Best advice you got from another builder?
 

What's the best advice you ever got from another builder, whether it's about building, flying, tools, etc. What one special nugget of wisdom sticks out in your mind as number one?

From multiple other builders -
 

?Build On?!

Do something every night.

Build or buy a Vans RV and get rid of that spam can Cherokee!

Build on ++

Don’t be a hermit builder, seek advice, use your resources...from the late, great Joe Blank, my tech advisor!

Are you building the next Lindy, or do you want to get the thing in the air?
Don't let perfect be the enemy of good. Build on.

Your building an airplane, not a watch. Ken Scott - Vans Aircraft and hangar neighbor.

Don't rivet anything until you absolutely cannot go further on that assembly without doing so.

Practice
 

Practice, practice, practice.
Building is a perishable skill. If it's been a while, practice on scrap first.

Get a Mentor then a Tech Advisor.

Perfection is the enemy of completion.

Compromise is the enemy of quality

"Compromise is natural to good design."

A friend built and flew his homebuilt. It wasn't an RV and had poor performance. Some time later, sitting in the cockpit of his recently-purchased Cessna, my friend said "I didn't have to built this. All I had to do was sign my name a few times."

That was good advice -- I took it; and I've only recently gone astray, building my RV-3B. But I still have and fly my Cessna 180.

Dave
P.S. Building an RV-3B is a lot more work than signing my name a few times....

Keep asking yourself, ?Do I absolutely need to order avionics now?? :rolleyes:

" If it can chafe, it will chafe "

Measure twice, drill once.
 

When we first started building, a friend brought over a [ruined] aircraft part. On it was written:

"Measure twice, drill once. That will be $60, please, for this lesson."

We still have it hanging in our hangar (19 yrs later).

Focus on small projects
 

Best advice was not to get overwhelmed by building an airplane and instead focus on individual projects. Keeps the sanity in check.

Use the right tool for the job - even if you have to invent the tool.

There's a simpler way
And a better plan.
Have it done
By another man.

-- Scott Gassaway

Dave

If you want it like downtown - take it downtown.

-- Scott Gassaway

Dave

"Think garden tractor, not space shuttle" - Mark Fredericks

Dont fix problems you dont have.

Why don't you take up golfing?

"Paint your wheel pants one color!"

This was before I had ever flown my 7a and I asked why? "So they are easier to fix when you damage them". Didn't understand until two years of flying, I landed in really long grass and damaged my main right pant. Only had to redo one color!

Wisdom from Paul Dye.

Buy a QB kit...:)

"Do something everyday".

Bevan

"When you get to a part of the build that has you totally stumped, take your wife out to dinner. Chances are you've been spending too much time thinking about the plane and not enough time thinking about your wife."

That one worked really well for me.

The other one that has always been at the forefront of my mind is:
"If you're not enjoying it, don't do it. If it doesn't feel right, it isn't. Come back to it later when you are in a better frame of mind."
I followed that advice pretty frequently and it often saved me destroyed or damaged parts, or allowed me to see a better way to do things. Sometimes getting away from the project is far more productive than continuing to work on it.

"Touch something on the project every day, even it it's just putting clecos back in the bucket".

"Decide if you're building a show plane or a go plane".

From Pierre Smith's VAF signature:
It's never skill or craftsmanship that completes airplanes, it's the will to do so.

This has given the the personal fortitude to continue on with my build.

Try never to do any riveting at the end of a build session. If you have an assembly all ready to rivet - drilled, demurred, clecoed together....quit for the night, and come back to do a sanity check at the START of the next session before driving, squeezing, or pulling those rivets. It will save you lots of do-overs if you give yourself time to think about what you are doing.

I go by this.... KISS.... Keep It Simple Stupid.

This makes it very easy to alter and maintain. And very easy to find problems.

Know when to stop for the day (or night). Tomorrow is another day.

My best guess is that the quality of an amateur-built aircraft is established even before the first rivet is driven. Some people have the patience and inherent disposition to build quality and others do not.

And you can tell which tribe they come from simply by the building advice they give to others. Here are some examples:

Build on
Don't let perfect be the enemy of good
Perfection is the enemy of completion
Build to go, not to show

or the diametrically opposing view

Compromise is the enemy of quality
Time spent equals quality (T=Q)

I'll leave it to you to guess who's building the better quality aircraft.

Simplicity
 

The best advice I got was:

Build it light, build it simple. Buy the parts and take the advice from Vans. Don't try and make your plane anything but the simplest you can. If it's available from Vans get it there and it will work.

"I think you should do it". Wife's advice, so who was I to argue?

Keep a picture for future focus, but work on the piece at hand, a little a day

If you love to fly sooner than later, build according to plan.

If you love to experiment, waste a lot of money, be chronic test pilot, go with an auto engine.

Oh good grief. There is nothing wrong with building a show-plane OR a go-plane. Just decide which you want and don't compromise on airworthiness items. But don't tell new builders they HAVE to build a perfect show-plane, or most of us would have never finished and given up in frustration. I'd love to do it on my SECOND plane. But I can tell you I have just as much or more fun in my unpainted plane with a small smiley on the vertical stabilizer than any of the Lindy winners. We need to be encouraging new builders, not telling them that they have to rebuild every part with a minor superficial flaw - it's admirable, but certainly not necessary.

Chris

I couldn't have said it better.


Advice I give is the way you eat an elephant is one bite at a time.

Also, the dang thing isn't going to build itself. Dive in.