FAA Inspection - Airworthiness Certificate
This is a very happy and satisfying day for us. We got our Airworthiness Certificate!!! Yipee and horay. 3 Years, $150,000 dollars and 4200 hours later.
Vic Syracuse inspected my RV 7A and he was extremely helpful during the process. I convinced Rafael to split the extra cost to have him fly in from Atlanta and inspect our RV 14A and we are pleased he did.
Although he was very complimentry about the build and how well N947RV built, he managed to find a few ares that could have caused us some big troubles. By the way, this was after the plane was inspected by my designee and many others, sadly including us. First we did not tighted the main alternator pivot bolt, nor did we safety wire the the attachment to the starter bolt. Holy cow and wow, how did we miss that? Then, the rod end Heim bearing on the stick to aileron was rubbing. Not critical but not right, and it could cause trouble down the line. In addition, Vic found a few minor things to tidy up to improve the airplane.
So, Rafael has spent over 3000 hours building RV airplanes and I have more than 6000 hours building RV airplanes, and we didn't catch these errors. The moral of the story here is, swallow your pride, get every builder / airplane fanatic and aviator to look for issues on you pride and joy before inspection and then get a really good designee and inspector to look it over one more time. Your life is on the line.
Vic Syracuse inspected my RV 7A and he was extremely helpful during the process. I convinced Rafael to split the extra cost to have him fly in from Atlanta and inspect our RV 14A and we are pleased he did.
Although he was very complimentry about the build and how well N947RV built, he managed to find a few ares that could have caused us some big troubles. By the way, this was after the plane was inspected by my designee and many others, sadly including us. First we did not tighted the main alternator pivot bolt, nor did we safety wire the the attachment to the starter bolt. Holy cow and wow, how did we miss that? Then, the rod end Heim bearing on the stick to aileron was rubbing. Not critical but not right, and it could cause trouble down the line. In addition, Vic found a few minor things to tidy up to improve the airplane.
So, Rafael has spent over 3000 hours building RV airplanes and I have more than 6000 hours building RV airplanes, and we didn't catch these errors. The moral of the story here is, swallow your pride, get every builder / airplane fanatic and aviator to look for issues on you pride and joy before inspection and then get a really good designee and inspector to look it over one more time. Your life is on the line.
Finally!!!!
Vic Syracuse, great guy and an exceptional inspector.
Engraved plate, Rafaela got it right the first time.
Checked everything again and start up
Well, her I go, ready or not. No, just kidding, I was ready
Looking good, damn this plane climbs fast, it has got some go mojo!!
Off into the wild blue yonder, looks weird with out it's bootie on. The flight lasted about one hour, with a few surprises that we worked though with my excellent ground crew on the radio for advice. These issues included loud whistling noises and a surging prop. Both were rectified. One was the gadget on the canopy and the other was an air bubble in the prop governor oil system which cleared up quickly after a few prop changes.
