My mom and step-dad are pretty crafty people. They are taking their talents to the extreme...
Here is the article that appeared in the Knoxville News Sentinel! Far Out! :)
Sam Robinson says you should have seen the first time he tried riveting together the fuselage on the experimental aircraft he's building in his garage.
It wasn't anything you might expect from a mechanical engineer. He says it was more like something out of a Three Stooges movie.
Rivets, the kind that fasten aluminum sheets to each other, were jumping like BBs on tin, flying everywhere. Sam Robinson was so excited about his new airplane, he couldn't quite gain control of himself or the rivet tool.
"The gun was bouncing everywhere," he says. He riveted his thumb, bringing to mind "How High Is Up?" - where the Stooges say they're "expert riveters" as they fire the pieces of metal at each other 97 stories up. "How do you feel?" Moe says to Curly. " A rivet."
When Sam Robinson cut on the rivet gun-like tool for the first time to begin work on the fuselage, "it began bouncing and bucking. I felt just like one of the Stooges."
Robinson is an engineer at Oak Ridge's Y-12 National Security Complex. For the past 31 years he has worked in the Technology Development section, where he is a section manager.
This experimental aircraft in the garage began when Robinson and his wife, Judy - both pilots - got the idea that they wanted to build their own airplane. Nothing fancy, but something, Sam says, that "looked like a fighter." They settled on a four-seat plane, with good seats. That was Judy's idea.
Sam has been a pilot for more than 20 years. He began taking lessons when he was 15 but didn't get his FAA license until he was 35. He is 57.
His wife, Judy, has loved flying like her husband since she was a child growing up in Kingsport. Sam gave his wife flying lessons as a birthday gift. She winces at a question about her age but says she always wanted to learn how to fly.
"I wanted to be a jet pilot," Judy Robinson says with a laugh. Her father, she says, had other ideas. He wanted his daughter to major in home economics, so she did. For a while. Then she shifted to medical technology at the University of Tennessee's Health Science Center in Memphis.
Later, she got a master's in education and taught school.
"Teaching," she says, "was too stressful." After four years in the classroom, she moved to Y-12 and became an analytical chemist. She just retired from that job. Now, she is working to become instrument-qualified for flying in foul weather. Sam is already qualified on instruments, but it never hurts to have two who can pilot their way through thick clouds or rain.
Flying is clearly a passion for the husband and wife team. So is the building of their four-seat RV-10, manufactured by Van's Aircraft Inc. of Aurora, Ore. It will be powered by a six-cylinder Lycoming O-540 engine that develops 260 horsepower and has a cruise speed of about 200 mph.
In the beginning, Sam says he didn't think building the plane from a kit he ordered would be too difficult. After all, he built model airplanes from kits when he was a kid.
"I'm five years into a three-year project," Sam says with a chuckle.
When very large boxes began arriving at their Knoxville home, he and Judy began stacking parts wherever they could find space: in closets, under the bed, in the garage.
Today, the plane sits astride wood struts, stretching diagonally like a silver fish in a two-car garage stuffed to the gills with tools, parts, paint, plastic, all manner of stuff to work on the aircraft.
Sam says the experimental designation will remain with his plane because the FAA does not give its stamp of approval on such craft, though it will have to pass FAA inspection before Sam takes it on its first test run, which he hopes is by this time next year. He also gets qualified pilots to take a look at the sheaf of paperwork he keeps as he builds the plane in stages. The FAA, he says, loves to see the paperwork on which another experimental pilot has signed off.
By this fall, he plans to have the engine in place, wings attached and the craft in a hangar. His goal, he says, is to have his first test flight by next spring.
"We are almost to the point where we will have to move out of our garage," says Sam.
"You know," says Judy, looking at the plane, "we could build out on the end of the garage."
Adding the engine could be a defining decision for them.
The propeller is in their living room at the moment. Still in the box. And the large airplane engine is in a box, outside the garage.
By the time the plane is finished and ready for flying, Sam says they will have paid out about $100,000. "We are on a pay-as-you-go plan," he says.
Both are looking to the day they can crank up, taxi down a runway and fly off to one of their favorite hamburger restaurants at a nearby airport.
"We often take off on a weekend," says Judy. "We will go to the beach, or meet friends (who are also pilots)." They are even looking into the prospect of retiring to an airport, complete with condos and runways.
But for now, there are hundreds, if not thousands, more rivets to buck into place. (That's a builder's term for a tool that keeps the rivet from flying through the aluminum.)
It is sort of the Stooges drill.
