Sun N Fun 2018

Hey everybody.  We have secured booth N68 at Sun N Fun 2018.  This is a great spot and along the main avenue.  We are delighted to represent Verner Motor and ourselves at Sun N Fun!  We are also super privileged to show Steve Wolf's SAMSONmite aircraft at our booth with the new Verner Scarlett 9S radial.  Steve is getting the engine installation ready at break-neck speed and its looking fantastic!  It will be a stunner!  He is a professional aerobatic aircraft designer and builder and airshow performer.  Though he is semi-retired now, you wouldn't know it by how quickly he is working.  He is thrilled to show his plane and he will be making kits of it.  The SAMSONmite is a 75% scale replica of his famous airshow airplane SAMSON.  The original had a Pratt and Whitney R985 and was a huge Pitts styled aircraft.  He thrilled crowds with that plane and was featured at several Oshkosh AirVentures in the late 80's.  The SAMSONmite replica was first flown and shown with a Rotec R3600 installed.  His engine experienced a major malfunction and he was lucky to get it back to base safely.  During a trip to Italy, Steve took a flight in a Verner powered aircraft and knew that he wanted one on his SAMSONmite.  The sound was perfect, the thrust was impressive.  We informed him that the 9 cylinder was in development and he and Kathy jumped on it.  Verner worked with us to get custom paint and chrome to closely resemble a Pratt and Whitney per the original.  I LOVE the color scheme - we will likely keep that for our ScaleBirds replicas.

At this year's Sun N Fun, we are concentrating on the Verner radials as our focus for this event.  We are planning to have Steve's 9S on display at our booth, then have my 5Si powered Fisher Avenger R flying off the Paradise City grass strip.  Also we will have Frank Johnson's 3VW powered Legal Eagle either flying in Paradise City too or in on display in our booth.  That depends on whether he can complete and fly it before the show.  I think he has a good shot at it.  I can't wait to see both aircraft!  If we can find a trailer large enough, we will bring the P-40/36 to fill up our tent and show it off - even though it has a long way to go before first flight.  But we still need to find a trailer big enough for it and the Avenger.  Flying the Avenger down is not a good idea - weather.  Just no way of knowing if the way will be completely clear and I'm still a working slug who doesn't have all the vacation time in the world saved-up to wait out storms and fog to get there just whenever.  So the Avenger gets priority in the trailer this time.  So we have a rental set up for a 7' x 16' with extended V nose.  I'm looking for something wider and a bit longer.  8.5' x 20' would be ideal but not easy to find up here in CT or RI.  Still looking though.  Either way, we will have a nice booth put together and will be making a big splash!  I hope you can make it and please stop by and let me get to know you.  We value your input into what we are doing and always willing to listen.  

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Scott and Sam are working like mad to finish the elevators.  The first one is complete.  Lead counter-weights will be later - prior to covering with fabric.  The second elevator will go fast as I made two sets of parts and fitted them.  Will write more about the build shortly.

Bird Cages

Hey everyone.  We have been working on finishing the canopy and making elevator ribs, jigs and weldments.  Not to mention surviving a bad head cold - luckily not the flu.  I got busy making the bird-cage framing that the real P-36A Hawk has.  I made a template of the frame to give Scott some dimensions to go by.  We back engineered the template into CAD and added the framing lines.  Then made a full size plot of the 2D pattern.  I put that back on the canopy to check for fit.  Perfect!  the front and rear bows with the router table.  I marked the frame lines onto the canopy.  Then I bent the vertical divider - inside and outside pieces - on the plexiglass bending form.  This gave me the correct curves.  Had to hand tweak that a little to compensate for the spring-back that aluminum has.  The other parts of the bird cage are straight-unbent pieces that are fit after the vertical divider goes on.  Drilled all the aluminum pieces and de-burred prior to taping in place on the plexi and drilling thru.  Cleco's were used to keep everything tight and stable.  The birdcage framing was attached with Stainless #6-32 flat heads and lock nuts.  Trying to keep a WW2 feel to the cockpit.  Looks cool to me!  

  So Scott machined a set of track slide blocks for the canopy so it can slide.  We had made some months ago but they didn't fit well.  It we easier to CNC machine a new set than to fix the old ones.  I made some brackets to mount the slides to the canopy and then had to make another set of those as well.  The second set fit much better.  Oh well, we are learning and improving along the way. We then added the skirts on both sides that cover the track and brackets.  I also cleaned-up the fiberglass windshield fairing and painted it.  Installed, it looks pretty good!  I used the AeroPoxy Light filler to fill the weave.  I didn't know it takes 5 hours to cure - I'm used to Bondo that is ready in 10 minutes.  So progress is slow and boring sometimes.  

