Bubba has moved on. Earlier this week, Tony and I flew up to NC to check a cozy out for a prospective buyer (smart move). After checking the rotary powered cozy out, FOUR builders emphatically told the buyer it was a piece of crap. Fuel leaks, structural issues… a plane worthy of a chainsaw. The buyer was faced with 5 days on the east coast with nothing to do until his flight back home, so I offered him a place to stay at my house so he could check out Charleston and more in the south east. Make a vacation out of the trip.
Somewhere along the way, we started discussing Bubba and he wanted to check it out. A quick trip to the airport and an hour later I agreed to sell him.
Two weeks late Soheb showed up with a truck and trail to move Bubba to his home in Vancouver BC.
The engine was taken off to allow for easier handling of the fuselage.
Bubba was tilted up at an angle on the trailer to ensure it did not exceed the federal width restriction on a trailer load.
Lots of blocking and hold down straps.
Sort of looks like a modern sculpture on wheels!
Bye Buy Bubba. I would have loved to have flown you again but I have my ultimate airplane to build and it is time for you to go to your new home.
Gerhardt wanted to filter some more WVO for our cars…. The problem is the waste oil is cold and my propane powered heater just didnt seem to work well. The best I could get out of was 0.5 g/m.
I decided to try an electric heater instead. Since the oil is non-conductive there is no risk of shock.
A quick trip to Lowe’s resulted in a $15, 1500 watt 120v hot water heater. An old extension cord was sacrificed and in 20 minutes I built a electric tank heater.
This showes the starting temp of the tank.
In 24 hours we went from 65 f to 137 f. I was able to pump 4.5 h/m through the filter with ease! What a great system. I was able to filter 300 gal in about an hour or so. A quick calculation showed that at the current utility rate, heating up the tank cost about $4 which means the it only cost me about 1.3 cents per gal of oil to run my car.
All that time I wasted with making the copper propane heater…..oya what a waste. Maybe I can use it to make some moon shine.
While checking out the individual power circuits, I found a MAJOR mess up. When I originally designed the oil pan I had the fuel servo hanging up side down. Later I flipped it right side up due to space considerations. I didnt take into account the push-pull movement and I found out my throttle cable now moves in the wrong direction. Shit….
After thinking about it for a while I came out with a fix which works very well. I installed a SS shaft with a support bearing for the cable to attach to. This effectively reverses the movement of the throttle cable and now everything work correctly.
Today was also noteable as I finally powered up the EFIS panels.
It has been quite a chore in checking out the wiring and powering everything up. Just about every circuit has had some issue from missing grounds to connector broken wires issues which needed correction. Slowly everything is being checked out and put in service. Tomorrow it will be correcting an minor issue with the EFIS panels and starting on the radios which are the last to do. I want to have all systems up and operational by Friday or Saturday!
Today was fun. I wanted to shorten the GTR antenna to remove a bunch of extra wire which wasnt needed.
To put on the new connector, I had to solder a very tiny post on a very tiny connector inside a hole… Fortunately I had some dental tools to clean up the inside of the connector from the excess solder.
Done. On to more antenna connections and finish up the wiring.
After finishing up the hull wiring yesterday, I completed the connection of the remaining radio power and grounds today. I only found a few errors on the install which were quickly fixed.
The electrical power system is nicely cleaned up now.
As hoped for all the wiring is hidden for a nice clean look.
Tomorrow, it will be the last of the major wiring…. hooking up all the radio data lines to the hull wiring. When finished I can start the electrical tests in preparation for full system turn on, computer setup and programing of the data communications systems. Cant wait!
Finally the fuselage wiring is done! Today the rats nest of wires in the magically disappeared into an organize mess (lots) of wires.
It is truly amazing to me the number of wires and it is my great hope that all work as planned (or at least be easy to trouble shoot.
I have removed the temporay tie wraps, installing the permanent ones to get ready for the big day tomorrow. I’ll be installing the instrument panel for the FINAL time. It is finally time to “marry” the panel to the plane. I think I should have a big ceremony and eat a cup cake with a candle on it. Shortly power will be applied to the bird and she will start to come to life! Cant wait.
