A Wandering Day
Posted Thursday July 25, 2019
Yesterday, I had a definite task: learn about taking apart and re-assembling engines. It was pretty nice, I got in, did my thing, and felt accomplished.
Today, I had no goal in mind. I had looked up a few forums and things yesterday and set them up on My Itinerary on the EAA website, but then this morning the website was not working right, and My Itinerary wouldn't load. I stopped by one of the info booths and grabbed a paper schedule. There's something to be said for not needing batteries or an internet connection.
The rest of the day is a bit of a blur. I know I stopped into a Stearman forum (a Stearman is the iconic biplane that most WWII cadets trained on), where I learned some random facts about Stearmans (it was more intended for people who actually own Stearmans, I think), but also managed to help a guy who was thinking he might have to replace his radio; turns out all he needed was a simple setting change. I have of course forgotten his name, but he owns a Stearman in Camas, WA, at I think 1W1. Without a name or a way to contact him, his offer to come down and take a Stearman flight, however well intended, is not something I can likely follow up on.
Sky-writing happened frequently in the morning, including sky-drawing
I briefly hit a presentation by Van's Aircraft called "Which RV is right for you?" which turned out to be a sort of crowing sales pitch covering information I already knew, so I wandered out again. I attended a talk on personality and safety in piloting, which I was hoping would cover my favorite, "The pilot must be free of ego" topic, but actually covered a broad array of psychological factors including the ego one. That one was interesting, but also obviously targeted at a particular audience, who were not us. It seemed like maybe the presenter got asked to present a talk at the last minute, so he grabbed the slide deck he already had prepared.
I was pondering dining today. Not just the "vegetarians are under-represented" thing, but my whole approach to dealing with food on this trip. I'm eating out almost exclusively at this point, since my access to a grocery store is essentially non-existent. There's a free shuttle bus to a nearby Target, which I should probably use before I depart to collect trip food, but that feels like a waste of the good part of a day when I should be attending events at the fly-in.
There are a fair variety of food options scattered around the grounds, from what seem to be a good selection of local restaurants. I'm pleased that the food prices are also not baseball-stadium level; here, a main entree typically costs $7-12, and the profit centers are obviously the $4 cookies and $3.50 bottles of soda. Since a typical establishment will have only a small handful of vegetarian choices, I find my diet is consisting largely of either cheese or salad. Not a bad combo, and I'm not complaining, but watching myself struggle between cheese and salad is amusing.
One of my first stops was the NASA booth, which I observed with dry detachment was justified with quite a lame excuse -- "I want to know more about that hubless motor/fluid battery display." True enough, as far as it goes, but I was really hoping my attractive UAS traffic control scientist would be there. She was not. The hubless motor really is a cool design, though it suffers from some drawbacks that I don't yet fully understand. The one I understood least was the problem of vane deflection, where the presenter said that these vanes, when they deflect, want to deflect more (positive feedback, though he didn't use that term), whereas apparently a hub style propeller, like every propeller you ever see on an airplane, have a negative feedback loop when the blade deflects under load. I think part of that puzzle is that the hubless blades are under compression, while center-hub blades are under tension. In any case, that was fun to think about. The other problem he mentioned was that of making a bearing that would be thin enough and durable enough in this style of motor to be worth putting on a plane. Apparently the ceramic bearing they're using right now is fine, but it doesn't last very long.
The fluid battery is much cooler than I was originally thinking. The idea is that you have two fluids that react across a membrane to produce electricity. They're not fuel, in the sense of being a fluid that can be burned to produce heat, but they act like a fuel: they can be swapped out at a refueling station in a matter of seconds or minutes, just like gassing up a car. They can also be recharged by adding electricity such as from a solar cell or regeneration, making them act like a battery. A surprising feature, to me, was that you can change the cell voltage by changing the flow rate through the reaction structure (he said they still don't have a formal name for the device that combines the fluids and produces electricity). Turn up the pump, and you turn up the voltage. Energy, or amp-hour capacity, is determined by the volume of fluid you have in the system. This variable voltage would be very handy for electric traction systems, where you might need a burst of speed for take-off (high flow rate), but a lower sustained rate for cruise (lower flow rate). He said that his fluid battery idea was first proposed about 10 years ago for ground-based intermittent power sources, like solar panels or wind generators, as a way to bank their energy for later use.
