Scudrunners

Homebuilts have entered some weird twilight zone between
true experimental and factory-built aircraft. A good example
of this is

https://www.vansaircraft.com/service-in ... revisions/

That sure looks like a certified aircraft manufacturer, doesn't it?

Not sure why people expect solid engineering from a homebuilt
kit maker. Not to pick on Murphy, but I remember the guys at the
airport hanging O-320's on the front of their Rebels and the firewall
collapsing at the top, so they stuck a bracer bar between the
engine mounts at the top of the firewall. And they were sticking
doublers in the tail. That's ok, but remember, when you make
something strong, you're merely transferring the load elsewhere.

Oh yeah, Murphy Rebels. I remember they had the weirdest stall
behaviour. I'm no aerodynamic engineer, but I wrote an article
about it, identifying the problem and one fix. People still email
me about it, many years later. That's what homebuilts are like.

The point is that homebuilts are CAVEAT EMPTOR. People liked
to pull the wings off RV's, I remember. Andy Philips fluttered his
rudder. Looked like someone put a stick of dynamite inside it.

That's what life (and death) is like with homebuilts. Certified
aircraft, they are most certainly NOT. Ask Steve Wittman, who
knew more about homebuilts than almost anyone. And no, he
wasn't killed by the B-52, ok?

I had a flight engineer/AME who was also an aeroplane geek, owning several of his own. I'm sure the Colonel knew him or at least knew of him since he was working out of a small private strip on the 401 close to the PQ border but in Ontario. Hank was always helping and even buying up other people's mistakes when trying to build their aircraft. He had a fly baby that was so twisted and flew weird and remember him mentioning on several occasions so of the high class work he would fix so wings and stuff would not fall off some of these aircraft. He took it in stride but it always gave me goose bumps.

He was a damn fine engineer, little grumpy at times but what can you expect from a Dutchman -- lol -- he is dearly missed.

"If you're not Dutch, you're not much"

I think I know that guy. Enough time has passed, and enough people have
died, that I can mention that I know of a really nice homebuilt Cub that
the new owner was getting some dual on - NOT FROM ME. Groundlooped.

Spar broken, fabric wrinkled on wing. Fabric wrinkled on twisted fuselage.

The homebuilt was then FLOWN with that structural damage to your friend
for rebuild. Fucking insane.

I think there was more than one F/E from first air hanging around smith's falls Hank was an interesting guy and somewhat of a bumpy past (the drink but sorted that out) but as an engineer I had no issues with him, was with me on the 72 and the herc and bailed me out several times with repairs in the field with never a thought of not fixing regardless of the wx . He also was very involved in the recovery of the 76 in gimli but a real dutchman -- can you spell cheep -- I can remember him arguing with a waiter because he only got 5 potato wedges instead of 6 -- we do run into real characters in this industry.