Going to Oshkosh

OSHKOSH-WE ARE ON SCHEDULE!
EAA 800 and HAWK are going to have a quick meeting. Then we are going to have a special lunch for our sponsors and supporters so they can see the airplanes off to Oshkosh.

Don is leaving the 19th Sterling and the Cherokee will follow later depending on weather. Ladd will also be going sometime during the week as he is flying his Carbon Cub in the Valdez show. It is really nice to have an airport in our area, MACK MESA AIRPORT (10CO), that is GA aviation friendly. MACK has the best Grass strip between the Utah state line and 11 road plus a really good asphalt strip. Come join us for the sendoff. The meeting is also going to be the meeting to go over check lists and make sure we have everything needed.

The kids cleaned the hanger and now we are starting the next build, the Zenith 701. I cannot even express the admiration I have for the kids work on the Dakota Hawk N280DH. They have learned a lot. We originally had 8 of our kids going to Oshkosh, but this number has swelled to 12 excited kids. I don’t think they expected to have an airplane, they helped rebuild, going to a large show. This weekend is the County Fair so several of our kids will not be present at the lunch as they are showing their Fair projects for judging. As in the past it seems farm kids still have a love of aviation.

For our Sponsors – Supporters be sure to come by the Teen Build Fly Area at Oshkosh and take a look at what your companies have help kids put together. All major logos will be prominently displayed on the aircraft. It is a flying billboard and is our ambassador for HAWK. A Copy of the TBF area is enclosed. The red area is the TBF area and is where the Dakota Hawk is to be displayed. We are keeping fingers crossed that weather cooperates for the flight out. it is a long way at 80MPH.

Teen Build Fly Area at Oshkosh
Teen Build Fly Area at Oshkosh in Red

http://www.eaa.org/en/airventure
http://www.eaa.org/~/media/files/airventure/av16-visitors-grounds-map.pdf

Dakota Hawk First Flight 1 July 2016

The Dakota Hawk  made it back into the air July 1 2016, piloted by Don Coleman.

Dakota Hawk First Flight (Post Rebuild)
Dakota Hawk First Flight (Post Rebuild)

First Flight Gallery

July 1 2016 is also the official date of our hull and liability insurance certificate activation. Securing insurance has been one big problem, but is now solved until next year. All it took to get insurance was the patience and perseverance of John C our treasurer plus lots of cash. Thanks Lambert foundation, without their financial help this never would have been possible.  We still cannot use the Experimental Dakota Hawk for students to solo, and it can only be flown by qualified pilots with tail dragger time. It will be used to fly young eagles and introduce them to aviation. This is a start, with enough money and time it’s amazing what can be accomplished.
John also secured insurance on the Cherokee so it can now be used for instruction, and qualified students can solo it.

Both aircraft will be flown to AirVenture this year. The Cherokee will be used by Sterling to instruct our students. Sterling is planning to have the Cherokee meet the group driving out when they camp and exchange students. Don C is flying the Dakota Hawk to AirVenture, and is currently flying it nearly every day to sort out any problems. Other than a little rigging adjustment and some minor electrical problems (elevator Trim), it is flying as it should.  Now we are working to make it pretty.

HAWK had several individual aviation pros go over the Dakota Hawk for problems and give it a clean, ready to fly, bill of health.
Thanks Dave Baxter – he will be with us at AirVenture with 3 of his boys he is one of HAWK’s IA’s and CFI’s he was very thorough.
Also Steve Wood looked it over after his presentation at last month’s EAA chapter 800 meeting. (Anyone who missed the EAA 800 meeting missed a really good presentation on Harmonics and their effects on aircraft engines. Steve did some of the original structural work on the Dakota Hawk wings when fisher products first started. Steve is an accomplished aeronautical engineer and has worked as an engineer for Cessna Aircraft. (Steve designed the Sky pup years ago and plans are still available). He is also currently Director of the Grand Junction Regional Airport Board. Watch for Steve’s next airplane – it is flying and is a real piece of metal ingenuity but that is a story for another day.
Also thanks Lowell Manery and Graham of EAA chapter 1373. Lowell and Graham flew in and went over the airplane after everyone else; Seems under Graham’s sharp eye the trailing edge of the horizontal to elevator hinge line is not straight. Another problem from the original build, its minor but still needs attention. I even missed this one.
ALWAYS’S ALWAYS have a second or 3rd or 4th set of experienced eyes look and critique your Build. You may think something is correct but you are so used to looking at the stuff you go blind to problems; I learned this rebuilding Type certificated airplanes at Wegner aircraft. We always had a final inspection by someone not familiar with the rebuild. There have been numerous accidents caused by such simple items as the trim tab rigged backwards.

Lowell, as usual, came through in a real time of need. Kelly at MITCHELL instruments Donated a new fuel transmitter to the project but it would not fit through the hole in the tank and would have required removing the windshield to drill larger. Lowell just happened to have a gauge that matched our capacitance sender. As usual, he came through. Nice to have a gentleman like Lowell working with HAWK. (All our gauges are MITCHELL gauges. Kelly at MITCHELL has been extremely helpful and their products are exceptional).

I talked to SANDIA AEROSPACE last year at Oshkosh about an STX transponder. They offered to donate one to the project last year but I never got back to them. Don C really wanted a Transponder for the trip (flight following) so I called SANDIA to see if the offer still stood. Guess what – they were waiting for my call. REALLY REALLY GREAT GUYS and the transponder is awesome. I will be ordering one for my airplane. Plus, we are looking at putting one of their new ADS-B units in the Cherokee.