We hand bent the elevator ribs with the forming blocks Scott had routered.  This makes them bow like a banana.  So I fluted the flanges to straighten the ribs out.  The trick is to know where the rivets might hit the rib.  These are fabric covered surfaces so I didn't have to worry too much about that.  I kept a standard spacing.  I've been working on making weldments for the elevator horn and torque tube hinge.  4130 steel tubing and plate.  I hand cut the patterns with a disk grinder and finished them up on the bench grinder.  Tig welded them and Scott trued up the flanges on the lathe.  They act as stops for the hinge bushings and needed to be smooth and true on the ends.  So far so good!  I'm always behind my planned build schedule, but not too bad yet!  

Meanwhile, Scott has been modeling and remodeling the landing gear mounting to the spar.  Our original idea was good but we figured out a nicer way to do it.  It just adds time to the CAD modeling.  

Next step is to build the elevators and fit them to the Horizontal and the elevator controls.  Should be a couple of weeks of fun stuff!  Talk soon.

Images from the New Year's break

Here's some images taken over the last little bit, showing off what we've been up to.

Our thermoforming setup, to drape form the plexi.

Working on the window and canopy trim.

Plexi fitted and installed.

Holiday Homebuilding

Hope all of you had a wonderful Thanksgiving and are preparing for a Merry Christmas and New Years. 
I know it has been way too long since the last blog entry.  So let me catch you up on where we are and what we have been doing.

On the Verner engine side we have our first 9 cylinder coming soon, we expect it to ship shortly after New Years, and this engine is destined to be installed in a special airplane.  It's a little early yet but I'm sure you'll hear of it soon.  We're looking forward to seeing it at Sun N Fun 2018, which will be available for you to check out in person.  We also recently sold a 5VW engine to a gentleman building a custom Ragwing Special which I think will make an awesome combination!  My own Avenger is being flown when possible (though it seems every possible thing has been preventing me getting to the airport lately, all the while it gets colder.)  Having finished the test regime I can say it is getting awesome fuel consumption – in part becuase I have to retard the throttle as soon as I get to altitude to keep from over-speeding the airframe.  Right now I'm averaging about 3.4 gals per hour on the 83 hp 5 cylinder.  

One of the lessons learned during the test phase was running into a stuck starter. The Verner being experimental and made using a many auto parts, it uses a common car starter. In my case, I went to go for a flight but I wasn't getting any action when turning over the engine. I've had batteries go dead which was my first notion; but after swapping batteries, and contactors, and checking my wires, we reduced it down to just the starter itself. So after pulling the starter to inspect it, we were able to simply tap it back into working again. Wish I had thought of that before pulling it. At any rate lesson learned with that, but also that if it happens again we'll need to look at a replacement part.  

Counting the delay from that starter issue, I have now flown the plane enough hours that I've satisfied the steps to take it from its Phase 1 test period and back to Phase 2 operations.  There's still things I'd like to change, (is a homebuilt ever perfect?) but for now I can say it's good to go.

On the fighter front we have permanently riveted on the fuselage top and side skins.  This depended on many things being done in certain order but we finally worked through that maze.  We had to finish the control stick assembly and elevator push tubes, rudder pedal installation needed to be completed,  rudder cables were run and swaged, vertical needed to be fitted and bolted into place with the horizontal; tail wheel assembly had to be modified with the shock mounted farther aft to get a better angle to the ground so it would work properly.  All of that work needed to be finished in order to get the rudder cables installed.  We modified the purchased throttle quadrant to have a mounting plate that is easy to remove – a lesson learned from the Avenger engine installation work.  Then we had to paint it to make it look right.  The tail is now on – though it will need to be removed again for transport.  We have been finishing details around the cockpit and canopy most recently:  The side windows originally had a P-40E type of look and had to have some changes to match the P-36 Hawk look we are after, which is a longer, more pointed window shape.  The mods required me to drill and cut into already finished skins and splice in some new panels. I almost cried to cut into a finished shape, but actually it came out great.  So no spilt milk after-all.

So as of right now, we are forming the canopy and windscreen. We bought two quartz space heaters that we disassembled to make a very basic thermoforming heat box, which just barely does the trick for heating the plastic we need.  It's not pretty or particularly good in any sense, but it only has to work a few times. The plastic sheets were heated then drape-formed over templates we made from wood and .032 5052 aluminum sheet, one for the windscreen and one for the canopy as they had slightly different overall shapes. The windscreen came out great, the canopy started to warp in spots from cooling but I think it will come out OK. If not I can make another! The windscreen was trimmed and fitted, and I'm in the middle of installing that permanently now. 

