Matt Anderson - Group of (3) Spread Eagle Builders

Matt Anderson - Group of (3) Spread Eagle Builders

Fletcher Burns flying the prototype UltraVair Spread Eagle

Legal Eagle Plans and Video's

2A042 engine Interest Group

(Click) to see second half of the building program

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Update

12/19/2004 (Click)

Current

Status

April 5, 2005

(Click)

This photo collection is the group progress of building 3 modified Legal Eagle Ultralight airplanes - quickly

(3 guys - 8 Friday evenings - 8 Saturdays and 8 Sundays) = 3 flying airplanes ...

The fuselages have been widened 2", the instrument panel raised 4" and the firewall moved forward 2.5"...

The engines are Teledyne 2A042 GPU power plants with modified induction, heads and cam to produce 26 HP using a 54x17 Tennessee prop...

The wings are reverse engineered from the Delta Honcho and have a 32' span...

The planes are planned to initially fly from a frozen lake (see build 16 & 42 photos) on ski's - the wheels shown are temporary for moving around the shop...

The building budget for each airplane is $2000 US...

The engines were purchased (New) surplus in a lot of 5 for $400 each...

Planning, materials acquisition, some covering operations, table and jig building are done between build weekends...

1) First session 3 days on 10/22/2004 - 10/24/2004 work completed thru picture build13...

(2) Second session 2 days and 1 builder short on 10/29/2004 - 10/30/2004 completed thru picture build24...

Empennage covering work was started mid week evenings...

(3) Third session 3 days on 11/12/2004 - 11/14/2004 completed thru picture build48...

Matt reports 11/14/2004:

Tail surfaces went really good this weekend. We started on the elevators Friday night and finished them all Friday night about Midnight. Started Saturday morning at 8 am and by about 1:30 we had all the stabs done. In between waiting for me to move parts out of the jig over to sub assembly line B, my buddy sprayed the vertical stab and rudder, so we were putting those on Sunday morning.

Started on the controls Saturday afternoon, rudder pedals, elevator horns, stand offs on the fuse and bushings, cable guides, etc..... Sunday afternoon we pretty much worked all morning into the afternoon on the stick assembly. Since we are using that other wing, we kinda went with Fletchers design, but tried to lighten it up just a tad. We had our EAA meeting at 2 pm, so we had to clean up and pretty much talk the rest of the afternoon with the guys. One of the guys had a dinner engagement this evening, so we were pretty much done at 2 pm today.

We are on target to start on the motor mounts next Friday evening. We anticipate finishing all 3 motor mounts sometime Saturday late afternoon. We may have a couple other minor things to do if we can think of it, but other than that we will have wrapped up the fuse, tail and motor mount by next weekend for sure.

I'm going to try to get the remaining 12 tail surfaces covered this week in the evenings, not sure if I can or not (I can if I find the time, it will take me 3 evenings). If I do, we will probably finish painting those next weekend also and get that taken care of at the same time. I'm planning on bringing one of the Honcho wings with also next Friday and we are going to go through it with a gauge and work up a materials list for the wings. Try to get that aluminum coming.

Thanksgiving weekend for me is shot and also for everybody else. I think I might have another commitment the weekend after that so it looks like the 2nd weekend in December we will start pounding out wings. As I said before, we anticipate 3 to 4 weekends to build the wings, hopefully.

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So far as to date, 3 guys - 3 Friday evenings, 3 Saturdays and 3 Sundays = 3 planes in-progress on schedule

(4) Fourth session 3 days on 11/19/2004 - 11/21/2004 completed thru picture build76...

Matt reports 11/21/2004:

Weekend went pretty good. All 3 guys there, started Friday night after work as usual. Hit it hard, Friday, Saturday and Sunday until about 5pm, at that point we pretty much ran out of stuff to do.

The goal for this weekend was motor mounts. Since no one uses the 042 on a legal eagle and I have seen very little on the Internet, we either had to copy someone else design or design something ourselves. We ended up designing something ourselves that I believe was thinking totally outside the box from what we have seen before with these motors mounted. Instead of a bed mount we have more of a cage style mount like a traditional airplane would. It required most of Friday evening (if not all) of head scratching and prototyping parts. But in the end, we have a pretty cool motor mount that is built very stout. The cool part is that all 3 people had a lot of input in the design of the mount until we reached the finished product. It was amazing to see how each person thought differently and brought different ideas to the table as we designed it. I think the end result is awesome!

Saturday was pretty much eaten up by motor mount production and a couple of other minor things. Motor mounts were a big job, but we figured that going into that this weekend and wanted to do a really good job.

Sunday we finished a bunch of little things, floor, seat, etc... It still took time, but it wasn't a full day of legal eagle building. When we finished up all we could do on the fuse and tail and that was it. I had brought one of the Honcho wings up on Friday night. We hauled that into the shop and spent a couple hours going through the wing with a metal gauge making up a materials list for the aluminum we need. I probably will work something up and begin working with our metal supplier this week. I think by the end of the week I probably will be able to place an order. Usually takes about 4 days for me to get it by truck. Not really a big deal since the next 2 weekends are shot for me, so we are essentially down now for 3 weeks. But, I would like to have the aluminum on the floor so in 3 weeks, we are in full wing production.

All 3 airplanes were hauled to the location where wings are going to be built. They will be there now until they are for the most part finished. The engine guy of our group is going to play with his motor for a few weeks and tinker with that turbo idea he had. Sounds good on paper, but the weight is starting to scare me? We are also thinking of leaving the lightening holes out of the aluminum pieces in the wing. We discussed it this weekend and are wondering if the time it takes to drill all those holes is worth the benefit. We are thinking that would be a full day, if not weekend job for 3 guys to drill all those holes. And for probably a weight savings of a pound per wing? The wings we have now weigh 26.5 lbs, were thinking if we left the aluminum in, it would bring it up to 27.5 or 28, before covering.

Right now we are weighing it at approx. 152 lbs. The scale reads about 156, but there was about 4 lbs of chain and bolts in there to, so 152 is a fairly accurate #. That 152 includes everything you see in the pics: Fuse with all the controls, floor, motor, all tail surface's covered and painted, wheels (probably another 5+ lbs for the correct wheels). We weighed the motor with the mount, 84 lbs (No prop or hub, just motor with all the acc. on it.)

Duane, are metal working guy believes that we are over half done at this point. I think that's about right. The next weekend we work is going to be dedicated strictly to building wing parts. So, when all the parts are done, we are just going to start assembling wings like a kit. At least that's the plan...We'll see?

Matt

Happy Thanksgiving!

You can contact us via email at roseauace@wiktel.com.

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