2006 Oshkosh AirVenture Diary                    by Bob Collins

Note: This is a collection of stream-of-consciousness writing that I put together each day at Oshkosh. Some of it is written for an RV audience; some is written for a non-RV audience, in this case, Stirrings From the Empty Nest, which I also pen. I apologize for the quality of the pictures but I lost my digital camera at OSH and had to use a backup old "toy" thing with 3 year old film in it. Now there might be a thing or two -- I editorialize a bit here -- on a few things with which you disagree. Don't get upset. It's just some schlep's opinion and it's not life or death. If it's one you disagree with, so be it.

Saturday July 22, 2006

Darwin Barrie was to launch from Chandler, Arizona early this morning, but by 3 I hadn't heard from him yet. I ran into Glenn Brasch, a heck of a nice guy, and he had talked to him and found out that Darwin was doing the run-up in advance of taking off and the engine began sputtering. He talked to Robbie Attaway at Attaway Air and was advised to check the fuel lines. As Glenn tells it, Darwin blew on the end of one and something, he wasn't sure what, came out the end. He reconnected it and the engine ran fine, but Robbie suggested changing out the hose anyway. At last check, mid-afternoon, Darwin was planning to take off this evening and stop somewhere for an overnight.

I did walk along the RV parking area but did not see planes from the more famous among us with the exception of Jeff Point's plane, the Spruce Moose. Shown is a picture of one plane that I saw there. How'd you like to be the guy parking next to this? I can't remember the gentleman's name, but I think he's from Iowa. And the plane is for sale. I also ran into Rob Hickman of Advanced Flight Systems who had just flown in with his son from Oregon. He showed me the new product -- the AF3400 and 3500. It's in his panel and is a huge engine monitoring system with instruments. Very impressive.

I saw two RV10s here, including the TruTrak RV-10. I think last year there were only two here all week, so I'm curious to see how many will show up. Everyone, by the way, is talking about the $270,000 price tag on the beautiful RV-10 that Paul Irlbeck and his building partner have built and are now selling (note: the pictures do not do it justice that are posted. I took several but they were lost with the digital camera). It spawned a good thread on the RV-List.

I then strolled up the homebuilt camping area and, again, did not find anyone who I'd heard of before. I was actually surprised how few airplanes were flying in today. We've had intermittent showers with those thunderstorm cells that you can see coming a mile away with shafts of rainfall, I'd guess, 2 or 3 miles wide. That's not impossible to fly into but not ideal. My guess is we'll have this kind of weather all week. Hot days, some convective activity, and cool nights with heavy dew.

Returning to Camp RV, I've put the canopy up (see lame cell phone photo), staked out the BBQ area and roped off a spot for Darwin should he want to be out here by the highway. It's a good spot, though. Camp Scholler is starting to fill in although folks are not quite out this way yet. By tomorrow, I should have some neighbors. Here's hoping they're RVers.

I just sat a spell with Bob Kelly who lives in Indiana. He wandered over to find out where the BBQ is and showed me pictures of his almost-completed RV-9A. His big story, however, is he thinks he's got the first look at the RV-12. He was walking by Van's tent when they were just covering it up with a tarp. So he says the RV-12 is here, although I vaguely remember something about the mock-up would be here. We'll see on Monday.

Paul Trotter pulled in from New York this morning and proved again what a small world it is. I had mentioned that my wife is flying back to New England for the wedding of her best friend's daughter in the Berkshires. Paul mentioned he visits the Berkshires quite often and then named Sheffield, which is where I lived for 6 years. It's a typical small New England town with a town green and a white Congregational church. "I have some friends who live there," he said. "Who?" I asked. He said "the Brunchsweilers." Well, I think everyone in Sheffield knows everyone else in Sheffield so , yes, I knew them. "The farm right there on Boardman Street?" Small world, indeed. His girlfriend is coming up Tuesday so perhaps we'll chat about the Southern Berkshires and old times. I do miss the area.

Larry Frey was by today in his golf cart, about the same time Rich Emery of the St. Louis area was also buy in his golf cart -- both are volunteers at AirVenture. They'd never met. Rich is bringing some long tables from his EAA chapter over to the BBQ and Larry, whose mother was in the catering business, has been most helpful in helping me figure out how much food to buy for the big BBQ on Wednesday.

I also visited with some folks from the Twin Cities who were joined by Rob Riggen of Vermont. He created ExperCraft, an online documentation system for homebuilt aircraft builders. Rob and I plan to talk about hosting the RV Builder's Hotline on his server. He's developed, apparently, a nifty e-mail distribution platform. In the small world department, they are also joined by Peter Denny, who I've long admired but never met. He's a teacher in the Minneapolis school system and he teaches kids about aviation by having them build an airplane. My colleague, Dan Olson, has chronicled his exploits on the MPR Web site, so it was, indeed, an honor to meet and aviator and an outstanding educator. When I hear people criticizing teachers, I think of two of them. One of them is Peter Denny, and the other is my son's first grade teacher who, when we first moved to Minnesota, realized my son needed a friend and so she gave him her dog. That dedication is alive and well in our education system and we would do well to recognize it more often than we do.

Oshkosh is a fascinating place and it does feel a bit like home coming here, especially as I meet more people and find myself chatting with folks who stop by. As the years go along, I find myself doing this more, and looking at airplanes less, and I'm just fine with that.

