PROMISES, PROMISES: REMEMBERING JIM BEDE KITPLANES APRIL 2016 ® Thatcher CX5 • Jim Bede HATCHER • T Vacuum Forming • CX5 Air-Oil Separator • Deburring • Logbooks • 3D Printing Parts • DIY Restrictors HOMEBUILDIng’S • Prop Theory BEST-KEPT SECRET • Engine SHOP UPGRADES Oil BELVOIR Keeping It Organized APRIL 2016 GOT PAPERWORK? In the Shop: • 3D Printing for PUBLICATIONS Records and Logbooks Homebuilders • Speed Deburring ENGINE LUBRICATION • DIY Restrictor Fittings Oil for Flight www.kitplanes.com April 2016 | Volume 33, Number 4 Flight Review 6 BUILDING THE THATCHER CX5: An insider’s view into one of homebuilding’s best-kept secrets. By Glen Bradley. Builder Spotlight 16 PROMISES, PROMISES: Remembering Jim Bede Sr. By Amy Laboda. 24 VACUUM FORMING LEADING EDGES: Making long, straight bends in sheet metal is easier than you think. By Paul Dye. 28 PRINT YOUR OWN PARTS: Using a 3D printer to make an avionics fan shroud. By Dave Forster. 16 33 SpEED DEBURRING: Why turn a hand crank when electrons work so cheap? By Ken Scott. 42 SEPARATOR OR CONDENSER? Air-oil separators 101. By Dan Horton. 46 AIRCRAFT RECORDS AND LOGBOOKS: What’s required for Experimental/Amateur-Built Aircraft? By Owen C. Baker. 50 ENGINE THEORY: Oil—lubing and cooling the source of thrust. By Tom Wilson. 67 COMPLETIONS: Builders share their successes. 74 ASK THE DAR: Highlander gross weight increase, using certified parts in a plansbuilt Cub. By Mel Asberry. Shop Talk 36 SHOP UPGRADES: Part 2—Keep it clean and organized. By Eric Stewart. 40 NO RESTRICTIONS? Restrictor fittings that are easy to make. By Paul Dye. 60 HOME SHOP MACHINIST: Drill guide for canard install. By Bob Hadley. 78 AERO ’LECTRICS: Let’s stay current. By Jim Weir. Shop Tip 66 NON-MARRING FLUTING PLIERS: By Larry Larson. Designer’s Notebook 75 WIND TUNNEL: Blade inflow angle. By Barnaby Wainfan. 6 Exploring 2 EDITOR’S LOG: Our worst fears. By Paul Dye. 56 HIGH-DESERT TALES: Nuke it! By Elliot Seguin. 63 CHECKPOINTS: Never too experienced to learn. By Vic Syracuse. Kit Bits 4 LETTERS 69 LIST OF ADVERTISERS 70 BUILDERS’ MARKETPLACE 80 KIT STUFF: Drawing on experience. By cartoonist Robrucha. 56 On the cover: Glen Bradley (front seat) and Patrick Panzera in the Thatcher CX5. Photographed by Sheldon Heatherington at Pensacola International Airport. For subscription information, contact KITPLANES® at 800/622-1065 or visit www.kitplanes.com/cs. KITPLANES April 2016 1 EDITOR’S LOG Our worst fears. As a lifelong student of aviation, I VFR, and avoiding even worse weather our birth as baby aviators about flying have spent a great deal of time studying while IFR—especially in a light single with in weather that can swat us like a bug. the causes of aircraft accidents—mostly limited capability to handle the worst the Pilots should take precautions against by reading accounts of aircraft accidents. atmosphere can throw at us. getting themselves killed by weather, but As a pilot for over four decades, I have But now let’s take a look at today— they probably shouldn’t worry about it developed a healthy respect for things recent history as applied to Experimental as much as they do—because they have that can cause a flight to end badly. aircraft in the real world. Our fear tells us many other things to worry about. And I have, like most pilots, cultivated a that many people are killed stumbling What things? Well, the single biggest healthy set of fears for “bad things that into weather for which they are not pre- cause of fatal accidents has recently been can happen to me and my airplane.” pared, or the airplane is not suited. Yet… defined as the “loss of control” accident. Maintaining a healthy respect for things if you look at the actual accident statistics, The FAA usually has a “hot button,” the that can kill you is, I think, a reasonably a very small percentage of the fatal acci- current problem that they really want to good way to help yourself live to a ripe dents in the homebuilt world are actually solve. In the past, it has been weather, old age and die in bed. Yet many pilots weather related these days. The reason? then it was CFIT—Controlled Flight Into and builders of homebuilt aircraft spend Well, I am sure that is debatable, but it is Terrain. There is something to be said for a great deal more time looking at things probably a combination of the enhanced an agency like the FAA having hot buttons that, while potentially fatal, are far less weather information available in the cock- and then directing a lot of effort into solv- likely to happen than things they over- pit, the vastly superior avionics available ing those problems. If they put enough look