SouthEastLondonFlyingGroupEuropaPage

Quick directory to these Europa pages: This cover page gives you a general feel of our Europa project, briefly covering Us, The workshop, Empenage, Wings, Fuselage, Cockpit Module, and Engine.; Some extra pictures and details of our wings.; The cockpit details, complete with illustrations.; Details of the engine including:; A list of modifications (both factory and our own, but incomplete)

OK, we're a group of eccentrics, and we're building a Europa. The group was originally set up by Bill Lams and Eddie Hatcher, and I (Nick Crisp) joined them a bit later - just in time to help with the construction of the first wheel chock. We've been going for a while now (longer than we care to admit) and have almost enough money saved to finish the kit. We're all agreed that our hobby shouldn't dominate our personal lives, so we make time to visit the theatre, restaurants, and the occasional air-show as respite from our labours. We also try to make time to keep our hands in with the flying skills we'll need once the plane's complete!

The construction, like most home-built aircraft in the UK, is overseen by the Popular Flying Association. We have an inspector (thanks Don!) who, for a modest contribution to his beer money, comes out to check that we're keeping to the straight and narrow. He checked out the workshops, and inspects each critical component or structural member before it is incorporated into the final airframe. As we are building a well known kit, there is already an agreed list of check-points during the construction, and we have a book of pre-printed approvals for Don to sign. (Now we just have to work on the pre-printed signature... just kidding).

So far we have passed with flying colours (so to speak) and we're aiming to keep it that way!

Eddie is also a member of the Europa Club, which is a group of like-minded Europa builders, and has been a source of many hot tips - as well as some helpful clarifications of the manual. Various people in the Europa Club have also developed modifications that we've considered using. I'll try to include the list of mods on our aircraft (mainly factory ones) so that people can contact us if they want to know how we did it.

The Workshops

We were originally based in a workshop that we had converted for the purpose (from an old seamstress sweatshop I think) by cleaning it and painting it. Bill, the man who always knows a man, installed a balanced flue heating system and plumbing. A year into the build the workshop was under threat of demolition to make way for a new development, so Bill charmed his brother-in-law and sister into letting us convert their garage into a workshop. An extension out the back and the same heating system, and we had a new home.

Well this is a generously sized garage, however it is quite a squeeze to fit things in. It can be done, but we have to plan storage areas very carefully. The image here shows the fuselage section, our workbench against the left wall, and the tool bench and tool racks against the back wall.

The kit has been bought in stages, starting with the empenage (tail section). The construction starts in fairly conventional fashion, building the rudder, fin and tail-planes up as fibre-glass over a male mould. Foam cores are pre-cut at the factory, and we apply fibre-glass and room-temperature cured epoxy resin to form the (structural) outer skin of the aerofoils. Because of the time at which we bought the kit (more than two hundred sold before ours) there was plenty of experience out there from people who had built each stage before us.

Empenage

The Flyer Europa project started around the same time as us, and is an apt case in point. This meant that a number of modifications were developed and available for us before we reached the relevant stage of construction - In fact, to date (touch wood) we have built sufficiently slowly to include all of the modifications we wanted as we built. The only time where sloth has paid dividends?
Maybe - but then we heard about the trim drive-pin mod!

We have now started the long haul to filling the surfaces, and started with the tailplanes. We've filled one with the surface filler that came with the kit, and on the other one we tried an amazingly blue gunge. Eddie is convinced that the latter is easier to sand and is much less prone to forming little pinholes in the surface as it cures. Their compounds include a paint-on primer and UV filter, so we've bought some of that, and it has given us a very smooooth undercoat on the tailplanes. Ever so sexy. While I'm on the subject of filling, Eddie came up with a good technique for this, where he applies the first coat of filler in ridges (about 3-5cm apart, maybe 3mm high) using a spreader with notches cut into the spreading edge. These ridges are then sanded back to define the depth of filler required, and the main coat of filler is applied to fill in the gaps between the ridges. This minimizes the amount of filler that has to be sanded off again and minimizes your risk of sanding into glass - since you sand back to the target level with the ridges, while you can still see the glass cloth in most places. Slight differences in the colour of the ridges and the subsequent coat make the ridges easier to spot during the second sanding.

