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Never flew it stock

So how did the plane behave before you installed the modified bell cranks or did you not fly it with the old f7's?Knowing would be a helpfull reference to know what/where to start checking.

Wheeeee!!!!

Sorry you had to do lazy 8s to look at the pictures.

Thanks guys for the feedback, and Paul I did get the info on the Posa . For now we'll continue with plan A and see what we come up with. Thanks. Jack

Beautiful area. It must be nice to be in the warmer climate where you don't feel like things are going to fall off due to frostbite if you go outside this time of year!

Nice pictures.

very nice !! looks warm

I like colors that are not found in nature in the area where you mostly fly - Purple and Yellow work in some areas - and then I think of Aspen leaves in the fall, and those huge fields of something purple and something (cannola?) yellow I saw in Canada.  But who would be so lucky to land in a big purple/yellow field anyway?

 At least some dark color trim will stand out in the sky.

After flying for 11 years in Search and Rescue, I can say that no matter what color you go with, that will be the predominate color of the large pieces of trash that the search pilots will see.  I could not believe how many turquoise couches, chairs, washing machines and cars we saw while looking for a plane that color.

EDMO

You do know, you want to use white as a base coat for most colors, , especially yellow,ask Paul seahaufer

I  like the white and black ,with out the purple ,we have mooney on our field that color and on of the classiest ones ive seen. note (I honestly don't think classiest is a word)

Awesome.

Flew to a local strip today and did a hike.

Part way thru my hike

One of the most visible planes I have ever seen from the ground or from the air, was a solid black MU2.  But in this Midwest heat, without air-conditioning, I just cant see painting mine black.   White is cool.  In Alaska, black with red tips and stripes is great, IMO

You sure as heck don't want any natural colors, or camo, unless you are hiding from the law - makes it hard to spot if you ever need help.

Anything that makes you smile is good.  Better yet, is anything that your wife likes - that is worth $$$ to you!

EDMO

What were those people thinking with the piper!? I agree with not going too crazy, but you have to realize with my background and a lot of free time on my hands I don't see this as being a big project either. I did play with it more and simplified the side of it. When done it should keep it looking longer as well. Obviously I'm just playing with a picture and who knows what the plane will look like in person. That will be more of a deciding factor than anything. If that's a beige I'd be surprised, since the interior and everything else looks brown to me too. Guess I'll see in a couple weeks!

Even IF I do this I won't repaint the entire plane, just the areas with new. I figure it will have to be recovered in a couple years so I'll get more fancy with it then.

On the other side, I'm working on getting back into school for my A&P so I might be able to use the plane to "experiment" on!

Lights are not a major change - Standard EAA oplims include something like "eligible for night flight when properly equipped, per FAR-----".  I believe with the new oplims by EAA, a major change is just a logbook entry, and W/B if significant change there.

Night flight includes other equipment too -

You could have a starter and battery - but no generator - but why?  So you can cross TCA control zones without a transponder?

EDMO

I know where there is a PA-12 set up that way - he gets away with having "no electrical system".

EDMO

Do what you want!  But you asked, so...

Actually I'm kinda taken by the paint job John has on it.  Simple and elegant.  I thought it was beige? 

Personally, I think the zig-zag makes it look shorter, and the length is one of the Pursang's strong points.  I would stay with a pattern that accentuates the length.

Here's a good one too if you run out of ideas...

To me, there's something to be said about the KISS (keep is simple, stupid) method as far as painting goes.  This is what I'm working on for my project Kitfox IV...

I'm honestly not a big yellow fan, but I want the visibility.   The grey with red accent is a nod to a Chevy Blazer I had, years ago...

I know I'm getting ahead of myself but since I'm waiting to pick up the new (to me) Avid, I'm working on a couple ideas for repainting. I honestly don't know what shape the paint is in but John lead me to believe it wasn't great. I also really don't like straight white and really dislike brown. Which is the only color he has on the plane currently. The panel will be treated with a carbon fiber look and maybe spruce up the interior but the exterior is what others see more often!

Here are a couple bad photoshop ideas I had for colors and a design. Wish I had a better program to do a decent job with it, but this at least lets me see something before I paint.

Let me know what you think, and which color combo you like better. I'll probably post up more if I get into another one soon too.

