William Wynne

Happy 103rd Anniversary Of Powered Flight From FlyCorvair.com Son of Cleanex Lives Today was the 103rd Anniversary of Powered Flight. Chris Smith of Floirda commemorated the day by making the first two flights of his 3,100cc Cleanex, nicknamed "The Son of Cleanex." The flights were flawless with the exception of electronic instrumentation errors. Chris is using dual Stratomaster installations. On the first flight, he had a reading of 469 F for oil temp. This obvious error was corrected with a simple sender change, and read a correct 230 F pre-cooler on the second flight. Hats off to Chris Smith, newest Corvair pilot. Speaking of new Corvair Flyers, check out ZenVair.com, our other Web site. Get an eyeful of Brandon Tucker's Corvair powered 601 HDS. The site is a work in progress that Grace recently upgraded. Pictured above is one of our new Engine Baffling Kits for 601s. These extremely high quality Baffling Sets are made for us by reknowned aircraft sheetmetal mechanics Jim and Rhonda Weseman. The kits are an exact fit, and tailored to either the stock Corvair cooler or Niagara heavy duty cooler. Jim and Rhonda did several weeks of R&D, test fitting and tooling to fine tune these kits. The fit and quality reflect their years of experience. For your Baffle Kit, please visit http://www.jsweseman.com/corvair.html. This past weekend, Grace and I attended the Performance Racing Industry trade show in Orlando, Fla. This giant show has 1,500 vendors participating. You must qualify as a legitimate manufacturing or racing business to attend. It's an excellent opportunity to meet the world's experts in these fields and meet and speak with them in person. In the above photo, I'm speaking to an engineer from J&E about the requirements for manufacturing custom forged pistons for large displacement Corvairs. J&E recently merged with world famous connecting rod manufacturer Carillo. They had a very impressive staff on hand. We also spent some time with the engineers at ATI. They have a damper design I'm very interested in adapting to high end Corvairs. While not every Corvair engine needs this, some Corvair builders have the perspective that if you spent 2/3 the amount of money that Rotax or Jabiru asks for their engines, you could build a fantastically advanced Corvair engine with performance, reliability and quality engineering that are beyond the imports' wildest dreams. The know how to build components for such an engine handily exists within the companies represented at the PRI show. Meeting people in person is an excellent way to find out which businesses run nice Web sites and which are real manufacturers. We were pleasantly surprised when the senior rep from Ross pistons told Grace that he's read our Web site many times and he's a pilot himself. Grace and I took time out Saturday night to watch the Space Shuttle's first night launch in four years. This can easily be seen from a hundred miles in every direction. In America today, sadly, most people are convinced to be afraid of many things. My personal definition of courage is volunteering to get in the type of vehicle that has killed all of its occupants before, twice. The courage of our astronauts and the trust they have in their co-workers in the space program personally moves me. The view above is from the Titusville U.S. 1 bridge 15 miles from the pad. Above is our 701's rear fuselage. Much more progress has been made in the past 10 days. Above are a dozen Rear Oil Cases. In the boxes in front of them are the pre-clearanced oil pumps. The 701's firewall rigidly mounted at a 17 degree angle on the build up stand, above. This is the beginning of developing the 701 firewall forward package. A batch of CNC oil top covers with their CNC oil fittings welded in place, above. The hot plate on the table is used to pre-heat the parts to 450 F. The weld quality is far superior because the pre-heated 1/2" plate flows into the light fitting from the first moment the arc is struck. The covers are machined flat after welding. Don't let anybody tell you Corvair parts are becoming scarce. We find all that we want because people know we're looking. The surest method to find Corvair parts in your area is to run a small ad in the weekly shopper paper. This truckload of parts cost less than a single piston for a Rotax engine, or roughly 1.5 percent of the cost of a Jabiru engine. The three photos above are shots of the baffling on Rick Lindstrom's engine. This was handmade by Gus, and used as a prototype beginning point for our Baffling Kits. Traditionally, we put the rubber on the inside of the sheetmetal, but we're testing a slightly different approach with Rick's airplane. Above, I turn a PVC pipe coupler to a thin tapered ring on the lathe. We bond these into Nosebowls to give a uniform, smooth inlet for air. Above, truing a 13" Vans FP-13 spinner after it's been worked to mate with a 64x41 Sensenich propeller. The dial indicator in a magnetic base is attached to the engine stand. The Prop Hub is on a crankshaft in a dummy case. The dial indicator shows only .020" of runout. On the plane, this setup can be simulated by removing the sparkplugs to allow the engine to turn over smoothly. Above are two views of Rick Lindstrom's 601. The paint job on it was designed by Rick's friend Craig Barnett. It is a mixture of our previous ZenVair paint jobs, and something of Rick's personal taste. With 2006 winding to a close, Grace and I both wish all Corvair builders and friends Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays. 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