The July chapter meeting was a quick 15 minutes.
With many chapter members headed to Oshkosh for the week, the third Saturday's breakfast was canceled as was the board meeting.
VMC and IMC Club
Kent Lynch reports on the recent activities of the IMC Club:
On Sunday, July 14, eight members of the St. Louis IMC Club flew up to join us for our monthly meeting. Nine members of our club met them for dinner and conversation at Avanti's, then attended our meeting at the EAA hangar. Bill Lane, with help from Terry Moushon, discussed their trip to Alabama, and the weather challenges they encountered. Carl Wilbur presented a discussion of his trips to Mackinac Island and Rapid City. He also presented a video from AOPA on an accident that occurred after encountering a rapidly moving thunderstorm. That information was very appropriate as a thunderstorm was developing south of Peoria that required the departing St. Louis members to deviate to the west to return to their home bases. An email was received from their coordinator indicating that they enjoyed having the meeting in an EAA clubhouse, rather than the FBO at their airport. They expressed interest in continuing the relationship and invited us to attend their meeting.
After the departure of the St. Louis group, our club discussed developing a strategy to provide monthly materials that were targeted at meeting the expectations of the group. The August meeting (Sunday, August 11) will continue that discussion.
Morrie, the VMC Club organizer, has a new flight scenario from Pilot Workshops for this month: "Low Volts Over Eugene. There’s nothing like an alternator failure at night."
He also sent along information on the FAA's updated Runway Safety Simulator. The FAA's blurb has more than its fair share of exclamation marks:
Based on your feedback, we are happy to announce the release of an enhanced Runway Safety Pilot Simulator!
Amongst other changes recommended by users of the previous edition, this site is now compatible with mobile devices! Check out our new 3-D animation, "Use The Airport Diagram," based on a real-life scenario about a pilot who opted not to use an Airport Diagram during taxi. We're excited to use this scenario as the start of an ongoing animation library. The library will house animated, real-life (de-identified) events that will enhance your learning experience. We'll keep you posted as more animations are added to the library, and as we continue to make upgrades based on your valuable feedback.
Check out the Runway Safety Simulator today! Don’t forget to build it into your CFI kit for Private & Commercial training, as well as Flight Reviews!
Youth Programs
Jayson Presley and his Ray Scholarship award was mentioned on the Journal Star web site. The paper was kind enough to include a link to our chapter web site. Jayson provided an update:
I have yet to solo but I have been working on lots of book work and plan on taking my written this coming week. I recently went up to Oshkosh and got to meet other Ray Scholars and ask them how their training has been. All the scholars were motivating each other to keep working hard and get all their requirements finished as soon as possible.
Treasury
There are 67 paid memberships. Donations are up from last year. Al Phipps donated an older airplane kit, and it was sold to a fellow in Colorado in need of the parts. The Ray Scholarship funds are being disbursed to Allmond Aviation. The B-17 stop brought in slightly over $4,000 to the chapter. About half of the recent income will be placed into the "endowment" fund. The budget is about in balance for the year and thus on track, and this doesn't include the recent donations and B-17 income.
Hangar
Member Bill Hounshell has donated a collection of several hundred books on aviation and included book cases for them. These can be found in the hangar along the east wall. A PDF catalog is found here.
Members
Welcome new members William Krokos, Charlie Cafaro, and Dave Montgomery.
On July 16 Steve Jones' RV-14A took to the air for its first flight, with chapter Tech Counselor Terry Moushon on hand. Congratulations to Steve.
He might want to lower that seat cushion some.
July 21 was a pleasant surprise for Kip and Karl Kleimenhagen in the build of their metal wing RANS S-20. They decided to assemble the control column, and for the first time, all the pieces were well formed and fit together properly and the instructions were correct. The following week a similar miracle occurred with the flap handle assembly. The same month the remaining wing ribs were also deburred and straightened and construction of the "rotisserie" for the fuselage was begun. Their new goal is to have the fuselage ready for covering next spring.
Christian Sloat, the Caterpillar summer intern who attended a previous chapter meeting, will be returning to school in August and offered these thoughts on his time with 563:
Originally from Eastern Pennsylvania, being in the middle of Illinois for my summer internship was definitely an interesting change of pace. With three times more farmland than city space, I thought it was going to take a while to adjust to the area and learn my way around, let alone meet new people. I started off here not knowing a soul, with the exception of the coworkers I was in contact with on a daily basis and after work, and afterward, I oftentimes found myself just hanging out at my apartment. It wasn't until I was reading through one of the flying handbooks that I brought with me when I remembered my EAA membership, which just so happened to be complimentary to the Airventure tickets I had purchased months earlier. Browsing through their website, I stumbled upon the information for the local EAA Chapter 563. I discovered their monthly meetings and decided what the heck, I'll stop by and give it a whirl. When I first popped my head in at the hangar, I was instantly met with overwhelming hospitality, including a home-cooked breakfast! What more could you ask for?
I'm extremely thankful for all the friends I've made here in the chapter and for the lengths that they've gone to get me airborne. With their help, I've experienced much more than I ever thought possible in such a short summer. I'm fairly new to the world of aviation, but never the less, it is an interest of mine that has grown immensely throughout the summer thanks to the gang here. Not only have I been learning about planes on the ground, but I've been going flying about every other week in a little ol' 1941 Aeronca, which is like nothing else I've ever flown in. It is astonishing to be flying so low and slow, taking the world in like I never have before. The awe is not just due to the beautiful scenery at 1500 ft, but also due to feeling as if you're one with the plane by observing every input of the controls, feeling the wind subtly push the plane around, and feeling the air rush past me with the windows open. This is something incredible which you'll never experience by flying in a commercial airline and I love every second of it.
Like I said before, I'm extremely thankful to the members of EAA Chapter 563 who took me in for the summer and opened up possibilities which I never expected. I'll be sad to head back home come August, yet I know I've made some life-long friends and the experiences I've had with them and the knowledge they've shared will stick with me forever. Now more than ever I am excited to start my pilot training and I hope that one day I will be able to have the same impact on someone as everyone in the Chapter has had on me.
Kudos to Scot Decker and his Aeronca: There's another convert to Low and Slow.
Airport
3MY
The 3MY Open House was poorly attended. Besides 563, IDOT, the Guard, SIU's aviation school, and Allmond Aviation set up tables. A local radio station broadcast an invitation from the FBO grounds and kept a booth for the first two hours. A local TV station arrived late and interviewed the head of PIA and our own Morrie Caudill, but neither made it to the air. Their write up can be found here.
At our table, a few back issues of Sport Aviation with chapter fliers were handed out to youngsters. Morrie brought his Onex to the line up and talked with a few families about his airplane. Scot Decker brought to the line his Aeronca and an uncovered Aeronca fuselage he has, and he talked with some of the few families who showed up.
