Homebuilders' Workshop - August 2011

Georgia On My Mind

By Ed Wischmeyer

The good news is that after 38 months of unemployment and 600 job applications, I’m now a contract employee with a major aerospace manufacturer in Savannah, GA. And that, in turn, leads us to the unlikely history of the RV-8A that I used to own.

The story starts nearly five years ago when I bought an AirCam at government auction at a screamingly good price. The plan was to fly it for three or four years and then sell it for enough to cover purchase price plus all the expenses of ownership. When I bought it, I lived in Arizona and thoroughly enjoyed flying it there.  But, nine months after purchase, I (and it) moved to Cedar Rapids, Iowa.

Aerial sightseeing in the Midwest is not spectacular, like it is in other parts of the country, but the Midwest in summer is as beautiful as any other part of the country. Trouble was, summer – even stretching the definition to mean any time the temperature was above 50 degrees, sort of a minimum required temperature for a tolerable AirCam flight – was at best six months of the year. The AirCam was advertised for sale several times, but then I changed the ad to say, “Might trade for the right RV-8.”

As it turns out the right RV-8 was actually an RV-8A in California. An acquaintance looked at it and gave it a clean bill of health, and I knew Dave Saylor of Aircrafters LLC, who’d given it its last annual condition inspection, from 20 years or so before.

So the new AirCam owner had it ferried out, and I followed a short time later to sign paperwork and bring the RV-8A home. With the paperwork all signed, I headed from Pine Mountain Lake on the west side of the Sierra Nevada to old stomping grounds in Prescott, AZ. Nellis Approach refused to acknowledge my transmissions – thanks, fellas – so I got to navigate all that funny airspace north of Las Vegas on my own. I landed at Prescott just at legal sunset, not that the legalities mattered, but the darkness would have.

Over the following days I played tag with that monster storm that set an all-time record for low pressure, and beat the storm home to Iowa. I had only two hours of RV-8A time when I bought it, but with 400+ hours of RV time, flying it was like old home week.

Then came the first winter project, replacing the boarding step, which had improbably fractured – broken clean off at the wing root fairing – before I bought the plane. I got the new step in and fabricated a fairing over the wing trailing edge out of aluminum sheet, the said fairing having an expanding radius instead of being just a simple bend. I was proud of that piece.

The next project was to build a new nose gear fairing, as the old one – like so many others on RVs – had been mangled by a towbar that didn’t really fit the nosewheel fork. And the only disadvantage to the full swiveling nosewheel – and it is a major pain in the rear – is that it makes it difficult to push a plane backwards, even with a towbar, and almost impossible without it. You can push down on the tail, but I’m barely heavy enough to do that on this RV-8A.

So the new nosewheel fairing got installed, but with a major modification. Instead of having a nose piece and an aft piece – both of which have to come off to get access to the wheel – the new design had a nose piece that could stay on while only the aft piece comes off: Way cool, but a ton of work.

So then along comes this job offer, hooray! But I’m thinking, I don’t really need to move to Georgia with two airplanes in tow, especially when the RV-8A really needs a new panel, and I don’t want to spend any more money on airplanes till the Cessna sells. So I advertise it for sale, hoping for the best.

A few days later, Dave Saylor calls and says that he has a customer who’s looking for an RV-8A, and can I tell him about mine. “Sure,” says I, “it’s Rich’s old red airplane, and you did the last annual on it.” In other words, the buyer knew the airplane better than the seller.  With lots of paperwork back and forth with their loan company and escrow company, the RV-8A was turned into the cash that kept the AirCam flying, that was borrowed from retirement savings, that lived in the house that Jack built.

So the new buyer bought the plane sight-unseen, as did the previous buyer, me. Go figure the odds on that one!

Now the RV-8A is in California getting a new instrument panel, the old panel will be advertised on eBay, the retirement account is happier, but we all know that very few retirement accounts are actually happy these days. I’m in Georgia with the Cessna, which is as beautiful and sweet as ever, but no faster.

So why did I sell the -8A? I didn’t want to have two airplanes when priorities were to excel on the job and to build community, wasn’t sure about a bubble canopy in the heat of the deep south, and the only place I could find a pair of hangars was a grass field, not necessarily something that an -8A would be fond of.

Over the July 4 weekend, I took the airlines back to Iowa to fetch the Cessna, waking up at four a.m. eastern time, a half hour before the alarm went off, then two legs on the airlines, lunch with friends in Iowa, an abortive attempt at a nap in a warm hangar, and then across Lake Michigan to visit my aunt. I made it okay, but I had used up pretty much all of my energy reserves. The 30-knot tailwinds, most I’ve ever seen in the Cessna, were welcome.

Next day, Saturday, was a recuperation day, and Sunday I headed south. The first stop was to visit old family friends on the other side of the state. Then I stayed the night in Columbus, Ohio, with EAA buddy Clare Lutton and his three, great kids.

The first stop the next day was for gas at some county airport in far western Virginia. They advertised gas at $4.99, and they had a brand new terminal building, but it was locked. So I headed out to the Port-a-Potty by the fuel island, and the solar heating was in full force on this 95-degree day. And the gas price wasn’t as advertised, either – it wasn’t $4.99, it was $4.29. You can’t lose ‘em all.

Then I headed south towards cheap gas in South Carolina, and I’ve got a new trick I use: when the clouds are at my desired altitude, or close, I file IFR and go GPS direct. No matter how much I try, it seems that doing this almost never gets me inside a cloud, and with tons of clear air below the clouds, this is about as easy as IFR ever gets. On the flight from eastern Michigan to Georgia, maybe 40 percent was this soft IFR – but I had an out, and was ready for the hard stuff.

So now, for the first time in five years, I’m back down to one airplane. The Cessna is still gorgeous, still a complete sweetheart, still slow, and still for sale.

• • • • •

My nephew graduates from USAF pilot training in two weeks, and last night all of his class members got their first airplane assignments. His first choice was the A-10, but that one available slot went to the #1 graduate in his class. Since he was #2, they assigned him from the leftovers. And, to build suspense, they announce each graduate’s assignment by projecting pictures of three airplanes on the screen and then removing them, one by one, with the assignment airplane being the last one on the screen. His three airplanes were the T-38, the F-15, and the F-22. First to disappear off the screen was the T-38, no surprise, as staying on as an instructor pilot is not usually a top choice, and was not one of his choices. Flying the F-15 as first assignment? Pretty cool! Then there was a really long pause. The F-15 disappeared, leaving my nephew stunned, speechless, and open jawed. He’s going to fly the F-22 Raptor.

Actually, the F-22 was his fourth choice (behind the A-10, F15E and F15C) because he didn’t think there was any possible way he could get it. Last night, the party wound up at his house and, appropriately, everybody was giving him huge amounts of… appropriate brotherly encouragement, we might call it politely.

We have flown together. For his college graduation present, I invited him out to Iowa for a week to fly with me, and he got six or eight hours in the Cessna, an hour in the AirCam, and an hour in a friend’s RV-8A. Last night when we talked, he reminded me that when he was a small boy, I gave him a number of rides in the Cessna. Never did get around to filling out the paperwork to making him an official Young Eagle, but the results are the same.

I am so excited for him. And so, so, so jealous…