RV-12 First Flights: Photo Album

[Peterk]

Originally Posted by kell311496

First flight this morning - flies beautifully. Thanks to all of you who contribute to this forum - your help to us first-time builders is invaluable !
http://s900.photobucket.com/albums/a...nt=move019.jpg

Congrats! Your plane is beautiful. You'll love flying it.

[John Foy]

First flight for the N7771. 1/25/2010. Test pilot Mike McMains reports all normal and a pleasure to fly. high quality picture

[JBPILOT]

Congrats ! Glad to see another one flying. Going to paint it soon ?

John Bender

[Geico266]

Congrats!

Glad to see another -12 leave the nest.

[ARPENN]

Congrats!
Is that aluminum instead of fiberglass on the front of the canopy?

Art Pennanen

[John Foy]

Yes, our local aluminium wizard ( Mike McMains, the test pilot) Whomped the aluminium part ,in two pieces, for us. This guy is amazing in what he can do with a piece of aluminium!
John Foy

[JBPILOT]

Are you going to paint it ? I also noticed std rivets on the hood hinges. Was there a reason other than it would save lots of time.

John Bender

[John Foy]

We plan to paint it after the 40 hours are flown off. We licensed it as an EAB. I think it may have looked like solid rivets but I think that was just the lighting. We used pop rivets throughout except where solid rivets were called for. We love those pop rivets!
John

[JBPILOT]

I didn't ask the question properly. I noticed the POP rivets on the hood hinges. I was referring to that. Would save time for sure. Going to do any body fillers on the alum piece on the canopy ? Any other things ? How did you do the gas tank - leave the window in ?

John Bender

[John Foy]

No plans for body filler, that will wait for the painter to decide. We wound up with a leak in the plastic gauge for the fuel tank after we had filled it with 20 gallons of fuel. It had tested fine with just air. Then we removed the top of the tank and removed the plastic sight gauge, replaced the plastic with a .040 thick plate of alum, properly gooped up with tank sealant, and riveted the plate on the inside. Then we gooped the rivets and the outside of the tank over the holes. Installed a mechanical gauge in the top of the tank and reassembled the tank. Reinstalled the tank and no more leaks from the sight gauge area. We had assembled the tank originally when it was hot and wound up with a leak from the front electric gauge plate when the weather turned cold. We tightened up the mounting screws 1/8th of a turn and no more leaks! The plastic sight gauge cracked when we filled the tank with fuel.
John