A brief history of LANGAIRE AIRCRAFT PARTS LLC’s (PRIOR LANGAIR MACHINING Inc.) association with VAN’S AIRCRAFT.
By Harmon Lange
First of all, dear friends, let’s us remember that take offs are optional. LANDINGS ARE MANDATORY.
In 1959 your UNITED STATES AIR FORCE took the farm boy that wanted to fly and turned him into a machinist. Hence the die was cast.
In 1969 I began making Wittman type rod gear. The first set was for my Davis DA-2a that I was building. Then it was for friends and other individuals with experimental aircraft. The Wittman tailwind was one of those experimental aircraft. Steve Wittman had designed the gear legs I was making. So, in 1972 (about) I visited Steve Wittman at his home in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, and obtained permission to use his name to advertise the gear legs. A small ad was inserted in the national EAA magazine. We have to assume (never got the story) that Van’s used that ad to contact Langair Machining and order the first production run of gear legs for the RV-3. (Van had chosen the Wittman type gear legs for the RV’s) As production increased I was contacted to assure that Langaire Machining would be able to handle the increases that where anticipated. (I’m sure no one at that time could have predicted how much that would be.) In any case Langair Machining purchased the necessary equipment to handle large increases in demand. Most of this equipment was made just for the gear leg production.
In the early years Langair Machining was located in Wisconsin and we made the gear legs finished to size, but not bent or heat treated. They were shipped from Wisconsin straight, they still needed to be bent and heat treated. Van had that process done in Tacoma, WA. The gear legs where then custom fitted to each engine mount. This custom fitting process was very time consuming. The problem was the heat treating warped the parts and caused a misalignment. I was not aware of that problem at the time but Van was trying to come up with a better way. The solution was to leave extra material on the 2 areas that provided the tight fit to the engine mount. This material would be ground off after bending and heat treating, and provide the close tolerance fit and alignment without the custom fitting. Great - problem solved. The only thing is no one ever made a grinder that could grind a part that was already bent.
After considering all the options I came up with a way to modify the grinder we had so we could basically do the impossible. The problem was it could not be done in Wisconsin with shipping parts back and forth. At the time Bill Benidict was President of Van’s and it was not a problem for him to literally beg for a strategic move.
So, in the spring of 1995 I packed up all the equipment (many items specially built for the production of landing gear) and moved to Oregon. The thought at the time was Van’s Aircraft would most likely relocate to the Scappoose Airport so that is why we are located near there.
Production kept increasing and at one point (about 2006) a meeting was called and the question came up about growing old and not being able to provide the gear legs. Tom Green was president at the time. Tom and I decided that a younger man should be trained to handle the production part of making the gear legs. Hence the partnership with Richard Squires was arranged. Richard has since made many improvements in gear leg production. Demand for the gear legs has rapidly increased over the years and Langaire Aircraft has kept up. We are however deeply dependent on Van’s Aircraft’s success with the reorganization.
The procedure that we have developed here at Langaire to manufacture gear legs has improved greatly over the past 30 plus years. This has allowed us to keep the price of the product at a minimum. However, our operation depends significantly on continuing to produce these gear legs. Since landings are mandatory, I guess we are also.
By Harmon Lange
First of all, dear friends, let’s us remember that take offs are optional. LANDINGS ARE MANDATORY.
In 1959 your UNITED STATES AIR FORCE took the farm boy that wanted to fly and turned him into a machinist. Hence the die was cast.
In 1969 I began making Wittman type rod gear. The first set was for my Davis DA-2a that I was building. Then it was for friends and other individuals with experimental aircraft. The Wittman tailwind was one of those experimental aircraft. Steve Wittman had designed the gear legs I was making. So, in 1972 (about) I visited Steve Wittman at his home in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, and obtained permission to use his name to advertise the gear legs. A small ad was inserted in the national EAA magazine. We have to assume (never got the story) that Van’s used that ad to contact Langair Machining and order the first production run of gear legs for the RV-3. (Van had chosen the Wittman type gear legs for the RV’s) As production increased I was contacted to assure that Langaire Machining would be able to handle the increases that where anticipated. (I’m sure no one at that time could have predicted how much that would be.) In any case Langair Machining purchased the necessary equipment to handle large increases in demand. Most of this equipment was made just for the gear leg production.
In the early years Langair Machining was located in Wisconsin and we made the gear legs finished to size, but not bent or heat treated. They were shipped from Wisconsin straight, they still needed to be bent and heat treated. Van had that process done in Tacoma, WA. The gear legs where then custom fitted to each engine mount. This custom fitting process was very time consuming. The problem was the heat treating warped the parts and caused a misalignment. I was not aware of that problem at the time but Van was trying to come up with a better way. The solution was to leave extra material on the 2 areas that provided the tight fit to the engine mount. This material would be ground off after bending and heat treating, and provide the close tolerance fit and alignment without the custom fitting. Great - problem solved. The only thing is no one ever made a grinder that could grind a part that was already bent.
After considering all the options I came up with a way to modify the grinder we had so we could basically do the impossible. The problem was it could not be done in Wisconsin with shipping parts back and forth. At the time Bill Benidict was President of Van’s and it was not a problem for him to literally beg for a strategic move.
So, in the spring of 1995 I packed up all the equipment (many items specially built for the production of landing gear) and moved to Oregon. The thought at the time was Van’s Aircraft would most likely relocate to the Scappoose Airport so that is why we are located near there.
Production kept increasing and at one point (about 2006) a meeting was called and the question came up about growing old and not being able to provide the gear legs. Tom Green was president at the time. Tom and I decided that a younger man should be trained to handle the production part of making the gear legs. Hence the partnership with Richard Squires was arranged. Richard has since made many improvements in gear leg production. Demand for the gear legs has rapidly increased over the years and Langaire Aircraft has kept up. We are however deeply dependent on Van’s Aircraft’s success with the reorganization.
The procedure that we have developed here at Langaire to manufacture gear legs has improved greatly over the past 30 plus years. This has allowed us to keep the price of the product at a minimum. However, our operation depends significantly on continuing to produce these gear legs. Since landings are mandatory, I guess we are also.
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