Lightning Bill

First Taxi video posted!

noreply@blogger.com (Bill) — Sun, 28 Dec 2008 01:49:00 +0000

Check out the videos page for a video of N197RW's first taxi on December 12, 2008.

Day 14 - Inspection!

noreply@blogger.com (Bill) — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 13:21:00 +0000

(Becky posting for Bill)

Bill has been working 12-13 hour days at the hangar this week and hasn't had time for any blog updates. The inspection was yesterday and as Bill said, he now has an airplane, no longer just a mass of parts. Here are a couple of pictures he sent last night.

Day 7 - Nov. 18, 2008

noreply@blogger.com (Bill) — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 04:06:00 +0000

Got in a little earlier at 7:50a, and got to work.

Reinstalled the instrument pod and was delighted to discover that the lower attach brackets were RIGHT were they needed to be. It took very little time to drill attachment holes and remove the pod. It's ready to mount, and just needs to be finished before mounting in the plane.

Fit, drilled, and temporarily attached the panel for the throttle quadrant.
Trimmed and final sanded the panel, and final sanded the instrument pod.
Temporarily reinstalled the pod to measure for the vertical console section.
Painted the pod flat black, then painted it with black fleck paint.
Installed Horizontal stabilizer.
Masked off and sanded canopy frame for painting.

This was a long, tedious job. I sanded for hours, filled some miscellaneous holes with 5 minute epoxy and flocked cotton, waited for that to cure, and kept sanding. After all the sanding on the instrument pod and the canopy frame, I'm convinced that there are two milestones that make a builder happy: First flight, and the day you get to quit sanding. I'm not sure yet which will be better.

Bill

Day 6 - Nov. 17, 2008

noreply@blogger.com (Bill) — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 03:57:00 +0000

Wow! I can't wait to fly 197RW home from Shelbyville, and a big part of the reason is the drive between Dallas and Shelbyville is almost 12 hours. Blech!

After making it to my hotel around 1am this morning, I arrived at the hangar about 15 minutes late at 8:15. Mark and Mike were already in the hangar and I got to take the first look at my plane since it was painted. The paint shop is indeed a magical thing!

But, as usual, I wasn't there long before Mark was laying out work for me and telling me to get after it! They really do their best to keep you on schedule. So, for my first day of week 2, here's the progress made:

Drilled and fitted the air vents in the instrument panel pod.
Fabricated the gas strut angle attachments from raw aluminum angle.
Positioned and installed the angle attachments in the instrument panel pod.
Glassed the angle attachments in place, filled the gaps around them with flox and epoxy, and sanded to shape.
Trimmed and sanded the aluminum instrument panel to fit in the cutout of the pod.
Drilled and clecoed the panel to fit on the pod. Removed, and fit and riveted nut plates in the pod to allow permanent attachment of the instrument panel later.
Fit instrument panel pod to fueselage. Got in place, drilled, clecoed and marked location.
Removed pod.
Fabricated angle brackets for the lower attachment points of the pod. Glued to fuselage with 5 minute epoxy then laid up two layers of fiberglass with 12 hour epoxy and left to cure overnight.

Bill

Day 5

noreply@blogger.com (Bill) — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 23:56:00 +0000

There's light at the end of the tunnel. Today I got the oil inspection door fit and riveted to the cowling before flipping the plane and hanging the engine. Once the engine was fitted (and so much easier than a Lycoming I must say) it provided the necessary reference points via the spinner backplate to mount the cowling.

Fitting the cowling to the fuselage was the same thing many times: Get it as close to centered as possible, drill one hole and cleco that and determine what part of the cowling has to be trimmed to fit against the fuselage. Take the cowling off, trim it, put it back, drill another hole, cleco it, mark the cowling, take it off...lather, rinse, repeat. It went on and came off 4 or 5 times before it finally fit correctly and then it was drilled and clecoed all the way around. It felt awesome to see the cowling on the airplane!

And as soon as it was on the plane, I could measure to make the location for various inlet templates and make 3 cutouts on the cowling. And then the cowl came back off to bond the inside part of the inlet scoops.

All the bonding was done at the end of the day, which is apparently how they do it at the build center. Much of the day is work in preparation for the evening fiberglass layups, and this day was no different. At the end of the day we bonded the internal parts of the cowling, fairings over the horizontal stabilizer, put a layup over the rivets on the oil inspection door, etc.

Then we cleaned up and I started getting my things together to leave. Nick agreed to let me have a little going-away present which he was kind enough to cut in half so I could throw in my truck for the drive home. It is going to be my Lightning Simulator, and I'll make some updates about that as I go along.

I'm planning to be back in Shelbyville November 17th, and my plane should be out of the paint shop and ready for week 2 of the build. Pictures from Day 5 and the Lightning Simulator are on the Pictures page.

Day 4

noreply@blogger.com (Bill) — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 02:16:00 +0000

Another 7am start, and I'm immediately at work on the elevator. I started by cutting off parts of the elevator, and bonding those to the horizontal stabilizer. Then I started working on fitting the cowl pieces together. I used the firewall template to help hold it in shape while working on it, and before long it was trimmed to proper size and clecoed together. Then there was all sorts of miscellaneous stuff that got done: Landing gear leg cutouts, firewall and motor mount installed, and other stuff I'm sure I've already forgotten.

Tomorrow morning, we should be able to flip the plane over and hang the motor on the mount. By the end of the day, it should look like an airplane, with wings, landing gear, motor, etc.

