Friends,
For the past three
years we’ve been very fortunate to have our CONTACT! Magazine annual
fly-in hosted by the fine people at the Golden West Fly-in (Marysville
California), who rolled out the red carpet for us. But each year the weather
seemed to not want to cooperate. Last year we had a record-shattering heat
wave, and the year before that we had 40 mph winds with low temps to match.
Each of these weather-related issues kept people from showing up, so our
numbers have been slowly declining while they should be rising exponentially.
So in the last issue I made mention of a few places we were considering, one
such place being French Valley Airport (F70), near Temecula California. Not long
after that I received an email from the French Valley EAA chapter (Pietenpol
builders!) offering their full assistance. Long story short, I paid them a
visit and they voted to help us all they can.
So with that, I’m
pleased to announce that on Saturday September 27, 2014, we’ll be hosting
our 11th annual Alternative Engine and Experimental Aircraft Round-Up at
French Valley Airport. The event will have a soft start on Friday, Sept
26th, as we receive and welcome arrivals. On Saturday we’ll have a
day of educational forums and lots of cool stuff to see on the ramp. We’ll have
a nice catered dinner that evening, and the next day we’ll be there to help
those who flew in to get home safely.
None of the details
are set in stone (except the date and the place) but we plan to have easy
access from the parking lot to the forums for those who drive in, and plenty of
ground support (including transportation to and from motels) for those who
fly-in. The uncontrolled field has a beautifully paved 6000’ x 75’ lighted
runway, lots of tiedown space, and even a few vacant hangars that can be rented
by the day for those who wish to keep their planes inside overnight.
Additionally, there’s a very nice restaurant on the field. For more
information, please visit our website:
http://www.contactmagazine.com/roundup.html
(still a work in
progress)
And if you’d like to
display your plane, present an educational forum, offer assistance or even
display a product, please let me know as soon as possible. You can reach me
best by email:
Editor@ContactMagazine.com
or by my calling office phone number during normal business hours:
559-584-3306
We hope to see you
there!
I’d also like to take
a moment to let you know that we are about to deliver our special, 85th
Pietenpol anniversary issue of CONTACT! Magazine, and to
thank all of you who were at the Brodhead Pietenpol gathering or AirVenture and
either bought the single issue or went the distance and subscribed to CONTACT!
And I'd especially
like to thank ALL who participated in the making of this issue. If it wasn't
for their generosity of information, we wouldn't have this awesome issue. It
was our great pleasure to work with these individuals that helped us create
this special 32 page issue filled with Pietenpol articles. Here’s a link to the
cover image:
http://tinyurl.com/CM-Issue108
Here’s the table of
contents:
•Dan Helsper’s Ford A
Powered Pietenpol.— Oscar Zuniga introduces us to a special Pietenpol built by
Dan Helsper, who did his best to stick to the plans wherever practical,
including the engine.
•Ol’ Tattered Wingtips.—
Pietenpol patriarch Donald “Doc” Mosher tells of some of the inside tips that
help fill in the gaps left in the various Pietenpol plan sets currently
available.
•Got Gas?— Steve
Williamson, President of EAA Chapter 1279 based at French Valley Airport, gives
us a little insight into the traps that can arise when building a plane as a
chapter, and details the fuel system in the Pietenpol they built.
•1937 Pietenpol Air
Camper NX308MB— Gary Boothe shares his story of building this simple yet
elegant version of Bernard Pietenpol’s Corvair-powered Air Camper, as a tribute
to his father.
•Greg Bacon’s Turbo
Subaru EA-82T Pietenpol Air Camper— Oscar Zuniga presents the tale of “Mountain
Piet,” a straightforward incarnation designed to be flown from a field in
Colorado with a summertime density altitude approaching 11,000 feet.
•Chris Rusch’s
“MitsuPIETshi” Air Camper— Oscar Zuniga highlights some of the many details
that make this Air Camper unique, including the Mitsubishi forklift engine that
was overhauled before being adapted to its new chore of powering a classic
bird.
•11th Annual
Alternative Engine Round-Up— The fine people from EAA Chapter 1279 have stepped
up and offered to cohost our annual fly-in. This year;s event will be held on Saturday,
September 27th at the French Valley Airport near Temecula California.
If you’re interested
in receiving CONTACT! Magazine, please contact us by phone,
e-mail, or just simply drop a check in the mail to us and we’ll enter you into
our database just in time to receive this issue. The link to our subscription
page is at the very bottom of this note.
Please remember that CONTACT!
Magazine is a recognized 501(c)3 non-profit, educational resource.
We publish CONTACT! not as a moneymaking endeavor, but
rather as a labor of love- love for experimental aviation.
As previously stated,
we just returned from a very successful trip to the Brodhead Pietenpol
gathering and Oshkosh. We met some great people with some new products and
interesting planes that we’ll be writing about in upcoming issues and I know
you won’t want to miss out.
Additionally, we
finally picked up the full-color version of Alternative Engines
Volume 4 from the printer just before I left for OSH. I had a good
supply of them at Brodhead and AirVenture and totally sold out by the third
day. While I was away at the show, my wife Veronica mailed out several hundred
to those who were kind enough to preorder so that we would have the funds to
self-publish. She’s still not done so if you preordered and haven’t received
yours yet, hang in there a few more weeks. If you haven’t ordered yours yet,
now is the time to do it!
We’ve had the less
expensive black and white version in stock for quite a while now and they’re
always available. If you’d like to know more about the book, please visit:
www.contactmagazine.com/Vol4tableofcontents.html
Here’s an electronic
version preview of Volume 4:
http://issuu.com/contact.magazine/docs/alternative_engines_volume_4_previe
If you’d like just the
current, all Pietenpol issue- that can be ordered by following the directions
at the bottom of this page:
http://www.contactmagazine.com/backissu.html
Please note that this
page hasn’t been updated in a little over a year and does not include all the
most recent issues, including the all-Pietenpol issue. Just be sure to ask for
issue #108 when you order.
Sincerely,
Patrick Panzera,
Editor
Editor@ContactMagazine.com
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information please visit:
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