Stbd Side
Port Side
Currently, I am have about 60 pages of wiring diagrams. Boy, talk about time consuming! Each one has to be reviewed, installed, corrected, rechecked numerous times. On the flip side, I can already see the need for the documentation as I forget what I have done from day to day. Just too many wires.
It is easy to image me or anyone trying to fix the wiring 5 years from now thinking how great it is to have detailed records of the installation. I have also drawn wiring harnesses into the paperwork to record where the wires go.
This is a pdf of Pg 56 if you wish to check out. It is the harness for the Noselift system.
Today the wiring on the instrument panel was finished out.
Prior to the final install in the plane, I needed to do as much wiring as possible on the bench. All the harness were hooked up and installed and the point to point wiring on the panel was completed.
What a mess of wires. The majority of them are just power and grounds. I decided to route them on the stbd side of the plane as the port side has a huge number of wires and I didnt want to add to the the complexity.
Nicely bound together. Tomorrow I will do the FINAL installation of the panel in the plane and “marry” the wiring together. Once done, this harness will become part of the plane harness.
I finished installing the rotary switch circuit board into the panel and completed populating the parts onto the lighting logic controller circuit board I designed for the planes lighting system. Overall, I am really pleased at how well it all turned out. Exactly as I had envisioned the end product.
On the panel, LED’s shine into tiny light tubes embedded in the panel which directs the light to the front illuminating the switch position selection. The switch position overall LED’s brightness is controlled by the panel dimmer.
The design purpose of this rotary switch is to reduce the overall number of switches on the panel. I combined 8 toggles switches to 1 rotary selector. The picture above indicates the “Start” position, which is the most dangerous to ground personnel, so when selected, the beeper, wig wag lights, strobes, belly strobe all turn on at once. Maximum awareness… “Warning Will Robinson”
After the engine start up, the selection is, “Taxi” which would be the next expected action. When selected the beeper and all strobes turn off, the taxi/landing/wing belly beacon activate. When you get to the end of the runway one selects “Day Landing” (and takeoff) and so forth through the different regimes of flight such as “Day” flight, “Night Landing” (and take), “Night Flight” and lastly flying in the “Clouds” (at night). Each position activates the desired combination of lights.
A long time ago I was always amazed at how complex an aircraft instrument panel looked. Lots of switches and breakers. Why? Now look at a fine car, there is none of that sh*t. I think the modern car turn signal stalk is a work of design/engineering art. Think about it it…. it turns you wipers of in all sorts of modes and speeds, has a button to wash the windshield, selects the Hi/Lo beams, flashes a car in the daytime AND activates your turn signals. So cool.
When I was a kid my dad was amazed when our VW came with a turn signal which had a little button button on the back side to FLASH the high beams. I think it was a German thing for the Audubon to indicate you wanted to pass someone. What a long way the simple turn signal switch has come.
Since the pilot ALWAYS activates (or should activate) a combination of light for best positional awareness for other planes, and for different types of flights, then why not build something which “automates” the process. Why not simply the panel if I could?
The lighting logic controller is a simple relay board with diode isolators. You can add/change the light combinations by changing diodes. Sort of like programing a simple computer. There are 8 relays each rated at 10 amp / circuit. A 12 pin plug on the board mates into the plane’s lighting wiring. I added a yellow LED light for each relay to show when it is activated to allow me to bench test the board.
If you would like to see how the circuit works, click on this link: Logic board controller
Work has started back on the plane. I am starting to install all the harnesses I built.
Here is a rats nest of wires. All my buddies are amazed that I can keep track of the the wires.
The wire runs look good when installed in the plane.
This is my first attempt ever at making a circuit board which will be used for the lighting control system. After designing it in Acad, I put a mask on the copper circuit board and used acid to etch away the unneeded copper. I am amazed at how great it turned out. I think I might try making a circuit board for the waste vegetable computer I make for my car.
Next I’ll drill the board, and add the components needed to make my lighting system functional.
