RV-4 build log: Visit to Praha, Czech Republic

Monday, October 20, 2008

Visit to Praha, Czech Republic

In June we (Olaug and I) visited Praha, or Prague, in the Czech Republic. One morning we went to Kbely Aviation museum just outside the city center. It is a very interresting museum with lots of very rare aircrafts (several one offs in the entire world), but it is also very crowded with aircrafts, making it difficult to take pictures.

I have includes a few pictures here. One geared radial Walter Mira II-R (95 HP). A few very nice light aircrafts from Zlin. The only two seat Me-109 in the world today (Me 109G-14). An Me-262. One La-7, probably the best Russian WWII fighter. One Yak-17 (the resemblence to the Focke-Wulf Ta-183 and Me P1101 prototypes is rather striking).

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Why?

For some reason people very seldom ask why I want to build an airplane, but they very often ask where. When I tell them, they immediately ask how I am going to get it out of there when it's finished...

Anyway, the real question to answer is probably why an RV-4 instead of some other plane. You just don't wake up one morning and say, "aha, it has to be an RV-4". Well, that was exactly what happened to me. I have always wanted to build real airplanes. I have looked at lots of kits, tried several finished ones, made large excel sheets, on and off for several years. Then I woke up one Saturday morning, everything was crystal clear, and the order for an RV-4 was sent to Van's before 10 AM the same day.

In hindsight, things like value, performance and so on can be brought up, and the RV-4 will come out among the best. But the truth is that some things in life has very little to do with logics and excel sheets.