2018 Home Safe From OSH Thread

Home Safe from One Week Wonder & Oshkosh 2018

I finally hit the pillow in my OWN bed at 2 AM this morning.

I left home on 7/11 for my daughter's wedding on 7/13 in Ohio.

Then flew Delta to the Atlanta area 7/18 to pick up N912VA from Vic and flew it to Oshkosh on 7/19.

Then I helped Roger and Big John prep the OWW booth Fri, Sat & Sun.

The real show started for us when the RV-12iS crates were opened at 8 AM Monday!

Many thanks to all the people who help push the OWW project to completion!

We wouldn't have been able to make the ambitious schedule without the help from the Van's community, both inside the ropes and all those who helped with the more than 2,500 volunteer riveters outside the ropes.

I also had the pleasure of helping "Rosie the Riveter" pull a rivet on Friday.



Watching Scott and Van taxi N2018 during the airshow on Sunday made me feel very proud to be part of the Van's Aircraft team.

I am privileged to work with some of the finest people I've ever known (including some whom you never see at Oshkosh), thank you Van and everyone at Van's Aircraft!



Monday I flew N912VA back to Vic's place at KHMP and took Southwest back to KPDX yesterday.

For me, this has been the most memorable Oshkosh experience ever!

I believe that may be Connie Palacioz in the picture

She helped build B-29s including Doc.

Connie Palacioz, age 92, has kept track of hers. ?All my rivets are still there, except for seven,? she assures me, pointing proudly toward Doc on the runway apron. Palacioz means the fasteners she personally installed over 70 years ago. As a teenage assembly line worker at Boeing?s Wichita Plant 2, she riveted her way from the forward pressure bulkhead to the nose of hundreds of Superforts, including Doc.

https://www.airspacemag.com/history-of-flight/restoration-doc-flies-again-180960367/

Cheers, David

Tony, I cant see the photos on my iPad.

Tony, good to see a post from my old friend! Congratulations on your daughter's wedding. You job at Van's must be very interesting!

Fixed Photo Links

BigJohn said:

Tony, I cant see the photos on my iPad.

Click to expand...

I used Google Photo gallery and didn't have the photos in a shared folder - they should show up now.

For anyone else using Google for image hosting read these tips from Alex Peterson... http://www.vansairforce.com/community/showpost.php?p=1247873&postcount=7

Oshkosh 2018

Oshkosh 2018
My statistics
Arrived Thursday 19. Departed July 30
Home safe July 31. We left on Monday morning and flew to Moberly, Missouri. We were asleep in motel by 12:00PM. Dead tired.

Home Built Camping Volunteer
Jay and Carol’s volunteer hours combined, 106
Flight hours to and from home, 12.4
Miles flown 1638

This was our 6th year to volunteer. It’s a lot of fun and work. We love it!

The powers that be, allowed us to bring our Cessna 180J this year. To HBC. It got a lot of strange looks! But bringing the 180 allowed us to have a big comfortable tent, and chairs. 11 nights in a tent is a bit long for 70+ year old workers. Being comfortable really helps keeps us smiling at our camping customers.

We looked at the weather and decided Thursday was a better guess than trying for Friday. We host a dinner for Volunteers Friday evening at The HB Pavilion so it’s important to be early on Friday before the show. The President showed up for this one. Pretty cool I think

Thanks for a good show, and to all that camped with us

I flew up commercial on Thursday night and camped with my Mooney buddy, flying home with him Sunday. Despite the official tally of record attendance, I thought the crowds were slightly thinner than last year. I'm excited to hear all the non-aviation vendors are getting booted from the four exhibit halls back to the fly mart. It was a business trip for me, but I spent a bunch of money and still had a ton of fun. Departure for us Sunday around 0900 was seamless and we waited no more than 3-4 minutes behind a flight of Yaks. We monitored Departure and were shocked at the number of flight following requests well within the 40 mile ring. We picked up our IFR over Niles MI. Awesome show, can't wait for next year already!