The post Gallery: The Evolution of Van’s Aircraft appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

If you’re like me, you walk the rows of these E/ABs and are envious of the builders who possess the skills to complete these airplanes. While being comfortable in saying that I doubt I have the mechanical ability to complete an E/AB airplane project, I know there is still a great way to own one and fly it with confidence.

Just buy the fully-assembled special light sport airplane (SLSA) version of the popular Van’s Aircraft RV-12iS.

In the Room Where It Happens

The Aircraft Assembly Division (AAD) is a large, well-lit portion of the Van’s Aircraft factory in Aurora, Oregon. Here, employee builders dedicated to the AAD work through all of the steps it takes to go from stacks of wooden crates full of thousands of parts to a signed-off RV-12iS SLSA ready for a new owner to fly home. At several workstations, airplanes are in various stages of completion, while other areas of the AAD are dedicated to paint, installing cabin upholstery, and avionics installations.

The pace inside the AAD seems calm but focused, as the bright fluorescent lighting provides assemblers with a good look at every part. It is not a noisy factory setting with people slapping together airplane parts on an assembly line, it is more of a laid-back atmosphere, where talented builders handcraft each airplane with as much care and attention as if they were building it for themselves.

If the inside of the AAD looks like any of the private shops of E/AB builders, that’s because, for all intents and purposes, this is just a big version of the same thing, says Van’s Aircraft vice president and COO, Greg Hughes. “All the parts used to build the SLSA version of our RV-12iS are made in the same factory, by the same people, as the kits we ship to builders worldwide. The same inventory of parts that go into the AAD goes into crates we ship to customers. The parts are delivered to the AAD effectively as a customer. The process for building is nearly identical to that of a private builder—it’s the same airplane built from the same kit.”

Hughes did however explain that while the finished product is identical to an amateur-built RV-12iS, the factory process is slightly different. 

“We do pre-build or pre-configure certain parts and have those staged, and we can have different sections of the airplane being built simultaneously by different people in the AAD. So while we may not be following the exact steps an amateur builder follows, we are still doing the exact same work,” he said.

Built to Exacting Standards

Van’s Aircraft has perfected the process of designing, manufacturing, and shipping airplane kits for its RV line of E/AB models. Hughes says the Van’s parts picking and crate packing teams ship between 65 and 80 “sub-kits” each week all over the world. “An RV-7 has four sub-kits for the wings, empennage, fuselage, and finishing. So 80 sub-kits in theory represent about 20 airplanes. Just to give you some historical reference, we were shipping half that amount just a year ago,” he said.

Those same sub-kits are the ones that end up in the AAD to be assembled into ready-to-fly RV-12iS SLSAs. And every nut, bolt, and rivet is assembled with strict adherence to ASTM standards, the set of requirements developed for checking and maintaining quality. “Even though the parts are manufactured in another area of our facility,” Hughes explained, “we check each part carefully to ensure they are acceptable to ASTM standards. In the unusual event we find a part that is questionable in some way, those parts are quarantined and not used. We have all of the standards-based controls and requirements in place to guide our dedicated team of people, who do nothing but build the RV-12iS airplanes.”

Flight Tested and Buyer-Ready

Once an RV-12iS SLSA has been assembled, Van’s test pilots run it through the same types of flight tests as builders who have put their kits together themselves. As I toured the AAD, I saw a gorgeous RV-12iS in a blue and white paint scheme just inside the closed hangar door, ready for final inspections. It had completed full-flight testing and was about to be inspected with experienced eyes by the AAD staff. Once any squawks have been remedied, the airplane would be polished to appear “showroom perfect” and its new owner would be summoned to come to Aurora and pick up their new ride.

Demand Is Strong

The order book is at high levels across the entire Van’s product line, and that holds true for the RV-12iS SLSA as well. Current lead time on the fully-assembled RV-12iS is a “moderately conservative” 20 months, Hughes said, with a $5,000 deposit due upon ordering to get in line. An additional $55,000 deposit is due upon commencement of aircraft construction, with the balance due upon delivery. The length of that “line” varies according to order loads and delivery schedule.

The post Van’s RV-12iS SLSA: They Build it, You Fly it appeared first on FLYING Magazine.

Fast forward to 2016, and the out-of-state business I was using the 235 to service dried up, and at 12 gph, Katy became quite an expensive hamburger chaser. Factor in the cost of maintaining a 1963 model, and it was obvious that selling the 235 was a smart move.

Since N8527W taxied away for the last time, I have not had any stick time in any airplane. I do try to keep my “stick-and-rudder” skills fresh in my X-Plane flight simulator, but I had not been PIC for about six years. So yes, some rust might have been forming on those skills. I wanted to see just what would happen when a 750-hour rusty pilot tried out one of the latest generation of SLSAs, the Van’s RV-12iS. What skills had atrophied, and what knowledge and muscle memory were retained would be quite evident in a model like this SLSA, which had the Garmin G3X touch panel with dual displays, and a sweet Rotax 912iS fuel-injected 100 hp engine.

