Richard Riley

The Vari doesn't require either an electric or mechanical fuel pump. It is a good idea to have at least one, if not both. The Long specifically requires a fuel pump. That was the core of the whole Bill Davenport debacle.

DeltaHawk says: Experimental aircraft firewall forward kit development is beginning. No indication of how many have been delivered, or how big the backlog is. If I were developing an airplane from scratch I wouldn't use it. County on a Lyc. It the DH comes along someday, great. We almost built a aircraft around the Thuria. Glad it didn't work out, now.

A 200 HP diesel for aircraft use would be a nice engine. Do you happen to know of any that are actually for sale? I don't mean an engine in development and are just around the corner. I mean an aircraft diesel engine that I can go trade cash for and put in the back of a truck and drive home. I've been doing this for 18 years now, and the most important rule I've learned is: Never design your developmental aircraft around a developmental engine.

Pnumatics can be used, some British airplanes have used pnumatics. There are some advantages. If there's a small leak, you don't care. You don't have to have a return line. On the other hand, if a line ruptures its' MUCH more exciting. Small high pressure air pumps are much harder to find. And there's all the stored up energy that you have to get rid of. If you have 3000 psi in a hydraulic line and you come to the end of the piston gear stroke, the pump turns off, the piston stops. If an air valve turns off, you still have 3000 pst trying to move the piston. So it's POSSIBLE, but it puts you into more basic design.

The Berkut hydraulic nose gear isn't strong enough to lift the airplane, like the Wright nose gear will. If you just want to save weight and cost, go manual.

Sadly, no. My most recent homebuilt project is just coming up on 8 weeks old. He's pretty demanding at this age.

HEY!!! I got 2 more years till I'm 50!!!

I'd suggest you grab the Berkut 3 view that's floating around on the web, blow up the side view to useable size, then draw a box the size of the Zoche engine profie. Put it aft of the firewall, make a rough guess as to the CG of the engine and how far back from the firewall it should be. Then draw 2 lines for the profile of the top and bottom cowl. Fiddle with them. See if you can get it to look tollerable while keeping the prop far enough forward so you don't get a prop strike on landing, and preferably with less than an 18" prop extension. (the gyroscopic forces get huge when you get that long".) 'Cause, we couldn't make it work, and we tried for a long time. And there's that whole the-engine-is-vaporware thing, too.

The only point where I disagree with Marc is on the fuel. Later airplanes, with molded wings, put about 15 extra gallons in the wings just outboard of the strakes. Beyond that, you could put about 50 gallons in underwing pods and for record attempts another 50 in the back seat. As to how to get one - they're rare. I'll sell you mine, but it's REALLY, REALLY, REALLY expensive.

If it ever comes to exist (and I would bet a year's paycheck against it) it won't fit well on a Berkut. You'd end up with the cowls going straight back from the firewall, curling around the cylenders and stopping around the prop shaft. The DeltaHawk is closer. But really, Berkut was designed around the Lycoming.

The Swings have wanted to sell since about 2000.

Best of luck.

The shape isn't patented. They can copy it all day long. However - it's going to be EXPENSIVE to bring a kit to market from scratch. Count on a couple of million. It would be cheaper to buy the whole Velocity company.

Yaw is driven by having rudders AFT of CG, not just away from CG. The farther aft, the smaller the surface can be and have the same authority. Gus McLeoud's velo had booms like what you're desrcibing

I've had a little experience with Berkuts. We didn't use wax in the molds. We used non-transferring silicon based mold release agents. It was a lot more expensive than wax. We used wax and PVA when making a mold from a plug. We were very careful to remove any trace of wax before sealing the surface and applying mold release. I've used perforated mylar as a release film between a laminate and the bleeder cloth, and never had a problem with it sticking to the laminate. I don't know why your mylar is sticking. I would never use wax on an epoxy surface that was going to get a subsequent bond. Wax dissolves into every liquid epoxy hardener I've worked with.