By Ted Myers, EAA 1303323
This piece originally ran in the What Our Members Are Building/Restoring section in the March 2020 issue of EAA Sport Aviation magazine.
Richard Kampeter, EAA Lifetime 1128617, began constructing his Kitfox approximately four years ago. He performed a lot of the build himself, including installing the landing gear, airfoils in the tail, and most of the tedious portions of construction. At that point, he asked me and a mutual friend of ours, Chris Gilmore, EAA 1220931, to assist in finishing the build.
Richard had already decided that he wanted to build it to be the first Kitfox with the Rotec R3600 radial nine-cylinder engine with an IvoProp constant-speed propeller. He also wanted to have the Garmin G3X Touch avionics suite with a two-axis autopilot. So, with that in mind, the three of us began to work together to make it happen.
About a year into the build, we moved the kit from Richard’s home garage to a suitable workspace at our local airport in Jefferson City, Missouri, and our team got to work to finish out the build. Chris worked many long, hard hours on the fiberglass for the airplane because there was not a bump cowling to fit on the nine-cylinder radial that we knew of at the time. Chris took three pieces of the seven-cylinder cowling from the Kitfox and cut it down into sections of two bump pieces and glassed them back together to create the bump cowling that you see on the airplane today. Along with that, we all agreed the landing light lenses on the wingtips could use a revamp. I engineered a modification to the landing light lens to give it a more streamlined look without taking away from the lighting ability. Chris executed the design with his fiberglass work.
I finalized the install of the Garmin avionics to include dual 10-inch monitors for the G3X Touch, along with a full ADS-B In and Out GTX 345R transponder, a remote audio panel with powered plugs to support Bose ANR headsets, and an angle-of-attack indicator as well as the two-axis autopilot. I also installed the J.P. Instruments nine-cylinder engine monitor designed for large radial engines and was able to retrofit the sensors to work on our Rotec engine to give us data ranging from EGT, CHT of individual cylinders, horsepower used percentage, manifold pressure, tach, oil temperatures and pressures to fuel flow, and almost any other data you would want to know about your engine in operation.
Together we worked to cover the airplane, and I began to prep for paint. Richard loved the paint scheme Kitfox had used on an airplane it had built with a Rotec seven-cylinder engine and asked me to replicate it. Using the Poly Fiber covering system, I showed Richard the supplied color card and asked him which shades he wanted. His response was “the blackest black, whitest white, and the yellowest yellow.” Thanks to that, controllers say they never have a problem seeing the airplane on its way into the airspace.
Building the airplane was a tremendous challenge for us to engineer the new installs, learn fabric covering, and for me to learn how to paint. But it was worth every minute of it. I enjoyed the build so much that my wife and I are now trying to find the next person to help in the building of their kit.
Building the kit was one of the most gratifying things I have had the privilege to be a part of, and given the chance would love to be able to do it again. All of our families were involved in the build in various ways — from sacrificing their time with us, to my wife covering the glare shield while my son and daughter spent time wiping the dust off the airplane.
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