"What do I look like?" Moe says to Curly.
"A rivet," he answers.
Retired senior writer Fred Brown may be reached directly at brownf08@gmail.com
It wasn't anything you might expect from a mechanical engineer. He says it was more like something out of a Three Stooges movie.
Rivets, the kind that fasten aluminum sheets to each other, were jumping like BBs on tin, flying everywhere. Sam Robinson was so excited about his new airplane, he couldn't quite gain control of himself or the rivet tool.
"The gun was bouncing everywhere," he says. He riveted his thumb, bringing to mind "How High Is Up?" - where the Stooges say they're "expert riveters" as they fire the pieces of metal at each other 97 stories up. "How do you feel?" Moe says to Curly. " A rivet."
When Sam Robinson cut on the rivet gun-like tool for the first time to begin work on the fuselage, "it began bouncing and bucking. I felt just like one of the Stooges."
Robinson is an engineer at Oak Ridge's Y-12 National Security Complex. For the past 31 years he has worked in the Technology Development section, where he is a section manager.
This experimental aircraft in the garage began when Robinson and his wife, Judy - both pilots - got the idea that they wanted to build their own airplane. Nothing fancy, but something, Sam says, that "looked like a fighter." They settled on a four-seat plane, with good seats. That was Judy's idea.
Sam has been a pilot for more than 20 years. He began taking lessons when he was 15 but didn't get his FAA license until he was 35. He is 57.
His wife, Judy, has loved flying like her husband since she was a child growing up in Kingsport. Sam gave his wife flying lessons as a birthday gift. She winces at a question about her age but says she always wanted to learn how to fly.
"I wanted to be a jet pilot," Judy Robinson says with a laugh. Her father, she says, had other ideas. He wanted his daughter to major in home economics, so she did. For a while. Then she shifted to medical technology at the University of Tennessee's Health Science Center in Memphis.
Later, she got a master's in education and taught school.
"Teaching," she says, "was too stressful." After four years in the classroom, she moved to Y-12 and became an analytical chemist. She just retired from that job. Now, she is working to become instrument-qualified for flying in foul weather. Sam is already qualified on instruments, but it never hurts to have two who can pilot their way through thick clouds or rain.
Flying is clearly a passion for the husband and wife team. So is the building of their four-seat RV-10, manufactured by Van's Aircraft Inc. of Aurora, Ore. It will be powered by a six-cylinder Lycoming O-540 engine that develops 260 horsepower and has a cruise speed of about 200 mph.
In the beginning, Sam says he didn't think building the plane from a kit he ordered would be too difficult. After all, he built model airplanes from kits when he was a kid.
"I'm five years into a three-year project," Sam says with a chuckle.
When very large boxes began arriving at their Knoxville home, he and Judy began stacking parts wherever they could find space: in closets, under the bed, in the garage.
Today, the plane sits astride wood struts, stretching diagonally like a silver fish in a two-car garage stuffed to the gills with tools, parts, paint, plastic, all manner of stuff to work on the aircraft.
Sam says the experimental designation will remain with his plane because the FAA does not give its stamp of approval on such craft, though it will have to pass FAA inspection before Sam takes it on its first test run, which he hopes is by this time next year. He also gets qualified pilots to take a look at the sheaf of paperwork he keeps as he builds the plane in stages. The FAA, he says, loves to see the paperwork on which another experimental pilot has signed off.
By this fall, he plans to have the engine in place, wings attached and the craft in a hangar. His goal, he says, is to have his first test flight by next spring.
"We are almost to the point where we will have to move out of our garage," says Sam.
"You know," says Judy, looking at the plane, "we could build out on the end of the garage."
Adding the engine could be a defining decision for them.
The propeller is in their living room at the moment. Still in the box. And the large airplane engine is in a box, outside the garage.
By the time the plane is finished and ready for flying, Sam says they will have paid out about $100,000. "We are on a pay-as-you-go plan," he says.
Both are looking to the day they can crank up, taxi down a runway and fly off to one of their favorite hamburger restaurants at a nearby airport.
"We often take off on a weekend," says Judy. "We will go to the beach, or meet friends (who are also pilots)." They are even looking into the prospect of retiring to an airport, complete with condos and runways.
But for now, there are hundreds, if not thousands, more rivets to buck into place. (That's a builder's term for a tool that keeps the rivet from flying through the aluminum.)
It is sort of the Stooges drill.
"What do I look like?" Moe says to Curly.
"A rivet," he answers.
Retired senior writer Fred Brown may be reached directly at brownf08@gmail.com
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