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Currently we
are flying an RV-6A “Casper”. We bought Casper when we moved to Texas in 2002 from the original builder,
Doyle Reed. Thanks Doyle! This is where Casper was born – Derby, Kansas.
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And this is
me just landed after the delivery trip, outside Jay Pratt’s “RV Central”. Jay was good enough
to fly me up to Kansas to look at Casper – I had initially intended to buy a
Cessna Cardinal. But Jay persuaded me that an RV was the only way to go –
what a star, thanks Jay!
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This was the
original panel – functional, but not spectacular. The first thing to go was
the cassette player – not much point with a mono intercom. I’ve always meant
to replace it with an ipod interface, but one of those things that I’ve never
got around to. The empty space is for the transponder.
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On the way
home from Sun n Fun one year we managed to get a few good air to air photos,
somewhere above Alabama.
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On the way
to Oshkosh in 2004 some of the engine gauges
started to mis-behave – for example the oil pressure gauge would occasionally
show no pressure! Usually it happened on the ground, but when the oil
pressure dropped to zero on cross-wind into Osh I was not particularly amused, I got
ready to land in a field, as the engine continued to run I guessed it must be
the gauge. Once I got home I removed 7 Van’s gauges and installed a Grand Rapids EIS-4000. One of my better
decisions. It took a day to install, but gave far more accurate and useful
engine data. This picture was taken about a year later,
I still haven’t got around to filling up the empty hole.
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At the same Oshkosh I was looking for an electronic
ignition. Although the Lightspeed
ignitions are often accepted as “the best” I did not really like the number
of components that had to be mounted. I had almost decided to buy the
Electroair system when I bumped into Brad Demet who was selling a new
ignition called an E-mag. As his factory (perhaps a slightly grand
description) was only 20 minutes from work I signed up for one on the spot.
Here is the E-mag, number 10 off the production line, on the old engine
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During the
annual in 2004 we discovered a significant amount of metal in the oil filter.
It was clear that an engine overhaul was in order. As the engine had run
about 2500 hours from new I was not that dismayed – except at the prospect of
spending $10,000+! However, the original purchase price had made allowance
for the engine time. I determined that Aerosport Power, in Kamloops, British Columbia, Canada was the best company to carry out
the overhaul, and were very competitively priced, despite the freight
charges. Here is the new engine on the hoist with the repainted mount
attached. Following Tony Bingellis’ advice I tried to attached
this assembly to the firewall – Tony was right about most things, but in the
end I caved in and bolted the mount to the firewall, then the engine to the
mount.
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Backside of
the engine. I took the opportunity to fit a remote oil filter.
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Here’s a
couple of pictures of the current panel and interior, along with me just
after I finished the PFA “test” flight – don’t tell any one, but I could have
filled in the flight test schedule without ever going near the aeroplane! But
I went and flew the schedule all the same – it was a nice day, any excuse to
go flying. The paper work had taken so long to get to this stage that I was
desperate for any chance to fly at that point!
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