Art Zemon's Blog Posts

Since the fuel tanks in my Bede BD-4C airplane are in the wings, I very much want to get it safely and securely from the wings to the engine. The plans call for running “hard line” through fully enclosed channels in the corners of the fuselage. Fabricating and installing the hard line is difficult, no […]

Go ahead and do it. Read the title of this posting aloud: Horizontal Stabilator Push-Pull Tube. I’ll bet everyone within earshot is looking at you real funny now, aren’t they? But what the heck; how many times in your life will you get to say, “Horizontal stabilator push-pull tube?” 🙂 Over the last few weeks, I […]

Today was a red letter day, for sure. With the control sticks (temporarily) installed, I sat in my Bede BD-4C airplane for the first time. I even felt the rush of air on my face (and ignored that it was a hot breeze from the fan on the garage floor). Woo hoo!!!

I rebuilt the aileron cables for my Bede BD-4C and began installing them over the last few days. Here is a picture (click on it to see it larger) of the aileron cables running around the right, rear corner of the fuselage. At the top, left of this photo, you can see one of the […]

(When last we visited with our intrepid airplane builder, he was thoroughly disgusted because his first airplane cables were useless. A bit of a contest ensued in which several of avid readers tried to name the error of Art’s ways and John Struhar succeeded. Tonight, we return to Art in his combination sauna and airplane factory just […]

July 14: I’m disgusted. Having made this cable, and five more like it, I get to make them all again. They are all trash. Can you tell why? Post a comment if you figure it out. I made my first control cables for my Bede BD-4C last night! Crimping the ends seemed kind of intimidating […]

I have spent the last month (has it really been that long since my last post?) doing non-picturesque stuff for my Bede BD-4C. The good news is that I now have 368 hours into the project, which means that I am 41% done, if you believe BedeCorp’s estimate of 900 hours to build the BD-4C […]

Since I last wrote, I have spent a busy couple of weeks making good progress on four subsystems of my Bede BD-4C: brakes, rudder pedal tubes, instrument panel support, and control stick torque tube brackets. It is nice to have both the time and the parts necessary. First up was installation of all four brake […]

I’m celebrating! This photo may not look like much but you are looking at the brackets for the brake master cylinders on the pilot’s side of my Bede BD-4C permanently attached to the plane. It has been a long time since I put something on “to stay.” Click to see a larger version and join […]

Light airplane brakes are hydraulic, like car brakes, but they are arranged a little bit differently. There are four rudder pedals in most airplanes, two for the pilot and two for the copilot. To move the rudder, you push on a pedal. To activate a brake, you push on the top of a pedal, tilting […]

Making shims for my Bede BD-4C makes me want to sing, Shim shiminey Shim shiminey Shim shim sher-ee! A sweep is as lucky As lucky can be but I will spare your ears and forgo the podcasting. The brackets for the brake master cylinders will sit on top of a couple of different pieces of […]

I mounted the rudder pedal tubes in my Bede BD-4C tonight and, hooray!, this set is made right and fits correctly. Here is a picture of one of the old (made wrong) tubes. You are looking at the pedal which will be under the pilot’s right foot. The rudder pedal tube should be aligned directly over the […]

It has been a long month of virtually no progress on my Bede BD-4C. When last I wrote, I had spent a week working on rudder pedals, guides for rudder cables, and the bell crank for the rudder at the rear of the fuselage. That was way back on March 18. After that, I tried […]

I spent the whole week working on various aspects of the rudder pedals and controls for my Bede BD-4C. I cut the steel rudder pedal posts to fit the rudder pedals, drilled the tabs on the backs of the pedals to accommodate the hinge pins, Alodined and painted a few parts, drilled the fuselage for […]