She is on her legs! (*)

(*) From a French language/culture stand point, I feel it a bit shocking for my RV-12 to be called a "she" but I am told that, as an air ship, it is the right way to call her. Darn Brits!

Well, kind of on her legs:

As you can see, I am missing the front wheel and here is the culprit:
 

The axle diameter is 625thou vs the bearing hole of 618thou: Aurora, we have a problem!
I decidedly had no luck with the landing gear, after the bad tire, a bad wheel. I understand that these are problems with the part suppliers of VANs but I would advise VANs to put some pressure on  those suppliers who have quality problems (earlier this year there was a more serious problem with the welding of flaperon actuators, also produced outside VANs).
I am waiting from VANs after they contact the supplier MATCO but I see a new wheel delivery in my future.
01/11/2012 update:
After investigation VAN's determined that the axle was not machined to the correct dimensions. I received a new axle and everything is now in order, we are on three wheels now!
The installation of the nose gear wheel will conclude section 35 per the instruction sheets below

The left gear is in

As for the right gear, I needed help and even with two pairs of hands, there was quite a bit of crawling and strugling to get the bolts trough and securely torqued to specs. The second pair of hands was provided by François again. Here he is trying to put a wheel on (or is he just warming his butt? - it was a cold day as the heater behind him shows):

One leg down, one to go!

It was quite a struggle and it took a few hours with the help of François.
Here is what was at stake:
 Fitting the right landing gear into this tight space

 Here it is done but aligning the bolts at the top of the picture with the holes is very awkward due to the lack of space to move the clamp and the lack of visibility. Two people have to be involved, one lying under the plane to move the clamp with the bolts and one looking from the top to guide the bolts into the holes.

This is the end result of the struggle: one gear leg in place, ready to receive its wheel.

One of the most difficult tasks since I started building. I felt lucky to be able to complete it without having to remove the rivets heads that were in the way as some builders did. Definitely not a one man job, thank you François for the help!
Let's wait until next year to take care of the left gear!
(Plus I have to visit my daughters during the holiday, one in New York and one in Washington DC, this will be a good break and well deserved too)

Wheeling and Dealing

This is what I discovered while mounting the tire on my front wheel:

This spot is diametrically opposed to the one above:
 

I have two more tires to mount but on inspection they do not seem to have this problem.
I have referred this to VANs and am waiting for their answer which hopefully will be a return.

As of December 17:
Vans sent me a new tire that I received today, no cost involved. They also asked me to return the bad tire to the tire vendor which I did. Issue closed.

What an RV-12 wheel is made of:

And don't imagine that it's easy to get there: the wheel comes all assembled and you have to pick it apart to mount the tire! Interestingly, there is no instruction to disassemble, in doubt I had to call Vans to make sure I was doing it right. Oh well, may be I'm not that smart!


At least I will know what keeps me rolling!

RV-12 going places

A fellow UK builder from Scotland (see his builder's log: http://www.mykitlog.com/grmps) shot these videos while flying over France and Italy:
(The camera is a wide angle positioned on the VS)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ofOC-qKF1DU
http://youtu.be/_FYv045auC4
http://youtu.be/0NFhc__pzKY
Now, this is traveling light but in style!

Open Shop for EAA 1114

I put the wings on for the second time to show my RV-12 to my fellow EAA Chapter 1114 members. I enjoyed exercising some "bragging rights" after one and a half year of building (although I also learned to eat lots of humble pie during this period). We were fortunate to have a wonderful weather for December and I got all the help I needed to move my stuff around. I think that this initiative to open builder's workshop for our chapter's members is a great motivator both for builders and for members who wish to start building one day. One reason among many others that chapter 1114 is among the most dynamic EAA chapters in the country.

This thing has got wings! ...

... It must be a plane - So were the neighbors thinking today while driving by my workshop.

After working on a few contraptions allowing to move fuselage and wings around and having a runway built in front of my workshop, today the conditions were perfect to have a wing fitting session. I got help from my friend François Hautin (a former colleague from Alcatel and NC State) which allowed me to communicate in French, a language in which we are both better at cursing than English.

 One wing inside, one wing outside: this will allow me to carry on the building at home for a few more months. There is nothing like a 30 seconds commute to work!

François is recovering from the stress of carrying the two wings from my basement to my "Taxiway" which requires slaloming between the trees of my backyard:

 No damage done and the wings in place =  A happy builder!