“Phase 1” is the testing phase. For a certain number of hours (40 in our case) after certification, the airplane is restricted: can go only 50 nm from the home airport, no passengers, daytime only, VFR only, and no flying …
It’s been a really wet spring, so haven’t done as much flying as I’d like (have I complained about that before?). The weather is starting to get better, though. Sunset is after 8 p.m. now, so plenty of time to …
It’s been almost two weeks since the last flight. The last one was a good one, though, flying over Arlington for a while, then heading up to Skagit and back. I’m slowly getting more comfortable venturing away from the home …
It’s now been two weeks since our first flight. We now have 8 flights and 5.3 hours on the airplane. The temperatures and oil consumption have stabilized, so I think the engine is pretty much broken in. The erratic RPM …
Thanks to Chad Hankins (RV-7) for letting me borrow his GoPro Hero HD camera. I mounted it to the door strut attachment bolt on the right door, which worked okay. Here’s a video of the takeoff and landing. …
There were a few things that needed fixing after the first flight:
- Idle mixture was still to rich
- One of the oil cooler fittings was leaking a little (I really dislike tapered pipe fittings on airplanes)
- Prop governor needed to
After three years, six months, and one week, our RV-10 finally had its first flight on Saturday! Rob took off from runway 34L at Paine Field, climbed to 3000 feet, circled the airport for 15 minutes, then landed uneventfully. Despite …
Paine Field, 1 p.m. Thursday.
After getting the inspection done, we needed to reinstall all the cover panels, the interior, seats and cowl. That took much longer than I’d thought. Then I noticed the nosewheel valve stem had been damaged …
Today we had the official airworthiness inspection, and we passed, so our project is now officially an airplane. Here are a few pictures.
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Before the inspection, it’s required to weigh the plane to, well, know how much it weighs, so you know how much stuff it can carry. Additionally, it’s important to know where the center of gravity is, because after adding people, …