I met up with Van’s vice president and COO Greg Hughes at the company’s factory at Aurora State Airport (KUAO), in Oregon, and we planned a hamburger run to Independence State Airport (7S5) in the 12iS. While it would be a relatively short out and back, there would be sufficient time for me to take the controls and see how much rust had indeed accumulated over the years.

Let’s take a look at my experience.

First Impression

The RV-12iS looked gorgeous parked outside Hangar India at KUAO awaiting our departure. The fit and finish looked perfect, and the paint was superb. With the canopy open, I gingerly climbed into the right seat. You do not jump into an RV like you do a Cherokee or Skyhawk—it takes a certain amount of finesse to work your feet around the control stick while avoiding stepping on the seat. But once I wiggled down into the laid-back position of the seat, the airplane fit me wonderfully.

Being careful not to elbow my PIC, I strapped in and began drooling over the Garmin panel. From the rather haphazard design of my Cherokee’s old-school, six-pack avionics, this was my first up-close meeting with a G3X system. Once Hughes fired up the electrical system, before me on the dual displays was an almost endless amount of engine and navigation information, including our pre-takeoff checklist.

When it came time to fire up, doing so in a Rotax-powered machine is a non-event. The RV-12iS started fast, more like a Honda Accord than any airplane I had ever been in before. When the Rotax starts, you know it with a distinct rumble, and the smoothness was almost unsettling.

Aren’t airplane engines supposed to cough, spit, and protest as you coax them to life? Not this one, as I could not even count the few blades of the prop go by as it sprang to life. After what amounts to a “mag” check when the PIC cycles the two “lanes” of the engine computer to check for proper operation, and with a minimal amount of touches with his finger on the G3X display to tune the comms, Hughes had us off the ground fast, and we held a nice 90 kias, 1,000 fpm climb out. The takeoff was as undramatic as you can get, as the RV-12iS seemed to want to launch from the moment the PIC pushed the FADEC engine control forward.

So far, this was nothing like flying my Cherokee. This was going to be an interesting day.

Stick and Rudder

Since all airplanes follow the same general rules of aerodynamics, I knew pretty much what to expect comparing the RV-12iS to my Cherokee 235. Push the throttle forward and the houses get smaller, right?

Wrong.

After Hughes departed Aurora, we soon hit the bumpy air of a warm day over the Willamette Valley. Even though I knew the airplane was getting punched around, it did not feel like it from the right seat. After Hughes handed the airplane off to me, I found out why.

You see, in my Cherokee—and every other airplane I had flown in my 750 hours—you had to really work the yoke to keep things straight and level in a turbulent sky. But within seconds of my hand touching the RV’s control stick, I realized that the precise handling of the RV line means you do not horse the airplane through rough air—you just think about correcting when a wing drops. With every smack upside the head from another gust, I would make a tiny flick with my hand and the RV-12iS would respond so quickly the gusts were a non-issue. I was able to easily stay on course and hold altitude to private pilot check ride standards.

I can only describe the handling of the RV-12iS as driving a Miata with sticky Bridgestone tires down a twisty mountain road instead of lumbering along in an old Chevy truck. The airplane’s flight characteristics were so intuitive, it seemed so far that there might not be all that much rust I needed to knock off.

A few “S” turns confirmed that this airplane handled like a dream. It was on rails in turns…crank it over into a turn and it just stayed there obediently; it was happy turning until you nudged the stick back with an almost imperceptible input to come back to wings level. Hughes said the RV-12iS is an “honest” airplane, and I cannot argue with that. It does what you want without drama, making flying it a pure joy.

The Airplane Is Smarter Than I Am

After enjoying a couple of $100 hamburgers that probably only cost $35 because of the Rotax’s polite fuel efficiency, we departed Independence and again Hughes climbed out and turned the RV over to me. The gusty conditions had worsened, but still, it was incredibly easy to stay on course and hold altitude. He demonstrated the Garmin autopilot, and we followed the magenta line towards Aurora where the PIC made a greased, uneventful landing.

I came away from this demo flight knowing two things. First, it would take this rusty pilot more time to learn the Garmin G3X touch avionics than it would for me to remember how to fly an airplane. This panel has so much capability, it requires a learning curve that would be significant to an old “steam gauge” pilot like me; but I also know that once mastered, this system would be as good as it could get in GA avionics.

And second, I learned that despite not flying for six years, the Van’s Aircraft RV-12iS SLSA would be a perfect choice for someone who wants to get back into flying. It is modern, well-engineered, and so easy to fly, any rust that has built up would quickly disappear once a new owner picked up a few hours of transition training.

Rusty pilot? Nope, not me. Sure, maybe a little out of currency, but with this airplane—or any of the modern LSAs—someone who has not flown in a while can get right back in the air, which we all know is where they truly belong.

The post Knocking Off the Rust in a Van’s RV-12iS appeared first on FLYING Magazine.