Ordered my Finish Kit!

bruceh · Post by **bruceh** » Sat Jan 29, 2011 9:49 pm

Sent off the order form as a PDF scan in email last night. Still don't know what exactly will power this plane, but I figured the odds are good if I get the Dynafocal type 1 mount, and a spinner for a wooden prop. I'm looking for an IO-320, so if anyone has any leads on one...

In the mean time, I think I can get the fuselage done in the next 8 weeks. I only have the tip up canopy roll bar to rivet. Scrubbed everything today and will prime/paint it tomorrow. I'm leaving most of the panel unriveted for now. Then I only have to fit the wings and tail feathers. I need to put the bottom wing skins on, and will attempt to fit the fiberglass tips to the tail pieces. I have yet to do any fiberglassing, so this should be another learning experience.

I will probably do the panel and wiring before the firewall forward and cowling. Seems like access to the panel will be easier without an engine attached. Lots of stuff to figure out and purchase. It is starting to get expensive!

itisgood · Post by **itisgood** » Sun Jan 30, 2011 7:40 am

Bruce,
I ordered my finish kit as well on the 25th to beat the new prices. I hope to finish the fuselage 7A by the time it come but not counting on it. I have already the engine so all I need is time to do it. Right now I am in Florida basking in the sunshine and won't be home until the first of March. I have lost 3 mo total of working on it. But, I did not want to make "work" out of it anyway.
Glad for you

Dave

Vlad · Post by **Vlad** » Sun Jan 30, 2011 12:23 pm

Good decision to order before price increase Bruce! Every little bit helps. It's very different subkit from the previous ones. "Interesting" to work with and relatively time consuming. Perfect labor therapy though .

Congratulations! The engine time will come do not worry. Do you remember the time of the empennage and no money for the wings?

Bob Barrett · Post by **Bob Barrett** » Sun Jan 30, 2011 4:41 pm

Before you work on the panel, you should really have your engine hung! You can have tenative panel layout and make many major decsions about the panel, such as radios, avionics, engine monitoring equipment etc. However you also need to make the holes in the firewall for the engine as much as possible! Every hole you have to make after the engine is hung is most likely to be much more difficult.!

You really need to plan this out carefully and you really need to know exactly what engine etc before you start putting the holes in the firewall! Have fun and good luck all!

captain_john · Post by **captain_john** » Sun Jan 30, 2011 5:08 pm

Bruce,

You will enjoy the finish kit. It definitely is the icing on the cake. This is where workmanship can really show, for sure!

CJ

cjensen · Post by **cjensen** » Mon Jan 31, 2011 8:46 am

Way to go guys!! Hopefully 2011 will see a bunch more completions!

hydroguy2 · Post by **hydroguy2** » Mon Jan 31, 2011 5:20 pm

completions are cool!

BSwayze · Post by **BSwayze** » Tue Feb 01, 2011 4:32 am

Bruce,

Congratulations! I got my finish kit order in on Friday, too! Just in time for beating the price increase. The guys at Vans told me that the Dynafocal I mount is good for 90 to 99% of the engines out there, so I feel confident in ordering it as well.

Lots of fun work coming up!

Post by **Spike** » Tue Feb 01, 2011 9:32 am

Sweet. Its nice to see a bunch of people get closer to the flight!!

Spike

bruceh · Post by **bruceh** » Mon Feb 14, 2011 10:58 pm

Never got any indication back from Van's that they got my order. No charge on the credit card for the deposit. Called today and found out they never got the order. Luckily, I saved the email so I resent it today. Don't you just love email?
Hopefully they will honor the old prices...

BSwayze · Post by **BSwayze** » Tue Feb 15, 2011 1:53 am

Wow! Let us know how this develops, okay?

bruceh · Post by **bruceh** » Tue Feb 22, 2011 3:27 pm

It looks like the 2nd time the order went through. I have a new charge from Van's on the old VISA card.

bruceh · Post by **bruceh** » Thu Mar 10, 2011 7:42 pm

Got the letter from Van's on the ship date for the finish kit. It will be the week of April 25th.

Oh, and they charged me the 2011 price on the kit, even though I originally sent in the order before the new price deadline.

captain_john · Post by **captain_john** » Fri Mar 11, 2011 5:11 am

WOW Bruce! That's a treat!

Glad you got your cowling and stuff! It is a very interesting part of the build.

What was the delta on the prices?

CJ

Post by **Spike** » Fri Mar 11, 2011 7:50 am

congrats!!!

Spike

hydroguy2 · Post by **hydroguy2** » Fri Mar 11, 2011 8:01 am

Time to order that engine, you'll be wanting it by mid summer

bruceh · Post by **bruceh** » Fri Mar 11, 2011 1:02 pm

The price delta was only $85. So not too bad.

I'd love to jump in and order everything right now to complete this, but I do have to remain fiscally sound. It is really starting to get expen$ive! The airframe kits are just the first third of the overall cost.

At this point I'm thinking that the next big purchases are going to be avionics related. I'm going to try to get as much wiring installed as possible before I close up the fuselage. I still need to close up the bottom skins on the wings and get those mounted for fitting. I'm deep into the panel planning and electrical stuff right now. Quite an education, and I have a (not so recent) EE degree.

If I put an engine on right now, it will put the nose of the airplane out the garage door. Getting the fuselage on the gear will also raise it up enough to be a pain to work on the interior wiring.

bruceh · Post by **bruceh** » Thu Jun 02, 2011 5:19 pm

I got the call from FedEx and my finish kit will be delivered tomorrow (finally!).

Quite the adventure with this kit. First, they lost my pre yearly price increase order. Had to resend it. Customized the order a bit, so I had to send in some additional paper work to Van's that I missed in the first go around. Finally figured out that the missing paper work was holding up the shipment (supposed to ship end of April).

I've been going through building withdrawals for the last month.

BSwayze · Post by **BSwayze** » Mon Jun 06, 2011 6:41 pm

Wow, Bruce, what a time you've had with this. I'm glad it will be here tomorrow and you can get back to work! Just in time for warm summer temps to cut the plexi. I'm into the canopy frame here on mine, for the tip-up canopy. We're still waiting for winter to end around here. We had our first warm day of the year this weekend.

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Ordered my Finish Kit!

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