[00:05.540 --> 00:10.060]  Hi there, welcome to my talk, Experimental Aviation Risks and Reward for the Aerospace
[00:10.060 --> 00:14.580]  Village DEFCON 28 Safe Mode. I decided to do this talk with a little bit lighter content
[00:14.580 --> 00:20.020]  than the stuff I did last year. Since those of us involved in security and variably are
[00:20.020 --> 00:25.000]  also involved with risk, I thought it would be interesting to kind of apply the risk model
[00:25.000 --> 00:29.380]  to some different perspectives. Since I'm building my own aircraft, I'll talk about
[00:29.380 --> 00:34.300]  some of the things that I learned, some of the decisions that you will have to undergo
[00:34.300 --> 00:39.600]  if you decide to actually get involved with building your own aircraft, and hopefully
[00:39.600 --> 00:47.400]  give you a new perspective on this particular segment of DII and being a maker of building
[00:47.400 --> 00:55.980]  your own airplane. So, again, my name is Patrick Kiley. I'm a member of the Penetration Testing
[00:55.980 --> 01:03.920]  Team at Rapid7. Previously, I've done research last year on avionic security. There's a talk
[01:03.920 --> 01:09.200]  that you can look up for last year's Aviation Village, before it became this year's Aerospace
[01:09.200 --> 01:14.680]  Village, where I talked about CAN bus and avionics. I've also done other research in
[01:14.680 --> 01:19.760]  internet-connected transportation platforms. I have experience in hardware hacking, Internet
[01:19.760 --> 01:27.460]  of Things, CAN bus quite a bit, and I'm building my own airplane. So here's kind of a quick
[01:27.460 --> 01:31.940]  overview of the agenda. We're going to talk about the FAA regulations very lightly and
[01:31.940 --> 01:37.340]  specifically this 51% rule. We'll talk about plans and kits, a little bit on quick builds
[01:37.340 --> 01:43.340]  as well. Composite versus riveted aluminum construction, you know, just kind of the construction
[01:43.340 --> 01:49.260]  materials that you can choose to build your airframe out of. A little treatise on making
[01:49.260 --> 01:55.300]  changes to tested designs, talk about engine selection, avionics, and then a little bit
[01:55.300 --> 02:06.530]  about the final steps after you've completed. So the FAA defines the language for what is
[02:06.530 --> 02:10.710]  permitted if you're going to build your own airplane. So certified aircraft have a ridiculous
[02:10.710 --> 02:18.090]  amount of regulations they have to comply with for safety to ensure, you know, consistency
[02:18.090 --> 02:22.350]  and everything else. And it's one of the reasons that makes certified aircraft so expensive.
[02:23.770 --> 02:29.210]  Experimental aircraft are not cheap by any means whatsoever, but they are a little bit more
[02:29.790 --> 02:38.590]  advantageous. The FAA defines the rules and federal aviation regulations 21.121 section G, and then
[02:38.590 --> 02:44.470]  they've got an advisory circulator that they did 20-27 where they clarify some additional stuff
[02:44.470 --> 02:49.450]  because of what some of the other manufacturers are starting to do. The biggest thing is you need
[02:49.450 --> 02:55.370]  to have proof, you know, you need proof that you actually, this was built by a person and not a
[02:55.370 --> 03:01.890]  company. So this is basically be taking pictures of your work, keeping a blog, keeping other records
[03:01.890 --> 03:07.750]  showing that you bought the components, that you put them together, something showing your progress.
