Original Posted By: "Jack Philips"
Welcome Travis!Looks like a nice engine; seems like someone care of it. My firstsuggestion is you skip that "other" fly-in and go to Brodhead instead, muchmore interesting. (kidding. Kinda.)I have always thought it was good advise to start work on the tail feathersto kind of get the hang of reading the plans, working with wood and somemetal without a huge investment in resources, space or time. You could evencover them and use them for daydreaming fodder to keep you going through therest of the project.You will undoubtedly here this a lot, but it is true. 1. Build to theplans; don't change or add a lot of stuff 2. Keep it light. Built toplans it is a very light plane, but we usually keep adding this and that andbefore you know it. there's a big performance difference between a light A65piet and a heavy one. 3. Get the bingilis books from EAA 4. Touch theproject every day if at all possible 5. Think of it as a series of smallerbuilding projects rather than one big project and you'll enjoy a great senseof accomplishment each time you finish something significant and you're thatmuch closer. 6. Ask questions and don't ever let stupid answers or rudepeople stop you from asking, just ignore them. We're mostly pretty friendly,but as in all gatherings of human beings there are some that are nicer thanothers. Just ignore those.$.02Douwe________________________________________________________________________________
Pietenpol-List: welcome
RE: Pietenpol-List: welcome
Original Posted By: owner-pietenpol-list-server(at)matronics.com
SHUT UP, DOUWE!!Just kidding. Douwe's right. Do everything you can to keep it light.Douwe and I have the honor of having two of the heaviest Piets around. Hehas 85 or 90 horsepower, I just have 65 and mine is a pretty slow-climbingairplane. On a short runway with trees at the end every takeoff is a botanystudy.One thing I differ with Douwe on is where to start. I think the tail piecesare some of the most difficult parts to understand the drawings (and I'm acareer design engineer, so am used to reading blueprints). I think buildingthe wing ribs is the most practical place to start. All 30 ribs just makesa stack 15" high so they are easy to store, and if you have room to stringthem along the spars they obviously look like a wing so your visitors don'thave to ask what it is you're building. The tail pieces could just as wellbe lawn furniture until they are put together.But it really doesn't matter, as long as you start somewhere. One of thehardest things to do on a project of this magnitude is to pull the triggerand get started making sawdust.One other bit of advice - never hesitate to throw out a part that you arenot satisfied with. I ended up building about one and a half Pietenpols,what with all the scrap parts I generated. I don't think I was unusual inthis.One more thing. Never get in a hurry to finish. Enjoy the buildingprocess. You will likely find once you're done that you need to buildanother airplane project. I know Gary Boothe is doing so, building aBoredom Fighter. Dan Helsper is now building a Wittman Tailwind (as isChuck Gantzer). Kevin Purtee is rebuilding his Pietenpol and building aFlitzer. I'm about 8 years into a three year build of an RV-10. Buildingairplanes is themost enjoyable pastime I've ever found. It's almost as muchfun as flying them.Jack PhillipsNX899JPSmith Mountain Lake, Virginia
SHUT UP, DOUWE!!Just kidding. Douwe's right. Do everything you can to keep it light.Douwe and I have the honor of having two of the heaviest Piets around. Hehas 85 or 90 horsepower, I just have 65 and mine is a pretty slow-climbingairplane. On a short runway with trees at the end every takeoff is a botanystudy.One thing I differ with Douwe on is where to start. I think the tail piecesare some of the most difficult parts to understand the drawings (and I'm acareer design engineer, so am used to reading blueprints). I think buildingthe wing ribs is the most practical place to start. All 30 ribs just makesa stack 15" high so they are easy to store, and if you have room to stringthem along the spars they obviously look like a wing so your visitors don'thave to ask what it is you're building. The tail pieces could just as wellbe lawn furniture until they are put together.But it really doesn't matter, as long as you start somewhere. One of thehardest things to do on a project of this magnitude is to pull the triggerand get started making sawdust.One other bit of advice - never hesitate to throw out a part that you arenot satisfied with. I ended up building about one and a half Pietenpols,what with all the scrap parts I generated. I don't think I was unusual inthis.One more thing. Never get in a hurry to finish. Enjoy the buildingprocess. You will likely find once you're done that you need to buildanother airplane project. I know Gary Boothe is doing so, building aBoredom Fighter. Dan Helsper is now building a Wittman Tailwind (as isChuck Gantzer). Kevin Purtee is rebuilding his Pietenpol and building aFlitzer. I'm about 8 years into a three year build of an RV-10. Buildingairplanes is themost enjoyable pastime I've ever found. It's almost as muchfun as flying them.Jack PhillipsNX899JPSmith Mountain Lake, Virginia
