From the Prez:
CHAPTER PUBLICITY CHAIRMAN
CARL YRENE has agreed to be chairman of this committee for our
Chapter. You may recall we had
volunteer sign up sheets for various committees at our meetings early this
year. Carl signed up for Publicity but
I failed to follow up with action to implement this committee. At our last monthly meeting it was suggested
that publicizing our meetings in the local area newspaper, radio and television
media would be advantageous. With Carl
in charge this will happen and we will evaluate the results at a future date.
DAR (Amateur-Built Designated Airworthiness
Representative)
In a recently received
communication from Randy Hansen, EAA Government Programs Director he is
requesting help in developing a directory for the new DAR program. I requested and have received packets of
information for anyone interested in becoming a DAR. Over the last several years, the demand to certificate
amateur-built aircraft has outpaced the growth of FAA inspector resources. The pool of available manufacturing and
maintenance DARs performing airworthiness certification of amateur-built
aircraft has not increased sufficiently to alleviate the shortage of FAA
inspectors. To meet the increased
demand several changes have been implemented for applicants.
Our Chapter surely has several members with the skills and
experience to become a DAR!!!
___________________________
EAA 2004 CALENDARS
Time again to
order EAA calendars. In years past we
ordered “X” number with the hope of selling as many. We ended up with many unsold last year. This year we will take
orders and order only that number.
The price will depend on quantity but in any event it will be less
than $10. If you want one or
more place your order with Harold Turvey before or at the meeting on
Nov. 15th.
BACK TO SQUARE ONE
By Don Knauts
When
I first joined EAA, I would guess that most experimental planes were built by
A&P mechanics using a lot of parts they had laying around and very
rudimentary plans or just some chalk lines on the hanger floor. My how the times have changed. Now with the very complete kits that are
available, a lot of the work is done before the builder ever sees the
parts. This is good and I am all for
it, but it comes with a cost. Being a
devout tightwad, I decided I wanted to see how cheaply I could build a
plane. I have a lot of parts from years
of scrounging, so these were the basis for the design. Borrowing from the J3, Super Cub, Vagabond,
Pawnee & Husky, the “Drifter” (or Acme Bugsmasher) took shape and off we
go. Several types of wood other than
spruce is suitable for aircraft construction.
A trip to Home Depot resulted in some nice straight grain white pine; ¼”
X ¼” sticks were sawn out and rib manufacture began. This is the status to date.
There is no rush. As the hanger is not heated, not much will get done
when it’s cold. Anybody out there
interested in carving props? If so,
let’s talk.
Don
Knauts
EAA
32493
Technical Counselor's Column
By Paul Tremblay
While there are many fields of materials testing relevant
to the manufacture of an aircraft, the testing of welded components is
frequently most challenging to the
experimental machine builder. NDE,NDT
& NDI are the alphabet Soup that serve to identify the processes of
examining weld quality without altering or destroying the usefulness of the
weldment.
There
are seven common methods used in weldment Non-Destructive Examination (the
official currently accepted term for the processes.) The seven, in no particular
order
are:
(1) VT - Visual examination
(2) RT - Radiographic Testing
(3) UT - Ultrasonic Testing
(4) MT - Magnetic Particle Testing
(5) PT - Liquid Penetrant Testing
(6) ET - Electromagnetic Testing
(7) AET - Acoustic Emission
Testing
The
first of these is arguably the most effective.
In any event, it is always the first and often determines which of the
other processes will be applied. To the
amateur aircraft builder, some of these will remain out of practical reach and
would be unnecessary for most circumstances.
RT is usually not available to the experimental
aircraft builder, but a new device is being offered through the welding
journals that uses a battery operated source of soft x-rays that is used to
identify the alloy constituents of a metal sample. It is priced in the $1500 range. (If you remember, this is what the remote
temperature probes used to cost a few years ago. I bought one last month for
less than $80.)
UT is useful for testing both ferrous
and non-ferrous materials, but is not very user friendly to the
uninitiated. The interpretation of the
myriad of radar-like returns present in any given probe orientation is daunting
even to those who've been to school on the systems. Perhaps the most useful application of this process to the EAA'er
is in the UT fuel flow guages that are now available from a couple of vendors.
MT is commonly useful only on ferrous
materials. Care must be taken to
ascertain
the orientation of the probing field to prevent hiding of cracks and inclusions
in the tested material. It can be used
on non-ferrous materials that are highly conductive and of such shape that a
heavy current could be conducted to form a strong magnetic field and expose
flaws existing parallel to the current flow.
