I sold the Kitfox last week to a gentleman in Midland, TX. My wife knew there was an ulterior motive since I have a bad habit of selling cars to trade "up." I once sold a sweet 944 to trade up to a rusty '69 911.

Yesterday I made a deal on Steve Pierce's Piper PA-22/20. This time I really did trade up...a sweet Kitfox for a very, very nice Pacer.

So, in March I am going to fly the Kitfox to Midland, zip down the road to Graham (250 miles is "just down the road" in TX), pick up the Pacer and return to Maine.

Cliff - You think I can takeoff on your 1500' in the Pacer? Would you mind if I cut down some trees?

Congrats on your purchase, I hope you have lots of fun with that Pacer. Congrats also on the sale of your Kitfox- as you know, it's a tough market for sellers right now. I just sold my 170 about 3 weeks ago after having it for sale for 8 months. (how do you spell relief? S-O-L-D!)

Eric

Congrats!! Steve is a Heck of a guy I'm sure you will be happy with the Pacer!

Steve is a heck of a guy, and I know the apple didn't fall to far from the tree after meeting his dad at the 07 Short Wing Piper Convention in WA. You bought one heck of an airplane that has been taken care of by a meticulous mechanic. Congratulations.

Of course, now you cant do this to your Kitfox----






Note:

I'm just posting these pictures to get the questions rolling.........

Brian.

I had the Speedster and it has great short-field performance. If your Kitfox is a long wing with a 100hp, I would imagine that a it gives a helicopter a run for its money with those mods.

Here's a question: why the double-row of VGs?

I've talked to Steve a few times and he seems like a heck of a guy. I can't wait to meet him.

Eric -- So much for my stance on fabric aircraft, huh? I still like that 170A in Sequim. I talked to the owner and it looked promising, but I have no way of getting out to WA until mid-summer. Maybe if I win the lottery next week I can have 2 planes......no wait, 3 planes. I'd get a Kenmore Beaver on floats.

Great news ivan. You will need to get that thing over to my strip. Steve was at the wad flyin, over in new hampshire this fall. He seems to be a real nice guy.

Well this particular KitFox has a long story to go with the list of modifications. The owner of this airplane has never been interested in how fast he can go. His main goal in life is to make the airplane fly as slow as possible. He bought the KitFox from the original builder and pretty much started modding it as soon as he got it home. One thing you have to know about the owner, he absolutely hates to work on things. He would rather pay someone than to do it himself. So he approached me to do some of the mods he has done to the airplane. The first thing he had me do is add 2 foot wing extensions to each wing. I removed the original tip and built up a tip using inserts from sky star and 2 foot long spar material. I finished the extended tips off with flat plates on the tips and covered the gap between the tip and the wing with a 2.5 inch wide piece of aluminum. He flew that for a while and then extended the cord on the tailfeathers. He flew that a while and then added VG's. He flew that for a while and then installed high compresion pistons in the Rotax.

Anyway, to shorten up the story a little. A few years ago we were talking fixed slats and he decided that was the ticket for extreem slow flight. I designed and built the slats. Since the original installation, they have been modified quite a bit. The nose of the slat has bee rounded off. The tail of the slats have been cut off to make the outlet bigger. The original plastic extrusion that is added onto the kitfox wing has also been removed to open up the inlet opening to the slat. VG's have been added behind the slat and on the slat. Since the picture I posted, the VG's on the slat have been removed. he decided that they dont do any more for the aircraft. I have also extended the flaperons a total of 2 feet on each side.

So, in its current configuration, it has fixed slats with VG's behind them and the plastic extrusion removed from the nose of the original wing. The engine HP has been upped by high compresion pistons from 80 HP to about 95. It is running the IVO seaplane prop pitched as flat as it can go. The elevators have been modified extensively by adding 4 inches to the cord and a balance elevator added to the front of each elevator. There is also VG's on the elevator and gap seals. It is also equipped with 30" tires.

And now for the performance number.....I have radar gunned this airplane flying at 14 MPH in ground effect without loosing altitude. That was the average after 3 flybys.

Brian.

And now for the performance number.....I have radar gunned this airplane flying at 14 MPH in ground effect without loosing altitude. That was the average after 3 flybys.

Brian.

Well you do have it flying slow. That kitfox is in a promotional video I got from the now defunct Skystar in 1994. I recognize the name on the cowl, "Skyscraper". It certainly looks different now.

Brian ,
Would your slats work on a Avid Stol wing?
Mark

Bandit,

Not sure, haven't seen the Avid STOL wing. If it is the udercamber wing it may not do as good. I figure that it would be a try it and see type of thing. Here is the CAD drawing that I did. Its a little different from the original, but it is close.



If you can imaging the leading edge of the wing forward of the front spar tube, then you can get a bit of an idea of the slat opening that I have on the Model 4 wing that I did.

Brian.

Brian,
Ok thanks. Sure love to try something like that on my Avid some day.
Bandit

hotrod150 wrote:Congrats on your purchase, I hope you have lots of fun with that Pacer. Congrats also on the sale of your Kitfox- as you know, it's a tough market for sellers right now. I just sold my 170 about 3 weeks ago after having it for sale for 8 months. (how do you spell relief? S-O-L-D!)

Eric

Congratulations Eric. I'm glad to hear you got it sold. Hope you managed to get a reasonable price for it.

GL

I've been flying quite a bit lately, mostly trying techniques I've read on BCP, we should get together soon so you can get some 22/20 time. Call me whenever you have time, I'm self employed so my schedule is flexible.

Mike

Hey Mike. Thanks! I've been trying to get over to Rockland but life, snow storms, and high winds keep getting in the way. I will take you up on your offer soon. I'd love to see what she can do before I have to fly one 1500 nm.

Hi Eric,
I heard it was a crazy weekend in Graham but you are now landing that Pacer in the worst of the cross winds Good deal I hope the ride home is fun and the wind died in Florida. It appears the weather here today will let you in no sweat. Congrats on the new ...slightly used only on Sundays Pacer
John