or simply ignore. Addressing the to the average homebuilder today, and energy into these things, they get results! actual causes of accidents, rather than (of course) that fear instilled in us since For instance, CFIT has been reduced to the imagined things that materialize in our fears, is a far, far more productive way to address risk management. Let’s look at an example. Aviation magazines for the past 40 or 50 years have been chock full of stories of pilots’ bad encounters with the vagaries of the atmosphere. Whether it is a VFR pilot stumbling into IFR conditions, an IFR pilot running into severe convection, or a terrible encounter with ice, weather has always been a staple fear of the light airplane pilot. Many of our brethren have met their fate while tumbling out of con- trol to the ground, with or without their wings. To be sure, I can’t think of any single topic more thoroughly drummed into my Lenticular clouds are often an indicator of strong turbulence and downdrafts that could head than avoiding bad weather while lead to loss of control or controlled flight into terrain. Paul Dye retired as a Lead Flight Director for NASA’s Human Space Flight program, with 40 years of aerospace experience on everything from Cubs to the space shuttle. An avid homebuilder, he began flying and working on airplanes as a teen, and has experience with a wide range of construction techniques and materials. He flies an RV-8 that he built in 2005, and an RV-3 that he built with his pilot wife. Currently, they are building a Xenos Paul Dye motorglider. A commercially licensed pilot, Paul has logged over 4800 hours in many different types of aircraft and is an EAA tech counselor, flight advisor, and member of the Homebuilder’s Council. He consults and collaborates in aerospace operations and flight-testing projects across the country. 2 KITPLANES April 2016 www.kitplanes.com & www.facebook.com/kitplanes the occasional anomaly by moving maps, GPS, and synthetic vision. Today’s effort is to stop LOC—and those Loss Of Control incidents are a tough nut to crack, mostly because they don’t have a single root cause. Some are just poor piloting; others are due to poor judgment—aerobatics close to the ground or buzzing, leading to a stall/spin on the pull-up. However you get into it though, losing control of the airplane often means a fatal return to earth—and this is something pilots really should be worried about. The statistics don’t lie; we can make great inroads into the accident numbers if we can solve the problem. Incidentally, the EAA is cur- rently running a contest soliciting ideas to reduce LOC accidents, and the prize money is pretty good! The good news, of course, is that the vast majority of aviation mishaps aren’t fatal. And that’s good, because there are mishaps every single day caused by pilots running off runways and collapsing the landing gear—or sometimes those two things happening in the other order. This suggests that if pilots really want to cut down on accidents, they shouldn’t be only worried about weather, or structural failure, or even how many redundant EFIS displays they have—they should really work at keeping directional con- trol during takeoff and landing. Well, that and keeping the wing from stalling when they are well off the ground. Learning what we should really be afraid of is simple—just read the daily mishap reports from the FAA, and every once in a while, spend some time reading a few NTSB reports—especially for aircraft of the type that you fly. The NTSB reports go into great detail into the why of acci- dents—not just how many occurred. And knowing the why, you can hopefully find a way to stay out of the same situation. You see, understanding what percentages of accidents are occurring in each cat- egory is useful and can help you under- stand where to put your emphasis when it comes to safety. That is valuable. But understanding the precise reasons that pilots get themselves and their airplanes into bad spots—that is worth its weight in gold. A little fear is good and healthy—so long as we fear the right things. J Photo: Paul Dye KITPLANES April 2016 3 EDITORIAL Editor in Chief Paul Dye [email protected] Aircraft Wiring and have solace with himself. Having Managing Editor Mark Schrimmer In “Top Ten Wiring Mistakes” [Feb- seen Mental Illness at AirVenture several Art Direction Dan Maher ruary 2016], I did not see mention of years ago, it was nice to reconnect with Editorial Director Paul Bertorelli an insidious pitfall/failure I have come the plane and now to have some under- Contributing Editors Larry Anglisano, Marc Ausman, across involving soldering and crimping.