Guitarmaster

This was not my idea. I got it off Don Maxwell's website, I thought it was a great idea so I tried it and I wanted to pass it on here. If your fuel caps are tough to get off, drop a few drops of oil from the dipstick on the shaft. It frees up those caps really nicely! No more busted fingers trying to get the caps open!

That's where my plane is based and have considerable experience with the shop. They do great work and are insanely knowledgeable.

Me too!!

Very cool! Can't wait to have one on my bird!

Just checking out another girl's fuel caps!!

That's sexy!!

I would love to have wing LDG lights. I wonder if I could get that field approved???

A couple more things to think about. The engine, I wouldn't be too concerned about that. Mine was overhauled in 1994 and had 12 hours on it when I bought it. The guy overhauled it, got sick and died. I talked at length with the engine shop on the field and they said they would not be scared of it. Mine wasn't even broke in when I got it so there is a difference there. So far so good on mine. I have put 150ish hours on it with no issues. Time will tell, but i believe I am beyond the infant mortality stage. In order to protect yourself, try a Mike Busch strategy, escrow $15,000 of the price for a year. Fly the crap out of the airplane and If there are no problems then the broker gets the 15, if it has problems bad enough to overhaul, it goes to the engine shop and you pay half of the re-build rather than the whole thing. The avionics would be a bigger concern, assuming you want an IFR bird. I just got a quote from Sarasota Avionics to upgrade. Aspen, GNS430W, Ads-b compliant xponder, audio panel and a few other things. $40,000. Yes, you read that right. True, this is an all-in -one shot, still.... my point is, avionics are EXPENSIVE! Many things are 'nice to haves" but there are a few "need to haves." The biggest thing I would be looking for is corrosion. In particular, stub-spar corrosion. Although it is a Cali bird, look closely. Good luck!!

I would agree with the '75 numbers being right. Now that mine is rigged right, the numbers are usually exact +-1kt.

Sent you a PM

That looks awesome!! Airtex?

I was actually toying with the idea of designing winglets and pursuing an STC. Of course, all in my spare time! LOL!!

Hey Guys I thought I would update our rigging fun. Summer has been so busy I haven't had a chance to address the problems. Today, we finally got to it. Problems: 1. Rolling to the right flaps up 2. Rolling more to the right flaps down. 3 Right rudder to keep heading with wings level. 4. Slower than book speed. 5. Yokes not centered 6. Ailerons drooping. Gear tight in the wells. Engine is per factory specs. No, we don't have travel boards (the guy that rents them has a long-term illness and closed his business). No matter. Solutions: Found flaps asymmetrical. Many thanks to Piloto (Jose) for clearing up the difference flaps up and down adjustments. After centering the yokes and setting the ailerons where they are supposed to be, we found BOTH flaps improperly rigged. WAY off! Like 1.5 inches off compared to the aileron. Now, flaps out, little to no rolling (still needs a little tweaking) and flaps up has a SLIGHT roll to the right. The up stop was adjusted but I haven't had time to test fly it again. Anyway, we are making huge moves to perfectly straight flying. Chris, I finally got time to do a TAS check. Four-heading method. 7500MSL and slightly above standard temp. Pressure slightly lower. @ 22"/2500 (72%) I got a solid 147KTAS. That is right in line with the book. This is up from 139KTAS when this party started! I am still tweaking and looking for more. I am shooting for the 150 mark with zero speed mods. This is a stock (except for Brakett air filter) 1975 F.

The pc system is totally rebuilt. The lines were crumbling and the boots were leaking. It works like a charm now!

Interesting topic. I have the opposite problem. The right wing is heavy. It takes right rudder to keep the heading from drifting and of course, that increases the right wing low. The roll is far more pronounced with the flaps out. Clearly there is a flap alignment problem. We already pulled the left flap up a few degrees, yes, you read that right , a few degrees and it needs more. The airplane rigging was all jacked up. In the annual, we re-rigged the ailerons so they are even with the wing and the yoke is straight. After we did this, the left flap was hanging about 1 inch down from the back of the aileron! Pulled the flap up, and got five knots extra speed! She is still rolling to the right and pulling to the left, albeit not as bad. I.E. If I keep the wings level, feet on floor, the airplane will flat-turn to the left. With the airplane wings-level and no heading change, the ball is hugging the left lubber line with right rudder pressure being applied. We are attacking this issue in the upcoming week. We will figure her out eventually! to be continued....

That and LOP operations combined with no flap takeoffs!!! Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

That looks AWESOME!

"At some point you will need to measure for holes in the piece that goes on top ... You could cut slices, from one side to make those holes so you can slip the piece on around those rods. Once you get the length of the slice cut to where the rods come through you can cut you hole the size of the openings. Mine added some baby boots to tie around those ... Looks like tne Johnson bar boot ... if I remember right there are two holes? One for a rod that goes to flaps and one for a couple other Rods..." For measuring holes try this... Put a dab of toothpaste over the hole you are trying to mark. Press the material against the hole. Remove the material and Presto! perfectly located holes WITHOUT measuring!

Backward tail envy is not pretty...

Yeah, they did a great job on mine as well. Very quick turn time!

Looks great David!

I think you could sell it for $14,000 and be reasonable with regard to Lopresti!

Sounds like the prop control is slowly working it's was back in. I agree, check your prop control tension.

Even if you do go with Aspen, you still need a backup attitude indicator. So you will not lose the overhaul cost either way.

Oh man... The freight doggin' days.... Many hours spent trying to kill myself in the weather over the mountains! Good times! Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk