Introducing the Open-EZ Tandem, a 2-place tandem canard

[JLKnolla]

Because I like to put the cart before the horse sometimes, below is my first pass for an Open-EZ with a few modifications (some obvious some not), including Tony's long nose and a 3" increase in cockpit width at pilots seat bulkhead, a canopy mod (fixed windshield for birdstrike, still side hinged), downdraft cooling, a 6" prop extension, MT-7 prop, and retracts.

 

Bob mentioned having a fighter, and so my first paint scheme is a tribute to VF-1 Wolfpack.

 

Enjoy!!

 

John - Open-EZ Thinker

 

[JLKnolla]

The attached is a comparo side view of a stock Long-EZ and then an Open-EZ with a 15" stretch on the nose (similar to Tony's). I also changed the canopy line and added a windshield as I said above. These are not full-on CAD drawings, just full-size basic views like I generate for our spray masks and graphics.

 

Enjoy!!

 

John - Open-EZ Thinker

 

[Cozy Girrrl]

John,

A few things: Mike & Dick were able to build quickly because they had done it all before, no doubt a few times, you then "just know what to do" and the head scratching phase is not involved unless you have some medical condition that necessatates it =) Good example it took Randi and I 2 weeks to build the first wing and one week to build the second, as far as we could tell nothing changed.

Second, irregardless of your reason for leaving off the lower winglets may I suggest at least a 3" lower winglet for three reasons:

1- first and formost, if you ever drag a wingtip (it happens more frequently than you would believe.. remember the are out there but also way back there-hint) and worse yet you are far from home, you have to ground your aircraft and make a huge repair... except for the paint, everything ground off is structural. A sacraficial lower is peace of mind.

2- contrary to many sources, they work, its when you get too slow on final you find out why.

3- if you don't take your rudders all the way to the bottom you don't break your rudders when your plane tips over backwards.

 

Your call, can save you a lot of grief later. Also you don't need the notch on the lower trailing edge if you don't want to.

Regards, Chrissi

[Mario]

About the lower winglets:

 

I´ll second Chrissi here! The cozy info-pak contained a very inresting article about aft c.g. testing and modifications to avoid deep-stall in the mark IV. Adding or removing the lower winglets hat a major effect here, so that´s a point I would be very reluctant to exercise self-realization unless I absolutely knew what I did.

 

By the way, @Chrissi: strange colours but great site!!

 

Kind regards,

 

Mario

[Cozy Girrrl]

Heres the deal, for whatever reason its even more pronounced on the Cozy than the tandem planes but Nat's plane was flown and tested with and without them, Jeff Russell flew the Aerocanard with and without them and said he would not fly without them. Steve Wright put half height ones on the Stagger-Ez, he says they seem to work and I believe he based his shorter ones on researching it in the community.

We put them on because we are getting older and slowing down, by the time we get proficient enough flying the Cozy to really enjoy it we should be real slow and we are doing this because we want a plane we'll love, not a thrill ride. It's the idea of scraping a wingtip and being stranded until proper repairs are made that stopped us.

Regards, Chrissi

[Waiter]

I cut them off as an experiment. I didn't see any difference in speed, nor any difference in low speed handling characteristics. My LongEZ is 1,000 lbs empty, and I fly at the aft CG limit. I routinely fly my EZ in all corners of the envelop, and the low speed, high angles of attack was the area I was most concerned abpout, Again, I seen no changes in low speed handling.

 

Review my site www.iflyez.com under "NO WINGLETS"

 

I do understand that I am giving up some of the "Tip Back" protection. I had one incident of this many years ago. A very slow tip back where the plane rested on the wingtips as I was dangling from the Canard.

 

I was pushing the plane backwards by lifting the plane from the front of the canard and pushing backwards. The main tires got caught in a rut and the canard slowly lifted, with me hanging on. It went over very slowly and didn't cause any damage.

 

Waiter

[JLKnolla]

Yes Tony, I could print just the side view with no wheels, $15 for a 12"x12". Do you have a complete side view in DXF or DWG or would you like to use the one I grafted together?

 

Your local sign shop may be able to take a DXF or DWG and do the same, worth checking on as well since they are right there near you.

 

Let me know.

 

John - Open-EZ Pre-Build Planning

[Jon Matcho]

Guys... please keep 'steerable nose gear' discussions in a different thread than the Open-EZ.

As of yet, there are no plans to add a steerable nose gear to the Open-EZ design. This may change once a design is established, flown, and proven, but until then the readers of the Open-EZ thread will only be rooting for this unique mod.

