Maybe soon you will need to request an electric hookup spot in HBC to charge your electric plane. I see lots of extension chords running up and down the rows.
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OSH'25: The VAF Thread. PIREPs, Latest News, Pictures….whatever you got.
- Thread starter DeltaRomeo
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Maybe soon you will need to request an electric hookup spot in HBC to charge your electric plane. I see lots of extension chords running up and down the rows.
If we discount the RV-15, this was probably the biggest hit at the show...the SE1. I was told $68K ready to fly (unconfirmed).
The OSH aviator's three favorite airships.
I admit a personal soft spot for this one. My very first airplane ride, in 1956.
The OSH aviator's three favorite airships.
I admit a personal soft spot for this one. My very first airplane ride, in 1956.
I am highly intrigued by that little Spirit bird. Very tempting if that price holds true. I almost asked if I could buy the #2 right there at the field, solely because it would fit the tail number scheme.
(I'm 112SB, it's 112SE)
That would make a fabulous 2-seater!
That little polished single-seater was indeed the most intriguing hit of the show….yet the guy running the company (founder) is adamant that it will never be a kit, which is too bad. It’s sort of on the same scale as a Hummel H5 however, so if you want to pound one out yourself from raw sheet metal, give those guys a call. The owner/founder of the SE1 was more receptive to selling the engine alone, so there’s a glimmer of hope for the homebuilder!
The shuttle was pretty good, but we had a group of four people and that makes Uber/Lyft far more competitive. Plus the ride sharing vehicles have air conditioning, which the bus lacks. The windows didn’t go that far down in any of the busses so it got hot in there at times.
The one time I feel the shuttle fell short was after the night airshow on Wednesday. We spent about 1.3 hours waiting to get on the bus because the line was so long. I’d guess they had maybe 3 or 4 busses operating.
Ron
I did not make it to OSH this year. Glad no big storms went through this year. They all seemed to miss as apposed to previous years where they all seemed to hit. From internet pictures, it looks like the RVs in the home built area are still being parked facing east. There was talk after all the rudder damage a few years back of parking into the most likely prevailing wind during a storm, facing west. Did anyone try to park facing west? Could you if you wanted to?
I was damaged in the storm of 2022, and subsequently have parked facing West. I was told as long as the plane stayed in the “box”, it could face any direction.
rocketbob
Well Known Member
Friend of mine showed me a photo of inside their factory where I'm guessing there were at least 20 of these airplanes completed.
Jerry Fischer
Well Known Member
Dan, it sure looks like the Military version of the Super Connie, the Navy had a version of one used in anti-submarine hunting. been so long ago, I don't remember the type letters...
Jeff, unrelated, but I'm hoping the young lady marshaller who went down in heat exhaustion this morning in HBP, in front of me, ended up okay. A few of us used my canopy cover hung off a golf cart as a sunshade until the EMTs could arrive. The heat and humidity seemed particularly brutal this morning as I was loading my plane, even worse than earlier in the week.
Scott,
Yes she was OK. By the time I got there she was already being attended to by the medical folks. It’s a challenge with the young Explorer Scouts to get them to drink enough water in this heat. Sunday was pretty brutal.
Great flight home to KLDJ from a great week! This was my first time flying in. The Fisk arrival was a blast. I loved the excitement of being part of that complex machine, with those awesome ATC people. Very impressive stuff! Flying the Chicago shoreline was a highlight, both coming and going. 
They also had two of them just off the northwest corner of the D-Buildng in the main commercial area….
I made a last-minute decision to attend AirVenture even though I could only go during the weekend. I realize that the weekend is not the best time to go, lots of interesting airplanes and exhibits were packing up to leave... but the opportunity presented itself, and it was certainly better than no Oshkosh at all.
Even thought it was my 5th AirVenture (the first one being 2000), I was still surprised at how many times I saw something that I had never seen before, or how many times I finally got to see in person a project that I had been reading about for months or even years... just on Saturday!
Some highlights for me:
Even thought it was my 5th AirVenture (the first one being 2000), I was still surprised at how many times I saw something that I had never seen before, or how many times I finally got to see in person a project that I had been reading about for months or even years... just on Saturday!
Some highlights for me:
- Beta's electric airplane. It's a lot bigger than I appreciated from having seen photos and videos. (I asked what the max gross was, and they said about 7,000 lbs). And all the surfaces are amazingly curvy. Whoever lofted those skins and made the tooling, I do not envy their job!
- The new Sonex High Wing. It's so small! And I have a hard time imagining that the view out of that very shallow windscreen is good, but I'm sure they put thought into that. (And I would say the same thing about the Cessna 190/195 - never having been in one of those either - but people seem to like them anyways, so, what do I know).
