Author: Ian Slater

I must apologise to all of our project followers, as several team members (myself included) have had a bit of a spell of personal matters to attend to, resulting in minimal public activity since 2017. In addition, it’s been a while since I’ve managed to update our web page, partially due to the issues above, and partially due to my learning curve to the new site that was launched in 2017!

2019 has been very busy here in the shop, primarily building fixtures for the forward monocoque, radiator fairing, and general flight control fixture that can be used for several assemblies (elevators, rudder, fin, tail planes, ailerons, flaps, wing tips), and a huge fixture table that will be used to build the cockpit section on. We were very fortunate to have three of our designers working away on data while things were quiet, which really helped me jump back into production here in the shop. My sincerest thanks to Nicolas Walter, Martin Oldfield and Bruce Slater for their persistence during this time.

With the main fixtures ready to go, we’ve also started production on fuselage frames and radiator fairing frames (the latter you may remember from a few years ago). As this work moves forwards, preparations are being made to bring in the materials needed for cockpit production; so things are really cooking!

Aside from design and shop work, some areas can still be a bit slow, a the full team isn’t quite back at it yet. I’ve removed sale items from our webpage due to the time it was taking me to process orders, and will be looking at some better alternatives to help raise funds for materials being used in the construction. I may soon be looking for a dedicated volunteer who is tech savvy, that would like to help out with social media and fundraising, as this would really help get us in front of more interested people, and would let me stick to the metal work! If you, or anyone you know would be interested in doing this, please let me now by contacting us through this page.

Regarding the web page, there are some updates that I just can’t do; like update our sponsorship information. We now have e3D Technology doing reverse engineering and scan work, 3D-CADD Services doing CAD design work, and Sealand Aviation who has been providing logistical support, and CNC router service! One of our more skilled members will be along shortly to update the webpage with new logos as soon as they are ready.

I will leave you all with this, and promise to be a bit more involved with the web page as things progress (quick updates are always available on our facebook page).

Thank you all for your patience,

Ian