akflyer

Looking good!  I have some 40# ers on order now.  Much Much better than what you had before.

F@#k cali... I hate congested airspace... but boy do I have the guy for you

Just give me the word and we will be on a commercial flight to go get your bird so damn fast you just wont belive it... but be ready for a side step to the avid / kitfox factory for a meet and greet 

You say the word

I be working every two weeks and go back to work this coming Tuesday.... do the math 2X2

Hey Steve, I need some advise.

A buddy picked up a nice Colt a couple months ago.  I flew up and got it for him and brought it home.  It was in annual, and flew great.  Iwent over it real good to make sure it was airworthy before I started the trip back over the mountains and open water.  He just had an annual done on it and the dill weed charged him 2500 to fix a very small crack in the lower cowling (it was about 1/2" long).  I need to know what I should do

1) Junk punch the A&P for being an ass
2) Break his nose for being an ass
3) hire a few guys named bubba to rape him just like he did to my buddy
4) decorate his hangar with gay porn and tell everyone in town he is into some wierd shit.

Just kidding, I am bored today can ya tell

I go back to work next tuesday so I will work on the new "regional" boards for you guys.  I need something to do when I am sitting at my desk bored outa my mind.

hey you gonna post up the flight... If you had smell a vision I think you would notice me shitting my pants when the antifreeze hit my legs and was blowing down the side of the plane

hey your giving away your age... you still remember steam gauges

When I redo my panel you can bet your ass that most of the clutter will be gone.  I just need primary instruments, in a standard pattern just like you said.  I hate having to look all over the pannel to find what should be right in front of you!  I is pretty apperant that the guy that did my panel was not thinking about ... well about any damn thing when he did it.  I have often wondered if he was good and stoned when he laid it out

Well shit... we replumbed the engine and the way it is run now it should have never got above 120 as the other planes here that are plumbed the same way we had to block of most of the radiator to get it to come up to temp... We did a ground run at the house with no issues, took her out to the airport ran it up again no issues... so I strapped in and tried to kill myself again.  Temps looked good, taxied down to the end of 07 took the runway and firewalled it... temps looked good broke ground started a shallow climb to keep maximum cooling flow and at 200' the temps started coming up... way up.  The water pressure came up to 12 PSI and then the temps went to 210 and I pull the power WAY back, leveled off flew a very short pattern and brought it in... of course on the taxi back the temps settled back to a nice 150.  WTF... soooo I pull in and pop the cowl and checked fluid level.. she was a bit low so I figured we just did not get it burped good enough... more burping, more fluid, more ground runs and I figure what the hell a cat has 9 lives, I have used 8 of them so far on this plane so I had another free shot left.  Same story, about 3-400' temps start coming back up, this time to 220 and she blows antifreeze all over the side of the plane and some on my legs... SUMBITCH, short short pattern, bring it in, put it on the trailer and go to scratching our nutts cause there is just no way in hell this can be happening.

A 3 hour call to Joe Grahek and now we have 4 people scratching nutts trying to figure this one out.

Joe calls me out of the blue a day later and said he had brain fart in the middle of the night.  The 532 was originally a points engine and he had converted it to CDI... You have to do some engineering to get the CDI conversion on it and he thinks that the timing may be off.  We pull the plugs and sure as shit, they are white / redish brown.  I bring the engine up to top dead center, roll it back to .070 BTDC and make some marks I can see with the engine running and hit it with a timing light... cant even see the marks in a 1" long window... DING DING DING I think we have a winner.  We have been chasing the wrong issue for about a year now.

Now we get to figure out how to modify the stator plate to get the timing reset to the proper specs.  Hopefully this will cure our problem and Greg will get to take a ride in his plane and start his training.

Will post more if this shit actually works

hell yeah I can dissagree... just won't do me any good

Friggin mechanics... just got done fixing some shit on a buddies plane that just came out of annual 3 days ago. 

X2... at least it flys !  I am wondering why he has the throttle WFO...  not a good way to store it. 

