For the airworthiness certification of an experimental, amateur-built aircraft, the FAA requires that the builder keep a log of the building process in order to prove that “the major portion of which has been fabricated and assembled by person(s) who undertook the construction project solely for their own education or recreation.” This blog will serve that purpose. To make it easier to follow the project, this page organizes the work on different chapters chronologically.
Pre-Building
- Introducing a new category: Airplane building! October 25, 2012
- EAA SportAir Composite Construction Workshop October 30, 2012
- (Yet) another project! June 11, 2017
- Aircraft rewiring June 16, 2017
- AeroVee intake experiment July 8, 2017
- Intake design: prep work July 18, 2017
- Intake design: Plenum and runners August 1, 2017
- Intake Fabrication August 25, 2017
- Printing the plenum: Beating Alloy 910 into submission August 31, 2017
- Finishing up the intake September 3, 2017
- Testing the new intake September 4, 2017
- Vacuum leak, found September 10, 2017
- Plenum intermission September 16, 2017
- Plenum test run #2 September 16, 2017
- Plenum test run #3 September 22, 2017
- Welding the intake runners September 29, 2017
- A spark plug interruption October 4, 2017
- Spark plug thread repair October 5, 2017
- More engine problems October 18, 2017
- Engine is off the plane October 24, 2017
- Engine guts part 1 October 28, 2017
- Engine guts part 2 December 3, 2017
- Fitting the propeller December 10, 2017
- Engine guts 3 December 19, 2017
- Engine guts 4: Blueprinting December 28, 2017
- Engine guts 5: Oil mods January 1, 2018
- Engine guts 6: More head work January 3, 2018
- Engine guts 7: More oil mods January 12, 2018
- Engine guts 8: Balancing act complete January 13, 2018
- Engine guts 9: Dialing the cam January 21, 2018
- Engine guts 10: Blueprinting the oil pump January 22, 2018
- Engine guts 11: Closing the case January 23, 2018
- Engine guts 12: Setting deck height February 18, 2018
- Engine guts 13: Setting valve geometry March 3, 2018
- Engine guts 14: Final assembly March 4, 2018
- Aerovee Oil Filter March 12, 2018
- Engine is back on the plane March 21, 2018
- Engine restart May 27, 2018
- Engine measurements June 3, 2018
- Wheels October 6, 2018
- Tailwheel October 11, 2018
- Plane updates July 21, 2024
- New workshop setup August 4, 2024
- Amateur building in Sweden August 7, 2024
- The Dimpling Tool August 8, 2024
Planning
- Plane, interrupted. August 29, 2013
- Plane updates July 21, 2024
Chapter 3 — Education
- First fiberglass test layup! November 20, 2012
- Second practice layup January 1, 2013
- “Confidence” practice layup February 7, 2013
- Carbon confidence February 18, 2013
- Even more confidence February 23, 2013
- Third practice layup February 24, 2013
- The Bookend March 6, 2013
- A Gasoline Experiment March 17, 2013
- A Gasoline Experiment, part 2 March 25, 2013
Chapter 4 — Fuselage bulkheads
Workshop Setup
- Epoxy hot box December 28, 2012
- A bit of woodworking… February 17, 2013
- A DIY CNC mill April 14, 2013
- New spindle mounts for ShapeOko April 21, 2013
- More ShapeOko upgrades May 19, 2013
- Let’s weld! December 23, 2014
- The quest for organization, part 1 May 6, 2015
- A mini mill, with CNC November 15, 2015
- The mini mill motion controller November 26, 2015
- The mini mill electronics box November 27, 2015
- CNC Mini Mill #4: Small tweaks December 9, 2015
- CNC Mini Mill #5: Correcting the X-axis December 16, 2015
- CNC Mini Mill #6: The Arduino shield December 21, 2015
- CNC Mini Mill #7: Another kind of shield December 22, 2015
- CNC Mini Mill #8: Limit switches December 27, 2015
- CNC Mini Mill #9: Spindle and coolant control December 28, 2015
- CNC Mini Mill #10: A better air spring bracket, and some tweaks January 2, 2016
- CNC Mini Mill #11: A little more work on the air spring January 17, 2016
- CNC Mini Mill #12: Streamlining Tool Changes September 11, 2016
- Compressed air improvements October 2, 2016
- More quiet compressed air October 29, 2016
- CNC Mini Mill #13: Gib mod November 6, 2016
- Filament storage February 23, 2020
- Filament storage part 2 February 29, 2020
- Filament storage part 3 March 9, 2020
- Filament storage part 4 March 21, 2020
- Filament storage part 5 March 28, 2020
- Filament storage part 6 April 12, 2020
- Filament storage part 7 May 17, 2020
- Filament storage part 8 November 1, 2020
- Filament storage part 9 November 7, 2020
- Filament storage part 10 November 14, 2020
- Filament storage part 11 December 13, 2020
- Filament storage part 12 December 19, 2020
- Filament storage part 13 December 28, 2020
- Filament storage part 14 February 15, 2021
- Filament storage part 15 February 15, 2021
- Filament storage part 16 February 27, 2021
- Filament storage part 17 February 28, 2021
- Filament storage part 18 March 21, 2021
- Filament storage part 19 April 4, 2021
- CNC mill upgrade: Spindle May 4, 2021
- CNC mill upgrade: Z-axis May 6, 2021
- CNC mill upgrade: Spindle part 2 May 16, 2021
- CNC mill upgrades: Couplers and gibs June 19, 2021
- Filament storage part 20 August 28, 2021
Hi Patrik,
I found your blog by searching around for Long EZ construction projects that are underway. If you don’t mind me asking, what are you using for plans? Do you have an original set of plans or are you using the TERF CD/Open EZ templates/something else entirely?
Tack!
-Max
Hej Max,
I do have an original set I got on ebay, but I also printed the OpenEZ templates.
So glad you bought my plans, Patrik. Hope the construction continues to go well, not many updates on your progress lately. Stay with it my friend!
I’ve moved from Germany to Great Britain, saw a very nice Longeze here recently. Let’s keep in touch, you can reach me at: tmartinrrt@hotmail.com.
How accurately do the OpenEZ templates line up against the original templates? Do you think the Open EZ templates along with the TERF manuals would make a workable substitute for an authentic plan set?
Well, I don’t have the original templates, but my printed copies are accurate to within about a few mm from the scale printed on the templates, so they seem ok. There’s been some discussion of this on http://forum.canardaviation.com/ if you search around.