Steamed Cap Strips

Last week we were able to get some cap strips into our steamer and then onto our buck.
Here Rob is tightning down the wing nuts before the cap strips are left to dry in the buck.

Wood Working DVDs available to builders!

BSA is offering a 2 DVD set of instructions on Historical Aircraft Wood Working. Topics covered include: Hand Tools, Table/Band Saws, Power Planes, Hand Planes, Lumber Selection, Jigs, Fixtures, Steamer construction and Steaming Wood, Bending Wood, Routing/Splicing Spars and Parts and much more. 3+ hours of material and many great hints and suggestions for the aircraft builder. The DVDs are available for $49.95 + $5.50 shipping in the US with delivery confiramtion. $7.00 everywhere else.

Please visit our web site to order http://www.blueswallowaircraft.com/ Paypal and Credit card or check payment.

Work Begins on Rib Building Boards

Well after a slow start, we began to work on building the Pietenpol's wing rib jigs. Rob was here at the workshop all day building his wing rib building boards and top cap strip steaming buck. Here are a couple pictures of the day's progress. Cheers! JAG

Wing Rib Layout

We have been looking at the differences between the coordinates given in the plans and the full size rib template that is provided with each set of plans. There seems to be a conflict between the rear spar fitting within the plotted coordinates and the template. A little more time is going to be needed to sort this detail out before we start building our wing rib jigs.

Below are three airfoil profiles based on the original coordinates provided in the magazine article for building the Air Camper, the measured coordinates based on the template provided with the plans we purcahsed and what I am calling the Smoothed Airfoil where the 4-3/4" spars fit accurately within the airfoil and any bumps in the profile have been smoothed out.

Resources for Builders

Here is a list of on line links that people may find interesting :

http://www.cpc-world.com/

http://www.matronics.com/pietenpol-list/index.htm

http://good-times.webshots.com/photo/2874865370096962917DMjxOX

http://www.airplanes.com/blog/tag/bernard-pietenpol/

http://aviationhalloffamewisconsin.com/blog/?tag=pietenpol

Chris Tracey's website:  http://www.westcoastpiet.com/

Planning Stage For Pietenpol Air Camper Construction

Today is the first day of our blog for building a Pietenpol Air Camper, the well known, Model A powered classic homebuilt aircraft of the 1920-30's. My company, Blue Swallow Aircraft, LLC is helping Rob Perry build this aircraft over the next coming months. You can learn more about BSA at http://www.blueswallowaircraft.com/ . We hope this description of our project will be helpful to other builders and we encourage you to contact us with your questions and comments.