[RAKY]

If I only want make a long nose,do I need stretch the fuselage of the open-ez?,I'm confusing here.

[Jon Matcho]

No, the nose straps on after the fuselage. You can extend the length of the fuselage, but not necessarily so to extend the length of the nose. (Note: you can also make your wings out of marshmallows... you're on your own with all of this).

Extending the nose is a common 'Berk-EZ' modification, which you can grab input from a few who have been there (speak up Berk-EZ'ers). Alternatively, you can make your fuselage per plans and just do the nose the way you like when it's time. At that point in the plans you should know much more about what you're doing and the impact of these options.

[Jon Matcho]

I just split the "build wings first?" topic into its own thread to keep this thread focused on the evolution of the Open-EZ.

Back on the topic of the Open-EZ, I am hearing a LOT of misinformation out there, based on people's feelings over what's right and what's wrong with the Open-EZ project. I understand the concerns, but find them out of context and obviously a result of not being aware of the background of this project.

For the longest time I was disappointed to be unable to get a set of Long-EZ plans. I purchased the TERF CD ages ago, only to confirm that the drawings really weren't in there in any form. I then found someone selling COPIED Long-EZ plans, and with some hesitation, I purchased them for hundreds of dollars NEVER KNOWING IF THEY WERE ACCURATELY COPIED. So now I'm out over $500 and still without a complete set of Long-EZ plans that I might someday build from.

I found many in the same situation -- some wanting to simply see what a Long-EZ drawing looked like, some wanting to have plans in hand, and some actually wanting to build an EZ.

When the opportunity presented itself, I took the time to review US Copyright and Patent law, and consulted an attorney specializing in intellectual property on the matter. The Open-EZ is what we came up with.

Some say, "Why not just ask Burt Rutan for permission to use his work?" For that, there are two very simple reasons:

1) I surmise that Mr. Rutan does not want to have any conversation whatsoever regarding continuation of the Long-EZ design.

2) Based on the advice of an attorney and detailed knowledge regarding the Fair Use clause of U.S. Copyright Law, we are entirely free to download the Open-EZ drawings for educational purposes, which by definition, includes building an experimental aircraft.

Mr. Rutan is out for a reason, legal liability, that is a major factor (if not the driving factor) for why he chose to exit the plans and kit business. For Mr. Rutan to return today (now affiliated with Charles Branson, Paul Allen, and other businesses), their wealth would be a major target for nefarious individuals seeking financial gain by filing frivolous lawsuits. In consideration and with great respect for Mr. Rutan was the Open-EZ created in exactly the manner it has been.Rutan has NOTHING to do with this project.

The Long-EZ was a great plane, but everyone needs to face reality -- the Long-EZ has been retired. We can either let the design disappear, or we can pool together and continue the progress already underway with the Open-EZ.

Long live the Open-EZ!

[Jon Matcho]

Welcome Alan...

aadamson said:

How about a quick summary of where this thread stands?

You can build a tandem canard aircraft given what's available. The scanned drawings that are available here are as good, if not better, than the original Long-EZ drawings. Work is still underway to further improve these, but that's not necessary to continue building.

One thing to concern yourself with is that there is NO OFFICIAL BUILDER SUPPORT. "Help" can be found in several places, online, as well as through the Central States Newsletter. The key is to educate yourself on what it is that you're about to do. This is not entirely unique to the Open-EZ, it holds true to the Cozy line, AeroCanard, and Long-EZ plans-built aircraft -- there is a burden on the builder. Kitplanes are slightly different.

If you want to build a two place tandem canard aircraft, you can. If this were a full-time job for all of those that have contributed to it, I'm sure you'd get a clearer and more detailed status report. Regarding costs, I'll guess that an Open-EZ will cost $30,000 to build. Whether that comes out to $29,500 or $30,500 isn't going to matter, because I could be off by $5,000 or more with the "base" cost.

[aadamson]

Jon, or anyone else, is printing these open-ez drawings pretty straight forward? I went to Kinkos today just to check things out. Obviously they prefer PDF's. I noted that the PDF versions are set for 24x18" paper.

 

So, when emailing them to kinko's to have them printed, is that all I need to tell them? Just to print them at 1:1 and I'll assume maintain the positioning (portrait vs. landscape) where needed?

 

Anything else I should know? I think I"m going to have on printed before I do the whole lot.

 

BTW, at my kinko's they are 4.50 a sheet for 18x24....

 

Let me know if you would please?

 

Thanks,

Alan

[Jon Matcho]

You have the paper size correct, so yes, have them print 1:1 on same size paper.