The other project that Scott is working on is cutting out parts for the elevators. He spent last month modeling those, and so far it looks quite good. The rudder taught us some lessons and so improvements have been made. The aluminum has all been cut on the CNC but it has to be sanded, deburred, and cleaned up before forming. The forming blocks and the full-scale template have to be made but those things go quick. There are also some  steel pieces that have to be made up, but overall we're pretty close. It seems that making the raw parts is about half the battle with these things. 

The latest CAD work involves the center section of the wing and the retractable gear mechanism. We've decided for sure to add retracts to the design as everyone says it really needs it and we can't really disagree.  So we have been working on making that a complete design so the center section can go forward.  The rotating gear leg to bring the wheel flush with the wing is an interesting challenge but we think we can make it work. 

We are pushing this to get the elevators after Christmas and then work on the wings and landing gear through the rest of the winter. 

As we prepare here for Christmas and New Years we hope you all are able to enjoy the holiday season, Happy New Year! 

Avenger R Flight

Check out this short clip of the Verner 5Si on Sam's Fisher Avenger. It wants to just go. Can't wait for the P36 to get this engine, we'll be able to really open it up.

Some 9 Cylinder Footage

A number of us from the ScaleBirds team (the ones not dealing with being newlywed) took a trip out to the Czech Republic to visit the Verner Motor home base, and meet with the men responsible for these awesome little engines, to be able to better support owners down the line. First thing we did on arrival was watch them do some static testing of the upcoming Scarlett 9S, which has components in production as we speak. These tests are trying to optimize the intake blower which will benefit the 9 cylinder engine with some moderate pressure boost. 

And at the end is a quick flyby of the Scarlett 7 powered Racek parasol, with me aboard. He did a few laps, cut the power, then put it right back in. Certainly no lack of go in that bird. All three of us were able to get a ride.

I'm still compiling the footage I took of our trip, and will have more updates soon, including behind the scenes at the Verner Motor shop, some glimpses of Czechia, more time with the Avenger, and, of course, more about the LiteFighter.

From L to R: Dave, Pravislov, Sam, Scott, Kamil

Local Airport Now Has Two Radial Powered Avenger Aircraft Over Its Skies

So after a long time working on the transition of the Avenger from VW power to Verner power, the aircraft has managed to take flight:

Westerly State Airport may be one of the few today that can say it has two Avengers flying out of it that have radial engines, though one is much, much bigger!

This video was very impromptu as was the flight itself, coming (as happens somewhat often with these homebuilts) as the inevitable result of a full-power taxi test. From what I understand though the full-power portion was not to be, the engine never got above 50% the whole flight.  
We'll be back under the cowl to check how everything is holding up after these test runs over the last few weeks and make whatever adjustments we need, then plan out a more official 'first' flight very soon.

The Important Things

Hey everyone.  Its been too long since we blog'd.  A lot has transpired - some good, some bad.  The bad is we missed Oshkosh 17.  I'm so sorry to all the RFA members who came to hear about Verner Motor and their engines. I had planned to be there and had a house reserved and everything.  Was going to give two forums during the week.  I just cannot miss an engagement like that!  However, I could not make it due to personal issues - my wife was away on business for a month, and our daughter needed me in a tough time. It took the family's full efforts to help, and all is now well.  That is all that matters to me.  But the other side of that is that as a working man, I had to spend all available hours of leave, which I had been saving for the Oshkosh trip.  

When my wife did get back, it was a huge relief, but it was too late for us to get back on track of making it to AirVenture.  I appreciate all the support and prayers I've received from the RFA group and all my aviation friends. Well I've learned the important things -  family - comes first and I know that all of you will understand and appreciate that!  

Now for the good!  I've finished the Avenger R - radial install.  First flight was today!  Jenni and Scott and my good friends helped me install all the cowlings and access covers as well as the weight and balance.  The plane was 50 pounds lighter than my VW installation!  My CG is good too.  It was nose heavy.  Scott recorded the taxi testing and flight.  Thanks to my whole crew and to Verner Motor!  I learned a lot about all the system and installation issues one can have.  I had them all!  Worked thru them and can now help others to avoid them.  Oh ya, the flight!  It was awesome!  The Verner purred in the normal fashion of a radial during the taxi testing and run-ups.  Then roared to life on the climb-out.  Wow!  The more throttle I put in - the better it ran!  I have open exhaust stacks which give you the full radial rumble sounds, the smell and warm puffs in your face!  Love it! 

On the LiteFighter side, we made the composite firewall transition ring and fitted it.  All the fwd skins are done now.  Ready for paint.  I've been contemplating making a new tail wheel arrangement to fit the P-40 look.  As I said, the shop was mostly locked-up for June and part of July.  So I'm happy to get back into it on a regular basis and get something going.  I will write much more shortly - You deserve it!   Thanks everyone!