Joe Foss
www.eaa.org 73 the seat cover was already made, and they couldn’t
do it with the stitching that was already in the seats.”
Preparations for EAA AirVenture were some-what dif cult with the added challenge of keeping the aircraft a secret from Ray.
“We hadn’t told Grandpa yet, so here we are, we’ve got the airplane painted blue with the light blue on the bottom, and we’ve got the Marines decals on the side, but I draped blankets over the airplane so he couldn’t see,” Mark said. “We’ve got the hangar door down pretty far to keep it hidden, but he’s out mowing the yard, and every time he comes by he’s trying to look inside the hangar, because he saw the Marines on the wing. He mowed that yard a lot more than normal!”
Eventually curiosity got the best of Ray, and he asked about the project in the hangar.
“I told him he’d just as well fi nd out now, and we pulled the cover of the airplane,” Mark said.
“He’s a man of few words, you know, and he just says, ‘Geez.’”
Mark said he tried to stick to the original Corsair scheme but with one change.
“Joe Foss’ Corsair squadron, VMF-115, had been dubbed ‘Joe’s Jokers,’
and we did all the research we could for the insignia on the tail for Joe’s Jokers,” he said. “We couldn’t make it look right, so we elected to put the POW/MIA insignia on.
Grandpa Ray said, ‘That takes care of everybody.’”
As the rebuild pro-gressed, Mark brought in his young business partner, Brian Morford, to assist more and more.
“It came together, and I
started to let Brian take on some decisions,” he said. “He really started to get a better understand-ing of what I was tryunderstand-ing to do.”
As his understanding grew, Brian’s passion for the project seemed to grow as well.
“I realized Brian was fully into it when he spent a day and a half polishing the spinner,” Mark said. “I kept telling him to just paint the thing, and he ignored everything I said and went on buf ng and sanding. A whole day had gone by, and he took it home to get it buf ed and brought it back all polished. He wanted it to really shine.”
Mark noted that all of Dakota Cub Aircraft was in some way involved in the project.
“Brian and Mike worked on the graphics to get the decals sized and cut, in addition to making the banner we had,” he said. “Speedy Dave was also a huge help—he not only helped with fabrication and assembly, he also did all of the test fl ying and fl ew the airplane to be on display at Oshkosh. Everyone contributed to making this air-plane a possibility, and they all earned part of the Bronze Lindy we were awarded.”
What does Ray think about this one-of-a-kind Cub? “That’s quite the deal, that airplane,” he said with a smile and a twinkle in his eyes. “It’s wonderful.”
Amy Gesch is an EAA Air Academy alum-na, private pilot, and aviation marketing manager. She is the proud owner of a 1946 Piper Cub.
PHOTOGRAPHY BY AMY GESCH
Extended landing gear, 31-inch tundra tires, and a Borer prop make this Cub at home off pavement.
74 Sport Aviation April 2015
www.eaa.org 75 THE FAA BLESSES HAVING A SECOND
PILOT INVOLVED IN E-AB FLIGHT TESTING The FAA’s Additional Pilot Program, a new policy that formally allows a second pilot on board while fl ight-testing homebuilt aircraft, is now a reality. This is big news! One of the fastest moving EAA/FAA programs ever to come to fruition, the Additional Pilot Program (APP) may also be one of the most important in terms of improving the safety of testing experimental amateur-built (E-AB) aircraft. At the same time it increases fl exibil-ity during the test period.
BY BUDD DAVISSON
76 Sport Aviation April 2015
the two bodies (with the help of lots of volun-teers and input from the homebuilt
community) developed AC 90-116, which out-lines the ways that the initial test fl ights of a homebuilt can be accomplished with more than one pilot in the airplane.
Under the new provisions, the owner/
builder can now be accompanied by a pilot who is more experienced and qualifi ed to help with the test fl ights. The program also out-lines ground tests for the powerplant and suggests test programs for both the aircraft and the pilot that are aimed at increasing the safety through building experience while doing the Phase 1 testing. Phase 1 includes all of the fl ight time prior to getting the restric-tions fl own of (typically 40 hours).
The new program is not a requirement. It is an option. The old test policies still remain in place allowing a builder/owner of the air-craft to do the testing himself (solo) or get someone he feels is more qualifi ed to do it.
The APP allows the builder/owner pilot to experience the thrill of the fi rst fl ight while having a more experienced and qualifi ed pilot at his side to ride herd on the proceedings, ready to head of any potential problems and to lend a helping hand if problems do occur.
THE BACKGROUND OF A GOOD IDEA There are several reasons this program escaped the seemingly endless delays that are often a part of altering federal policies. EAA has long advocated some sort of provision that would allow more qualifi ed pilots to assist in the testing. However, the real push to get that
done came from the NTSB. When it reviewed E-AB accidents that occurred during 2011 (a representative year), the board came to the conclusion that having more experienced pilots in the airplanes could reduce the accidents, especially those end-ing in fatalities.
The statistics clearly show that the causes of accidents fall almost equally into three distinct categories: powerplant prob-lems, pilot loss of control, and incidents that indicate a lack of experience, profi ciency, or qualifi cations such as hard landings.
With those statistics in hand, the NTSB tasked the FAA to work with EAA in developing a program that would lower accident rates. It opined that would probably involve a second pilot.
After the causes of accidents in 2011 were researched in the light of having another, more qualifi ed person on board, the FAA, with EAA’s input, came to its own conclusions:
• Powerplant problems were often caused by some sort of fuel system defi ciency, so tests to help prevent those problems should be recommended in the APP. At the same time, many of the powerplant accidents on record were made worse by poor decisions or poor skills on the part of the sole pilot on board. It was determined that the handling of the aircraft during a powerplant emergency would be greatly improved by having a more experienced pilot at the controls.
• Loss of control accidents were almost always the result of a builder/pilot being over his head in the type of airplane being fl own for the fi rst time, usually because of a lack of currency and eroded skills. Of the loss of control accidents, 20 percent happened on the fi rst fl ight, but 65 percent happened in the fi rst eight hours. So, the APP not only includes allowing a second, more qualifi ed pilot in the cockpit, but also spells out some maneuvers the builder pilot (BP) should do in the airplane to gain familiarity with it while the qualifi ed pilot (QP) is at his side.
• “Other” category accidents included any number of factors, some beyond the pilot’s control, but many of them could have been avoided had the pilot been more skilled and profi cient. These included things like landing short, being overcome by a crosswind, and other varied causes.
The research made it obvious that during the test period the pilot was being tested just as much as the aircraft was, and the Additional Pilot Program was designed to deal with both factors.
ELIGIBILITY: THERE ARE PILOTS AND THEN THERE ARE PILOTS The way the program is organized, there are actually three dif-ferent “grades” of pilots, each of which must meet eligibility, currency, and experience requirements.
AC 90-116 goes into much more detail than a magazine arti-cle can deliver, so it is suggested that the PDF be downloaded at www.EAA.org/sportaviation to get all of the details.