EAA Sport Aviation

expensive. I got started and soloed. Also,
after 9/11 a new law was implemented with
TSA requirements. I was affected and didn’t
fly again until I had my citizenship. Besides,
I didn’t want to waste money on anything ’til
my plane was done.”
In case you missed what he just said: He
didn’t fly until his RV was almost finished. In
fact, the financial obstacles involved in get-
ting back into flying loomed large and played
a role in his starting a homebuilt in the first
place. “Decision to build was mainly driven
by inability to buy and maintain certified
bird. I have regular job in unionized labor
with average paycheck.”
As with so many homebuilders, the deci-
sion to build was relatively easy, but the
decision of what to build wasn’t. “I spend year
before starting looking for different designs.
Since 2005 I was visiting Oshkosh every year.
Analyzing pricing, estimated time to finish,
and costs to operate after it’s flying. Talked to
multiple builders. Took several demo rides and
looked at hundreds of airplanes.”
Although he considered building a GP- 4,
the wooden construction and size wouldn’t
fit his “workshop,” such as it was, and he
decided to follow in the footsteps of thou-
sands before and build an RV. “I chose Van’s
RV-9A mainly because it was a proven
design with thousands of airplanes flying.
Second, it was a kit, and to assemble it didn’t
require extensive jigs and tooling. As I like to
tell my non-aviation friends, it’s like a Lego.
Parts come in boxes; you just hammer it
together, bolt the wings on, spray paint the
dings, and go flying. Many didn’t buy that.”
It’s helpful if you put the building of this
particular RV-9A in context. In the first
place, as anyone who lives in the New York
City/New Jersey area will attest: You need a
surplus of grim determination to overcome
the many area-specific environmental fac-
tors that work against sport aviation. These
range from less-than-wonderful weather to
high overall expenses, and an aviation com-
munity that is widely scattered across some
of the most densely populated areas of the
United States. For that reason, the aviation
spirit in the New York metro area is amongst
the most persistent in the nation. It has to be
just to survive.