Sunday July 23, 2006

I guess the big news today was the announcement from Van's that the big announcement from Van's is that there's now matched-hole tooling on the RV-8. OK, well, I guess everybody nailed that on the various bulletin boards. I feel left out because I had no idea there wasn't already matched-hole tooling on the 8.

Other than that it was a pretty quiet day as I spent most of it at the RV "hospitality tent" being hospitable. Chad Jensen and his father pulled in today. Also we now are surrounded by neighbors out here in the field, many of whom are RV builders or RV wannabes.

David Kewley hosted an impromptu margarita festival at his campsite this evening so I gladly stopped by along with Rich Emery and Paul Trotter. And, yeah, the margarita was excellent. Earlier, Dave stopped by the tent and showed me the latest pictures from his construction. His plane -- and Dave -- had their first flight on July 2nd. I realize I have a LOT of work to do on mine. I'll get to it. No pressure.

The Pattons from Washington state stopped by after picking up their new RV -- the kind with four wheels -- at the factory in Iowa. He's in charge of wiring and avionics for Boeing's 787 project and says he's still going to take a SportAir workshop before he wires his RV.

Paul Trotter spent most of the day on the flightline today and said the RV gaggle of 16 arrived around 2 this afternoon, including Messrs. Checkoway and McCurdy. He also says he saw Doug Reeves and Flash in the homebuilt camping area.

There was a report awhile ago that an RV -- I'm not sure what model -- groundlooped and the guy went into the weeds at about 40 knots. For a long time they were landing people with a tailwind and the guy came in hot. (ed. note: it was not an RV)

There was a rumor around that someone spun in on final this morning but I haven't been able to get that confirmed. (Update: Ercoupe. Story here.)

Still no sign of Darwin Barrie. He was to try to take off again around 5 after two aborted attempts yesterday. Chad Jensen says he thought he saw his plane fly over and called over to me. While he was trying to read the tail numbers, I was trying to see the plane. Oh to have young eyes!

Monday July 24, 2006

Darwin Barrie showed up yesterday, as it turned out, and Glenn Brasch set up his stuff in the volunteer camping area. When Darwin called Monday, he'd already heard that I was beginning to panic that maybe the head chef wouldn't make it into Osh because of plane trouble. So when he called he pretended he was still in Arizona. I guess I can stop asking people walking by if they know how to cook chicken.

Pretty much more work on the barbecue, but in the morning I went to a couple of forums. At the risk of alienating the faithful, I have to say that EAA could work on structuring the forums a little better to be a little more useful. Look, I understand these are all volunteer presenters and I very much appreciate what they bring to Oshkosh. On the other hand the quality of the forums and the inconsistency of presentation from one to the next makes picking the ones to go to a total crap shoot.

The first one I went to was pretty decent. Kent Paser presented a forum on gaining speed and efficiency by reducing drag. He did it in a pretty interesting way. He had his whole presentation on video tap and just played that. It's always a little tough to hear what with the noise and all but it was pretty interesting, even though it didn't offer a heck of a lot of advice I hadn't already learned from Dick Martin at a meeting of Van's Air Force's Minnesota wing.

Most of the work he did on the subject, apparently, was from the 1970s when -- he says -- he
picked up 54 miles an hour by reducing drag. Much of his work, not surprisingly was better farings and reducing gap. He wrote a book on his work.

Immediately after that, there was a forum that I thought would be spectacular. "Fiberglass for RVs," with Sam James. And, unfortunately, it was here that the inconsistency of forum presentation reared its ugly head. First, the forum wasn't held in the forum tents where hundreds of people can sit and look at someone on the stage. It was held in the composite workshop where people gather around a guy and watch him work. And that's great if you're one of the first 25 people, but if you're in the next 150-200, you can't see a thing and there's no place to sit.

But beyond that if you're going to have a forum "fiberglass for RVs," I'm going to guess that most of those who attend haven't yet done fiberglass on the RVs, and probably don't know much about fiberglass.

From all accounts, Mr. James is a heck of a nice guy and a terrific glass man, but that doesn't make him a good presenter. My review of the forum was it started in the middle of a conversation and pretty much stayed there. He started by talking about why you shouldn't mix polyester resin with epoxy and how micro balloons add no strength. And that's all well and good but that's the sort of stuff that you throw in as asides as you go along, or during a question-and-answer period, not as the lead message of your forum.

What the presentation lacked was a clear focus and I think people could have benefited with a broad introduction of what sort of fiberglass skills and work are needed on an RV, the differences in fiberglass depending on where you are on the RV, and some particular techniques. There are, of course, times when a down-home presentation is a good idea, and there are times when a rather structured outline and focus is needed to be of benefit to builders. Finding out a beer can makes a good device for shaping fiberglass isn't really a helpful jumping-off point.

But, again, that's just my recommendation. When I got back to the campsite later that night, a fellow RV builder had arrived and set up his site and as we were exchanging pleasantries and talked about the forums he said to me, "I saw a really great presentation last year."
"Which one?" I asked. "Fiberglassing your RV, with Sam James," he said.

That provides an important lesson for Oshkosh attendees. One size does not fit all.

