There Just Aren't Enough Pictures of Rockets On This Forum!

[AX-O]

Originally Posted by vfrazier

Me? I'm building the first pre-production F4 in my shop right now.

Omg! I have been wanting to do this. F1 with a nice supped up 4 cylinder.

[logansc]

It's great to hear from all of you (especially you, Ben---Semper Fi). Rockets are just terrific airplanes and certainly fit well within the RV family. For that matter, there wouldn't be any Rockets if there hadn't been RV's first.

So...I'm up for any fly-in you guys can put together (fixnflyguy?) and for that matter, you might put early October on your calendar for a trip down to Ridgeland (3J1). I'm not traveling as much as I expected during retirement, so putting on the "Race to Ridgeland" again is a possibility (I've gotten a couple of offers of help, which are very welcome), so...

Anyway, any news about F1 and F4 parts being available is very welcome and certainly Mark F. has been helpful to anyone who has asked for his assistance with their aircraft over the couple of years since he shut down the kit assembly line. I for one would love to see it kick off again. Vince Frazier built one of (if not the) first "composite" Harmon/F1 airframes. There were only three guys with comprehensive build sites out there when I was building mine (Vince, Randy Pflanzer, and Doc Throck). There is a little of every one of their airplanes in mine---thanks guys! In fact, I just replaced the tail stinger and tail wheel assembly in mine with Vince's FlyBoy stuff last month.

For Palamedes: Basically, the Harmon is literally an RV-4 (and RV-4 airfoil) with some parts replaced by John Harmon parts, mated to a different engine mount and a 540 just as Vern says. The F1 benefitted from some additional engineering work by the Czechs who manufactured the kit (without any RV parts) under Mark's direction to make it into a "quick build". Also, there were two different wing options on the F1, EVO and Sport. It wasn't THAT quick a build because though some of it was premanufactured, the rest was neither pre-drilled nor trimmed to fit, only formed and rough-sized.

There are many more Harmon's flying than F1's (350 or so, I believe); my current count (certainly not complete) is that there were something like 180 F1 kits built with something over 100 now flying. I've been trying to keep tabs but haven't heard of any new finishers in quite awhile. Anyway, it's a great airplane that in many ways sits right at the top of the two-seater RV "food chain". Mine will do 215 knots indicated at full power near sea level and I usually see 190 knots true at 22/2200 at 10,000' and above burning just under 13 gph (the equivalent of about 8.5 gph in a 4-banger). I even passed a Baron at altitude once coming back from Birmingham. Rockets will burn less gas than RV's at similar speeds and altitudes.

Anyway, just playing the role of Johnny Appleseed here I guess. Thanks to all of the Rocket guys who've checked in. We'd love to see yours over here sometime Greg! Where are you, Smokey?

Good flying, everyone!


Lee...

[fixnflyguy]

Here is the all black Rocket my friend Alex has in Cheraw SC.

[logansc]

What a beauty! That one is a very early F1 and was (I believe) originally built by John Cash. It was the inspiration for my solid color paint job in the first place. It's great to hear that it is now in South Carolina.

Do you have any more information on it? I'm trying to inventory all the F1's, including kit serial number, owners name, airfield, basic description (wing, engine, prop, major avionics...), first flight, etc.

Have the owner PM me if you don't mind. I'd love to know how the airplane is doing.

Regards,


Lee...

[hydroguy2]

Originally Posted by logansc

What a beauty! That one is a very early F1 and was (I believe) originally built by John Cash. It was the inspiration for my solid color paint job in the first place. It's great to hear that it is now in South Carolina.

Do you have any more information on it? I'm trying to inventory all the F1's, including kit serial number, owners name, airfield, basic description (wing, engine, prop, major avionics...), first flight, etc.

Have the owner PM me if you don't mind. I'd love to know how the airplane is doing.

Regards,


Lee...

Jimmy Cash was the builder. He said he did the first flight of a customer built F-1. He is quite a guy, I had him do the first flight on my RV-7.
He and a friend brought another F-1 to Townsend to get some paint work done. N1BY was a solid dark blue color. I think it is in Idaho now

Only pic I could find since my computer crash


found another one on a backup drive

[xavierm]

[f1rocket]

Just when I thought I had built my last airplane, then this. MAYBE my wife will let me build one more.

Here's a few shots of my old Rocket. It's now in TN.

[TS Flightlines]

Wow Lee---I think you've started something. Look at all those beautiful Rockets!
Tom

[n5lp]

One of the prettiest and most memorable RVs I have ever seen was Jim Cash's Black Jack. He flew it into an early LOE gathering and I was pretty stunned. I took lots of photos which are now lost. The best photo I could find on the net was from an EAA newsletter. Does not do it justice at all.

[airguy]

I simply MUST build one of these next.

I just have to figure out how to do it while staying married...