Old September 9th 03, 06:08 AM
Snowbird
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default

osite (RobertR237) wrote in message ...
In article ,
(Snowbird) writes:

Sort of like having kids, if you wait until you can afford
them it will be too late and you will be over the hill.


Oh, hush
Sydney (OTH parent of 3 yo)


Gee, did I hit a nerve?


No, kinda the contrary. We waited to have a child until we
felt comfortable financially, and I *am* the lucky parent of
a wonderful child. It was *not* too late, that's the point.

Yes, we could have had trouble we might not have had when we
were younger, and yes, it was harder on me physically than it
would have been when I was younger.

OTOH, younger parents who are struggling financially and/or
trying to grow up emotionally and work things out with a spouse,
have different troubles and they're not necessarily pretty either.

Robert, I take your essential point to be something like,
"if it's something you really really want, plane...kid...
whatever...there will never be a Perfect Time so just
consider your priorities carefully and if that's what you
really want, Go For It." And if I've distilled it correctly,
I pretty much agree.

But I really dislike hearing "if you don't do it now, it
will be too late", because IME one way and another it's
usually not true. So if it's honestly NOT a top priority
for one or another reason, I think it's important to say:
DON'T rush into it...plane...kid. Because chances are good
when it's the right time for YOU, and your other ducks are
more or less in a row, it can still happen.

Sydney (born moderate -- can usually get both sides of an
argument mad at me)
  #9  
Old September 9th 03, 06:45 AM
Jerry Springer
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default



Snowbird wrote:
osite (RobertR237) wrote in message ...

In article ,
(Snowbird) writes:



Sort of like having kids, if you wait until you can afford
them it will be too late and you will be over the hill.



Oh, hush
Sydney (OTH parent of 3 yo)



Gee, did I hit a nerve?



No, kinda the contrary. We waited to have a child until we
felt comfortable financially, and I *am* the lucky parent of
a wonderful child. It was *not* too late, that's the point.

Yes, we could have had trouble we might not have had when we
were younger, and yes, it was harder on me physically than it
would have been when I was younger.

OTOH, younger parents who are struggling financially and/or
trying to grow up emotionally and work things out with a spouse,
have different troubles and they're not necessarily pretty either.

Robert, I take your essential point to be something like,
"if it's something you really really want, plane...kid...
whatever...there will never be a Perfect Time so just
consider your priorities carefully and if that's what you
really want, Go For It." And if I've distilled it correctly,
I pretty much agree.

But I really dislike hearing "if you don't do it now, it
will be too late", because IME one way and another it's
usually not true. So if it's honestly NOT a top priority
for one or another reason, I think it's important to say:
DON'T rush into it...plane...kid. Because chances are good
when it's the right time for YOU, and your other ducks are
more or less in a row, it can still happen.


I have NEVER heard a person that has built and flown their own airplane
say "I wish I had waited longer before building my airplane." Everyone
of them say "I wish I had started when I first considered building an
airplane." If you want to build get started now.

Jerry


Sydney (born moderate -- can usually get both sides of an
argument mad at me)


  #10  
Old September 9th 03, 12:32 PM
alexy
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default

Jerry Springer wrote:


I have NEVER heard a person that has built and flown their own airplane
say "I wish I had waited longer before building my airplane." Everyone
of them say "I wish I had started when I first considered building an
airplane." If you want to build get started now.

Jerry


Well, I have to pick on your methodology here. I imagine that your
sample is representative of those who build and fly planes. But look
at the completion statistics on kits, and ask some of those who did
not complete them if they wish they had waited until circumstances
were better for them.
--
Alex
Make the obvious change in the return address to reply by email.
 




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