I did alot of cleanup and work on the wiring on mine when I got it.  Replaced all the automotive wiring with AC wires etc... at the end of the day, the wiring is all correct, sized right etc, but could have been installed a little cleaner.  As much shit as he had put in the panel, it was a real nightmare to try and keep it all perfectly neat.  Mine will never win osh kosh, but she flys great and I am happy so what the hell, thats all that matters to me.

The heater core was installed in series the first time... then it was changed to go in parallel with the shut off valve... while the temos initially started off nice and cool with the ground runs, the bitch still overheated in the air... this was flight #7 that the bastage tried to kill me with engine that wanted to shit the bed.. Lastnight we replumbed it with nice big sweeping 1" hoses and no sharp 90 Degree bends.  No heater core just the engine and a nice big belly mount radiator.  Radiator has been flow tested, system has been burped up the freeking wazzoo so I know we dont have any air in it.

The system up to this point was plumbed in with alot of copper pipe that had quite a few 90 degree bends in it.  I am hoping that the many flow direction changes were slowing the coolant down.  We do alot of piping systems at work that part of the de-bottle necking is removing flow direction changes from the systems.  I am hoping that this change will do the trick for Greg cause he really really really wants to be flying his own plane, and I want to stop shitting myself everytime the temp gauge reads holy crap you need to land now.

With just a tiny touch of good luck, we should know in a few hours if the changes last night are going to solve the problems and he will get his first ride in his own plane.

Dude I am gonna junk punch ya  .... you know damn good and well if you say the "W" word it is gonna come up and get nasty


See ya this evening

I got the double tail spring, but am going to have it cut down.. The tail is too high even with 24" mains and avid wide, extended gear.  I could drag it in WAY slower and get off the ground alot quicker if I could get more angle of attack on the wing.  I am going to cut it down as much as I can and still have some spring left to absorb a bit of the shock.

Mine did not come with rigging instructions, but I got some online that someone had made a .jpg of.... so they took a pic of the instructions but they are readable.  I will see if I can find the file and upload it here.

go get your wings and finnish them yourself.. get the polyfiber manual and the video.  It is a pice of cake, especialy if you have ever coverd an RC model before.  The exact same principles apply and I found it easer to cover the full size than a small park flyer model.  This said after I have coverd over a hundered models. 

if all goes well tomorrow I will have the plane out and can get a vid... shit.. no I cant, my floor boards for the baggage cover them up.. I will try to get a shot of my buddies KF as the system is the same.

you bastage... one of these days I will have the hangar on the lake.. till then it is trailer from garage to the airport...

Congrats.. now go junk punch the mech. as the wings should have been done in a week tops start to finish.

I installed them beforeI ever flew it.. if it is anything likethe KF I or II in adverse roll, then yes it is worth it.  Mine have far less roll coupling than the KF does.  Rigging was simple and took about an hour tops.  Probably closer to 30 minutes.

how many # lift are those struts?  I have a 30# on mine now but an going to go with 40# or 45# cause they loose alot in the cold

I did a breif flight with mine ipen, and did not notice any flutter.. I did not do any hard slips etc to really test it out as I never really thought about it and it was damn cold outside   I have flown quite a bit in my brothers old KF II withthe doors open, but he did not have struts on them, the air just held them up against the wings.  I have heard of guys letting the door hang there, and as they increase speed on takeoff the doors will slowly move up t othe bottom of the wing and stay there until they land and slow down enough for them to drop.

I would make sure you used good heavy duty hangers not the cheap flimsy ones.. and make sure you have 7-11 twists per inch  

make sure you have the washers on there too so the strut does not slide up on the bracket.  Bolt, washer, strut, washer, bracket, nut.

I am at work till Wednesday.  I can get a pic then but mine mount differnt with ball mounts.  Is it possible to move the strut lower on the fuse and in on the door frame so it is more perpendicular?  I know the strut mount is only out a couple inches on the door frame.  I will get a buddy to post a pic of his as they are mounted the same way your are I think.

holy shit, I helped   damn, that just made the site fees worth it to me