Meanwhile, somewhere around that forum, by the way, I lost my digital camera, probably as I was pulling a laptop out of the bag searching -- fruitlessly as it turned out -- for some free WiFi

Back to the campsite afterward and off to Appleton to buy 16 bags of potato chips, coolers, tables, napkins, plasticware and condiments for the barbecue. I also bought 16 cases of beer. Not many people provided information in the sign-up about what they wanted to drink, so I had to guess on how many were beer drinkers.

In the evening, Warren Starkebaum of Plymouth, Minn., and headed off in search of a decent restaurant. Warren is building an RV-7 and we met years ago at the first meeting I ever attended of the Van's Air Force Minnesota wing. We try to get together at Oshkosh and compare projects, but mostly end up talking about the joys and trials of being fathers. We found that decent restaurant too, on Highway 21 just as you cross over the Fox River. I can't remember the name of it now, though. But Warren bought dinner. That much I remember.

Tuesday July 26, 2006

A real treat for RVers, and I suspect thousands of others, was a gorgeous formation show that 15 RV pilots put on in the morning. I have Meniere's Disease, which is an ear imbalance that causes vertigo. A good way to induce it is to look up -- a bad thing at Oshkosh -- but I didn't care. I was blown away by the talent of these individuals:

Stewart, Mike Kahuna 8
Carmichal, Dick Checker 8A
Sobek, Gary Condor 6
Kight, Danny Speedy 6
Reese, Greg Greese 6
Clark, James 6
McCurdy, Stu Falcon 8
Geer, Roy Jarhead 6
Newhouse, Bud Joker 8
Gieleghem, Ron 8
Legette, Len 8A
Gunn, Bill Gunbody 4
Checkoway, Dan Sharpie 7
Harril, Ken 6
Wilson, Greg Wizz 4

Congratulations to all of them and thanks for the show. According to a post on Vansairforce.net from Mike Stewart, "The recognition we got was from the warbird guys, who dont just pass out compliments to the RV'ers, come over and said we were S#@# HOT! The reward was in shaking the hands of the flight members aferwards of a job well done. Well planned, well briefed, & well executed. I was stopped several times around the show by folks who, saw my Team RV shirt, and passed out their thanks and compliments."

Otherwise today, more setting up. Howard Kaney of West Bend, Wisc., stopped by to deliver a grill and it was great to meet him. Larry Frey dropped off more coolers and Rich Emery delivered some tables.

Showers and thunderstorms are a constant threat and the heat is on the rise so I headed off to the seaplane base. There's no map in any of the EAA stuff they give you when you get here, so I just hung by the road coming out of the "south 40" plane parking area and followed the shuttle bus down. It's a different vibe there although I did notice it's getting a little more crowded and a tad more developed. But the trees are nice, the view is terrific. If only there were more seaplanes. I'm actually kind of surprised the EAA hasn't started providing seaplane rides the way they do for helicopters and the Ford Tri-Motor. But the best you can do is a boat ride around the lagoon. One of these days, I'd like to rent a boat and watch the airshow from it in Lake Winnebago.

In the evening, I met Rob Riggen who was staying with a bunch of Minnesota flyers and we headed over to the beer tent in the company of a number of them, including Peter Denny, who teaches at Washburn High School in Minneapolis. He teaches kids about aviation by having them build a plane. I've never met Peter before although he's a bit of a hero to my wife and me.

So standing in line for the beer Tuesday night, I was talking to my wife on the phone when I said "I met Peter Denny tonight." "I'd love to talk to him sometime," she said, so I gave the cell phone to Peter and they had a good chat. Oshkosh is a good place to meet your heroes.

Wednesday July 26, 2006

Got up early, met Darwin and we headed for the first Van's forum of the two he's giving at Oshkosh. And, of course, it was held in the #7 tent, the largest one, usually reserved for the likes of Rod Machado and Bert Rutan.

Van brought Ken Krueger along (Picture is of Ken talking with a builder after the forum).. Van was Van and quickly gave way to Ken, who is an outstanding presenter and he ripped through a presentation on the RV-7, 9, and -- for the most part -- 10. He took a hand count before he started his presentation about who was interested in the 7, 9 and, 10 and it was clear within a very short timeframe that the RV-10 is now the king of the hill at Van's.

He then concentrated on the RV-12, which is here. Darwin and I both were surprised that the RV-12 doesn't look at all like an RV. I happen to feel it's butt ugly with the pulled rivets but there's certainly a good reason for it since it's going to fly under Light Sport Aircraft rules and there's a speed limitation making flush rivets unnecessary, especially since ease of construction is supposed to be a key selling point.

The wings should be a snap to build. There's no fuel tanks in the wings. There's a single tank behind the seats.

I suppose it's only a matter of time, though, until someone tries to put a 180 horsepower engine in the thing, and that idea opened the door for Van's to throw some darts consistent with his scathing article in the RVator a few months ago referring to "people who know more than the designers." Maybe he should just name the person he keeps quoting who, allegedly just "raised his gross weight by 300 pounds" to address weight and balance concerns of performance modifications.

The other subject that came up was the nose-gear allegations in the RV-7A. Some suggest the number of flip-over accidents involving the "A" model indicates a problem with the nose gear design. Ken was pretty direct in fielding it saying that as they've checked these nosegear rollovers that "there's more to the story" than what's on the various bulletin boards. Van quickly jumped in that they're not disregarding the complaints and they are taking a look at things.

Ken's presentation was the first time I really paid a lot of attention to the RV-10 and it certainly is an impressive design.