[03:07.750 --> 03:13.390]  The work can be started by someone else. You can actually buy somebody else's amateur built kit and
[03:13.390 --> 03:16.650]  finish it yourself. Of course, you know, cabbie and emptor, you don't know what their skill set
[03:16.650 --> 03:22.690]  is, so you need to have someone who knows to kind of help review it and be able to actually examine
[03:22.690 --> 03:28.830]  the work up till then and see if it's sound. And then you can also have help. That's how
[03:28.830 --> 03:33.710]  quick builds work. There are a lot of programs where you can actually go to a factory and do
[03:33.710 --> 03:37.970]  most of the work and then you just have the instructors there to guide you so you actually
[03:37.970 --> 03:43.870]  comply with that 51% rule. A repairman's certificate is a little bit different. A repairman's certificate
[03:43.870 --> 03:49.150]  basically allows you to work on it after it's done. So, for example, you can work on the engine
[03:49.150 --> 03:54.170]  more and wouldn't have to hire an airframe and power plant mechanic. You can demonstrate
[03:54.730 --> 04:00.270]  you have the skill to do the work safely and successfully. That's what a repairman's certificate
[04:00.270 --> 04:05.270]  is. It's separate from the airworthiness certificate and it's a demonstration of the
[04:05.270 --> 04:09.730]  skill, not a demonstration of the work. And experimental aircraft have restrictions that
[04:10.570 --> 04:16.610]  don't apply to commercial aircraft. You cannot use an experimental aircraft in a for hire manner.
[04:16.670 --> 04:20.310]  But if you're just moving yourself and your family around and you're not charging for it,
[04:20.310 --> 04:26.630]  you're allowed to do that. You can basically use it for pleasure all pretty much within the
[04:26.630 --> 04:29.950]  limitations. When you get the airworthiness certificate, your airworthiness certificate is
[04:29.950 --> 04:34.730]  going to have its own set of limitations in it and it's going to be very clearly defined
[04:35.210 --> 04:42.250]  as to what you're not allowed to do with it. Beyond that, the topic is very complicated and
[04:42.670 --> 04:47.050]  I would just encourage you to do the research if you want to use an experimental aircraft in a
[04:47.050 --> 04:53.010]  particular manner. There's going to be someone who has actually tried and done it and the answer is
[04:53.010 --> 04:58.910]  going to be out there for you on the internet. So, why would you want to choose an experimental
[04:58.910 --> 05:03.250]  aircraft? It can't be just because you want to fly. If you want to fly, you should just rent.
[05:03.250 --> 05:07.810]  There are many things in life that you should rent and not own. Aircraft is probably one of
[05:07.810 --> 05:12.390]  them, but if you want to fly something that's a little bit more higher performance and you're an
[05:12.390 --> 05:18.170]  engineering nut and like to build stuff, this might just be for you. You have to be able to tolerate
[05:18.370 --> 05:23.830]  a certain amount of risk. Building something that's normally done by professionals automatically
[05:23.830 --> 05:29.430]  inherits a specific amount of risk and you have to be willing to analyze that, see what it is,
[05:29.430 --> 05:33.470]  accept it. It's going to be probably the most complicated thing you've ever done
[05:34.410 --> 05:38.290]  because you're not just doing the airframe, you're doing the avionics, you're doing the engine.
[05:38.670 --> 05:43.730]  It's a lot of different disciplines mixed in together, but you can get a higher performance
[05:43.730 --> 05:48.190]  aircraft than you would be able to get for a specific dollar amount. The image that I have
[05:48.190 --> 05:53.230]  here of the Long Easy, it's a very high performing aircraft. It's also very reasonably
[05:53.230 --> 05:58.950]  priced. It's a two-seater tandem. One of my favorites is you'll kind of see later when you
[05:58.950 --> 06:04.030]  actually see that the kit that I chose to build, it's a very solid choice for an experimental
[06:04.030 --> 06:10.090]  aircraft. So how are you going to build it? There are a few different ways you can go about this.
[06:10.090 --> 06:15.150]  You can buy a set of plans. I actually have a set of plans here for my kit. This is a
[06:15.150 --> 06:21.810]  set of Cozy Plans. It's a very thick, bound, large bound manual that also comes with some
[06:21.810 --> 06:27.530]  very large format drawings. So this is some drawings of the instrument panel using
[06:27.530 --> 06:33.170]  conventional gauges. And then, you know, that's just one section or two sections of the plans
[06:33.170 --> 06:38.930]  that actually cover the whole thing. The other thing that you can do, and when you buy plans,
[06:38.930 --> 06:44.250]  you actually just source everything. You're going to buy all the components. For example, this one,
[06:44.250 --> 06:48.410]  it's going to be all the fiberglass, all the epoxy, all the individual metal components.
