Marty_d

I guess the problem is accessibility - if the switch is on the firewall for example then there's either the chance of hitting it with your foot or not being able to reach it in an emergency. Where did you mount it? Would be interested in the details of your isolator.

Don't people put a battery isolation switch in their aircraft? I was in Repco today looking at this - https://www.repco.com.au/en/globes-batteries-electrical/electrical-accessories/switches/narva-rotary-battery-master-isolator-switch-with-removeable-keyed-knob-contacts-rated-100a-12v-61036bl/p/A9758517 Would like to hear from the electrically qualified here, would it be a good idea to have that going straight from the battery before going anywhere else?

@Flightrite - sorry if I misunderstood you - but if you have a read of what you said, it's easy to do. Kind of like "The boy helped his uncle, Jack, off a horse" vs "The boy helped his uncle Jack off a horse".

Well mate, I'm sorry if you took what I said as a personal attack, but your post immediately prior called people who got the vaccination "lunatics" - so you did kind of throw the first stone. And while you're enduring lockdown, consider this - the government's mistake was not organising bulk purchase of Pfizer when they had the chance, because you don't put all your eggs in one basket. But the only way you're NOT going to get lockdowns is when you get a certain percentage (probably 85-90) of the population vaccinated.

Yes, but the intelligent person who had the jab will live. But never mind that, better to die free and stupid huh?

I've heard an urban legend about a penny-pinching pilot at Cambridge airport (Hobart) who would turn the engine off after touch down if it looked like the Hobbs meter was about to click over. Guess he would have got some exercise pulling the 172 back to the apron.

I think they're talking about the other little prick...

Duncan, I'm using chrome moly steel tube for the struts on my 701. One idea I'm considering is simply to fold 0.016" aluminium into an airfoil shape and rivet to the tube. Because the distances are so small and the curvature gives strength, I can probably get away with either no ribs at all or maybe one top and bottom. Have you considered that as an option?

Great parking job!

Mark, please don't feel I'm downplaying your concerns about the political parties, I'm not. In fact I share them, probably from a different perspective to you, but certainly agree that the mob in power are pretty useless and Labor hasn't distinguished themselves greatly (mainly because they went to the last election with a pretty good set of policies and an ineffective opposition, and still lost). My point is that when we decide to sweep the existing democratic process away and go for any kind of dictator, we get a Trump, Bolsonaro, Duterte or some other useless turd who fouls up anything important, like protecting their people from a pandemic for instance. What would change politics enough to get good action on the climate? Getting rid of the reactionaries that hold both political parties back. Labor and the Greens should be hammering electorates that currently have National Party members sitting. They should be fielding their best people and putting the most effort into seats with the furthest right-leaning Liberal members. Talking about proper electioneering here - lots of volunteers, lots of talking to people, lots of visiting people, organising groups. Intelligent use of big data. Take a ticket from Obama's election run, which was groundbreaking in its grass-roots activism. If the parties see enough noise about climate change and are put under enough scrutiny as to who is funding them, plus their big business mates actually start moving green, then they will be dragged kicking and screaming into a position of doing what they're supposed to and actually developing policies. Hey who knows, maybe one day they'll actually start competing to be more green than the other lot instead of what they do now.

Yep - we'll need whale oil forever - copper wires will always be needed for telecommunications - we can't get by without ivory - horses will always be essential... The list of things that would "always" be critical has found itself changing drastically. The internal combustion motor in small transport vehicles is just one more. Fact is that as citizens of Australia we have 2 choices. We can accept that a major change in engine technology is happening worldwide, that the kind of cars we used to buy new are no longer going to be available, and we can get in front of the curve and invest now in the infrastructure, manufacturing and planning that's going to be necessary to actually use and charge these cars. (As @kgwilson says, Norway has hydro, Australia has sun.) Lots and lots of sun. Lots of rare earths. Lots of education. Lots of ideas. Lots of manufacturing potential. Bugger-all government leadership. The other choice is to fight against it, stick with the old technology, build new coal-fired power stations, manufacture our own Commodore utes and put that middle finger up to the rest of the world. Be the polluted beacon of conservatism and small-mindedness we have the absolute potential to be. Hey, it worked a treat for South Africa in the apartheid era, didn't it? ...and that's exactly what Trump said too. Be careful of alternatives!

High wing, T tail, looks a bit like a BAe146? Could be an Avro RJ85 airtanker. https://s3-ap-southeast-2.amazonaws.com/nafc-arena-help/2018+National+Fleet+Poster+A3.pdf

I'll leave the Rotax on this one. The Spitfire, now....

54% of the new car market in Norway. We don't need design / test / tool / production, the vehicles are already available, just that existing manufacturers see the Australian market as too difficult due to lack of progressive policy in the area.

Hi Mark, so you coat everything in white, let dry, then mask off for colour?

Popped the new top cowl out of the mould on Wednesday - took the whole morning to get it out, despite using PVA it really didn't want to move. Bearing in mind the lessons of the first one I carefully used a series of tools including strips of aluminium, egg flip and wooden venetian blinds to break the seal. Finally got it to pop. I reckon that doing fibreglass in near-freezing temperatures probably isn't the best either, but because of the smell I can't do it in the shed - my wife works in the front part of the shed and poly resin smell goes straight through! I was trying to fit it today. I figured the top cowl would go over the outside of the bottom cowl, but when I did that there was a noticeable gap on the front corners - just couldn't get it to pull in tight. So in desperation tried fitting it under the bottom cowl - and amazingly it fits a lot better! I think I'm going to get everything fitting right, cleco it in place, then cling wrap the bottom cowl and use microbeads or some other filler to fair the top cowl to the edge of the bottom. After that's set, pull it all off and trim the edges of the top cowl which slide under the edges of the bottom so that it's easy to remove the top. What do people think - is that a reasonable solution?

I would have thought the Pipistrel Alpha Electro would have met their requirements.

I just watched the one about cutting his mould. Good tip there about putting in inspection hatch / oil door, mostly cut out the part but while still attached, tape over the inside then lay up the carbon lip under it. Also drill for nut plates before doing the last cuts to release the piece. Genius!

The burned skeleton of Thomas the tank engine.

Something wrong there. I joined last year as a non-flying member (hopefully that will change in a couple of years) and there was no mention of a doctor's certificate.

That is pure brilliance. Can't wait to see Scrappy in the air. Slow speed performance should be phenomenal.

Laid up another top cowl today (hardly the weather for it, but I knocked up a cover with a lava lamp bulb in the top to keep it warm). Had enough scraps of carbon left over to do 4 layers. Hoping for a successful release in the next couple of days!

Man that first video had my pucker factor up. That looked REALLY marginal. Hope I'm never caught in weather like that.

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2021/jul/01/jeff-bezos-space-flight-pilot-wally-funk She sounds like a legend!