Hallmarks of Homebuilding

Ever since the original homebuilders Orville and Wilbur Wright solved the problem of powered flight, other aviation pioneers have been working on ways to reach the skies on their own terms. One of the must-see highlights at EAA AirVenture Oshkosh 2006 will be the Hallmarks of Homebuilding, a special tribute to several milestones that defined the homebuilding movement.

Over the weeks leading up to this year's convention, the AirVenture website, www.airventure.org and the EAA electronic newsletter, e-Hotline, will feature weekly installments spotlighting these "Hallmarks of Homebuilding." At EAA AirVenture Oshkosh 2006, visitors can then visit their individual displays located along the homebuilt flight line for further details.

“Hallmarks of Homebuilding” will celebrate the revolutionary moments in aircraft design and construction from those whose enthusiasm for flight extends to building their own airplanes, rotorcraft, amphibians and other designs. The activities will include the significant dates, designs and people who developed the homebuilt aircraft community.

Nearly all homebuilt aircraft can be traced to specific moments or breakthrough designs that changed that community. We’ll share those hallmarks in an even more special way at EAA AirVenture 2006.

Special features include a display near AirVenture’s showcase AeroShell Square, highlighting the homebuilt aircraft that began or defined a particular homebuilding hallmark and an evening program at Theater in the Woods that looks at how the homebuilt aircraft movement has evolved, with some of the personalities who made a difference.

EAA has identified 11 Hallmarks of Homebuilding. Each week leading up to EAA AirVenture Oshkosh 2006, we'll add a new Hallmark to the list below.

• Pioneering Years (1903-1953)
  Aviation's first successful homebuilders were the Wright brothers, whose famous first powered flight in December 1903 was followed by numerous other efforts. Early homebuilders such as Glenn Curtiss, Alberto Santos Dumont, Matty Laird, and others contributed greatly to early advances in flight ... (read more)
   
• The Experimental Aircraft Association
  Our second homebuilding "Hallmark" is the formation of your organization, the Experimental Aircraft Association, without which many of the hallmarks to follow would not have occurred. Several previous attempts to form a national organization for homebuilders were unsuccessful, but when the Civil Aeronautics Manual No. 1 was published in the Federal Register on September 19, 1952, homebuilders finally had official procedures in place by which their creations could be issued airworthiness certificates ... (read more)
    
• Lou Stolp's Idea: The One-Stop Shop
  These days if you want to build your own airplane, there are countless companies from which to choose that will provide everything you need in complete kits. But that was not always the case; homebuilding meant you purchased a set of plans and then it was up to you to obtain the parts needed to build it. Until an aircraft designer and EAAer from California had an idea ... (read more)
   
• Thorp T-18 Advanced Metal Homebuilt Construction
  The individual “Hallmarks of Homebuilding” have been so designated because they fundamentally changed an element within the homebuilt movement. By definition, one very definitive hallmark is represented by John Thorp’s all metal airplane, the Thorp T-18 ... (read more)
    

• Ken Rand's Composite Airplane, The KR-1
  Among the most talked about airplanes at the 1972 Oshkosh EAA Convention and Fly-In was the Rand Robinson KR-1 created by Ken Rand of EAA Chapter 92 in Huntington Beach, California. Not so much the airplane, which was so small that some EAAers figured it had to be either a large RC model or some over-indulgent father's taxiing toy for his child ... (read more)

• Burt Rutan Unveils Mold-less Composite Construction
  At the 1975 EAA Convention and Fly-In, EAA Lifetime Member Burt Rutan unveiled a new, highly anticipated airplane design that had been written about extensively in EAA’s Sport Aviation in the preceding months. The creation built at his Rutan Aircraft Factory in Mojave, California, was called the VariEze (Very Easy). It was (and still is) a futuristic canard pusher that utilized an entirely new construction method that used foam and fiberglass cloth and practically no wood or metal ... (read more)

• Frank Christensen's Complete Eagle II Kit
  In the late 1970s, a successful entrepreneur named Frank Christensen became consumed with the idea of creating a homebuilt aerobatic aircraft that anyone could safely build and fly, regardless of their background…a sort of Heath Kit for aircraft homebuilders. Not only did he create the aircraft-the popular Christen Eagle II biplane-but the total package he marketed set a new standard in the completeness of a homebuilt kit and established a true Hallmark of Homebuilding ... (read more)

• Tom Hamilton's Molded Composites Construction Glasair
  In the late 1970s, Tom Hamilton of Arlington, Washington, set out to design a new airplane from the ground up, one that coupled utility and efficiency with high performance. His five-year effort resulted in the Stoddard-Hamilton SH-2 Glasair, a sleek, conventional 2-place, side-by-side kit airplane that took composite material construction to another level of sophistication ... (read more)

• B.J. Schramm's RotorWay Exec
  Building on the lessons learned from his previous models of the Scorpion and before that, the Javelin, RotorWay's B.J. Schramm designed a whole new helicopter called the RotorWay Exec that greatly popularized the homebuilt helicopter. RotorWay, operating at that time out of Tempe, Arizona, refined the building process so as to make a reliable helicopter an achievable goal for the homebuilder, which makes it a Hallmark of Homebuilding ... (read more)

• Homebuilt Ultralight Vehicles
  The FAA created a new regulation in 1982 that allowed additional freedoms to fly the simple, lightweight vehicles with minimal government regulation. The regulation was called Part 103, Ultralight Vehicles. Part 103 led to tremendous growth in new designs that incorporated simple, inexpensive construction techniques and materials. Ultralight vehicle construction was primarily bolted-together aluminum tubes covered with pre-colored, stabilized Dacron sailcloth. ... (read more)

• Vans Aircraft Advances Homebuilding
  Van's Aircraft has proven to be the most successful company in the kit aircraft industry with nearly 4,700 completed aircraft registered with the FAA. Van's Aircraft has brought homebuilding into the mainstream with designs that appeal to people who never before considered homebuilt aircraft to be a viable option. From the original single-place RV-3 to the four-seat RV-10, the RV line of airplanes has been continuously developed to meet the demands of the marketplace ... (read more)