Building the new Bushbaby SAFARI

[Boet]

We achieved our goal for today, roof, turtledeck and flapperons. Remember that everything we have to make , we make 2 off, the next Safari is on it`s way.

[Karamba]

Die ding sal seker n moerse enjin moet hê vir die groot body van pyp,lap,hout,fibreglass,blik,plastiek ens

[Bushbaby Aircraft]

Die enjin se minnimum groote is 100hp. Maar jy sal verbaas wees oor hoe min gewigs verskil daar werklik is. Die grootste faktor gaan die drag wees a.g.v die wyer body.

[Low Level]

Jislaaik maar julle wikkel - is dit iemand se Christmas box ?

Building two proto types (demos) or is it on order ?

[Trikenut]

What will the MAUW be and what licence will be required?

[Boet]

ay!!Vandag nog einemal vreeslik gat skoongemaak. Ek moet nou nog net die jury struts maak, dan kan die vlerke afkom en "D" cell kan dan aangesit word. Intussen kan ons die romp begin oortrek. Ons is drie bymekaar, en weet waar om te vat of te los. Dit gaan heel vinnig. Dis net VREESLIK koud hier. Winter van voor af en gelukkig nog nat ook. Die flapperons werk nou reg, en ons het die errie nou redelik naby aan klaar. Die Safari se vlerke kan ook terugvou, maar jy moet eers die flapperons afhaal. Jaa, dit IS n Krismisboks. Hy moet Krismis gaan speelgoed afgooi vir die kinders. Oom Frans se Krismisboks.....aan homself.

[Boet]

Today all thee of us were as busy as the proverbial one-legged man at an ass kicking contest. Jury struts made, we are now busy glueing and rivitting the glassfibre leading edges on. I weighed the completed frame today 191kg. Oom Frans`s one hip has been giving him all sorts of hell, so he`s of to the "workshop" to have one ball-and-socket replaced. Hope the mecanic does a good job, and that you will soon be hopscotching around merrily. For you ok`es that does not know Oom, hy is eintlik al lankal n outoppie, maar hy DINK nie SO nie!! Strongs my ou groot maat!!

[vliegvark]

j die man is onder die mes ( tables turned ) , ek is seker dit gaan goed gaan en julle manne kan nou reg staan vir 'n paar stories hier want hy gaan nou tyd he^ vir skryf
strekte vir my beste friend

[extra300s]

Ja, ek glo ook dit gaan n sukses wees en hoop om jou pa vinnig weer in die lug te sien. Sterkte oom Frans

[Boet]

Vandag was spoeg-en-plak dag. Leading edges of both wings glued on. You will notice that we hang the wings vertically for this job. If you let the wings lie flat while the glue sets, you will have a permanent curvature up-or down. The tank cuff gets glued on when all the other cuff`s glue has set. The cuff gets glued onto the top of the tank. ( Tank will tend to leak a bit if you drill holes into it to pop rivit stuff to it........ ) While all this glouey gooey stuff is poly - crosslinking we started prepping the fuselage for covering to commence on Monday. (While the glue sets on the tank LE cuffs) Had a call from Oom this afternoon, he, in his usual style had an Epidural injection, so he could keep an eye on proceedings. He recons the ex top knob of his femur will make a nice stick-grip for the Bos-ot. Lekker om met jou te gesels my ou maat, soos jou "not so silent partner" gese het: Wees asb n patient patient. Moeilik soos dit gaan wees. Hoop jy kan gou weer tiekiedraai. Strongs.

[grostek]

Hi Boet,

I a enjoying your posts as you and your "span" build this airie

I look foreward to your daily posting.

Thanks for sharing the progress pics.

Se vir die twee kerels Estaban and Willem hulle werk is puik, joune natuurlik ook.

Kind regards,

Gunter Rostek

[Boet]

Baie dankie Gunther, ek waardeer jou mooi woorde, en sal vir Esteban en Willem ook oordra. Ons 3 geniet ons werk baie.

[3wheels]

Boet,

You are a MASTER Craftsman
I follow this thread with great intrest, well done, a great talent.

[Boet]

Thanks 3 wheels. Spoke to Oom a bit earlier this afternoon. He was on his way home!! Says his house is a nicer hospital than the .....uh......hospital?? Hopefully after this lot his entry and exit from his aeries wil be a far faster and less painfull exersize. Hope to see you walking around without the 2 kieries soon old friend!! We do not build BB`s on weekends, so spent my time usefull and sold another BB kit. Exiting times are ahead. It seems the Safari will become very popular, for it`s large cockpit size.

[Oupa-G]

After testing the springsteel undercarriage for the new Safari I found out that my own undercarriage was not up to spec compared to the springsteel legs of the Safari. Pain won the argument and I had a full hip replacement last Friday (highly successful) It does however make one slightly immobile and I have decided to write on the Safari project page on things that preceded the birth of the Safari.
1.The choice of engine
2. Aiming for an engine (piston) that could rival the reliability of turbines as can be found in the PC12 aircraft which I happen to fly quite often.
3. Reasonably priced
4.100hp was the benchmark as the new LSA is aircraft will be the suitable market.

So here we start with choice of engines we are only considering four stroke gasoline engines the diesels still lack fuel supply redundancy Thielert is struggling
with that.

The air-cooled group that includes VW Lycoming Continental Jabiru just to mention the most commonly used full air-cooled engines.
What all these engines have in common is that the cyl heads and exhaust valves are purely air-cooled. All these engines have had their fair share of exhaust valve breakages Lycoming partially solved the problem by first replacing the 7/16 inch valve stems to 1/2inch valve stems this improved the problem somewhat but valves still broke then the 400 hr famous valve wobble test was introduced and then later high chrome valve guides the problem however is cooling. VW renowned for breaking valves Sodium cooled valves followed and various mods they still break their exhaust valves. Continental seem to be a bit better but most engines have quite a low TBO. Jabiru has had their fair share of breakages especially in the early models. This is a beautifully machined engine but the cyl head has pure air-cooling. The later models seemed to have solved most problems with the exhaust, time will tell. All these engines have the simplicity of direct drive, which helps reliability. They also have quite big capacities that do not closely come to the present norm of about 100hp per litre.

When we look at the liquid cooled engines we come closer to the desirable 100hp per litre. The modern engines achieve this through liquid cooling but there is a downside they all need a gearbox. In the liquid cooled engines we find the Rotax 912S 100hp for 1300cc water-cooled. Subaru 165hp water-cooled 2500cc.
BMW 1200GS oil cooled 100hp. The Rotax is very expensive but has a wonderful track record and has flown around the world on various aircraft. Reliability to be strived after. The Subura engine is widely used an aircraft power plant but does not fit the 100hp LSA specs.

Our final choice fell on the BMW oil cooled engine.

Follow the Safari Project page and I will tell you what we did to achieve our goal of making an engine that should eventually achieve the reliability of turbines.

The project was exiting to do and we are looking forward to fit it to the Bushbaby Safari. More news to follow tomorrow night Pappa-G