Paul Dye
Paul Dye, KITPLANES® Editor at Large, retired as a Lead Flight Director for NASA’s Human Space Flight program, with 50 years of aerospace experience on everything from Cubs to the Space Shuttle. An avid homebuilder, he began flying and working on airplanes as a teen and has experience with a wide range of construction techniques and materials. He flies an RV-8 and SubSonex jet that he built, an RV-3 that he built with his pilot wife, as well as a Dream Tundra and an electric Xenos motorglider they completed. Currently, they are building an F1 Rocket. A commercially licensed pilot, he has logged over 6000 hours in many different types of aircraft and is an A&P, FAA DAR, EAA Tech Counselor and Flight Advisor; he was formerly a member of the Homebuilder’s Council. He consults and collaborates in aerospace operations and flight-testing projects across the country.
Light and Capable
There are so many ways to try to keep the weight down in a homebuilt project, but some are better than others.
Restoring the RV-1
The very first Van’s prototype flies again, thanks to months of volunteers’ hard work, and its designer climbs back into the cockpit, some five decades after he built it.
Build It Better: Show Me the Data!
Don’t believe everything you hear when making an important building or maintenance decision—do your homework.
When Good Electrons Go Bad
When wiring up a homebuilt aircraft, it pays to ask: What do I want to protect myself from?
Build It Better: Where’s Your Margin?
How can you give yourself that margin of safety that you hope you'll never need?
Anatomy of a Modification
Paul Dye takes readers through a rework of his RV-3's fuel system to illustrate why some mods are a sound choice.
Simplicity
Countless modifications for homebuilts are available, but does that mean they're right for our projects? Paul Dye discusses the value of keeping things simple.
A Tale of Two Kits
What a difference a few years make. Paul Dye discusses the evolution of kits, using the two he built (Van’s RV-8 and RV-3) as examples.
Build It Better: When 1+1 Does Not Equal 2
Paul Dye explains how to achieve unlike (or dissimilar) redundancy on the various systems in your homebuilt.
Free Flight
Acknowledging risk and taking steps to minimize it are safer than denying that it exists.
In Case You Missed It
What’s New
Among the news items this month are the announcement of extended-range fuel tanks for the Arion Aircraft Lightning, a flight bag thats customized for RV aircraft, a light-aircraft jack and a new transceiver from Microair Avionics of Australia.
Remember When: The BD-5 Micro
The BD-5's reputation precedes it: long in development, company bankruptcy, investor losses, challenging to fly, early accidents. With an introduction like that, who would think this micro plane would be such a positively straightforward blast to fly?
Letters: September 2019
Building and Selling
Two articles in the June edition really hit home for me: “How...
Alternative Energy Projects
This month I’m taking a step back from doing the usual aircraft-related project to...