PT is probably the second easiest of
the seven processes to implement and interpret. It exists in two basic forms. One uses a colored solvent that
penetrates a flaw reaching to the surface of the test sample. The solvent is cleaned from the surface and
a "developer" is applied to the surface, which draws some of the
penetrant back out onto the surface as a color spot or streak
delineating
the flaw. The other is similar, but
uses a penetrant that fluoresces
brilliantly
under illumination by ultraviolet light.
PT can even be implemented with the use of "home-made"
penetrants and "developers".
Come to the next
Chapter
407 meeting to learn how and see this demonstrated.
In an earlier Chapter 407 technical
presentation, an application of
electromagnetic
testing was demonstrated which could measure the thickness of
paint
over aluminum and could tell if corrosion existed beneath the paint without
physically removing it. This equipment
is available for Chapter members to use from the author's toy shop.
AET is not well known in the
industry. Sound waves are generated by
impingement
of high energy laser pulses on the surface of the sample. The sound
waves
propagate through the metal and any material dense enough in contact with the
metal. An application is known to allow
identification of the amount of liquid present in a tank and to identify the
liquid by its properties related to the speed with which the sound travels
through it. The radar-like returns of
the sound encountering flaws are interpreted much the same as UT, the key
difference being that AET allows for non-contact excitation of the sound waves.
Moving onto other structural
components, simple tapping of a coin on a
composite
layup after cure can quite easily discover void areas needing attention
before
flight... Oops, Topic materials for
another time. See you at the meeting
with
a bunch of goodies to demonstrate.
Paul
E. A. A. Chapter 407
Minutes of October 18, 2003
Pocatello, Idaho, I. S. U.
Hangar
The club met at the I. S. U.
hangar at 10:30 a.m., and after waiting for a few minutes, departed for the
National Weather Service building at the south end of the airport. We were met
there by Ken Simosko. He proceeded to explain the multiple screens and information
that can be provided to pilots to help in their decision making and flying
safety. These included satellite and infrared, which helped to determine
moisture levels at the different elevations, for use in overlaying the routes
and determining en route weather and jet stream information. He described the
models they use on the screens (some as small as 1 square kilometer) that are
available for different types of data to enable prediction of weather matched
to a timetable. There are people in outlying locations that telephone the
center with hourly weather data updates daily from the hours 8 to 5. This data
is logged, and when combined with computer data gives an accurate
representation of local weather conditions. The phone number to use to contact the
service building is 233-0834, and the web site to use is www.wrh.noaa.gov/Pocatello.
The group of 17 souls, including
visitor Rick Morin, then reconvened at 12:18 p.m. at the I. S. U. hangar for
the business meeting. Rick is the son of Ofilia Tremblay, and is a potential
student of the Aviation school at I. S. U. Pete Stewart gave a report on the
nominating committee selections for Vice-President being Jerry Phillips, and
Harold Mothersill for Treasurer. The floor was then opened to the membership
present for nominations, which there were none voiced. Nominations were closed,
and the names chosen to be voted upon will be mailed to the membership prior to
the next meeting on November 15th for voting. Harold Turvey gave a
treasurer’s report of $4,134.50 in the checking account, and then read the
minutes of the September 20, 2003, which were approved. A motion was made with
a second, and approval was given to Don Knauts to purchase covers for the Sport
Aviation magazines. Jerry Phillips gave a report on the activities committee,
and there is a fly-in scheduled for 9 a.m. next Saturday, October 25th,
at Dell, MT. Gary Shipley gave a report on the 68 Young Eagles flown at
Blackfoot last week, bringing the total to about 250 for the year thus far.
There will not be a Young Eagles fly-in for Pocatello at least for the next two
weeks, as Gary will not be available. Gary also apologized for the lack of the
Tools segment on the web site, which will be remedied shortly. Austin Moses
gave a report on what is being done to bring the web site up to date. A motion
was made with a second, and approved for Austin to be reimbursed $89 for the
purchase of the program “Front Page”, which will be used to include photos on
the web site and in the newsletter posted on the web. A motion was then made
with a second and approved for the President to have authority to authorize
discretionary expenditures of up to $200 for professional help with the web
site. A motion was made with a second and approval for the Christmas party to
be held December 6th, upon approval by Bob Hoff, at the Aero Mark
building in Idaho Falls. A banner has been located, which has the name of the
club, and can be used in parades, or other media events, and hung on the wall
at I. S. U. to help promote the club. It was also decided to include the
meeting dates in the news media to help promote the club. The “Bring-A-Buck
drawing was held, with Harold Turvey being the winner. The meeting was
adjourned at 1:00 p.m., and the group had the opportunity to have more “hands
on” work in the hangar.