At the conclusion of the forum, Van said he'd be available to talk to builders at the tent, and then set a speed record of his own for darting out, leaving Ken behind to field a few questions.

That was it for the forums for me, Darwin formed up with me and we and headed to Appleton for BBQ shopping. Now keep in mind I called Darwin a few weeks ago and said, "man, 150 people are coming!" and he said, "ahh, don' worry about it, I cook for that many people at family reunions." So we arrived at Sam's Club in Appleton and started the shopping. We got to the meat department and he said, "how many brats do we need?" "138," I said. "Whaaaaat?" he said.

"I told you," I said.

We bought about $600 worth of meat and potato salad and cole slaw and hoped the thunderstorms wouldn't return, leaving us -- well, me -- to foot a very substantial bill if they did.

I dropped Darwin off at his campsite and headed back to the "Collins compound" to start setting up. I did the "pre-icing" on the beer and soft drinks and continued setting up, then I dropped some parking credentials off to Jim Whitaker and Debbie Pennington of Lee's Summit , Missouri, who had just arrived at the Circle R campground, and headed back to the compound to get things going. The clouds began to darken. Our plan was to start the grills at 5, get some stuff made so when people started showing up, we'd have some food for them. But precisely at 5, the storms moved in. All I could think of was what I was going to do with 60 pounds of cole slaw and about $2,000 worth of food.

We huddled under our canopy when Frank Zwart of Portage Michigan and his new bride, Joyce, pulled up in their RV. Frank and his brothers camped next to us last year and were a big help getting our BBQ pulled off last year. He saw what was happening and, like a pro trucker, brought his RV around to the back of the compound and unfolded a big awning. The 50 or so who had already shown up, including the folks at Trio Avionics and Titan Engines, had a place to stay dry. Sort of. We moved the coolers around to keep people happy with beer and suddenly I was in a wet t-shirt contest as the rains came down and I got drenched. Anything's better than eating 50 pounds of cole slaw.

Terry Frazier came by and quickly volunteered to help cook so we now had three cooks -- Howard Kaney, Darwin Barrie, and Terry Frazier.

And the people kept coming.

Larry Frey, who is a saint, pulled up with two big roaster pots full of baked beans. I finally got the tables configured, stacked high with buns, next to a table of beans, salads, cole slaw, potato salad etc.

And the people kept coming.

Bill Swaim started organizing the canopy operation and Rick Belsaas manned the sign-in area where people could pick up their name tag and, hopefully, make donation. Rich Emery was darting between "stations" to keep things flowing.

And they kept coming.

Then came tragedy. We were running out of beer...and maybe food too. So I grabbed $100 from the donations and Dave Domeier Curt Welge, UPS pilot and RV builder, headed to WalMart, stocked up with two shopping carts full of beer and got back within a half hour. "Who wants beer?" I said as I came back in the compound which was now filled with more than 200 thirsty and hungry folks. "Forget the beer," Terry said, "we're running out of food."

I hopped back in the car and headed back to WalMart. When I got there, my phone rang. It was Darwin. "We've got at least 100 people still in line to check in. We need food and get all the beer you can and get back here FAST." I picked up three additional watermelons, more buns, beer, 40 pounds of chicken and another 150 hamburger patties. The checkout women at WalMart asked if they could come to the party and then helped me take everything out to the car and load it.

I got back in time to run into Dan Checkoway and it was a distinct pleasure to have him, and all of the RVers. I was sorry I didn't have more time to chat with everyone and I was just hoping everyone was having a good time. Since someone else had made another beer run, it appears they were as there were smiles all around. I think some people in line finally gave up on signing in and just came in the compound to chat because suddenly our food line disappeared and there we were with 4 cases of hamburgers and 12 cases of unused beer. Oh, and I'd also forgotten to get the rest of the potato chips out of the tent, along with two other cases of beer. Watermelon had already been cut so the the three I brought weren't needed. Ouch. That hurt the bottom line.

Things had slowed considerably and Darwin, Terry, and Howard -- not to mention Bill, Rick, and Larry, could now relax a bit, I hoped, and get a chance to talk. There was applause all around, smiles everywhere and I was asked to say something. And here's what I said. "Someone had just reminded me that a few years ago, as I struggled with some parental issues, I'd lost enthusiasm for plane building and put my tail and wings up for sale. They talked me out of it and I'm glad they did because the fatherhood issues that demanded my time were resolved -- as they usually are -- and I can thank my fellow RVers for that. And while I'm here at Oshkosh by myself, I feel I'm also here with my family and I hoped everyone else felt the same way. But the folks who LITERALLY pulled the barbecue out of the fire were Darwin, Terry, and Howard for cooking, Larry Frey for doing just about everything a guy could do, Rich Emery for constantly showing up and bringing stuff, Bill Swaim and Rick Belsaas for pitching in. I can't possibly thank them enough."

I then thanked Stein Bruch at SteinAir, who gave us a donation a few weeks ago 'because that's what RVers should do,' he said. He didn't want any advertising. He didn't want anyone to even know what he was doing. But I put the SteinAir logo on all the nametags and it was the least we could do. I very much enjoyed meeting Stein and the gang he brought over from Direct To Avionics and TruTrak and Chelton. Without Stein's donation, we'd have lost a pretty chunk of money. As it is, the $7 charge for an all-you-can-eat dinner of chicken, brats, hot dogs, hamburgers, potato chips, beans, potato salad, cole slaw, watermelon, and dessert, is guaranteed to lose money on its own. That wasn't a real problem when we had 20-60 people. But when 400 show up -- almost 200 more than expected -- that's created something we're just going to have to think about.