It won't be quite finished when I head out. Nick generously agreed to mount my wing tips with piano hinge, so I won't have ugly screws showing, and there was a problem with my rudder that will require a replacement rudder. Other than that, the airframe should be ready for paint when I leave. What a week.

Cowl all fastened together with the plywood former as a brace to help hold it in shape. Lots of fiberglass dust on the table there!

The horizontal stabilizer halves after I had bonded the pieces from the elevators to them.

Motor mount in place.

Cutting 1/4" off the horizontal stabilizer skin to allow full travel of the elevator.

Fitting foam plugs into the elevator.

Final glassing of the tips on the horizontal stabilizer, which is back on the plane at the end of the day.

End of day pic. Doing all fiberglass layups that need to cure overnight at the very end of the day.

Bill

Day 3

noreply@blogger.com (Bill) — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 02:43:00 +0000

Each day seems to get just a little longer. I shaved lunch down to about 30 minutes today, and was at the hangar from 7:00 until 5:30. Tons of work on the elevator. Building a trim tab from scratch, cutting the hinge to size, drilling all the holes on the hinge...and the tab...and the elevator...and deburring...and...and...and.

Mike and Mark do an awesome job. Not only are they working on the tasks they've taken, they're constantly ensuring a steady flow of work for me. There are so many times that I would look at the manual, scratch my head, and not know where to start. One of the guys takes a look over my shoulder, grabs a few tools, lays them out, and then starts a sentence that usually begins with "What you need to do is..."

As a result, the only downtime is the occasional break to visit and get to know the Arion gang a little better. I couldn't ask for a more enjoyable experience, both the airplane and the company while working.

So, today in a nutshell: Almost finished the stabilizer/elevator section (just a bit of bonding for tomorrow) brake cylinders installed, firewall worked on, wing fairings laid up. And Nick has told me that he is going to supervise the installation of my wingtips with piano hinge to completely hide the attachment, yet allow easily removable tips. When he comes out with short tips that integrate the same winglet design as the long tips, I hope to be the first to fit them up and report the results.

If the rudder cable hardware arrives tomorrow (fingers crossed) then I hope to get the firewall closed off. If we get that done, and finish the control surfaces, we should be able to flip the plane and do fairing work on the top half and hang the engine! Two more days, and my elbow is holding up fine!

Here are a few pictures of today's progress.

Me putting two layers of fiberglass on my elevator trim servo cover.

The front of the plane, showing the adjustable rudder pedals... that will all be covered once I get the firewall on.

The glass layups to cover the gap at the wing root. It will be faired in and smoothed before painting.

Bill

Day 2

noreply@blogger.com (Bill) — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 03:30:00 +0000

Another 7:01am start, except this time there are no introductions. Mark and Mike are already in the hangar getting out tools and setting up for the day's work. I didn't really get to take any pictures today, but we did accomplish the following:

Left and right flaps mounted
Left and right ailerons mounted
Rudder pedals installed (easier where there is no firewall in the way!)
Elevators hinged, and trim tab started

I finally got to fly the Lightning demo plane today, and it was very nice. The Jabiru engine starts up immediately, runs smooth on the ground and is electric-motor smooth in flight. It was a short flight, but I can tell I'm going to love the plane. It was the first time I had flown the Lightning, having committed to building a plane I had never flown, sat in, or even seen in person.

I'm sure glad I liked it because it is a little late to change my mind!

Tomorrow I think we will get the engine hung, and by Friday morning, the plane should be rightside up again on its landing gear.

Bill

Day 1 - Getting Started

noreply@blogger.com (Bill) — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 02:21:00 +0000

The realization really sunk in on the drive from my hotel to the Lightning hangar, about 20 miles away: I'm building an airplane! Not someday, not eventually, but today! In fact, 7:00am this morning but I underestimated the traffic and arrived 1 minute late. :)

Mark welcomed me to the office, and in less than 5 minutes I was out in the hangar, looking at the fuselage for my Lightning. Apparently Lightning subscribed to the theory that the best way to prevent self-doubt it to not leave any time to consider it, because within another minute Mark had introduced me to Mike, and Mike immediately started showing me how the wing root template would be attached to beging drilling holes and making cutouts for the wing spars to pass through the fuselage.

At that point a more or less continous effort began:
The cutouts for the wing spars were made on the fuselage
Spar box was mounted in the fuselage
Mounting brackes for horizontal stabilizer were attached
Horizontal stabilizer was attached
Wings were mounted
Stainless steel firewall was cut out based on template and fitted to front of fuselage
Hinge brackes for rudder were mounted
And the rudder pedals had just been assembled with Mark let me know it was closing time.

Wow! 9 hours of work, with an hour break for lunch. 10 hours passed in what felt like 3 or 4, but at the end of the day there isn't just a fuselage on the floor with nothing attached. At the end of day one it already looks suspicously like an airplane!

I can only imagine what tomorrow will be like, but continuing at this pace should produce an airframe in a week. My new rule on how to build an airplane: Start...and just don't stop.

Bill

Day 0 - Heading to Tennessee

noreply@blogger.com (Bill) — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 03:41:00 +0000

(Becky posting for Bill)

Bill loaded up and left Plano about 10:30am, heading for Shelbyville, TN.

After a long day of driving, he arrived about 9:30pm Central Time. As you can see from the picture, he's still wearing a compression sleeve on his elbow, but it seems to be healing. His anti-inflammatory medication makes him incredibly sick, so he's trying to take it at night so as not to interfere with his build days.

Tomorrow is Day 1. Hopefully pictures and video will be coming soon!