RE: Pietenpol-List: welcome
Original Posted By: Ray Krause
Hi Travis,Welcome to the Pietenpol list. Having your engine already is a BIG deal and I'm so glad you have a good Continental A-65 in hand. I have flown my Piet many yearswith the A-65 and it is a good, honest engine.The one thing I found is that when I didn't know how to do a part of the airplane I looked it up in the Bingelis books in the index. Like AN hardware. Hmmm....it was likea new foreign language to me. Tony explains it all. He takes the mystery out of how to make a strong, light-weight cowling. He tells you HOW to install that AN hardwaretoo and where certain pieces are not allowed like elastic stop nuts should not go in the engine compartment. I wouldn't have known that had I not read his books.Also, if you think a part is going to take you a week it will likely take you 2 weeks. Everything took me twice as long as I had hoped or predicted it would take me so don't getdown on yourself for not being Speedy Gonzales.The basic design of the Pietenpol has been flying well for more than 80 years now so if you really want to change something or modify something chances are good it would havebeen fine without any fussing but we as homebuilders in this country have the privilege (dangerous though it can be sometimes) of coming up with our own ideas and trying themon our planes---after all, we are (usually) the test pilot when it is built.On my plane I made some cosmetic changes like I raised the height of the turtledeck and instrument panels by 1" to give a more rounded look. I added belly stringers to give the fuselagea more rounded look.One thing that is quite tedious is getting bolts into wing and fuselage landing gear/strut fittings if you don't make those fittings a little longer to stick thru the fabric a bit more than the plans show.Pietenpol cut everything to the smallest part size he could but in these special areas you want to make sure you make your metal fittings to stick out thru the fabric enough to get a bolt thru and haveroom to spin an nut or put a washer on with a cotter pin.Keep an open mind---there are some Piet folks who have strong opinions on various aspects of the plane......but we just bury them out back behind the wood pile after Uncle Guido takes care of them!Mike CuyOhio________________________________________________________________________________
Hi Travis,Welcome to the Pietenpol list. Having your engine already is a BIG deal and I'm so glad you have a good Continental A-65 in hand. I have flown my Piet many yearswith the A-65 and it is a good, honest engine.The one thing I found is that when I didn't know how to do a part of the airplane I looked it up in the Bingelis books in the index. Like AN hardware. Hmmm....it was likea new foreign language to me. Tony explains it all. He takes the mystery out of how to make a strong, light-weight cowling. He tells you HOW to install that AN hardwaretoo and where certain pieces are not allowed like elastic stop nuts should not go in the engine compartment. I wouldn't have known that had I not read his books.Also, if you think a part is going to take you a week it will likely take you 2 weeks. Everything took me twice as long as I had hoped or predicted it would take me so don't getdown on yourself for not being Speedy Gonzales.The basic design of the Pietenpol has been flying well for more than 80 years now so if you really want to change something or modify something chances are good it would havebeen fine without any fussing but we as homebuilders in this country have the privilege (dangerous though it can be sometimes) of coming up with our own ideas and trying themon our planes---after all, we are (usually) the test pilot when it is built.On my plane I made some cosmetic changes like I raised the height of the turtledeck and instrument panels by 1" to give a more rounded look. I added belly stringers to give the fuselagea more rounded look.One thing that is quite tedious is getting bolts into wing and fuselage landing gear/strut fittings if you don't make those fittings a little longer to stick thru the fabric a bit more than the plans show.Pietenpol cut everything to the smallest part size he could but in these special areas you want to make sure you make your metal fittings to stick out thru the fabric enough to get a bolt thru and haveroom to spin an nut or put a washer on with a cotter pin.Keep an open mind---there are some Piet folks who have strong opinions on various aspects of the plane......but we just bury them out back behind the wood pile after Uncle Guido takes care of them!Mike CuyOhio________________________________________________________________________________