It should only cost $3 to print each sheet. My Kinko's charges $0.75/s.f. Be sure they're giving you the 'black and white' price.

If you can, try to go to the store for the first one. Bring a tape measure and verify the tick marks. If you like what you see, then print the rest. If the tick marks are terribly off (more than 1/8"), let the storeperson know and see if they can have them resized. Either way, please let us know how you make out.

[aadamson]

Jon Matcho said:

You have the paper size correct, so yes, have them print 1:1 on same size paper.

It should only cost $3 to print each sheet. My Kinko's charges $0.75/s.f. Be sure they're giving you the 'black and white' price.

If you can, try to go to the store for the first one. Bring a tape measure and verify the tick marks. If you like what you see, then print the rest. If the tick marks are terribly off (more than 1/8"), let the storeperson know and see if they can have them resized. Either way, please let us know how you make out.

Thanks Jon, I went to Kinkos last night and had them pring the A1 and A2 sheets. I didn't have a very good measuring device while there, but at first blush it looks like the measure marks were within 1/32 (prolly no more than the line width out). Like I said, I didnt' have a very good measuring device so I'll figure that out today.

I also did note the distortion on the right side of the instrument panel. It seems to be correct up to the CL on both, but then squeezes down on one or the other to show that 1/8" or better, more likely 3/16" difference at the most right top panel opening that meets at the page divide.

I know there was an effort to correct that. What ever became of that effort?

I also have Tony's drawings in both pdf and dxf and am going to see about printing one of his. His in PDF are setup for 8.5x11 so I'll most likely start with his DXF's, then setup the paper and print them to PDF and try that...

We'll see... I'll also let you know what I get back from RAF. I sent money last friday.

Thanks in advance,

Alan

[aadamson]

Here's an interesting little file... I made one quick attempt and it came out remarkable well... I didn't look at sizes, scales, etc, only the amount of detail that it was able to convert....

 

http://www.rastervect.com/

 

Alan

[aadamson]

Also found this raster to vect conversion tools

 

http://www.img2cad.com/index.php

 

I converted both the A1 and the A2 to a DXF file. Opened turbo cad and read them both in. To make the A2 file line up and fit the edge profile of the A1 file too my expanding the A2 file by a factor of 1.005, I think thats less that .5%. It still wasn't perfect and there is some distortion in the file. The attach line between A2 and A1 has a bow in it that I suspect is also in the rest of it.

 

So, bottom line, these could be converted to line/arc drawings with the help of some of these "starter" apps. I may tackle them one at a time and see what happens, but it's gonna be way down the priority list.

 

Either of these tools are "cheap". The one above is free and will do 3 drawings at a time. You don't have the control over the conversion that you do in the other util however. The rastervect tool is $79.95 and provides a huge amount of control over the conversion with limited editing before the save to DXF.

 

Bottom line, to get to a Cad version wouldn't be all that hard. Then once there, collecting the mods from the newsletters would be the wise thing to do. All of this before any "user mods" are added...

 

I'm certainly not the guy to do this, but I certainly can provide moral support

 

Hope this is helpful...

 

Alan

[rpellicciotti]

Just a quick comment on templates. I have had a chance to examine several sets of plans over the years. All of the template sets that I have seen (from RAF) have distortions in them. We have to remember that these plans were drawn and duplicated using late 70's technology. Thousands of airplanes have been built from these templates without problems.

 

What most builders do is that they "adjust" or "straighten" the lines when they transfer the templates to the material. This is an accepted practice.

 

One suggestion that I would make to the group is that a set of hard templates could be made and these could be shared among the group of builders. You only use your templates once (hopefully). At EZ Jets, Inc., where I have the priveledge to work from time to time, there is a set of templates that I know have been used to build 10 or 12 airplanes. Maybe more.

 

Jon has a great idea here, creating an open project where everyone with their diverse skills can contribute.

[Jon Matcho]

dtoften said:

Great site. I appreciate the work that people have done to get the templates for this great aircraft.

Thank you!

Quote

Does anyone have Varieze templates online?

Not that I know of. I'm curious as to why you're asking.

rpellicciotti said:

Just a quick comment on templates. I have had a chance to examine several sets of plans over the years. All of the template sets that I have seen (from RAF) have distortions in them. We have to remember that these plans were drawn and duplicated using late 70's technology. Thousands of airplanes have been built from these templates without problems.

What most builders do is that they "adjust" or "straighten" the lines when they transfer the templates to the material. This is an accepted practice.

Thanks for pointing that out. We tend to get distracted with perfection, when, in practice, it has proven not to matter.

