Blue Thunder Air Racing March 23, 2008 report on “Blue II’s” construction progress.

Here it is deep into April and I am just now getting out the March progress report.  I must begin this report by wishing all of our sponsors, fans, supporters and crew a belated Happy Easter.

The electronically operated remote fuel valve from Andair we promised to show you in this month’s progress report still has not shown up yet.  We are quite disappointed with this delay, and if any of our friends going to the Sun-N-Fun show, stop by the Andair booth and ask Andy, or Owen, about the remotely operated fuel valves we have on order.

The hydraulic pump has arrived and we are setting up a test stand for it on our hydraulic mule stand.  All of the hydraulic plumbing forward of the main wing spar has been installed except for the inner gear door cylinder lines.  I am sure all can recognize a high tech test stand pictured at the left.

What appears to be a snake pit at the left are the push- pull cables that will operate the flight controls.  These cables eliminate a considerable amount of complexity and weight, but probably not much cost.

Pictured at the left is the tail wheel unlock assembly.  The assembly electrically unlocks the tail wheel with an over center latch to hold the wheel unlocked when the power is off.  A momentary lock, unlock switch is used to control the assembly which includes a light indication when the tail wheel is unlocked.  We have not decided yet as to whether we will mount the switch next to the gear lever or on the throttle.

Normally there is a very large gap between the lower wing skin and the flap as designed by Papa 51.  “Blue II” has a gap seal which will close that gap and improve the aerodynamics of the under side of the wing as well as effectiveness of the flaps.

Hopefully we will be able to have some news about the remote fuel valve after Sun-N-Fun.  As soon as the wing portion of the fuel system is finished we can close out the wing.

We are doing a lot of work on “Blue II” that sometimes looks like very small steps; however, we will have plenty to report on in the April report.

Blue Thunder Air Racing