[06:48.410 --> 06:53.130]  You're going to buy the engine, the airframe, the avionics, and you're going to build the
[06:53.130 --> 06:57.890]  airframe from scratch using just plans. It's the least expensive option. It's also the most time
[06:57.890 --> 07:05.290]  consuming. The way kits work is you purchase the plans and partially completed parts, enough to
[07:05.290 --> 07:09.890]  qualify for the 51% rule. They have some quick builds where a lot of the stuff is done for you,
[07:09.890 --> 07:15.230]  but you still have to finish it, and it greatly decreases the amount of time that you spend on it.
[07:15.230 --> 07:21.430]  But you also increase the cost. The picture I have here is actually from Sun and Fun 2017.
[07:21.470 --> 07:28.210]  It's a Velocity Twin. It's a gorgeous aircraft, very high performing, beautiful inside,
[07:28.210 --> 07:33.370]  canard design, which you can kind of see my preference towards those already.
[07:33.610 --> 07:37.750]  And then there's another thing called builder assistance programs, where you actually go to
[07:37.750 --> 07:42.010]  the manufacturer and they help you along the way, but ensure that you're actually doing
[07:42.010 --> 07:44.770]  enough to qualify for 51% of the work.
[07:47.450 --> 07:50.330]  And then there's different materials. So if you're going to build an aircraft,
[07:50.330 --> 07:56.030]  if you want just something low and slow, or maybe a small and single seat airbag,
[07:56.030 --> 08:00.170]  the Fabric Overwood is perfectly valid. The very first aircraft were made from these. You
[08:00.170 --> 08:08.770]  might have some just aluminum tubes, aluminum spars, and the rest of it's going to be wood.
[08:09.390 --> 08:14.250]  It also can be very lightweight. And then you cover that with a doped fabric. It's a special
[08:14.250 --> 08:22.010]  type of fabric that's coated in epoxy to make it very rigid, relatively easy compared to the other
[08:22.010 --> 08:26.690]  techniques, inexpensive. This was just a gorgeous one that I saw at Sun and Fun. I'm not even sure
[08:26.690 --> 08:32.430]  if it's fabric covered, but it's the type of aircraft that you'll see. Probably the most
[08:32.430 --> 08:36.890]  popular style out there, the one that has the most examples flying, is riveted aluminum.
[08:36.890 --> 08:42.150]  The Vans RV line of aircraft are all riveted aluminum, maybe with some composite components
[08:42.150 --> 08:50.230]  that you add here and there. And that's how, for the majority of aircraft history, aircraft were
[08:50.230 --> 08:55.610]  built. It was aluminum that was all held together by rivets. You have to be comfortable banging
[08:55.610 --> 09:02.610]  rivets, working with blind rivets, but it's very strong and light. It was only recently that
[09:02.610 --> 09:07.850]  aircraft construction moved towards composite, but you'll still see a lot of riveted construction
[09:07.850 --> 09:16.570]  out there for existing airframes. And now we get to my favorite composite. So this is what I chose,
[09:16.570 --> 09:24.050]  fiberglass and epoxy, or carbon fiber and epoxy. You can see a beautiful carbon fiber airfoil here.
