Gone West

Conrad Crane Shields

8/8/1927 - 11/26//2011

My mentor

My friend

My dad

Heading west into the sunset

Our last flight together in August of 2008

His first radio control airplane called the Rudder Bug.

This was in the late 1950's.  He won many contests

with this airplane.

After running out of GI Bill after WWII, Dad put

education on hold.  He went back in the 60's part time

while working and raising a family, and finished

his degree in 1970.  Like my clip on tie?  

Dad and our 1946 Aeronca Chief which won Best Chief

award at Oshkosh in 1973.

Playing basketball with granddaughter Kristin in the

late 1980's.

Flying R/C sailplanes together in Seattle in 1981.

Dad and Mon with Kala and Kristin,

summer of 1993.

Strobe & Position Light Installation

I have a few days of vacation left to use before the end of the year, so I decided today would be a good day to use one.  That gives me a 5 day weekend!  Yea! 

I received a package via UPS from Wicks Aircraft Supply mid-day.  It contained some one lug floating anchor nuts and rivets for installing them.  These anchor nuts are what the position/strobe lights will attach to.  I cut a slot for the strobe connector to fit through and then made a doubler plate.  After that, I attached 3 of the anchor nuts and then attached the position/strobe light assembly. The position light is actually several LEDs and the whole thing is made by Whelen.

I have the other wing to do yet and then maybe I'll hook up everything to some power and ensure it is all working before we cover it all up.

I also ordered a Klixon 7277-2-5 circuit breaker from Wicks just to see how it would fit in the panel.  I'll need about another 14 before this is finished.  As you can see from the photos, the circuit breaker fits well.  I also installed the phone and mic sockets, plus the socket for an IPOD to play through the intercom.

Hope everyone reading this has a nice Thanksgiving.  We are blessed in so many ways, though we often are too busy with life to stop and count them.

Rivets and one lug floating anchor nuts

Doubler plate with 2 or 3 anchor nuts installed

Completed installation....looks pretty good!

5 amp circuit breaker installed along with various jacks

Backside of panel...plenty of room still!

Tension High During Trammel Activity

Actually, the title is referring to the tensions in the wing's internal bracing wires, not our personalities!

Wade came over this afternoon and brought a few tools along for checking the squareness and internal rigging of the wing (called trammeling).  We did the left wing first and it only required some adjustments in the outer bay by the wing tip.  Everything else was pretty close.  When we did the right wing, we ended up adjusting the tensions in several of the bays, with several being too low.  We now have square wings with the internal bracing wires all at the appropriate number of ft-lbs of tension.

The pictures below should give you an idea of the process:

After marking targets on both the front and

rear spars, we measured the diagonal distance

across each bay in each direction (making an "X").

Hopefully each measurement was the same.

Using a round dial torque wrench and the special tool Wade

brought over, we checked the tensions in each bracing wire.

Adjusting these tensions also had an effect on the distance

measurements, so it could be an iterative process.

After going bay by bay, we checked the

entire wing to see if it was square.

The last step was to run a string down each

 spar and see if all the targets lined up (they did). 

Let there be light...and there was!

Nathan and I wheeled the wing over to near my car tonight and hooked the landing lights up to the car battery to see what would happen.  After getting a better ground connection, everything lit up.  Its hard to believe after 32 years of not flying, and the wings being removed from the airplane and moved who knows how many times, the filaments in both lights are still intact!

Instrument Panel Starting

I have installed the Sigtronics intercom I got for Christmas a few years back and also the Monroy traffic watch I previously had.  I also had an N-number and name plate engraved this week and have installed them (black letters on a gold background).  Hopefully with Christmas around the corner, the empty holes should begin to fill in!

Post 250...another milestone

This is post number 250 for this blog!  I have also posted 188 on the house blog and 153 on the antique airplane blog, so I am pushing 600 posts total.  I joked the other day I would have more done on the airplane if I didn't spend so much time posting stuff.  At least it is a great way to document progress and communicate with folks!

I have completed the wiring runs in the wings for the lights.  This morning I routed a spare wire (the yellow one for future reference) in each wing.  This was suggested by Wade and seemed like a good idea while it was easy to do (i.e. no covering on).  I also replaced the various wires in the landing lights.  I had ordered electrical connectors and other goodies from Aircraft Spruce which arrived mid week and allowed me to complete that task.  Maybe I'll hook up the car battery later and see if the bulbs still work after all this time.  Tomorrow, Wade is coming over to help complete the trammel activity on the wings.

I also received an e-mail yesterday from Al Folsom who owned 98K back in the 1960's.  He sent a picture of 98K in Manhattan, Kansas of all places (also where Kala and Nathan went to school....home of Kansas State University).  I believe from previous e-mails Al was based in New York at the time and had flown to Manhattan for a conference.  His son, who is shown in the picture below, is now a 777 captain!  Hopefully we can all connect at Oshkosh next summer!  Thanks again, Al, for the picture and info.

Landing light wiring.  The line on the blue tape

is one of the targets for the trammeling process.

You can see the wire run.

Another view of the wire run.

98K in Manhattan, Kansas around 1965.

Getting Wired

Nathan and I turned our attention back to 98K tonight.  We have worked a few other projects the past month including building a loft at the back of the hangar, planting trees along our north and west boundaries of the yard, and several other small tasks.....one of which was to publish a book on blurp.com of the Stinson restoration to date.  I also did one of the house construction last year.  I have not made them available to the public yet, so don't go look.  They are basically just down loads from the blogs with a lot of formatting.  I am quite happy with how they turned out.  I'll post a note if I go public with them.

We completed wiring the right wing tonight.  It was much easier to do with it vertically in the cradle than when we did the left wing flat on the saw horses several weeks ago.  We used loop-type cushioned aluminum alloy clamps on every rib and doubled looped zip ties in other convenient spots.  Nathan was busy making small aluminum brackets to attach the clamps to the ribs while I did most of the installations.

We still need to finish the ailerons and trammel the wings (ensure they are square).  Wade stopped by last Saturday and offered some good advice, so there are several things to accomplish.  We'll see how much we get done this weekend.

Proof I actually do something besides direct Nathan.

Wires zip tied to tube on right and clamped to rib on left.