So it begins... First off, welcome to my blog. My name is Mike, and I am building an airplane in my garage. The aircraft comes in a kit from Van's Aircraft Company, and the model I chose is the RV14.
My wife and I chose the RV14, as it seems to be the latest iteration of an absolutely awesome line of "RV" aircraft. We liked the 14, as you sit side-by-side, its has awesome range, and is relatively fast. Also, I am over 6 feet tall, and the 14 has a good amount of head room. Like most Van's aircraft, the RV14 can do light aerobatics, but that was not really a deciding factor for us. Sure it will be nice to loop/roll on occasion, however we really just wanted an awesome cross country machine that doesn't burn a ton of gas.
The RV14 comes in two flavors; with nosewheel (RV14A), and without nosewheel/taildragger (RV14). We chose the straight RV14 Tai for a few reasons. One, if my kids want to learn to fly, I would like them to learn in a tail dragger. Two, the nosewheel adds weigh and hurts the speed a little. Three, loading/unloading the airplane is easier with a tail dragger, as the fuselage is lower to the ground. I suppose most importantly, the taildragger just looks awesome on the ramp!
So here we are. On June 26th, the empennage kit arrived in my garage. Intimidating to say the least. After staring at it for a few hours, I ripped open the crate. As one would expect, it was packaged well in the crate. Nothing was damaged during shipping. Over the next two days I completed the inventory, and put away the parts.
