Tom Wilson
Pumping avgas and waxing flight school airplanes got Tom into general aviation in 1973, but the lure of racing cars and motorcycles sent him down a motor journalism career heavy on engines and racing. Today he still writes for peanuts and flies for fun.
School, Pylon Style
Pilots interested in polishing pylons at the National Championship Air Races learn their trade at the Pylon Racing Seminar, or PRS as all the...
La Zoom!
Jeff LaVelle ushers out the first 25 years of Sport class racing and the Reno era at 400 mph.
Free Beer, a Radial and Save $1,000
Verner radial engines are popular these days and if you’ve been thinking of buying one there are a couple of things to know.
First, the...
Sport: Air Racing’s New Beginning
With the catastrophic elimination of Reno-Stead Airport as a racing venue this coming September, pylon air racing must once again reinvent itself.
This won’t be...
Going Overboard
Have you ever lost anything out of an airplane? Gravity being omnipresent—and apparently increasing annually according to an equally decrepit friend while digging post...
Commander Klutz and the Lost Planet Airmen
It’s a fair assumption most KITPLANES® readers were not big on essay writing in school, which at least left me with a job (I’m...
Being Assimilated
By dint of starting young and aging rapidly, I’ve been doing some of this stuff for a while now. By stuff, I mean flying...
51 Questions
The press of business being what it is, I recently found myself in bucolically superior British Columbia at Murphy Aircraft. The major result of...
In Case You Missed It
What’s New
Drill holes without a template using a transfer, get around an airport with a foldable mobility scooter, auto-darkening smart welding helmets are introduced, and relays can save your avionics.
Going Off-Plans
Going off-plans adds significant time to your project. Even small changes will add to your build time.
Straight Floats to Amphibs
Fed up with the restrictions of being able to land on water only, builder Mervin Zinck came up with a design to add retractable gear to his floats. By Don Ledger.