Dakota Hawk Almost Ready to Fly

The Dakota Hawk N280DH- is almost ready to fly.

The 0-200 overhauled engine is now running

THANKS – CHAMPION AEROSPACE and SLICK MAGS, MARVEL SCHEBLER, B&C, SKYTEC, AIRCRAFT SPECIALTY SERVICES, WESTSTAR EAA CHAPTER 800, THE KEBLER FAMILY, COLORADO AIRPARTS, AND ALL THE OTHERS that helped bring this engine back to life. Now we can taxi the airplane back and forth to the build hanger (weather permitting). We have started working extra week days and with the schools in our area finished the kids are able to work extra days. Anthony is painting the last of the hawk parts and bottom cowl. John and Josiah have finished the engine baffle. The PAC prop is on and the weight and balance has been performed.

MATCO Inc. donated a modification of our existing 6 inch solid tail wheel tire and made it a wide 8 inch tire with a tube. This mod gained about 4 pounds on the tail and is awesome. THANKS MATCO! This airplane features all MATCO LANDING gear and brake parts including their parking brake and copilots brakes. Even with this heaver tire and the ELT in the tail we are still adding about 7 pounds of weight to the tail. With all the repairs and the added systems the airplane’s empty weight came out at about the same empty weight as the original 756 pounds. We are adding 7 pounds of lead in the tail so a 125 pound pilot can fly it without adding baggage weight to keep the airplane in CG. A 200 pound pilot puts the airplane at forward CG as it sets but for our lightweight kids to fly it solo we need the extra weight. The airplane will fly to Oshkosh.

Jun 27, 2015 Build Report

Another build day bites the dust! The airplane is starting to look like an airplane. This week there was a definite lack of kids- Josiah and Anthony were it. Its vacation time and warm so most of the young builders families have other endeavors like barbecues, weddings, fishing or just enjoying being warm and dry and just goofing off.

John W and Josiah installed the engine mount permanently. They spent a lot of time trying to figure out torque values for the bolts. 4313 does not address torque values for wood structures. After much searching on the internet by myself and Jerry F no real way was found to access what to torque the mount bolts as to not crush the wood. Pat W and Ken P worked on installing the tail feathers. Again how tight is tight enough on wood? Standard torque values will crush the wood. Interestingly after much searching we found Composite torque values in the Cirrus maintenance Manuel and they are about half the normal published torque values. even the Hawk build Manuel’s we have do not address this that we could find.  I started calling around and as usual Don Coleman has the answer and also confirmed what we found- nothing published even he could find. INTERESTING!. Anyway here is the answer per the pro Don C.- with AN hardware Snug the nut up. then on soft material (which is what we have on the tail) add 1/2 turn. On hard wood (our mount) add one full turn. The old way of tightening bolts to max and leaving off the 1/2 turn before you strip it is definitely out on wood – it just keeps crushing! Armed with this info the tail ins on. Josiah, Anthony, Pat and Ken P got er done. The mount is also installed with no innocent wood damaged in the process.

(As a side note when Tres brought his Pietenpol out to our dry climate from California all the bolts and nuts became slightly loose, When he went home they tightened right back up. according to Tres Composites also do this, that is one of the reasons for white or light colors on composites. Even on metal airplanes the cables tensions vary with temperature but not so much with moisture).

While the airplane was being properly( I hope) put together Bill Derose, John C, Anthony and I worked on the engine. Everything went smoothly until the last clamps on the push rod tubes were being installed by yours truly. A new – and I quote – new clamp decided to fail (with a loud snap) when compressed ( with the proper tool) to install it. and as usual it was on the last cylinder installed and 2nd from last clamp to install. (Murphy). So we had to loosen the cylinder to install a new clamp, When Brian brings one back from Colorado airparts.

I will be flying balloons in Provo this weekend for the Freedom Festival, so i will not be in the hanger. I have check in Wednesday 2-6 in Provo, so will not get anything done with regard to the HAWK or the Mooney. (I would rather stay here but have flown Provo for the past 31 years). I will be back Sunday because there are no flights on the sabbath due to it being Utah.

There is plenty of work to be done even without me. The baffling can be trial fit on the engine. The control installation can proceed. Hopefully Rodger will have his work of art finished (the beautiful carbon fiber instrument panel), and it can be put together. The wiring can be installed etc.

Anyway the build continues- Sorry for no pictures as my finger could not remember to find the shutter button.

Jun 14, 2015 Correspondence

On Sun, Jun 14, 2015 at 1:34 PM, Roy Evarts wrote:

Hey Eddie,

Thats really great news.    I am so impressed with whats going  on.   Any idea about the weight issue?   Not that the 0200 won’t solve a lot of that for you.
All the best,
Roy
The original airplane weighed 740 pounds. with all the changes who knows but I have cut weight everywhere I could. I am hoping we gain less than 50 pounds. We gained weight with the gear mods. We lost weight when we moved the battery forward. I do not know what it had for accessories before, but I am making sure to use everything light weight. The slick mags alone weigh more than 3 pounds less than Bendix mags. We should be able to weigh it in the next few weeks and then we will know if it is a boat anchor. It will still be a lot less than a 150 at about 1000 lbs and has the same power.