Trip to Dell Montana
I arrived at the airport about 8 am, October 25th and Hal
already had the Lancair 360 out and ready to go. We loaded our flight bags and decided to check the weather one
last time and to warm up at the Red Barron office. A call to the weather indicated what we observed, severe
clear. A beautiful crisp fall morning
with blue skies and winds out of the north as I recall.
We climbed into the Lancair 360. Hal started her up and got clearance to taxi to 35. As we taxied out we noticed Carl doing his
checks of his Piper Cherokee 140.
Another nice airplane and the model I flew to get my pilots license.
Once in the run-up area we had to wait for the oil to heat
up. Hal readied flaps, etc. for
takeoff. I particularly liked the young ladies voice, in our headsets that
reminded us that the flaps were down.
After Hal performed the run-up we were cleared for takeoff. I was surprised with the acceleration of the
Lancair- shouldn’t have been with 180 hp up front. We had a similar engine our Mooney M20G – another good
airplane. Anyway, once airborne we
briskly climbed to cruising altitude for our short trip up to Dell. With a north wind I saw about 180kt on my
GPS. Navigation was not a problem with
my GPS, Hal’s panel mount GPS, and his hand held – more navigation capability
that we had on the old diesel submarine I was on my last year in the Navy. We had a great trip up with just a little
turbulence. The Lancair is great to fly
- just have to think about which way you want to go.
Approach into Dell was uneventful, just had to go way out to
get the Lancair slowed down. We went
all the way down the end of the runway and stopped the engine while still on
the tarmac. I once got picked up a
large nick on the prop of the Mooney by taxing on the rocks adjacent to the
runway.
We waited a while for Carl, but we did not see nor hear him
so we started to walk over to Yesterdays Calf-A. We again waited a little while
for Carl and then ordered. Our
breakfasts came and we started to eat.
About midway through the meal, Carl walked in. Turns out his battery on the Cherokee died so he drove all the
way up to Dell. We all had a good
breakfast of ham, eggs, pancakes, and all the trimmings. Even got a little business in – discussed
how we could advertise our meeting in the local newspapers and on TV. Coffee was great and served in what seemed
to be a two-gallon pot. Since it was
too early for dessert – nah – we were just too full, we got pie to go. Carl drove us over to the plane. We said our goodbyes and Carl headed south
by the road and Hal and I headed south by air.
On the way back we saw 212 kt on my GPS .
Carl, Hal, and me had a great breakfast and some good conversation. The rest of you missed a great day in Dell,
a great walk, and good food. See you
ya’ll next time.
Respectfully submitted,
unofficial Lancair copilot and a still smilin Jerry Phillips.
The following are details of the 100th
Anniversary of the Wright Brother’s First Flight accommodations. Jerry, his wife, Paul Tremblay and Ofilia
are going to stay in a house in Kill Devil Hills and are looking for an
additional couple who might be interested in going with them. They have the
house with the available room from Friday, December 12 (4pm check-in time)
through Dec 19 (celebration activities extend from Dec 13 through Dec 17). The
cost per the couple is $420. The $420
includes their room, as well as linens, a $70 refundable deposit, and all other
taxes and fees. The cost also includes
entry tickets for two people for all five days of the celebration. The only
additional expense should be food (which we can take with us or buy locally).
The house has three bedrooms, three baths, a full kitchen, living room, and
dinning room; and the available bedroom has either two single beds or a pyramid
bed (a single and a double bed). The
house is located about two miles south of the Wright Brother’s Memorial where
many of the activities will occur. I
checked with the realtor today and the “official” shuttle service for the
celebration is expected to travel within a short distance of the house.
Please call Jerry Phillips at 208-523-3981 or email at jhpidaho@cableone.net. We have also put out the word to the EAA
club in Raleigh, so you need to call Jerry soon if you are interested.
Absentee Ballot
E. A. A. Chapter 407
2003 Election
For Vice-President:
(
) Jerry Phillips
(
) ___________________________
For Treasurer:
(
) Harold Mothersill
(
) ___________________________
Your
Name: ___________________________
Signature: ___________________________
November, 2003 Edition