- The SE-1, which I had read about just a couple days earlier. On the one hand: it's beautiful, certified, they even certified a new engine, so, very cool. On the other hand: only one seat, and the engine makes only 40hp so most airplanes would need at least 2 of them. So I admire the work and the product, but, not super practical. Still, very neat to see.
- The DeltaHawk RV-14. If I were to start an RV build right now, that would be it right there (plus a nosewheel). I'm very curious about what fraction of RV builds will have DeltaHawk engines in the future. Seems like there's a possibility for it to be a decent fraction eventually, if they really do get production going. And that's exciting. 100LL won't be around for ever, and bonus points for compatibility with biofuels (SAF in this case). I had been following the VAF thread for ages, so, cool to see it in the flesh.
- That scaled-down P-38 replica that a guy built in his garage. Man, what a project. And the result is spectacular.
- Bearhawk's six-seater (helpfully called the "Bearhawk 5"). It looks a lot like a Cub, but as you walk closer and closer to it, it keeps getting bigger and bigger until you realize it's quite huge (compared with other airplanes with a similar shape). And it's impressive how the whole side of the fuselage opens up.
- Rutan Solitaire; RAFE has two, and this is the only airworthy one at the moment. (I happen to have an old Cuyuna engine in the garage that I'll probably donate to them...)
- SW-51. We all think that the RV-8 and the Rocket are beautiful, fighter-like airplanes... and the SW-51 obviously cranks that up a notch.
- Pipistrel Panthera. Roomier than I imagined, and the back door is a nice touch. Are they ever going to finish certifying this thing? First flight was like 12 years ago... Maybe not the highest priority anymore now that Textron owns Pipistrel.
- MagniX e-Beaver. Probably the most practical application of electric airplanes (after ultralights) are sub-200-mile flights made in small propeller transports, such as seaplanes in Washington and Alaska and the west coast of Canada. So this is probably the electric airplane that is closest to commercial use (or maybe second, behind the Pipistrel electric airplanes that are being used for flight training at a couple of places, thanks to an LSA exemption).
- Porto Risen. I've been reading about it for years and finally saw one. Not as tiny as I expected, given how fuel-efficient it is. The canopy goes so far forward, I wonder what the sight picture is like. In any case: It's nice that MOSAIC will allow the US to enjoy these fast and efficient two-seaters.
- Junkers A50, a certified LSA that is a rebirth of a 1920s design. I wonder how many they are selling, but in any case, I'm glad they're making them!
- Turbulence. It was neat to see Mike Patey's turboprop Lancair at the EAA museum. (And in case you have not heard: The engine blew up because its previous owner had never done an AD related to a failure mode where all the teeth in the reduction gearbox get stripped out... and that's what happened. This effectively disconnects the turbomachinery from the propeller, allowing RPMs to shoot through the roof and causing more centrifugal force than the blades were designed to handle. In any case: Good lesson for all of us who put old certified engines into experimentals. "It was flown in a certified airplane so all the maintenance must have been perfectly, right?"...)
- Seeing the PB4Y-2 Privateer fly at the airshow, that was a new one for me. (And of course the F-22 and F-35 demos never get old, nor the huge numbers of warbirds all flying at once). (And I used to work at the airfield where that Me-262 was made and where that MiG-29 made its post-restoration test flights, so, those were old news for me ;] ).
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AirShowFan, it's been a while since I've flown a Cessna 190/195 but the excellent visibility was one of the things I liked about it.
Dave
Dave
Dan, I was fortunate to get to fly a blimp. I heard that only .006 percent of people have flown in a blimp. I was lucky to fly one.
Did you get the pilot to sign your logbook for the time? A Commercial blimp pilot s automatically a blimp CFI, so you can log the time towards your blimp rating!
(I have thirty minutes from about 40 years ago, but never added to it - couldn’t afford to pay for the ground crew, much less the flight time!! 
)
Got that ticket punched post 9-11, going into the first weekend blimps were allowed over football games. Spent the afternoon loafing around Auburn. We had two armed FBI agents in the cabin. The potential terrorists were the captain's father, grandparents, and me...but hey, orders are orders. I think they were a little embarrassed. One of them lived nearby, so we buzzed his house.
Paul,Did you get the pilot to sign your logbook for the time? A Commercial blimp pilot s automatically a blimp CFI, so you can log the time towards your blimp rating!
The flight wasn’t prearranged. I was flying one of my sons friends in the Bird Dog and the blimp pilot ask the tower if anyone want a ride, they didn’t but we did. They let both of us go and let me fly. I was amazed how hard it was to control. A combination of flying and sailing.
WhamO from Smoke On lead this as an impromptu flight with planning started the day before. It was a combination of several RV guys from several teams. They put up smoke signals, is there a better form of communication?
