There was a thread here not long ago that said Thunderbolt lead times were creeping up to 11 months and I'd be willing to bet that the pandemic is going to drive that number even higher. I just started the fuselage kit about 3 weeks ago and am making reasonable progress, at least in comparison to my progress on the wings. My practice so far has been to time the purchase of the next kit so that it arrives just as I'm finishing the current one and I've been pretty successful with that so far. Given the current lead times I'm thinking I should order the engine soon, even though I just started on the fuselage. But here's the rub; Van's website says you can't order the engine until you have ordered ALL the kits, so that would mean I would have to buy the finishing kit first even though I'm not going to need it probably for at least 6 months. Given the 11-month lead time for the engine would mean I'd have to sink a huge amount of cash into both just to get the engine ordered. So not only am I not able to spread those last big purchases out over more time, I will likely have the finishing kit just sitting in my shop until I am done with the fuselage. That kinda ticks me off.
How have others dealt with this? When did y'all pull the trigger on the finishing kit/engine purchase?
How have others dealt with this? When did y'all pull the trigger on the finishing kit/engine purchase?