In talking with Stein afterwards, we agreed that the barbecue should stay in Scholler because it's essentially for the "family reunion" vibe. This is really just a grassroots operation that just took off this year and clearly we're going to need bigger digs and a big tent and more grills -- and more beer. Oh, and we're going to need a better count on who is coming. During the evening, I had at least 3 companies volunteer to provide support next year, but I'm not good at this side of the event and I admit to being concerned that it not become another typical Oshkosh "event." In fact, I know it won't because I won't let it if I am still involved in putting it together. I just think it has to maintain the "just plain folks getting together" atmosphere. Yeah, it's a little rough when you're standing in line while Bob makes beer runs, but that's a part of the vibe too, I think.

I was taking Brad Oliver back to the blue lot late in the evening. He's heading home today and he was telling me everything he saw on his first trip to Oshkosh and he was very excited and then he said, "but tonight was the BEST part of being here."

And that is why we do it and we thank everyone who came or wanted to come. You really ARE all family.

Postscript. The campsite is almost all cleaned up. I got most of it done last night and Larry and Rich and Terry were all back this morning to finish the job. We ended up giving the left-over 10-12 cases of beer to Larry for a family reunion he has. We dropped the watermelons off over at the Civil Air Patrol kids' tent. As it turned out they lost their breakfast so they were hungry. We gave 'em the potato chips too. We had leftover single beers and stacks of buns and condiments that I put out on a table at the compound with a "free" sign and they're slowly going away.

I haven't done all the financial stuff yet but with the expenses of about $2,000, the cost of the campsites and donations of about $2,300 ($1,300 at the event and $924 by PayPal and mail prior to Oshkosh) , a, it looks like we're going to be within $100-$200 (I'm just not sure which side of that yet) of breaking even. (Update: We came up only $289.18 short.)

The one thing I regret is not having time to talk to many people but that's the price of hosting the BBQ. The point is to create a place where RVers can talk to each other. If you were in line and gave up, I'm very sorry. If you paid in advance and you didn't get food or beer, please let me know so we can return your money.

I also didn't get an opportunity to take many pictures (well, I took exactly one and as you can see, it's lame. I think that's Darwin looking back at you there, and Larry Frey is in the white cap. See? Everyone's smiling.) so if you took some, could you please send me copies. I've got nothing for the RV Builder's Hotline, especially since I lost the digital camera earlier this week. (Todd Moeller sent some pictures that his wife, Tami, took)

Aero News Network also sent a fine gentleman named Mark over to document our grassroots homecoming and hopefully that will be online soon. Please look for that. (Update: Here it is.)

And who knows? Maybe next year will be the year that even Van's sends someone over.

Thursday July 27, 2006

Over the years at Oshkosh, there've been several times when my jaw has dropped and my breath has been taken away. Wayne Hanley was the first pilot I ever saw stand his airplane -- the Oracle Raven -- on end and hold it there, then give it the throttle and make it climb again. He crashed some years later, survived, and retired. Of course, Scott Tucker is an amazing aerobatic pilot.

Lately, though, I've felt somewhat guilty coming over here to Oshkosh and thinking, "oh, yeah, seen that. Yawn." But a few minutes ago I found myself being young enough to dream of being a jet pilot when I grow up, when your government sent two of the brand new F-22 raptor fighter planes to show their stuff over the skies of Winnebago County.

As one did his (or possibly her) thing down over the main runway, the other one came over here over the campground to entertain me -- and I assume a few others for awhile -- giving us a great show of their capability.

The pilot, like Wayne Hanley, seemed to make his fighter stand still in mid-air, then put nose up and just enough throttle to hold it there in a vertical position, nosed it over to a flat position, and then gently let the nose drop into a dive with a kind of aeronautical artistry that nearly demanded music. But the dive was short, almost unnoticeable, and allowed enough airspeed to allow him (or her) to again trade it for altitude that in a graceful return to a vertical position. And as the pilot brought his newfangled plan around for the climb, he showed both afterburners ablaze to me and my binoculars to the point where I thought that any minute I'd be hit with a blast of hot air.

A couple of high speed passes over the main runway was followed by a third at slow speed as the pilot wagged his wings to the left, to the right, and to the left again, a traditional greeting to the crowd.

The pilot, someone's grandson or granddaughter no doubt, then ascended in a soft turn, joined up with his mate and from miles high circled the air in two 360 degree turns. I imagined the pilots inside spending time looking down, envious of the people that were on the ground at the greatest aviation gathering on the planet; people that were on the ground looking up, envious at their ability to fly two of the greatest airplanes ever developed.

At the conclusion of the second wide circle, another jet appeared in my binoculars' field of view ahead of the two fighter jets. One, peeling off to one side, the other disappearing in the dot of the larger jet. I wondered if they were now escorting some dignitary home, until I realized it was a tanker jet, providing a drink of fuel for each of the fighters to return home.

One of the great things about Oshkosh is the vibe of Camp Scholler. And at night, it becomes an asexual version of Key West or Provincetown. Scooters, motorcycles, Gators, bicycles, and pedestrians going back and forth up the main drag. The teenage kids come out – Camp Scholler is probably THE best place in America this week to pick up girls, from what I can see and what I remember about my teenagers when they were here.