I tried to take one of the tram tours of the warbirds area, which was a recommended activity from the seminar I held in January about going to Oshkosh. I'm having a hard time getting excited about warbirds, because once I started seeing fighter planes as really expensive rifles with the goal of killing people, it got hard to stop. It's a conflicting feeling, because I have a strong nostalgia for WWII, and I think the planes designed in that time are quite good. But I'm not sure I'm into going on an OOO-RAH sort of over-enthusiastic presentation on how cool all these killing machines are. I'm trying to keep an open mind. Fortunately or unfortunately, the tram rides were closed, and many of the parking areas guarded by surprisingly young men and women in fatigues, during the airshow. Poor timing on my part.
Fidot talking with one of the Waco chapter members who hosted the Biplane Forum dinner
The day ended with the Biplane Forum dinner. I met about a dozen folks from the forum, and it was indeed nice to put names to faces. I discovered somewhat to my surprise that I'm not the only bleedin'-heart liberal there, which was again a nice thing to know. There was much talk of Chargers, since Pat Brennan was there, and he recently purchased a partially-completed project which he's making good progress on. He's working on his wings, which is exactly what I'll be working on once I get my shop set up. We discussed some of the problems he's been running into and trying to solve in his wings. I soaked it up, though I don't really have a larger context to fit it into yet, since at my stage of progress I only have a broad-strokes idea of how each wing is constructed. He did give me one excellent idea, which was to make a V-shaped "sled" for the table saw, with each side of the V at 10° to the blade. There are a ton of 10° cuts to make due to the sweepback of the wing, and I can see that being a very handy device to have around. I should also find some way to make an easily-repeatable 10° detent on the miter saw for the same reason.
I excused myself around 9, between the mosquitoes and looming knowledge of laundry back at the dorm. This single-change-of-clothes idea was perhaps not the best-considered thing. It's working, but it means spending more time on laundry than I might have hoped. The days at Oshkosh are warm and moderately humid. Since I start each day with a notable coat of sunscreen, I'm already at a disadvantage for feeling sticky, and most of the day is spent with a lingering background awareness of how gross my skin feels. At least a load of laundry is pretty cheap, only $2.50 to wash and dry.
The return trip is starting to make itself felt in the back of my mind. I saw 20-30 knot winds pushing me along to the east on the way out, making the trip here actually pretty short. If I have to fight the same winds on the way back, my actual speed over the ground is going to be something like 50 MPH. There may be a certain amount of finagling with altitudes to see where I get the least unfavorable winds. My concern is whether 7 days will actually be enough to get back. My calculator says it will take a bit under 6 days to get back at 50 MPH, but that doesn't leave a lot of time for weather holds, and certainly doesn't leave me with the option of taking a day off mid-trip.
I'm considering a trip to visit the American Champion factory, which is close by, but will require that I go tour it either tomorrow or Monday. I don't have definite plans for Oshkosh tomorrow, but if I left tomorrow to visit the factory and their skeleton crew, that would probably by the end of my Oshkosh visit for a variety of reasons. I would forfeit two days of paid-for lodging, including those hot-hot shared bathrooms. So Monday is probably the day. But that takes up part of my day of flying, and I don't think I can get Norbert in the air before about 10 am between all the ground transportation connections I have to make. It will be a tight squeeze if I choose to do that.
Well, I'll have to do a bit of research and figure out more definitely what my options are. For now, it's time to go rescue the laundry from the dryer and get myself to bed. G'night internet.
Post-scriptum: turns out past-me was cleverer than present-me, and I'm checking out on Sunday, which means I can fly to the Fox River airport (96C) on Sunday, and be at the factory bright and early for minimal time-wastage. Now I just have to sort out the logistics of a trip to Target for snax.
Copyright © 2019 by Ian Johnston.