Wings

The wings were the next bit we bought - about six months before the fast-build option became available, although again the modifications such as longer outrigger legs and revised pitot-static position came in before we were irrevocably committed. The pitot was the most problematic - we still have two holes for the pitot head, and pitot tubing has been laid into both wings...
The wings are again made as structural skins of fibreglass laid over foam cores. The spars are pre-formed by the factory, and the wing structure is built up in front and behind the spar, with the (separately formed) control surfaces filling up the trailing edge of the wing. We have made all of the control surfaces, and the ailerons are installed and working. Both flaps and outrigger mechanisms have also been installed, although they cannot yet be driven from the air/ground lever in the cockpit.
So, we are now the proud owners of two wings (one port and one starboard, thankfully!). The attached pictures and blurb give some idea of what I'm going on about. We have included the increased weight modification by drilling out the existing wing fixing points and replacing them with larger bushes to accept the larger wing fixing pins. This was handy as the original holes were not perfectly matched, whereas now the pins slide in and out like silk...

Who built that house going down hill then?

Fuselage

The fuselage kit has been with us for quite a few months now, and is very exciting as we can get our teeth stuck into such a range of differing tasks. Most of the major fibreglass parts of the fuselage are pre-formed, in a conventional gel-coat and female mold process. The structural backbone of the fuselage is the cockpit module, which forms the seats and holds most of the control linkages, as well as the fixing points for the wing spars. At the front end, it has the mounting points for the undercarriage/engine mount.
So far, the brake master cylinder, control columns, aileron controls and pitch torque tube have been installed into the cockpit module, and we have fabricated and installed the rear bulkhead ready for the tail-plane torque-tube. We've also made a start on the door latches, although those slots in the door-latch push rods are a b&^^$££d to shape - a possibly worthwhile tip is to fit three blades to a hacksaw to cut a wide slot length-wise, then file out to size. Don't forget to drill the holes first, though!
The fuel tank fittings, including the optional fuel tank drain and tank vent extension have been prepared, and the fuel tank (suitably swollen with a month's soaking in fuel) is going back in this week. We've included a dual Avelec capacitance fuel gauge as we don't like the original tubing fuel sight gauge in the footwell, however we may put a back-up sight gauge running up the luggage bay starboard wall for cross-checking during the walk-around.

Instrument panel We're making the flight instruments removable by installing them into an aluminium plate which in turn attaches to the main instrument panel. We weren't convinced about putting in the full six-pack of instruments, so there would have been no cause to get a vac system. To some extent we were waiting to see where the negotiations on home-builts in IMC/Night got to. However, to be honest we pre-empted ourselves and decided to go for the vacuum pump anyway! We had bought what we considered to be the minimum set of instruments - an altimeter, air speed indicator and an electric turn coordinator. The normal VSI position has been sourced from Rocky Mountain instruments, which also acts as an encoder for a transponder... which we just bought at the 2000 Cranfield Rally.
We also have an ICOM radio and the group owns a SkyForce SkyMap, which I hope to install on a flexible mount on the panel. We're putting a g-meter into the instrument panel, to give us some idea of air-frame wear and stress, and once we buy a compass that should do to get us airborne. There are pictures of the instrument panel

Engine

We had originally intended to install the Rotax 912 as recommended by the factory. When the Jabiru 2200 came out we were seriously tempted - particularly by the lower weight and lower engine revs. That said, there was some debate as to whether we would get enough power out of the Jabiru engine - the Rotax with its reduction gear produces slightly more power for the same prop speed. Then we looked at the BMW motorbike engine the factory was developing (now contracted out to a separate firm) - however this is not going to deliver in time to be useful to us. The Subaru conversion of a vehicle engine looks attractive for power but when we visited Kemble we thought the installation too heavy and unwieldy. Surprising how aesthetics can affect one's confidence in a powerplant. The rather ad-hoc wiring and plumbing of the Rotax and Subaru were so much less attractive than the neat installation designed by Jabiru.

Of course, things change and both Jabiru and Rotax brought out higher power options - putting out over 100hp, and both at about the same weight as the original Rotax 912 installation. We have decided to install the Jabiru 3300 flat six engine, and will let you know how that goes as we make progress.

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Updated 6th November 2000.
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