Quote

I received the Roncz canard plans, the landing brake plans and large rudder plans. The note says that the flush bellhorn plans are still available but backordered. They will be sent later. The O-235 Install plans (Section II) are no longer available.

So, for the Open-EZ project, we need to develop the Section II drawings and templates. If anyone has a nice, clean copy of the Section II drawings and plans, I would be happy to have them scanned and return them to you.

The Long-EZ Section II plans are on the TERF CD I believe. If there's a large-sized drawing, then that's another story -- we should get that scanned, but anything on the TERF CD cannot be included as part of the downloads. I'll see if I have any O-235 drawings...

Thanks for the update Rick!

[Jon Matcho]

dtoften said:

Well, if I can give a good Varieze, then I would like to know that I can get templates since some planes are sold without plans.

Give or get a VariEze? Right now there are no downloadable VariEze drawings available that I know of.

If someone has VariEze drawings they'd like to donate to start an Open-VZ project let me know.

[carlos]

hi all.

mi name is carlos and i am a long-ez builder/flyer.

at this time i am starting a cozy mk IV (s/n 1408).

after reading about the open-ez i work a little with autocad and make the winglets templates in one piece in dwg format.

i water jet cut them and check it with my 20 years ol long-ez plywood templates and the cozy ones and found they are the same thing.

my idea is make the wing templates in one piece and one paper so you dont have to cut and aling to work with them.

here you can see how it looks.

carlos

WINGLETS_TEMPLATES 12-10-06.pdf

[Jon Matcho]

Well done Carlos! I'll print and check these with the other full-size drawing that's under development. If everything checks out, these will definitely be included in the next Open-EZ release.

[Waiter]

Lifessamsara;

 

I built my EZ in the mid/late 80's and had the experience of all those first generation EZ builders. In those early days, the overwhelming opinion (against the Rutan purist) was to install an O-320 instead of the plans O-235. So, that was my plan from day one.

 

During the build, I made every attempt was made to move as much weight as far forward as I could. This would head off the Aft CG and Ballast issues with using the heavier engine.

 

1) Nose extended approximately 18 inches.

 

2) The battery is installed approximately 12 inches forward of the plans location.

 

3) The Longerons were a little larger than the plans, i.e. From memory - My Longerons are 1/4 inch thicker than the plans. Use caution on this as it will effect the main gear hardpoint mounting and also the engine mount extrusion hardpoints.

 

4) I use a Oddessy PC-930 battery instead of one of those pucky 25 amp aircraft batteries.

 

5) Brake master cylinders are in the nose, not on the firewall. (per Debbie Iwatie plans)

 

6) Larger size engine mount extrusions.

 

7) Fill the spar troughs on the wings and centerspar with addition layers of UNI tape. Mine took two or thee additional layers both upper and lower.

 

8) NACA scoop cooling (although I would consider downdraft cooling if I were building today)

 

nothing to do with O-320, BUT;

 

Look at my web site for things that I am doing during my retrofit. I would consider doing these on a new construction.

 

1) I love the way I did my Canopy stay, See my web site for details.

 

2) Add an access panel for the instrument panel in front of the canopy.

 

3) Bring the forward edge of the canopy back so there is no gap for water to find its way behind the instrument panel. This requires additional layup in the front of the canopy (I used three or four pieces of spar cap UNI to strengthen this area.)

 

4) Put the landing lights in the leading edge of the wing ( I uses Camaro head lights, but the Projector lamps made today are a better choice)

 

5) Position the strake bulkhead (the bulkhead that separates the fuel tank from the strake inside storage area) inboard 2 to 3 inches. This would provide 3 or four more gallons capacity per side.

 

 

WAITER

[carlos]

well... not sure it is truly 1/1 scale, but just let me know when you print it.

i draw a cote in the root template, you will see a lot of numbers, there are milimiters . 27,90 inches is acurated enought (i think).

carlos

WINGLETS_TEMPLATES 1-1 03-11-06.pdf

[carlos]

you are right jon, you need 2 dimension to check it. the paper was 22 x 36 in. and had not room to show the ruler of the drawing.

i allways work with milimeters, it is 10 times more acurated than centimeters and dont need to work with decimals.

what i did now is look for a specific format so the all drawing fits in,"ARCH D".

this format is 24 x 36 inches and because now you can see the rulers of my drawing (the distace is 50 milimeters or 1,9685 inches, 2 in. for the friends) in the border you can check if it is correctly printed.

anyway i send you the dwg just in case.

soon or later we will get it

i will continue with the wings in the moment i have time for it.

WINGLETS_TEMPLATES 1-1 08-11-06.pdf