[09:26.210 --> 09:32.330]  What is composite? So really, anytime you combine two materials, and when those two materials are
[09:32.330 --> 09:36.710]  combined, they form a stronger material, you get a composite. Concrete is a composite material
[09:36.710 --> 09:41.310]  because you have your aggregate, your sand, and your cement, and you get concrete. Sometimes,
[09:41.310 --> 09:46.050]  you know, with your reinforcing structures like rebar or other structures added to it,
[09:46.050 --> 09:50.990]  but it's still a composite. So fiberglass by itself is not a composite. Fiberglass,
[09:50.990 --> 09:57.170]  when it's bonded with epoxy, is a composite. Carbon fiber and Kevlar, not the bulletproof
[09:57.170 --> 10:02.910]  Kevlar, but an abrasion-resistant Kevlar, are also a couple of other fabric materials that
[10:02.910 --> 10:08.990]  can be used in composite construction. In fact, newer aircraft like the Dreamliners,
[10:08.990 --> 10:20.030]  all composite construction. 777X uses composite wings and then conventionally fabricated fuselage.
[10:21.370 --> 10:27.130]  So what I chose, the Burt Rutan design, this is a little bit about those, my favorites.
[10:27.450 --> 10:34.490]  He pioneered moldless composite construction. So it's a method of fabricating fiberglass parts
[10:34.490 --> 10:43.510]  without a mold. You take a section of foam, and I have an example right here. So for this image,
[10:43.510 --> 10:48.230]  this is a section that was actually removed from the aircraft in a building. You can see you have
[10:48.230 --> 10:56.390]  your fiberglass and epoxy layer, but beyond it you have sandwiched types of foam and they're
[10:56.390 --> 11:04.230]  held together with micro bubbles mixed in with epoxy to bond both the fiberglass to the first
[11:04.230 --> 11:09.090]  layer of foam and then the second layer of foam together. And what you do is on this other side,
[11:09.090 --> 11:12.790]  you're eventually going to get foam on this. Not for this, this is a discard piece.
[11:13.670 --> 11:19.390]  And between the two, by having this space separated by the two separate skins of fiberglass,
[11:19.390 --> 11:23.390]  you get much stronger construction. And you can basically take those shapes, you can
[11:23.990 --> 11:30.330]  lay them out, and then you lay the fiberglass on top of it into its final design. That was what
[11:30.330 --> 11:35.430]  Burt Rutan successfully did in his very easy and his long easy, and he turned that into scaled
[11:35.430 --> 11:41.650]  composites. And it now is going into space with that design. He just did Voyager, the aircraft
[11:41.650 --> 11:48.190]  that flew around the world without stopping, and many of his other brilliant designs. He was a big
[11:48.190 --> 11:54.310]  advocate of the canard. I think some of the the work has gone away from that, but I'll kind of
[11:54.310 --> 12:00.430]  go into what a canard is in the next slide. But most of his designs were canard based.
[12:00.510 --> 12:04.410]  Canards are very resistant to stalls. You still have to follow weight and balance,
[12:04.410 --> 12:10.550]  and you always have to ensure that it's far enough forward so that the canard stalls first.
[12:10.550 --> 12:15.150]  But a canard adds from lift instead of subtracting from it, as I'll kind of show you in the next
[12:15.150 --> 12:21.090]  image. This is all from Bold Method. In a canard designed aircraft, the canard always must stall
[12:21.090 --> 12:26.170]  first. If the main wing stalls first, you're going to enter into a situation called a deep stall, but
[12:26.170 --> 12:29.690]  it's a relatively easy thing to avoid as long as you follow weight and balance, which you're
[12:29.690 --> 12:36.410]  supposed to do every time you fly anyway. You'll never get into that situation. So a traditional,
[12:36.410 --> 12:41.170]  conventionally designed aircraft, you have your horizontal stabilizer that provides
[12:41.950 --> 12:48.770]  a vector of force opposite that of the wing. So it's providing, in this image, 250 pounds
[12:48.770 --> 12:57.410]  of negative lift that counteracts the 2250 pounds of positive lift. And then in a neutral situation,
[12:57.410 --> 13:01.890]  you have 2000 pounds of weight, you know, in this particular configuration. In a canard,
[13:01.890 --> 13:07.190]  the idea is that it's more efficient because both surfaces are providing lift. Both surfaces
[13:07.190 --> 13:13.810]  are providing a positive amount of lift to counteract the weight of the aircraft.