There’s an 8-story movie screen that the Ford Company pitched on a spit of land in the camp and every night hundreds of folks sit on the grass and watch aviation movies, and there’s something of a Tanglewood feel to the thing. Last night I stopped in for a few minutes, grabbed a bag of popcorn and watched a few aerial scenes from The Great Waldo Pepper, then strolled down to Theater in the Woods to watch a little of the Wisconsin Singers, a musical troupe from the University of Wisconsin, finally finding my way back West, when I stopped in at Glenn Brasch’s trailer to sit a spell. Glenn’s a great guy (by the way, he brought his truck over at the end of the BBQ the other night and loaded up all the trash – and there was a ton of it -- and took it away. Nobody asked him, he just did it.) Roger Everson, also from Tucson) was there too, and so was Glen’s son, Michael, and a volunteer whose name I can’t recall who is from Baraboo, Wisconsin.

Glen invited me to sit down and I was only too happy to accept. You keep Robert Redford and the UW Badgers, and I’ll take a nice evening with good friends anytime.

Before I begin this entry -- well, too late, I've already begun it -- I have to make a few disclaimers. First, I'm a real fanatic about studying how people relate and interact. If I hadn't gone into journalism, I'd probably have become an anthropologist of some sort.

In my regular job , which involves a lot of political coverage, I tend to focus not on what blowhard politicians say, but about how people involved in the political process relate to the process and actually change the process -- occasionally for the better, but usually not.

EAA at Oshkosh provides a similar opportunity to re-examine how about a million people relate, what they value, and how they change aviation, occasionally for the better, but sometimes not.

With AirVenture winding down, the various bulletin boards will soon filled with the annual "EAA is too commercial/no it's not" thread. And it's true that AirVenture -- with EAA's blessing and prodding -- is commercial. Just about everyone has their hands out here and you can always find a friend if you have a personal relationship with anyone named Hamilton, Jackson, and Franklin.

But over the last day or so, I've tried to put to words into why the RV BBQ on Wednesday night has such a different feel, and has become so popular in the context of this larger question of homebuilding roots and it was only at Van's annual dinner held last night at the Nature Center, that I began to sort it out.

Don't get me wrong. Van's puts out a terrific product and provides excellent support. They're in the business of selling airplanes and that's why they're here. From all appearances, they're nice people. On the other side of the coin, however, there is a builder who wants to have a good plane and great support but also soon finds him or herself swept into a community of diverse individuals and a single bond that, as the community begins to flourish, becomes a series of
bonds that may have only a peripheral connection to an airplane.

The folks at Van's don't understand that community and those bonds. Last night, Van proudly pointed out, that he's been coming to AirVenture since the days at Rockford. He should be proud of that. For most of that time though, he's been actually coming to a small strip of blacktop to stand near a tent and sell some airplanes. He really hasn't been part of AirVenture -- in a community sense -- for a long time. He hasn't been hanging out with builders at barbecues, or strolling Camp Scholler on a warm night and popping in to sit a spell with someone he didn't know, to start talking about an airplane an end up talking about family, for example.

That's what Oshkosh REALLY is because that's the very definition of a community and while we worry that EAA has gotten away from that and, in essence, gotten away from us, complaining about it isn't going to change anything. It's actually been happening for so long,
that's it's become instinct. But in a way, that's OK. The community doesn't belong to them, it belongs to those who actually want to be a part of it.

It was a fine dinner with very good food and the chance to socialize just a bit although a tent stacked with picnic tables affords little opportunity to mingle. And most of the evening is actually spent listening to Tom Green give some company background and recognize
a few folks who help the company sell their planes. Then there's a giveaway in which stuff donated by some businesses get a mention and a few builders get a free gift. It's a nice night.

But since I was in a "sort out this community thing" mode, I had put my anthropology hat on to see how Van's folks related to the community that we -- not they -- created, to see if maybe they want to be part of that.

They don't.

There were about 200 people there and all the Van's folks sat at a picnic table, together. If you run a business and you've put these sorts of things on, you know this is a huge no-no at events like this. Think about it, you've come all this way to sell some planes, you have a dinner for your customers, and then you and your employees sit with the same people they sit with every day. What they should do is get out and mingle. Sure, they've already sold their airplanes to you, but it's just good business sense to say "thank you" more than after that moment when the customer hands you a check.

It's a good way to stay "in touch" with homebuilding's roots and if you don't, you become like a politician who hasn't got a clue what a gallon of milk sells for, and then tries to legislate as if he does. Van's spoke for a few minutes and noted there are 550 RVs here, and then chewed us out in a good-natured sort of way for wanting flush rivets on the RV-12. OK, maybe we deserve that , but the words that I would've liked to have heard at some point were any combination of
"it's good to see you, again," "how have you been," and "thanks for being one of our customers." Those are the underpinnings of bonding, that lead to a true community.

Folks who've been to Oshkosh know, however, that there's a hierarchy here. Tom Poberezny is interested in -- not necessarily in this order -- the Ford Motor Company, John Deere, and anyone else who is (a) listed on the NYSE and (b) has got a wad of cash to give to him.
Fine, I get that. Good for him. But Tom Poberezny isn't really part of the homebuilt community either and asking him to change is like asking a newborn not to cry. I think Poberezny is a nice guy and having different priorities is not necessarily wrong and perhaps we've been unreasonable expecting him to understand what the homebuilt community is.

