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I ran into my South African friends at Whisper again this year and checked out their X350 Gen II. This is a REALLY SLICK KIT AIRPLANE! The interior is very wide and comfortable. There is a TON of baggage space behind the seats. It's quick also - 175 kts (200 MPH!) cruise speed at 80%. And, 538 lbs of useful load with full fuel (63G - 1000nm worth!).  These guys love talking about their airplane. It's almost the complete opposite of the Van's booth :) Christiaan at Whisper forwarded me more information on their airplane to share. Spec Sheet: x350-Gen-II-Info.pdf Pricing Sheet: X350-G2-Pricing.pdf Inflight Article: Inflight-Article.pdf  Hmmm, this looks like a new prop.  Sure is! The AXSport Aviation (http://www.axsport.co.za/)AXL3 3-blade Constant Speed / Adjustable Pitch prop (electrically actuated). I didn't see the weight on their site, but I recall the Whisper guys saying it was around 40 lbs. Pricing seems great too - 75,000 South African Rand, which today equals about $5,200 USD. If I was building a RV-7/8 now, I'd seriously consider this prop!  Last plug for Whisper - their plenum is AMAZING! It's very strong and extremely well made. They sell it separate from their airframe kit. I think it would work out very nicely on any RV model.  I felt like getting some walking in so I walked down to the ultralight field. These guys seem to be having the most fun at Oshkosh.  I'm usually not a Helo type of person, but the Mosquito XET Turbine is pretty slick.  Maybe I'm just a sucker for anything that burns Jet-A the fun way!  So this is one of the craziest things that happened at Oshkosh. When I left Wautoma, I was convinced I would probably never see my friends from Lubbock, TX again. Turns out I saw them all 6 days at Oshkosh. Here I ran into Trey and his son randomly while walking around from the ultralight field to Aeroshell Square. Just as in the past, when I went my own way I told them ...."See ya tomorrow!".  This is one of the nicest paint schemes I've seen on an AirCam yet. While gawking at it, someone walked up and started asking me a bunch of questions about AirCam's, which I happily answered. I must of been convincing, because at one point he asked me "what year did you finish this??". I reluctantly needed to tell him I was just a fan of the airplane, and where the AirCam booth was. He said they should have me on their payroll (Robert Meyers at Lockwood - ya listening????).  The fuselage was making good progress today at the One Week Wonder.  One of the more unique AirCam paint jobs. It's name, "Road Runner" and painted colors were inspired by the 1970's Plymouth Superbird.  When I got back to HBC a new neighbor had arrived - Tom Savrda from Vero Beach, FL. His RV-7 won the Grand Champion Kit Homebuilt award at Sun 'N Fun this year. I didn't get a chance to see it at SNF, so I was happy it was in close proximity to me.  THIS IS WHAT I'VE BEEN LOOKING FOR MY WHOLE LIFE! Someone figured out how to do the front tip-up canopy seam right!  Tom had one of the cleanest firewall forwards I've ever seen. In fact, everything about his airplane was just perfect. A&P Mitch quickly found one fault - 0.032" safety wire instead of 0.040" wasa used to secure the prop bolts! Now THAT'S an A&P I would want doing a pre-buy for me!!  Off on another adventure. We utilized the Welcome Wagon to take us to the Red Barn to stock up on beer and dinner supplies, and Mitch and I had a Media Golf Cart reservation to get to.  Just as Mitch and I were being dropped off at the Media Center, the Blue Angels made a flyby.  Mitch and I had a few minutes to burn waiting for our cart to return, so we got an obligatory picture in front of the Brown Arch.  When Mitch and I grabbed our cart, we realized the fuel quantity was damn near empty. A visual look at the gas tank verified what the gauge was telling us. Off to a new Oshkosh experience - figuring out where to fuel the golf cart! Oshkosh is truly it's own self contained town for this week. Grocery store, maintenance shed, gas station, etc.. Everything you could ever need within a couple square miles. Gassed up, Mitch and I used the remainder of our hour to haul-ass from the most southern portion of GA parking to the extreme end of North 40. THANKS EAA FOR THE MEDIA PASSES!!!!  When we got back to HBC, we found some people were in the middle of a Siesta.  And this is what Oshkosh is all about for me -- the friends, both new and old. We enjoyed a couple of brews while Marie was kind enough to cook us dinner.  Next up was the night air show. The walk over to the sideline of runway 18/36 was very picturesque.  Of course we had VIP access to Mike Goulian's tent to watch the airshow from.  The Boeing B-1B departed in style before the night airshow began.  I don't know if the C5 Galaxy left and came back, or whether it just got out of the way for the B-1B to depart. In any event, we got to see it taxi back in to Aeroshell Square.  So bad news - a dangerous line of thunderstorms was heading our way. Good news - We're under cover at the Whelen tent with free food and booze.  A small rain storm passed through and then stopped before a large thunderstorm was about to roll through. Our options were limited, and we had a truncated time schedule to figure out what to do next -- go back to HBC, or wait out the thunderstorm in the protection of the SOS Brothers tent? Walking through Aeroshell Square was eerily peaceful. Not a soul around and every airplane looked pristine, glistening in a fresh coat of rain. It was almost like a ghost town.    Speaking of ghost towns, so was the SOS Brothers tent...or at least the main stage. Or perhaps that has to do with their music choice for tonight.  It freakin' poured here. I didn't want to know how my poor little tent was holding up.  As I previously mentioned, my friend Derek couldn't make it to Oshkosh this year. So we did what we could to make him know we missed him and bought him a signed Beer Ventures poster.  Karina didn't understand why Derek would miss out on all of this fun. I'm sure this photo isn't contributing at all to Derek's list of regrets for not attending!!!!  Well, why not another beer bong? I need to make up for not doing any last year.  Mitch, under the guidance of my expert tutelage, decided another bong was also a good idea. Even though it was disappointing the night air show was cancelled and some terrible weather rolled through, we made the best of the evening! 
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Last Modified: August 13, 2023 |