Hi all, my name is Casper and I just bought a 1978 Super Decathlon. The engine has 800 hours and seems fine, but the fuselage and wings need new fabric. That's why I decided to do a full restoration.
My goal is to get the aircraft in 'new' condition, and also update everything so the airplane is most similar as possible to a newly built Super Decathlon.
Besides this I'm curious if there are possibilies to turn the plane into an Extreme Decathlon even.
For this, I'm gonna need a plan. The main project will be executed by an experienced company in The Netherlands (where I live). But I'd like to make a plan myself first, to decide which parts I need to buy etc.
I am looking for people who are able and willing to give me some advice. Is this forum the right place for these kind of questions?
I'll be creating a website on which I'll post the complete restauration-project, so everybody is invited to follow.
Sounds like a nice project! My fuselage has one minor dent, and the restoration company said they will replace this piece. That's all I know about it. I think you should give Chad from ACA a call about these things. I think that he knows everything about these airplanes.
Hi Martin, nice, project has been paused for a while due to capacity issues at the company that's performing the restoration. I tried to do things myself, but i'm not skilled enough. So, I guess we have 90% of all materials needed, and we're in the process of 'refurbishing' all assemblies and after that building up the fuselage. And a complete engine overhaul, engine turned out to be in bad shape. And you?
We are also restoring a scout how is everything going ?
Thanks for your reply! I'll use all the Service Letters. As far as I know the airplane already has the aluminum spar wings installed 10 years ago. The 'Extreme' plan is cancelled as of now :-) Some questions I recently ran into: - Should I replace the main landing gear by aluminum, even if the current gear is still working fine and I'm not changing to the larger TrailBlazer-propeller?
- Should I replace the propeller? Currently I think the plane has the standard aluminum cs propeller.
- I learned that I can save weight by updating the prop, gear, carbon interior etc. But this comes with a price. How big is the difference in performance with these weight-savings? (assuming that I am pretty heavy myself, 110kg / 240pounds).
Thanks!
To start with I recommend you go to the Support tab and print out and be sure to accomplish all the Service Letters that apply. Be sure to accomplish 518, Electrical system.
If you can, I recommend buying the new version of their aluminum spar wings.
Making it into an Extreme I believe would not be a very practical idea.
Good luck on the project.