The best we can do is understand why EAA is what it is and not what it was and move on. On a smaller scale, perhaps the best we can do is understand Van's is this regard too. They sell airplanes. Period. Anything else that springs up from that isn't them, it's us.

The other part of last night that was telling was when Tom Greene was thanking his supporters and giving out prizes. First, he called a shoutout to Doug Reeves, who -- and let's be
perfectly clear here -- has done a lot for the RV community. He may understand better than anyone the importance of "community." A few minutes later, he was giving away a t-shirt from Rivetbangers.com. It's another online forum of RV builders.

He never heard of it and actually had a slight lilt of disdain -- well, we know how Van's feels about the Internet anyway -- for it.

So there it was. Green was Poberezny. Doug Reeves -- in the Van's hierarchy --was Ford Motor
Company, and Rivetbangers.com was guy sitting on a lawn chair in front of a pop-up in Camp Scholler.

That's not a community, at least not in the sense that I've discussed before.

And finally, the third element of my "anthropological" research were the builders I talked to last night who told me they stopped by the Van's tent to see if they knew where the Wednesday night BBQ was. Every person I talked to who did that said the same thing. They were told "I don't know anything about it," and one person said Tom Greene said he didn't think it was very well publicized so he didn't have much information about it.

OK, let's think about that one for a second. The BBQ was posted on Van's own Web site, it occupied almost half of one full page in the last RVator that Van's publicizes. It was on Doug Reeves' site, it was on the Yahoogroups site, it was on Rivetbangers, it was on the
RV-List, and it was in the RV Builder's Hotline, it was on the AirVenture Web site, and it was in not one, not two, but three separate e-mails to Van's inviting them to stop by, and confirmed by at least one employee who said he'd be sure to pass it along.

If you work for Van's and you have any interest at all in being part of a community, it was hard for the BBQ to escape their notice, but it did. Not wrong, just telling.

The one thing I notice in my "research" over the years, is people want -- desperately want -- a true sense of community. And that involves knowing some one as an acquaintance, and then a friend, and having no other vested interest other than that friendship.

I referred to the folks who were at the BBQ the other night as my "family." And in many ways -- many ways -- they are. When I come to Oshkosh, I come to spend time with my family. Everything else comes second. Family is funny like that.

And if you came to Oshkosh and you didn't stroll through Camp Scholler at some point and stop at a campsite -- anybody's camp site -- and meet a new friend, brother, you didn't really go to Oshkosh and you weren't really at AirVenture.

Friday July 28, 2006

The temperatures pushed well into the 90s today, but I headed out to the flight line area anyway, an area of red-hot blacktop. Good thing, though, because the Blue Angels flew by in an unscheduled appearance. They can’t perform here because the “box”, an area of safety around any air show, isn’t big enough. But six F-18s flying in close formation is impressive as all getout anyway. Number 7 has been here all week and joined them on their final pass.

I stopped by to check out the RV-12 airplane again – that’s the one that’ll be available under the new light-sport rules (price yet to be determined and availability “sometime next year” according to Tom Greene) at Van’s Aircraft and introduced myself to one of the volunteer workers there who noted that “a lot of people had a hard time finding the RV BBQ you had.”

This gets me. I had a Web site, Van’s ran a half page column on it in the last newsletter they sent out, it was on Doug Reeve’s excellent Web site, it was on the list of "type group" meetings on the official AirVenture site, it was on the Yahoogroups list, the RVers list, about 4 other bulletin boards, I sent out three individual e-mails, provided printable maps online and a step-by-step guide, and I even provided GPS coordinates accurate to 4 feet. It’s a good thing, I guess it wasn’t the navigation portion of a checkride for those folks.

I took one last look at the RV parking area and it had thinned out considerably from earlier in the week. In fact, the Van's tent was very quiet and there were a lot fewer people around than yesterday.

Here's what I think is the most talked-about RV here. It's one with an unbelievable paint job, which I'd bet ran $10,000 easily. The awards aren't out as I write this but I'll bet here is where we find out if it's true that judges for the EAA will deduct points if sheetmetal builders cover their rivets. This one didn't have a single rivet showing that I could see. Not one. Update: It did not win any awards. Here's the list.

But check out that paint job! It is a shimmering green that changes slightly depending on how you view it. As you can see, it has a poker theme to it with the dice images there. On the top of the wings, however, there are five cards (I'm not a poker player so I can't tell you what their significance is), and check the other picture. Using a mirror, there you can see that the cards' cover face is on the bottom of the wings. Unbelievable. Simply unbelievable. I am not worthy of showing my plane at Oshkosh.

I also looked at others and for some reason I focused on the trailing edge. I saw perfection. I saw nothing but perfection. (ed note: When I got home on Saturday, as this is being written, I looked at my trailing edge, which at the time I did it, I thought was real good. Again, I say, I am not worthy.)

I also saw Lauran Paine Jr.’s new RV-8. He’s a retired (I think) airline pilot and regular columnist for Sport Aviation magazine who built parts of it as he traveled around the country for his airline. He’d take a small part, work on it, add it to the other small parts, and one day there was only one part left so he stuck an engine and a propeller on it and there it was. OK, maybe it was a little more than that. A sign on it said “it’s not finished yet but it’s finished enough to get to Oshkosh.” He flew in from Spokane.

