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Don't know what his prices are now, but when I got my Jabiru cowl from him through Avid which them must have made something off of, I paid $450 plus shipping.  That was about half or less of what Jabiru wanted.  Jim Chuk

Leni, Joey,

     Is there any way to make your last post stay lit up for a while until everyone has a chance to contribute for

this year?  We are just now into the 2nd week of Jan.

EdMO

yes Cessnas make you lazy in turns - unless you have a commercial flight instructor giving you the worst ass-chewing you ever got for taking your feet off of the pedals for a while in gusty winds on a cross country flight!  I KNOW! 

EDMO

No engine performs in the Lower Midwest or Southern states like they do in the cold air - Pilots here don't have skis because we don't get enough snow usually, and they don't go to the airport if it is below 40F, unless they are trying to finish their commercial training, like I did.

I am seriously hoping that the 4 inch leading edge extension and bigger tailfeathers will do the job that the stretch does.

I could have done the stretch, but didn't feel like I needed a longer nose-dragger that would take more space to store - and I drag the skid off of the tails enough already!

BTW:  If anyone has not heard of Mike Jacober, or Artic Sparrow,  he used his carb adjustment to set altitude records in thos funny looking triangle wing thingys with a 2-cycle engine on them - (weight shift powered somethings?) and I believe he even went over Denali (Mt. Mc Kinley) 20,000+ feet in one!

He made them and also had a Rotax repair shop in Birchwood, Alaska.

Sad part was, that he also died while flying one at low altitude in Alaska.

EDMO

Funny part is - They were bringing my friend's Luscombe back and contracting for the insurance company who had just paid out about $25K to restore it after he hit a hole in the air on landing and drove the gear up to the roof!

BTW: He is mad as hell - this was a first prize winner at Osh - and he is a perfectionist, and said the plane now looks like crap!

I think he now has photos and ready to raise hell with somebody!

EDMO

The fuselage stretch makes all the difference in the world in regard to heavy motors and Avids.

The original design basically gave you twice as much DOWN flaperon as it does UP flapperon... inducing a good bit of adverse yaw.  The new arms give you more up than down and do away with most of the adverse yaw, however, there is still some.  I flew the KF II for 300 hrs before putting them on my avid and I really cant say that it was a life changing mod.  You still have to use your feet and I always lead with rudder going into and out of turns.  The Avids and KF line are still largely rudder dependent planes.  I could fly all day and land without flaperons, but your damn sure not gonna do it without rudder.

I forgot how much more rudder dependent the avids were till I started flying the 180 this fall and I got a wake up on my foot work.. Cessnas make ya lazy

I was wondering about the cowl too ,I like how rounded it looks. so what cowling is it?

Also, I was DEFFINATELY in the camp that the subie was NOT the engine for the Avid airframe.  Light is the way to go... well, after flying a good bit with Randy, using the same damn wing I have, its pretty impressive to me how his "pig" performs.  If you can put a subie in a normal airframe and get the W&B OK by just moving the battery to the tail, I would say go for it.  Randy only has to carry half the fuel I do for any given mission and his plane performs just as well as mine and he kicks my ass in cruise now.

With all this said..... We are flying at lower temps than a lot of you guys do and at lower altitudes and I feel that plays a HUGE roll in the performance we are seeing from our planes up here.  Cold air at sea level makes for a good performing plane, and I would not expect a Subie powered plane at 80 degrees and 7-8000' DA perform remotely close to how Randy's plane flys.  But he made a believer outta me up here or at lower DA's

Ken,

     My friend at Artic Sparrow in Birchwood, Alaska, designed a system like the Hacman - Akflyer is using one, I think - and I don't know if there are differences in the two systems, or the costs, or if one is better than the other.

Mike died a few years ago, and I don't know if they are still available.  Leni should know.

EDMO

When Mike died the Arctic Sparrow In Flight was taken over by one of his instructors (Bud Gisham) but when I asked him about them a couple years ago he said he was not making them anymore.  There are a few sets floating around I have seen where people had them for sale, but if you break a cable, or a needle gets worn, your back to square one and putting stock barrels back in your carb.  If anything happens to mine I will be going to the hacman system.

hopefully the plane was insured and the insurance pays for the recovery.. which in turn is passed on to anyone who has insurance, or is trying to get it.

It may have cost them contracts, or even some problems with the Father of American Aviation department - they were CFIs too.

And who pays for the recovery of that wreck - the taxpayers (NTSB) or them?

EDMO

I am going to speak with him on the cost of the tooling?? will see what happens, boat builders are not light sport aircraft builders, also i am sure my costs will be far less then his.