[13:16.170 --> 13:22.090]  Again, all this composite picture of the skin I just showed you, where you basically have a very
[13:22.090 --> 13:30.410]  thin layer of fiberglass embedded with epoxy. It's actually a very friendly method to get
[13:30.410 --> 13:37.510]  into. Both the aluminum and the epoxy kits, they have what are called kind of like builder's
[13:37.510 --> 13:43.590]  confidence kits. You're like, I'm not going to spend $10,000 on a set of components just to
[13:43.590 --> 13:48.510]  see that this is really not for me. So you can spend just a little bit and they'll give you some
[13:48.510 --> 13:55.710]  epoxy, some fiberglass, and some foam and you do it. You actually go through several steps to show
[13:55.710 --> 14:00.290]  that this is actually something that you're capable of. In this other image, we actually
[14:00.290 --> 14:07.650]  have a canard style wing that's for a COSY that's actually up on a jig before it has the
[14:09.310 --> 14:18.330]  fiberglass applied to it. So this is where I got into the selection for the plans that I
[14:18.330 --> 14:25.490]  eventually chose. So Bert Rutan designed the very easy and then he does design the long easy as a
[14:26.170 --> 14:31.910]  ground-up redesign of that. Long easy is a two-seat tandem aircraft. These pictures are from
[14:31.910 --> 14:38.650]  Sun and Fun 2017 when I took them. And then the picture you see here is that of an air canard
[14:38.650 --> 14:43.570]  that's still in partial primer. I was really interested in this one because it's the design
[14:43.570 --> 14:48.730]  that I originally chose to go with. And eventually I actually licensed the set of COSY plans as well
[14:49.590 --> 14:54.730]  because I just wanted to make sure everything was covered. There was some disagreement between
[14:54.730 --> 14:59.190]  Nat Puffer and the guy that designed the air canard, which is a slightly roomier version of
[14:59.190 --> 15:06.730]  the COSY. So just to avoid any possible issues in design, I wanted to have both set of plans
[15:06.730 --> 15:11.930]  because they're reasonably inexpensive. And I could actually decide that if something didn't
[15:11.930 --> 15:20.940]  give me a clear image, I figured the other set of plans would. So here's the little blurb about
[15:20.940 --> 15:25.100]  making changes. One of the biggest things I learned about from just looking in the forums,
[15:25.100 --> 15:31.720]  talking to people, is that any changes that you want to make can have unintended consequences.
[15:32.200 --> 15:36.400]  One of the earliest things I learned is like, you know, why wouldn't you not
[15:36.980 --> 15:41.020]  take the fiberglass and use carbon fiber? It's reasonably cheap now.
[15:41.160 --> 15:45.600]  Well, you're really not going to save a whole lot of weight, but you are going to introduce
[15:45.600 --> 15:53.520]  completely different moments of elasticity. You could actually add some vibration elements that
[15:53.520 --> 15:58.440]  could cause something to shear and cause something to fail and not anticipate it.
[16:00.100 --> 16:04.940]  The other big line that I heard was basically, you know, from your aircrafts actually end up
[16:04.940 --> 16:08.260]  being lighter because you're not going to be able to afford any avionics to put in it for after all
[16:08.260 --> 16:11.760]  the money you spent on the carbon fiber. So you'll end up with a lighter aircraft that way.
[16:14.380 --> 16:18.160]  It's pretty interesting when you actually dig into it and see that, you know, maybe not carbon
[16:18.160 --> 16:22.900]  fiber is the best choice for all aircraft. There are aircraft that were designed around carbon
[16:22.900 --> 16:29.540]  fiber. The Burkut, which is a fast and slick version of the Long EZ, is a carbon fiber variant,
[16:29.540 --> 16:34.720]  but it was designed from the ground up to have the amount of carbon fiber necessary that it has for
[16:34.720 --> 16:40.000]  it. And then this is kind of a famous line from a plan. If you want to put something in your
[16:40.000 --> 16:43.860]  airplane, first throw it up in the air. If it comes down, it doesn't belong in the airplane.
