10.08.2019: Nothing regarding flying so far this month, but I managed to update my website for the first time since around April. I have spent a total of nearly 4 months in Sydney, Australia for work since March, which has kept me more than busy. But there have been some events related to flying, the details can be found in the blogs from April to July.
11.08.2019: It’s soon time for the annual meeting of the EAS again, it takes place in a week from Friday 16th to Sunday 18th August at Birrfeld Aerodrome (LSZF). I will definitely go there at least Saturday / Sunday, and take as usual my tent with me.
18.08.2019: I’m back from the EAS meeting at Birrfeld Aerodrome. I flew there on Saturday afternoon, but instead of taking the quickest route, which would only have take me maybe 30 minutes, I did a little detour through the alps. The weather wasn’t too nice, with a high layer of clouds at 11’000 ft, but apart of that no problem.
As every year many participants arrived with their tent, staying overnight by camping next to their planes. Unfortunately there were two other aviation related events scheduled for the same weekend, so the participation was smaller than other years with only around 40 planes attending. I took my tent with me as well, below a picture taken early in the morning.
One of club members always prepares a morning coffee on a small gasoline burning stove, which he says is convenient as he can refill it by draining fuel from the plane. Another member took a 360 degrees camera with him, below one of the pictures he took. With the right application you can also view the pictures the camera takes by moving your view, but I guess most people don’t have this application installed on their computers.
One member brought the fuselage of a Europa kit he is building, but the main element he was showing is not the plane, but rather the engine.
I’ts a Kawasaki motorcycle engine, which he has however altered significantly. Apart from the casing and the camshaft he exchanged most parts, and even the casing is highly modified. He removed the gear and the clutch, built a new speed reduction gear, installed different pistons and piston rods, built a propeller hub etc.. He made most of the parts himself on a CNC machine, either from high strength aluminum or even titanium. The weight of the engine is close to that of my Rotax 912, but with at least 50% more power.
Note also the belt driven reduction gear as well as the air inlet, built from carbon fibre.
The weather was a lot better today, so when I flew home I again chose to do a little detour through the alps. Below some pictures, showing perfect blue sky conditions.
South of the alps the weather looked different, with a layer of clouds pushed against the alps.
