| Welcome! |
| Each
of you who has received this inaugural issue of Vintage
Aircraft Online is a vital part of the vibrant
vintage aircraft community within EAA. Your branch of
the EAA family has been a significant part of the annual
convention and fly-in since its arrival in Oshkosh in
1971, and the division's activities have grown to become
a yearlong effort, |
H.G. Frautschy
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| with full-time staff
representing
the interests of VAA members throughout the year. As
we've have evolved from the Antique/Classic Division to
the Vintage Aircraft Association, we've gone from a
four-page black and white newsletter to a full-color,
44-page magazine that highlights the accomplishments of
our fellow members and shares the fascinating history of
the airplanes we've come to enjoy. Read
more |
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| News |
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| Flying
Windmill Makes Appearance at Oshkosh!
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If you've been on the fence about coming to EAA
AirVenture Oshkosh this year, I can solve that dilemma
right now. It's been more than two decades since a
Pitcairn Autogiro has flown in Oshkosh, Wisconsin,
during
the annual EAA fly-in |
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| convention, but with any weather
luck at all, we may very well get to see the last flying
PA-18 Autogiro tool around the pattern here in Oshkosh.
How about that? Is that enough to make you throw your
tent and sleeping bag in the airplane or car and point
the nose toward Oshkosh? Read
more |
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| VAA
Area One of the Highlights of EAA AirVenture |
| If
you’re headed to EAA AirVenture Oshkosh 2009, be sure
to stop by the VAA Red Barn and say “Hi.” We’ll
have popcorn and lemonade available for a small
donation, you can pick up your |
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| participant
mug and plaque if you flew your vintage airplane into
the convention, and you can shop for the coolest vintage
airplane clothing and gifts you’ll find anywhere. Oh,
and did we mention the newly
completed Vintage Hangar, a project funded entirely
with donations made by key VAA volunteers and those who
have chosen to support the organization over the years
through the VAA Friends of the Red Barn annual campaign.
It will be the home of the type clubs and the vintage
workshop during the convention, as well as other VAA
activities, including the awards program on Saturday
night, at 6 p.m.
Besides
the amazing Autogiro, we have been told that the DH.88
Comet Racer replica will be on display in our area,
as will the American
Barnstormers Tour, and many other great aircraft,
plus more than 20 returning past Grand Champion
airplanes. There’s plenty to see and do, so be sure to
stop on by! |
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FAA
Issues New Advisory Circular for Vintage Aircraft
This
is big news, folks. The FAA has issued an advisory
circular specifically intended to make it easier to use
parts on your vintage airplane that just plain make
sense to install!
In a move intended to help keep vintage
aircraft safely maintained, restored, and flying, the
FAA has issued new Advisory Circular AC 23-27, Parts and
Materials Substitution for Vintage Aircraft, dated May
18, 2009. The AC, created by the FAA's Small Airplane
Directorate in Kansas City, Missouri, was a joint effort
by the FAA in consultation with industry representatives
including EAA and EAA's Vintage Aircraft
Association. Read
more |
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| Hamp
SafeStart Starter System now STC'd
|
In the April issue of EAA Sport Aviation we
detailed the quest of Harold Hamp, EAA 300857, to
produce an alternative to the requirement for
hand-propping many of the lightplanes built prior to the 1950s. The self-contained |
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| system, built around the
high-torque capabilities of a battery-powered cordless
drill motor, allows the engine to be started from within
the cockpit, and it does not require the installation of
an external electrical system. Read
more |
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Airworthiness
Directives and Special Airworthiness Information
Bulletins
Since the FAA ended the mailing of special
airworthiness information bulletins (SAIB) a few years
ago, the only way to get them, short of making an
appointment at your local flight standards district
office so you can thumb through your local inspector's
notebook, is to receive them via e-mail. SAIBs are
pretty handy; they highlight maintenance issues that do
not warrant an airworthiness directive (AD), but are
things that should be watched for when working on
particular aircraft. An issue brought up by an SAIB may
later wind up as an AD created by the FAA, but more
often than not simply pointing out the potential problem
seems to head off the problem. If you'd like to receive
both ADs and SAIBs via e-mail, you have to subscribe to
them using the FAA's website at http://RGL.FAA.gov.
Read
more |
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| Chapter
Newsletters
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Each month we're going to reproduce one or more of
the VAA chapter newsletters that come across our desk.
Not every VAA chapter produces a newsletter (either
electronic or printed and mailed), but we're always
interested in what's going on in each of the 18 VAA
chapters across the United States. One of the most
active chapters is VAA Chapter 10, Tulsa, Oklahoma.