[16:44.060 --> 16:48.860]  The designer of this was very minimalist in what he designed. He wanted this aircraft to
[16:48.860 --> 16:54.500]  go without a battery. He wanted to go without a starter using just a prop start. Most people
[16:54.500 --> 17:02.120]  have chosen not to do that. There are other issues and risks when you deal with hand cranking a prop.
[17:02.820 --> 17:06.160]  You know, all it takes is a little slip of the foot and now all of a sudden you're, you know,
[17:06.160 --> 17:13.500]  like the bad guy in Indiana Jones with a big fat spinning piece of metal right in your face. So,
[17:13.500 --> 17:19.400]  no thank you. I'll pay the weight penalty and deal with the starter. And then with glass panel
[17:19.400 --> 17:22.600]  cockpits, you need to have a backup battery source. You need to have a power source.
[17:22.820 --> 17:27.060]  And if you're going to have a starter, you have to have a battery. But it just goes to show that,
[17:27.060 --> 17:31.020]  you know, you really need to be careful when you're actually considering making changes.
[17:31.280 --> 17:34.620]  Is this going to add weight? Is this going to change the wing loading? Is this going to
[17:34.620 --> 17:40.640]  significantly change the performance characteristics of the aircraft? And here's really a case study in
[17:40.640 --> 17:47.000]  this next example. The unfortunate accident that took John Denver's life. John Denver was
[17:47.000 --> 17:55.840]  flying along easy. The NTSB actually found that the probable cause of that accident was the designer
[17:56.400 --> 18:03.980]  decided to take the fuel selector valve and instead of it being in front in the area where
[18:03.980 --> 18:12.160]  it's easily reachable by the pilot, he relocated the fuel valve to be closer to the fuel source.
[18:12.460 --> 18:17.020]  But what that actually did is when you actually have to select it, you have to reach over your
[18:17.020 --> 18:21.680]  shoulder because of the, you know, just you're kind of confined in. So you actually have to do
[18:21.680 --> 18:26.300]  this maneuver to change the fuel valve. And then when he was doing that, they say he probably
[18:27.780 --> 18:34.020]  unintentionally put control pressure on the rudder, causing a loss of control, causing him to
[18:34.020 --> 18:43.000]  fly into Monterey Bay, taking his life. So just the thought, the designer, it's thought relocated
[18:43.000 --> 18:46.620]  the fuel valve to make the fuel line shorter. By having shorter fuel lines, there could be less
[18:46.620 --> 18:51.980]  risk of a fuel leak, but introduced other elements that were not necessarily reconsidered from the
[18:51.980 --> 18:58.300]  fuel valve being up front. So in a long easy, the fuel tanks are behind you, the engine is behind
[18:58.300 --> 19:04.100]  you. So the thought was let's put the fuel selector behind you as well. Maybe not the best idea. It's
[19:04.260 --> 19:10.740]  a perfect example of the unintended consequences that you can have from actually making changes and
[19:10.740 --> 19:16.120]  why you really need to take a risk-based approach to any possible changes than what the designers
[19:16.120 --> 19:21.160]  actually intended on this. Because an experimental aircraft is inherently a risky activity.
[19:23.060 --> 19:27.860]  That was a little section about engine selection. So when I was getting into this, I was debating
[19:28.460 --> 19:38.480]  did I want to spend tens of thousands of dollars on an engine that was effectively a 50-year-old
[19:38.480 --> 19:44.100]  design? And that's what they all are. All of the air-cooled engines out there are really based on
[19:44.100 --> 19:51.140]  old, old technology. Pardon me. But they're designed for the purpose where they're used.
