Call him the George Costanza of EAA AirVenture Oshkosh 2024. Randy Rettler, EAA 1030161, may not wear oven mitts to protect his hands like George did in “The Puffy Shirt,” the 1993 episode of the NBC sitcom Seinfeld, but he does have experience as a hand model, specifically as one for an EAA advertisement for SportAir Workshops. Now, after utilizing the knowledge he gained at a couple SportAir Workshops sessions and a dozen years of building, he has his own airplane — a pristine Van’s RV-9A.
An engineer by trade, Randy was building houses in the mid-2000s when the housing market collapsed and he found himself with little to do. Fifty years old at the time, Randy asked his wife Maggie if she minded if he went out and earned his pilot certificate. Certificate in hand, Randy started looking for an airplane.
“We started looking at Cessnas and other certified stuff,” Randy said. “I probably looked at 50 planes and they were all from the 1970s. They all needed a ton of work, most of which I couldn’t do because I’m not a certified mechanic. At some point the light went on that experimental is the route I got to go, build it myself.”
Deciding on the RV-9A because he wanted a cross-country-capable airplane as well as side-by-side seating, Randy, despite his engineering background, knew he needed to learn a lot before diving into the build. That’s when he decided to attend an EAA SportAir Workshop focused on sheet metal, where his hands were photographed and later became the “face” of future SportAir Workshop ads.
“I never saw him take the picture,” Randy explained. “[EAA] ran it for years, but maybe not anymore. It’s old. I was embarrassed because obviously that’s not how dimple dies are used. They’re typically in a squeezer. … I looked at that for several months and I didn’t know it was my hand.”
In addition to the sheet metal class, Randy also completed a SportAir Workshop session on electrical systems. Those experiences helped him complete his RV over the past 12 years.
“PowerPoint presentations really don’t click with me too much before I get my hands in there, and that’s what I call shadowboxing,” he said. “‘Oh, that’s how these things work.’ That works for me. … That kit’s sitting at home in a really expensive box, and you don’t want to mess it up if you don’t have to. So why not spend the weekend going to a class that’s going to give you some skills?”
In November 2023, Randy flew his completed airplane for the first time and just finished Phase I testing earlier this spring. Randy arrived in Oshkosh on Saturday morning. You can find his beautiful RV-9A in the Homebuilts area.