Charlie Harris, VAA's treasurer, serves that chapter as
its editor, and he has a ball summarizing the chapter
meetings and giving us the lowdown on other local
goings-on and personalities. Here's its May newsletter:
May 2009
The chapter's April 23 meeting was a strange affair. We
had a big turnout standing in the lobby waiting for the
unlocking of our duly assigned library meeting room. More |
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Great
Web Links
We run across great links regularly as we surf
the web. Here are a few websites we’ve enjoyed
in the past month or so: |
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 www.VintageWings.ca
The website of the Vintage Wings of Canada Foundation in
Gatineau, Quebec, Canada, overseen by the talented Dave
O’Malley, is filled with interesting stories and great
photography While much of the content is
warbird-related, there’s enough Commonwealth
lightplane material to whet your appetite for a visit to
our northern neighbors, either in person or via the web.
YouTube
One thing you
have to say about this community video website is that
it is filled with just about everything you could
imagine, and thankfully, that includes some great
aviation footage. Here’s one video titled Aircraft
Construction in 1910 in which the French firm of
Voisin is pictured, along with stills photos of many of
its wood and fabric biplanes. Here’s
the
link.
Obscure Public Relations and Educational Films
One of my favorite websites for stuff that you never
thought would see the light of a movie projector again
is www.Archive.org.
The site is dedicated to preserving archives of all
types, but the one that really gets me fired up is the
aviation films section. Not Hollywood films, but those
great 16 mm flicks we watched in grade school, like this one from Encyclopedia Britannica on how helicopters work.
Why not share your web
find with your fellow Vintage Aircrafters? Just drop us
an e-mail at vintageaircraft@eaa.org
with the link, and we’ll get it in the next Vintage
Aircraft Online! |
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| EAA's
efforts to compile an oral history of aviation's
pioneers and those who have helped make it such
a fascinating piece of our nation's history have
culminated in their Timeless Voices project,
with hundreds of videos now archived at EAA
headquarters. |
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| We continue to create online
versions of those videos so that members and
those who have an interest in aviation can watch
and learn from those who have come before us.
One of those videos is an interview with the
late Johnny Miller, whose career in aviation
spanned nearly a century. John was present as
Charles Lindbergh took off from Roosevelt Field
on his epic trans-Atlantic solo crossing, and
later, he was an active autogyro and helicopter
pilot. For John's entertaining and illuminating
reminisces, watch his Timeless Voices video
here. |
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| Okay,
I'll confess. When EAA created its online video
series called Hints for Homebuilders, I
didn't always pay attention to the videos.
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| Turns
out I was really missing out on some great
stuff. Heck, there's even a whole section
dedicated just to tube and fabric construction
techniques! Once I started viewing them, I
couldn't stop! So if you've not taken a moment
to watch a few of these videos, I encourage you
click on the link below and watch a few. Most
run around 3-5 minutes, and none are over 8
minutes.
Our
long-term goal is to create videos in that same
vein for restorers, but in the meantime, there's
so much good stuff on the EAA Hints for
Homebuilders video player page that we're
going to point you toward that great part of
EAA's website and highlight some of the videos
that would be of particular interest to those of
us who live in the type certificated world. So
without further ado, let me introduce to you Joe
Norris, Waco owner, VAA and EAA member, and
EAA's homebuilders' community manager, as he
demonstrates the correct way to safety a
turnbuckle. Watch
it here. |
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| There's
such a wealth of information contained in the
pages of VAA's Vintage Airplane magazine
as well as EAA's flagship publication Sport
Aviation that we're just bursting at the
archive seams! Since one of our planned
highlighted airplanes during EAA AirVenture
Oshkosh 2009 will be the replica of the DH 88
Comet racer built for Tom Wathen by the late
Bill Turner and others who worked with Turner,
we thought it only appropriate we bring you the
article on the airplane published in the March
1994 issue of Sport Aviation. Bill
himself penned the article telling us all about
the history of the original Comets and how the
replica came to be. Here's how he starts it off:
There's
a Comet in the Sky
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| It was the mid 1930s, a time of giants, of
original thinkers struggling to press forward
with meager funds for aviation development in a
depression ridden era…of trying to overcome
politicians determined to follow the path of
whatever was the best way to stay in office. |
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| Well nothing had changed there even today, but
spending money on aviation in the '30s was not
popular. Read
more |
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| Question
of the Month
Q. Do
you use auto fuel when you fly your
aircraft?
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