[19:51.580 --> 19:55.760]  But the thing I quickly learned is that the problem you run into with automotive conversions
[19:55.760 --> 20:02.060]  is, and the Subaru is a big popular one because it's kind of the same horizontally flat plane
[20:02.680 --> 20:08.340]  opposed engine, you have all the cooling issues. You have to introduce some type of cooling system,
[20:08.340 --> 20:14.960]  now you have a radiator, you have additional weight. You have to put in a reducing gearbox
[20:15.520 --> 20:19.680]  to slow the engine speed down to the appropriate speed for a propeller.
[20:20.040 --> 20:24.300]  That adds additional weight, adds additional complexity, additional points of failure.
[20:24.900 --> 20:28.500]  And then you have to deal with the fuel injection system. A fuel injection system that
[20:28.500 --> 20:34.300]  if you're using the automotive ECU, you may end up going to limp mode. And when you're in a car,
[20:34.300 --> 20:38.240]  you can just pull over. In an aircraft, you have to find a place to land immediately if you lose
[20:38.240 --> 20:44.260]  power. It can introduce an element of danger that's unexpected. And what I discovered is
[20:44.260 --> 20:49.560]  they ended up not being cheaper. They ended up being heavier, more complicated, more prone to
[20:49.560 --> 20:54.360]  more things that can go wrong. And because of all the changes you have to make there,
[20:54.360 --> 20:59.380]  they end up not being any cheaper. So that leaves us with conventional engines. Okay,
[20:59.380 --> 21:03.460]  you can do a turbine, but if you have that kind of money, you're going to be getting a super high
[21:03.460 --> 21:10.120]  performance something anyway. So conventional engines, they are lightweight, they're expensive
[21:10.120 --> 21:17.700]  for what you get. They are just look up IO 360 new and you'll see what I mean. Not to mention
[21:17.700 --> 21:23.320]  things like an IO 540 or IO 540 turbo, you know, turbo normalized or, you know, some of the other
[21:23.320 --> 21:27.340]  fancier ones. And imagine if you had an aircraft that had two of these, which you'd have to pay
[21:27.340 --> 21:33.980]  for to replace them in. So there are experimental options. What that basically means, it hasn't
[21:33.980 --> 21:39.120]  gone through the exact same certification process because the certification process itself is
[21:39.120 --> 21:46.040]  expensive, but yet you get the same quality. So you can get an experimental version of these
[21:46.040 --> 21:53.280]  engines that have the same quality for a much more reasonable price than buying something else
[21:53.280 --> 22:00.900]  that would be kind of in the certificated realm. All right, avionics, one of my favorite subjects.
[22:01.640 --> 22:06.080]  So when most of these designs came out, all you had choices were like, you know, your
[22:06.080 --> 22:12.240]  little round steam gauges, as they call them. You have your individual airspeed indicator,
[22:12.240 --> 22:17.220]  your horizontal situation indicator, you know, your compass, your turn and slip,
[22:17.220 --> 22:24.400]  vertical speed, altimeter, all of your, you know, attitude indicator, all separate designs.
[22:25.020 --> 22:31.360]  In a glass panel, you combine all that with a moving map, with GPS, all your controls in a
[22:31.360 --> 22:34.820]  centralized point, but you're also introducing a central point of failure. So you need to have some
[22:34.820 --> 22:42.060]  additional plans for that. But glass panel avionics are getting cheaper all the time. They're some of
[22:42.060 --> 22:46.340]  my favorite things to mess with for those of you who've studied the previous research that I've
[22:46.340 --> 22:53.580]  done. I think they're safer. I think they provide you better situational awareness. Even in, you
[22:53.580 --> 22:57.840]  know, darkness, you're going to be able to see the terrain in front of you if you have a more recent
[22:58.960 --> 23:03.140]  system. So you're going to be able to see that because it's going to have the terrain database
[23:03.140 --> 23:07.540]  loaded into it. You're going to see that there's an antenna tower loaded and I have to refer down
[23:07.540 --> 23:12.240]  to a sectional chart and manually de-conflict. The aircraft is going to tell you that there's
[23:12.240 --> 23:19.840]  an issue coming up. All your approach procedures are going to be built into a database within the
[23:19.840 --> 23:25.780]  avionics. But what I feel that these need are some backup gauges. Now they have electronic backup
[23:25.780 --> 23:33.660]  gauges, but why not look for something that is reasonable and inexpensive and just use a couple
[23:33.660 --> 23:41.620]  of must-have backup instruments as your backups next to your steam gauges. I think that's the
[23:41.620 --> 23:50.520]  best way to go. All right, so a little blurb on avionics cost. And we're going to take the Garmin
[23:50.520 --> 23:57.040]  G3X for example. They make certified and experimental versions of the exact same display
[23:57.040 --> 24:04.860]  running the same firmware. Just it's been blessed by the FAA and received certification approval.
