Hi KR Team, N44774, a KR-2 retractable tail-dragger originally built by the great hands of Gary Garvin in New Hampshire took its First and Second Flights on Jan 17th at the Burnet, Texas Municipal Airport. (the Second flight is important)...
Gary originally finished it in 1986 but a balky 1835cc engine and family needs led to the sale. It switched hands 4 times before becoming mine in July 2014. I believe that at each change of owners, it suffered but Gary helped me get it back in shape and he coached me thru the work that I invested in it. I designed and built in a light belly-speed brake following some of your KR examples, added a second ignition - electronic from Great Plains, harness mods to the magneto from G3ignition (very good), 042 dual plug heads from Great Plains (after 2 fouled attempts from other suppliers), crafted my own dual port induction manifold using part of the single port manifold that Gary built, redid an antique revmaster carb (not finished here), added the nav/com, transponder, and ELT with 4 antennas inside the empannage (may not be done there) with a re-wire, installed David Witter's spare 52x46 prop (after my first one bit the 'dust'), added impromptu carb heat (after another owner removed the first one...), and re-sized Ebay stobe parts for top and bottom placement. (605 lbs empty-14.5 gal tank) After 3 flights last weekend totally 2.7 hours, it has a living log book. Perfectly balanced as built (every possible weight and balance condition was inside the conservative range). Very slick- level flight at 3000 agl full throttle at 2980 rpm was 155 mph with gear down (I need to work on the carb to get the top around 3400 and I know that the idle isn't right yet but I set it high at 1400 for the flights). The engine loosened up and gained rpm after those flights. I am very happy with the cooling in all areas, I am using Quaker State 10-30 DEFY semi-synthetic (API-SL) - not the same product by name as API-SN - both are on the shelves-- SL has high zinc & phosphorus, where SN doesn't. (API-SN is built to protect catalytic converters) also full synthetics can fail using LL100 fuel because synthetic oils are not compatible with leaded fuels- that why the semi-synthetic is good - especially since I set the compression ratio at 7.9 so unleaded 93 octane works well. Well I could chat forever, but I just wanted to say thanks to all of you for the archives and the active support from the KR Net. Cheers, Rene' Ffrench N44774 (flying now) Austin, Texas based at Spicewood airport 512-547-7164