I could only last so long in the heat so I made my way to the EAA museum since it’s air conditioned and, besides, I haven’t spent anywhere near enough time there during Oshkosh weeks past. Lots of heroes of various stripes speak there during the week. And I’ve never heard a one of them.

Today I did.

A lot of folks who know me know I have a special spot for the Greatest Generation. Years ago I had the idea of writing a book with interviews of that generation, average people who went off and did special things, like saving the world, then went back home and resumed average lives as if it wasn’t nuthin’. I never did the book, but Tom Brokaw did. He’s famous now and I’m living in a tent in a field in the middle of Wisconsin dairy country. Life is funny like that.

Tex Hill was one of the Flying Tigers. The U.S. wasn’t in the war in China, so it gave money to the Chinese government, and the Chinese then hired a company here to employ and provide warbird pilots.

Let’s review how good the Flying Tigers were. Two-hundred-and-sixty-nine planes went over to China. Only four pilots died in aerial combat with the Japanese. “We were the first guys to defeat the Japs,” Hill noted. The Japanese had been bombing a city called Rangun in Burma when the Tigers, a highly mobile group, arrived. “That was my first experience with war,” he said. “When we landed there were dead people everywhere. The Japanese were bombing the city every day.”

The next day the Japanese bombers came back again. None of them made it back to their bases.

“I was in a dogfight with a guy and I lined him up and I was only a few feet away from him and I could see him and I shot him down,” he said, “and another guy from overhead was coming at me and he put 33 holes in my airplane, but I got around on him and I shot him down,” Hill said.

It was real flying back then. Here at Oshkosh the vendors are hawking fancy instruments with satellite maps that tell you where you are and where you’re going. “We had no navaids,” Hill said. “We had some maps but when they agreed with what was actually there, it was a coincidence. We didn’t get any good maps until we shot down some Japanese.” They navigated their way home by having several listening posts on the ground and as they made their way back from a mission, they’d fire their guns into the ground, and the “listeners” on the ground would hear it and tell them where they were. I’ll bet he could’ve found his way to the RV BBQ.

Back then, the “red Chinese” – as Hill still calls them – were fighting the nationalists, but joined together to fight a common enemy. “They saved an awful lot of our guys,” he said.

“They were such a friendly people. When we stopped that bombing, the people just loved us. And we loved them,” Hill said. On one raid, we got to a field with over 100 bombers and over 100 fighters on it. It was one of those raids where you either lose everybody or you don’t lose anybody. It had to be total surprise. We got right down on the deck, about 50-150 feet, and they hit this airport that was essential to the Japanese. They got 7 fighters off and I shot the first one down and the guy behind me got the other six. Not one guy got one bullet hole in his plane.”

“I don’t know how long I’m supposed to talk,” Hill then said. “As long as you want,” someone in the audience shouted.

Remember Pappy Boyington? The TV series “Black Sheep Squadron,” made him a hero. But not to Tex. “That’s like hitting me with a cattle prod,” he said when asked about him. “Unfortunately the guy had a drinking problem. When you’re drunk you’re not fit for duty. He only flew 6 combat missions while he was over there.”

I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that old Tex is a Republican. “I don’t think any president in this country has the burden this one has. Things are moving so fast,” he said, showing no concern for what we used to call political correctness when he addressed the Islamic movement. “Everywhere those people go, there’s problems. Even the moderates, if they embrace the Quran, there’s no room for anyone else.”

He’s an old man now, there’s not much voice left, and he had to be helped from a wheelchair up the steps to the small stage. When he sat down, 200 people stood up to give him a standing ovation, appearing to applaud not a man, but a generation.

It wasn’t nuthin’.

As my last evening at Oshkosh began, I complied with my tradition of having a steak dinner at IHop. OK, it's a tradition I just started this year. Then I grabbed a folding chair and headed down to Tom Gibbons' pop-up, which is parked right across the street from the big movie theater. This is really a great idea by the EAA, which has done a terrific job of providing night-time entertainment.

As I got near, I could see that actor Cliff Robertson was being interviewed prior to the movie being shown, which was 633 Squadron, in which he starred. It was an OK movie with some good aerial scenes but, just for the record, some dreadful faults. In one seen, a line of men are running for cover as a German fighter straifs them. The special effects had the bullets hitting the ground approaching the men and as they did, of course, the men died. Only in the movie, the guy in the front of the line running, throws up his hands and dies before the bullets reach them. But I digress.

I sat down with Tom,. who is newsletter editor for Chapter 54 in Lake Elmo, Minnesota, opened a beer, grabbed my free popcorn from Ford and settled in as the movie started and darkness settled.

At that point, about three people started walking up the road in our direction, moving very slowly and one appeared possibly drunk. Since they were in the middle of the road, a car behind them couldn't get around and its lights were shining in our eyes as we tried to watch the movie.

"C'mon, get the heck out of the road so the car can pass and we can watch the damn movie!" Tom shouted. The three sheepishly moved off the road and one -- the one who appeared drunk -- sat down next to us. It was Cliff Robertson and , no, he wasn't drunk; he was just old.

He stayed with us for about a half hour before leaving.

You just have to love Oshkosh.