SportAir Workshops?

[Hal Bryan]

We've posted a number of updates to the SportAir Workshop schedule just recently (attn: those of you anywhere near Kansas City, there's a whole suite of workshops coming your way at the end of this month!) and that got me wondering how many of you have attended one (or more) in the past? What'd you think?

I'm very much looking forward to taking my wife to our first one in a couple of weeks here in Oshkosh - RV Assembly. She'll do great, while I may well end up being the first EAA member in history that will be legally barred from building an airplane...we shall see.

[steveinindy]

She'll do great, while I may well end up being the first EAA member in history that will be legally barred from building an airplane

That's funny but at least one of us has faith in your abilities Hal!

[Mike Switzer]

I have been to 2 of them & liked them. Both were in Indy, that is a nice facility & it works great for me as it is 2 hours from home.

I actually looked at the schedule for KC thinking I might kill 2 birds with one stone, so to speak, & scratch another ballpark off the bucket list, but the Royals are in Minneapolis that weekend.

[CraigCantwell]

I keep trying to make a couple of them, but work kept getting in the way. We are currently on strike over some major contract differences, but when we go back finally, it will probably be 7 days a week til the end of the year. Maybe next year.....

[Eric Witherspoon]

I did the sheet metal one a long time ago, and the fabric covering one last year. While I was there last year, I looked over the sheet metal project. The metal project has "evolved" over time. Nothing wrong with that, but definitely with reference to the increasing popularity of blind-riveted construction popular in the lower-speed designs. The project is partially bucked, partially pulled rivets. Both of the workshops I did were excellent. The sheet metal one propelled me into two plans-built riveted-metal airplane projects. And while I haven't gotten into the fabric work of the current project, the workshop seems to be a great start for that one as well.

For those who look at the schedule and are unfavorably surprised by the prices - keep in mind these prices are LESS than it costs to deliver the workshop. These are supported by vendors (on the reasonable assumption that you will become a customer in part because of the workshop). It's also a heck of a lot cheaper to mess up a classroom demo than your own airplane, and it's a heck of a lot cheaper to learn that airplane building isn't for you in a couple hundred $$$ weekend than after buying into a multi thousand dollar project... Given all that, the value of these workshops is much more than what you pay...

Now, if they had one pertaining to the Phase I flight test program, data collection, data reduction, and the information which should be developed as a result of the flight test program... I'd probably pay my money and spend my weekend there as well.

[CarlOrton]

I attended the Electrical class in 2010 in Dallas. Taught by Dick Koehler. I had always messed around with electrical stuff as a kid, and some minor digital circuitry stuff in a job a few years back, so it wasn't exactly the first time I'd been around wiring.

I casually talked with Dick and mentioned that I would have liked greater depth to the course, but he made a good point that the class was designed for the full spectrum of abilities that might take it, so I have no issue with it.

The ACS discount I received as a result helped me buy my ELT, so I was thrilled!

The course was fun and I did learn stuff, even with my prior experience.

I have not taken other weekend workshop, but have done all of 'em at AirVenture.

[Fred Stadler]

I attended the Fabric Covering workshop in Dallas a few years ago and found it refreshingly more informative and motivating than the same topic as taught in A&P school.

My two weeks of fabric class in A&P school had the approach of "we're teaching you this so you'll understand that you're not good enough to do it." The shop project was a small box with fabric (and maybe some of my skin) glued to it.

The weekend SportAir workshop, by contrast, was filled with information and encouragement. Covering a DC-3 aileron was much more realistic than covering a box. I left the workshop confident I could take on a project and eager to do it. What a difference!