Kent Ashton

Today, no pics. I guess we know who wears the pants in that family. Barely married a year and the new wife is running the show. https://www.zola.com/wedding/caitlinandavery2020 🙂 I did not find any Long-ez registered to that name

Saw this idea for mounting an oil cooler on a Cozy but to be frank, I don't like it. It may work somewhat but consider: the airflow has to enter the NACA, look around to find the oil cooler and make a twisty turn around the air-control door, enter a duct to the cooler and make another 90 deg turn to go through the cooler fins. Nothing is making it enter the oil cooler duct except plenum pressure and the area above the engine is not a particularly low pressure area--there is certainly no suction pressure there. If you were an air molecule, would you rather take that twisty-turnie route or would you just take a path though the fins or leak out around the engine? If I was a lazy air molecule, no way I would want to make all those tortuous twists and turns. I would just hang out in the lower plenum with my other molecule-buddies until I could find an easier way out. OTOH, If I could just enter the NACA and shoot straight up and through the oil cooler mounted at the top of the cowl and escape, I would do that versus tunneling through the fins. This is why oil cooling is pretty decent with the plans top-mounted cooler and a block-off is necessary in the winter. Yeah, I (a lazy molecule) cause a little more drag as I shoot out into the airstream but I am FREE! (and taking your oil heat with me!) 🙂

Saw this neat idea (pic) on the VansAirForce site for making an articulated borescope camera . For about $25, you can buy those borescopes on ebay that will wifi-link to an iphone. I think I paid several hundred for the Vividia 400 model. However, Mike Busch says he can sometime inspect the cam by removing the oil dip-stick tube and feeding the Vivida through the hole. The one below might do that with a stiff wire holding the shape. -------------- In other more expensive news, one of my LIghtspeed Plasma ignitions gave up. This was an original Plasma, 25 years old. I think I got it on ebay. The engine missed and ran rough under load on one ignition (dual systems). After futzing around with coils, wires, plugs and swapping outputs of the two boxes, I established that the miss followed one of the Plasmas. A trigger circuit went bad and Lightspeed said it could not be repaired. The newer Plasmas have some updated features but AFAIAC, there is very little to be gained with the newer systems. They may be a bit easier to mount the crankshaft triggers; you can read the advance and manifold pressure. They may be more reliable but up to now, I have not had any problems except to replace a coil. Lightspeed said the 4-cyl version does not need ventilation to the box if inside the cockpit (6-cyl does) but I think I will ventilate them. BTW, I noticed that the caps on my Autolite 386 plug were somewhat loose. I hammered the male threads a bit to make them tight but maybe there is a better way.

Good 360 photo of a Concorde cockpit here https://www.facebook.com/aerospacebristol/photos/3534327836603934 Ordinarily I eschew FB but the Contact Magazine page https://www.facebook.com/www.CONTACTMagazine/ is worth reviewing periodically before all the interesting stuff disappears at the bottom. Like this Archon SF-1 (pic). An ultralight F-35 look-alike that would get pilots to walk out of the FBO. 🙂 Also jump to this video of a Facet fuel pump teardown at about 4 mins. https://youtu.be/Dtf66p8M11g

Toyota starters were frequently used. No idea if that is a Toyota but you might take it to a starter shop and ask them. These things can be rebuilt too, so that's a possibility. Contact Magazine issue #5 shows a Toyota being used on a Continental. It does not say the Toyota model and the picture is doggy but I imagine it is a late 80's or early 90's starter. (pic)

This E-racer project first seen here over a year ago at $15K, then $11.5K, then $9.5K relisted again at $9.5. Very reasonable at the price with most of the big parts done. I imagine he would take a bit less if you showed up with cash. Centerspar and molded strakes in other pics.

Also this Cozy III today. I think an IO-360 is a bit much for these airplanes. See those containers of blue (water?, concrete?) in the footwell? That's to balance the IO-360 on the ground. They do real well with an O-320. I think I'd go for the one above. Never been a fan of the wood-grain paneling. 🙂

This Cozy LLL today 🙂 (Cozy III) Reasonable price. Perhaps even cheap. https://www.aircraftone.com/aircraft.asp?tn=n765r Not airplanes for big people though.

The wood through the firewall only acts as a guide for building/attaching the firewall. As long as you can tell where the wood should have stuck out, it should be no problem.