[24:05.480 --> 24:13.400]  $99.95 for just the display. That's without any of the instruments, without your magnetometer,
[24:13.400 --> 24:21.800]  without your airspeed sensors, your various electronic gyros, any of your engine instruments.
[24:21.800 --> 24:28.120]  $10,000 just for the display. Whereas the exact same experimental display is $3,895.
[24:28.460 --> 24:35.920]  So my opinion, best choice in avionics. What I like, the ones that I've actually displayed
[24:35.920 --> 24:40.160]  them for and they're not mine. I've just done research on them. But experimental glass with a
[24:40.160 --> 24:43.800]  emergency backup steam gauges is a great combination.
[24:45.740 --> 24:50.920]  Okay, so now that you've done this, you've actually built your aircraft, what's the next step?
[24:50.920 --> 24:55.640]  You have to get a special airworthiness certificate. So what you do is you work with
[24:56.680 --> 25:03.360]  what's called a DAR and you have it inspected and you get an airworthiness certificate that tells
[25:03.360 --> 25:08.860]  you you have to fly for 25 to 40 hours in a restricted area away from population. You have
[25:08.860 --> 25:15.860]  fly out of a special airport that's away from everyone else. And you have to basically fly off
[25:15.860 --> 25:21.780]  the number of hours to show that this aircraft is worthy to be operated on the same runways and
[25:21.780 --> 25:28.120]  areas that other aircraft operate. And if you DIY this, you effectively you are a test pilot.
[25:28.740 --> 25:33.240]  But there are people that you can hire for this. If you are not,
[25:33.240 --> 25:37.020]  you know, this is a level of risk that you don't necessarily want to undertake. There
[25:37.020 --> 25:40.600]  are people that you can hire that love to do this all the time that are very skilled,
[25:40.600 --> 25:45.740]  especially maybe for your particular airframe. But effectively what you have to do is you have
[25:45.740 --> 25:49.640]  to build a test plan. Same thing that test pilots would do. So the first thing you do is you fire
[25:49.640 --> 25:54.580]  up the engine, you test everything. Then you taxi around in a little bit, shut everything down,
[25:54.580 --> 26:00.160]  inspect everything. Then you undergo high speed taxi testing where you actually get almost up to
[26:00.160 --> 26:05.740]  flight speeds and then slow back down again. And then you have your first flight. And the biggest
[26:05.740 --> 26:10.620]  things I see in the plan sections are when you do this, you need to wear a parachute.
[26:11.480 --> 26:16.540]  I guess that assumes you need to have taken skydiving classes, but I guess any parachutes
[26:16.540 --> 26:21.300]  better than any parachute, even if you haven't been through this stuff, is better than not
[26:21.300 --> 26:25.600]  wearing one if you need to get out because you've gotten into an uncontrollable situation.
[26:27.180 --> 26:31.200]  But this is kind of like probably one of the most risky areas of flight. It's where a lot of the
[26:31.200 --> 26:36.640]  accidents happen because something was tinkered with, there were unintended consequences, and
[26:36.640 --> 26:43.760]  that's where disaster struck. So thank you. I think we're gonna have some Q&A after this,
[26:43.760 --> 26:47.760]  so we'll cut over to that. And please feel free, I look forward to your questions.
[26:47.760 --> 26:49.420]  Thank you for listening to my talk.