Awesome find!  Thanks for sniffing this guy out and posting it up!  I can think of a ton of glass parts that we can use and hopefully be cheaper to buy than take the time to make!  At least we now have a source to get sticker shock from anyways

I think I have updated the guys who sent a donation, you don't know how much that is appreciated.  As Ed pointed out this site used to be cheap.. to the tune of around 6 bucks a month, but thanks to hackers, and their back door use of the band width, I had to step up to a dedicated server etc to the tune of around 100 a month, plus pay someone from 50-250 bucks to restore the site and clean it up after every hacker attack (there has been 3 of them in the last year) so needless to say, at times I was just about ready to toss in the towel and just let the site fall to the wayside.  Through your donations, it gives me enough incentive to keep dealing with the punk kids or the stoned worthless middle aged guys that cant get a date who just sit in their parents basement in their underwear getting off on hacking sites... OK, maybe the last one was a bit graphic, but that was edited from the original version prior to me hitting the post button

One last thing, if you do send a donation, please include your user name as it makes it easier for me to figure out who I need to turn green and list as a contributing member!

ok, this is the last thing... we even have some guys who don't own an Avid or a Kitfox hanging out here and making donations.  Way to step up guys, thats awesome!  I will try and get a forum up for you guys to post to.. maybe a catch all "any other type plane" thread that you can post in so we can see your projects, or maybe help out with an issue.  Most of us on here have been around aviation for awhile and have worked on or flown many different planes so perhaps we would have a former type owner who can answer your questions and help out.

      < a huge chug to those who help keep the lights on!

ahhh.. or in my case youth and big brass commercial fisherman balls got me into some weather shit I had no right to live through... it is amazing to me today that I have the ability to say no, I am going to hang here another night versus pushing the weather as I have in the past.. Damnitall, does that mean I am getting old, now that would just piss me right off if I was

At any rate, I am glad to hear they both made it out and are still able to fog up a mirror held under their nose   Too bad it cost a plane to learn that lesson.

grab some gasket material and make your own.  Napa has tons of various thicknesses.  If I remember right, the gasket is about 1/8" thick overall, so if they have some 1/16" thick material you can make a ring on each side and be good to go.

http://www.avidfoxflyers.com/index.php?/forum/10-avid-model-iv/

This is a link to the MK IV specific area.  You can post it in there.  Like Larry said, I / we dont holler at ya for posting to the wrong section around here, but we may horse whip ya a bit      

This is where you can ask "Where do I ask?".  

As you look at the forum home page (link to home page), half way down is the "Avid Flyer General Hangar".  There is a sub section titled with the misname of "Avid Model IV".  This would be a good section to post your comments and questions specifically to your "Avid Mark IV Heavy hauler" airplane.

The other sections listed on the home page have a little description to what each section is all about.

You will not ever be punished or hollered at here for posting something in the wrong place.  (Unlike some other forums….)  SO-- just post away and if something needs to be moved, it will be eventually.  Or maybe not.  

I am new to the forum and I have questions I would like to see if the members could answer. I am building an Avid Mark IV Heavy Hauler. Is this where I post the questions?

Jon

Great lead, Chris!!

Joey--  Move that post to the Avid resource forum?

Hello again!

Spoke with Ron Smith at AllPro. Interesting guy and interesting story. He has fiberglass molds for a TON of Avid stuff and is willing to make one offs of anything for us. He ended up with the molds as "payment" for bad debt from Tomash and they are his now. He was dealing Jerry Madison (the previous owner of Avid) before Brett and later Brett, but that has ceased too since Brett dropped out.

So he is willing to make parts. He is sending me photos of what I HOPE is a cowl that will work for the Fat Avid.

Some of the Avid molds he has:

different Spinners

different Wheel pants

different instrument and dash board tops

All Magnum fiberglass molds from cowl to bottom to floor pans etc

MKIV cowl

Jab cowl

Early Avid bullet cowl

The big one piece "mystery" cowl with two faceplates (probably for different engines) that I am hoping is the one I need (Update this is the Airdale flyer cowl Ron thinks. Ron is checking with Jerry Madison.)

Ultralight cowl

Various wingtip molds

etc.

He said it is OK for any of us to call and see if he has the mold for what we need and he will work out a price to make it. He is "in business" not marginally in business and has little patience for companies that do not deliver. I got a GREAT feeling from him.

His email is: RonAllPro@yahoo.com

His Phone is: 406-388-3099

Just guessing from memory, but the thermostat is only about 1 1/4" in diameter.  Jim Chuk

Bingo! I may have hit the jackpot. Ron Smith from All Pro Composites in Belgrade Mt. called me back and left a message. He has the molds for several different Avid Cowls. He said to call back and we could try and figure out what was what and if he could make what I need. Bottom line I wanted to get this documented even if he doesn't have the Fat Avid cowl so others might benefit. His Phone is 406-388-3099. I will post back again when I find out more!

Thank you Jim Chuk!

Best Guess - Save money instead of getting Motel for the night?  Had another contract waiting in Texas?

Sometimes, age and experience can lead to bad judgement and overconfidence......

EDMO