Seen on the Cozy list. Want's $10K in Texas http://www.pathtofly.com/index.php/cozyblog/for-sale/ ----------------------------- Then this Long-EZ project in California with some great (cough) pics! The tub and canopy look OK. The dog is thinking of lifting his leg on that BID. 😉 https://redding.craigslist.org/avo/d/weaverville-long-ez/7386418404.html

This Varieze being auctioned in Hawaii. Lots of pics in the ad (and lots of refurbishment needed) https://www.mbauction.com/auctions/10884/lot/22138-Vari-Eze-Aircraft-(for-parts) N98EZ. Auction ends Oct 29

We have mentioned Hanson several times. Here is one: https://www.canardzone.com/forums/topic/21972-sales-ive-seen/?do=findComment&comment=77222

Today from David Hanson in Ohio. Lots of interest in this one on the National Fake News Site

https://aerocomposites.aero/the-hanger-price-lists/#Long_EZ

Likely not. It is probably a cover built onto the canard. Can be removed by cutting it off and gently sanding off the layups that attach it with a small angle-grinder and sanding disk but don't sand into the canard skin layups.

.050" 4130 works pretty well. Make a pattern for the piece from posterboard or flashing. Drill the wheel pant holes to match the 4130 piece. A strong light on the inside of the pant will show where to drill. I have also seen a small laser sitting on a sandbag off to the side that points to the 4130 hole, then position the wheel pant and drill at the laser spot. Pants are very fiddly to install.

Google Images for Wheel Pants Attach or variations on that. You will see many pics. There are a dozen ways to do it but you have to decide what works best for you. I use a wheel nut from Vans and a lengthwise bent strip of 4130 on the inside that accepts two bolts through the two halves of the pant. I put patches of kevlar where the bolts go through. My pants separate front and back.

I would guess you are causing yourself a lot more trouble than necessary. The bit of rust on the screws is nothing. The surface corrosion seemed to clean up well. If the depression is on the upper side (in compression), it wouldn't bother me. Even on the bottom, it doesn't look like much of a problem. If the mount hole was cracked or notched where a crack could propagate from the bolt hole, it might be worth changing but I doubt that small depression is going to weaken the aluminum appreciably. Personally I would find those mounts acceptable but I can't speak to the UNI issue.

My Cozy has not flown in a year while I fiddled with getting a Special Issuance medical. The medical approval finally came through--five months after submitting the paperwork. It expires in 5 months but I think I will get back on Basic Med which will be good for two years. Anyway .. . . The airplane had a worrying miss on one of the LIghtspeed Plasmas. Low takeoff RPM and an alarming miss running on that one Plasma. I thought maybe it was fouled plugs. Nope, they are almost new. Plug wires are pretty new. I thought maybe the screw-on sparkplug caps were loose. Nope. One time I had a Lightspeed box that suffered a broken connection to an internal chip. It seemed to be a manufacturing defect but Lightspeed did not publicize it. Bad on them. I doubt thst is the probem here. Ordinarily, the boxes are pretty stout. One time I had corrosion in a coil tower connection to the plug wires that caused an engine miss. I see that Klaus says a disconnected sparkplug is very bad for the coils and a corroded connection could mimic that. I suspect my problem is going to turn out to be a bad coil. News at 11. The nice thing about the Lightspeed is that they are pretty easy to troubleshoot.

I am not an engine expert but it seems to me that these are big old heavy slow-turning (relatively) engines that would not profit much by porting and balancing. People do polish the ports and balancing cannot hurt but I doubt it makes much difference. As they say: "nothing beats cubic inches". Electronic ignition will give you a few HP. It seems that very careful drag reduction is where the money is. Removing the lower winglets would be pretty easy. AFAICT, it does reduce drag a little bit but the stall characteristics are a not as nice. I removed some upper winglets once. The lower winglet would be a piece of cake. This page: https://www.canardzone.com/forums/topic/18661-kents-long-ez-project/page/3/ What I question is if the EZ is the best design for winning races? I don't know.

I imagine there are aircraft salvage yards in Europe. Here in the states, Wentworth handles a lot of salvage engines. Make sure you know the model numbers and know what you're buying. You will need a new prop, too. As for mods, a carbed O-320 can be converted to fuel injection pretty easily. I just saw a discussion of this on the VansAirForce site. Streamling the struts is a good mod. Also use smaller wheels and pants. A smaller canopy. Seal the cockpit well so air is not leaking in and out except where you want it. See what Gary Hertzler did to reduce the builk of his cowl https://www.canardzone.com/forums/topic/45834-varieze-plans/?do=findComment&comment=79848 Very good, tight cooling will help Ah, you want a gain in drag! Forget what I said. 🙂

If you want to email them to me, I can probably post them. kjashton AT vnet dot net

Here is a big Advisory Circular on Intergranular corrosion https://www.faa.gov/documentlibrary/media/advisory_circular/ac_43-4a_.pdf

I suggest starting a new topic in the Models --> Varieze section entitled "Varieze Plans" https://www.canardzone.com/forums/forum/305-varieze/ I think you can drag and drop the files into the bottom of the post. Maybe Jon would like to create an "Open Varieze" model to which they can be moved.

Today: Also this notice (pic). The sale information is posted in a private group but I suppose you can try to contact the seller