Lights are not required for daytime VFR.  I'm sure you could add them later.  If it's a major change to the aircraft, (probably not), you have to notify the nearest FSDO and go back into phase one flight testing.  Your operating limitations issued by the DAR will spell out what you have to do for a major change.  Jim Chuk

Do the FAR allow VFR day flying with no electrical system, and therefore no anticollision lighting?  If you get your E-AB airworthiness without an electrical system, can you add one later?

Cons of no electrical system are obvious - no night, no engine monitors and other toys, hand propping...

but... there's something to be said for simplicity.  If it ain't there, it costs nothing, weighs nothing and never fails, I think someone on here said that once.  And it's faster to build!

Mark

I had a lengthy discussion with Steve Winder about this subject one time, and his suggestion was strap a straight stick tightly to the bottom of each flaperon pointing back perpendicular to the flaperons.  Close to the fuselage, equal distance from the plane.  Sticks should reach back 18" to 24" behind the flaperon.  Put a mark on each stick same distance back of flaperon.   With plane level, and if floor was flat, and if the flaperons were adjusted properly, when you put the joystick all the way to the left and all the way to the right, you should have the same dimentions up and down from the marks on the sticks to the floor.  That would tell you that each flaperon was going up and down the same amount.   The main reason to put the sticks on the flaperons, is it will give larger differences to measure to than if you measured off the back of the flaperons themselves.  If your measurements are different, then you have to adjust till they are as close a possible.   My Avids had a tendency to be left wing heavy also that was helped by pulling in a bit of flaps.  Hope my explanation made sense.  To hold the joysticks in place, I cut a 1X2 that wedged tight between tubes on bottom of door openings and clamped or wired the joystick to the 1X2  Jim Chuk

I installed my F7A's per the manual on my plane but other than that I didn't mess with any of the controls during the restoration of my plane. I leveled my plane and set them using my warp drive protractor but I've NEVER been happy with my rigging since day one I just got sick of messing with it and been flying it ever since. It rolls to the left but what's weird is if I pull on just a little bit of flap it isn't nearly as bad. I think I rigged them with about 5 degrees reflex. I need all the nose up I can get due to a forward CG. What really has me perplexed is it's not just a roll it's almost more of a yaw which leads me to believe to I'm getting differential flaperon when I put my flaps full up. Because it's not just a straight roll I don't want to monkey too much with my left rod end till I'm confident my flaperons are good.

I was around another guys plane today and he had a nice detent type feeling when the flaps were full up. Mine doesn't do that I have to keep the flap bolt really tight to keep them from creeping on.

How have you guys done your rigging? I have a nice digital angle finder now and I want to start over from scratch and totally redo them.

1. How did you lock the stick in place so your not fighting them moving back and forth?

2. Angle finder on the bottom of the flaperons since it's flat? How to attach it so it's accurate?

3. How far out from the inboard edge of the wing did you take your measurements?

4. The flaps linkage has two adjustable rods. From what I can tell it looks like all that really does it adjust where your flap handle travel limits are. I'm wondering why right at the end of my travel with flaps up I get that yaw.

I've attached some pics of my mixer and my flap handle position. If you see anything that looks different from your set up PLEASE let me know. I want to make sure everything is good before I start over.

Mixer...

Flap Handle position with flaps full up

Rod end on the end of the flap handle. Notice how it doesn't really line up. Looks like it's been tweaked to me. The paint missing is from the last set of bungees I had it was rubbing on the metal piece that holds the bungee loop.

Thoughts??

Valley Engineering builds a redrive for the VW's. If you're looking. I don't know much about them other than I checked into their ultralight engine a few years ago.

Paul,

     I was thinking that Revmaster, or one of the major VW makers, had a redrive listed in the Kitplanes engine buyers guide.

I don't know that much about who is making them.  I did read some about doubling torque and slowing down prop so you could swing a larger prop and get STOL performance out of them.

EDMO

I have over 200 trouble free hours behind an aircooled VW 1600. I don't have an oil cooler and used to fly it in Phoenix even when the temps were over 115 degrees outside. Never had a problem with it cooling. The cool tins that cover the lower part of the cylinders and some type of well made shroud (much like an older Piper cub) will work wonders on these engines. You can not fly them with these or they will overheat. Just stick the heads and cylinders out in the air and they cool wonderfully.

I can't vouch for what they'll do when you cover them up with a pretty cowling though. My plane isn't big enough to have such a critter mounted on the front of it. The engine is the widest part of the cockpit and fuselage.