Oshkosh 2004 - Page D

Friday, July 30, 2004: I made it to AirVenture 2004 a bit late in the day around 12 noon.  A very light rain had been falling this morning before I arrived and was ending as I made my way down from the entrance and headed for a class on "Fiberglass for RV's" to learn a bit about putting the windshield on my RV.  After that, I stopped by the Van's Aircraft booth to pick up a banquet ticket for Saturday night.  Then I went back to the RV parking area.  The first RV I saw was this one:

The big coincidence about this guy and his airplane:  This is William "Bill" Duffy from Cincinnati with a NEW RV-9A.  This time, he opted for the sliding canopy.  He has 42 hours on the Hobbs meter on this one.  Below is the plane he brought TWO YEARS AGO when I first came to make my decision about which Van's RV to build.   He sold it to make way for the new one above.

I made the rounds to visit several vendors.  I met the guys at Penn Yan Aero Services, the company building my engine.  I also bought a LIFT RESERVE INDICATOR from the same guy who sold the unit to Sam Buchanon at TVRVBG.   Tomorrow, I hope to meet with the folks from Garmin, Narco, Anywhere Map, and Engine Components, Inc.  I will get a full day in tomorrow and should have more pix for you all to see after I get back home to Tennessee.  I will be leaving OSH right after the banquet tomorrow night and should be back at home late Sunday evening. 

Saturday, July 31, 2004:  This was a better day weather-wise.  Sorry for the delay in posting, it is now August 5th as I post this to the web.  I had a chance to visit with Ron Drake late on Saturday evening, but did not take the picture of his airplane until Sunday when the sun was high in the sky.   Ron was one the folks bringing a NEW Van's RV to Oshkosh, but unlike the others, he got to park his plane at the center of all the activity -- right in front of the FLYING MAGAZINE tent at AeroShell Square.  He was one of the builders who submitted pictures of their airplanes for this honor.  Since Ron's paint scheme featured RED and WHITE, he was selected because the plane matched the tent colors used by FLYING at OSH.

And yes, there were a few other types of planes at OSH this year as you can see below.  This F-18 dropped by for a visit also at AeroShell Square.  Since the Lockheed C-5 Galaxy moved out Saturday night, there was plenty of room for more military visitors.

Just so you know that I was at the right airport, here is the traditional tourist sign and the "World's Busiest Control Tower" -- for one week at least.

I found this Mazda Rotary Engine-Powered RV-6 just down the flight line.   Note the addition of a dorsal fin in front of the vertical stabilizer and the NAVY BLUE paint used on World War II Navy fighter aircraft.  For those of you who may not recognize a dorsal fin, it is just to the LEFT of the registration number N6880R.   In case you can't read it, the URL on the cowling says www.atkinsrotary.com.

This is my picture of the main RV parking area.  There are a few other types of birds in here, but the area was dominated by Van's Aircraft models of all ages.   It was announced at the Van's banquet that evening that over 400 RV's were at OSH this year.

A departing RV pilot took these two shots on his way home from the air.   He is looking at this same parking area from REAR and the LEFT of the picture above and from a higher perspective of course.  I got these pix off the internet.

Note from February 23, 2006:  I was resizing and re-sampling a lot of photos on this web site today to reduce some file sizes on the web server.  When I got to this photo from 2004, I realized it is showing the home built camping area where I parked my airplane during my visit in 2005!

The best shot taken of Oshkosh was from an even higher perspective -- from Earth orbit!  Can you see the RED tent near the center of the picture?  North is UP in this photo.  Look at the north/south runway, then find the large taxiway heading to the LEFT in this photo.  The red tent is between the first TWO of four identical hangars as you move away from the runway.  These four hangars are used for indoor exhibitor booth space.  The satellite photo was not taken on the same day as the photo above.  You can however make out the big mound of dirt with the other RED tent in the next block north of the four exhibit hangars A, B, C, and D down by the main taxiway to AeroShell Square.