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Just one more

By General Aviation News Staff · January 28, 2024 ·

By DENNIS KIRKWOOD

I had to build just one more…

At the age of 77 I thought I was done building airplanes, but when COVID hit I couldn’t see myself sitting around the house for who knows how long looking for things to do.

With that I started searching for a new project.

I had already built five airplanes, so it made sense to find another airplane project.

Since my father, Robert, was high school buddies with Morry Hummel in Bryan, Ohio, I thought it would be fitting to build Morry’s last design — a Hummel UltraCruiser, to honor both of them.

Both my father and Morry were huge influences on my love of aviation. We started with homemade kites when I was about 8 and soon moved on to scratch built model airplanes.

Excerpts from Robert Kirkwood’s 1934 high school yearbook.

Morry made several trips over the years in his Hummel Bird from Bryan, Ohio, to Brighton Airport (45G) in Michigan to have lunch with my father and me. I was totally impressed that you could build your own airplane and fly it to another state.

While this was my last project, it was my first with a partner.

There was a new pilot at our airport, Brandon Burnett, who had expressed an interest in building. So, we talked, and decided to build the UltraCruiser as a team.

Why not, I thought. I had all the tools and build knowledge, and we could build it for half the cost in about half the time. It would also give Brandon a chance to try his hand at aircraft building.

The outcome was perfect. We minimized our COVID exposure for the better part of a year, Brandon learned a lot about aircraft building, we both saved 50% on the cost of the project, and now we have a snappy looking little aircraft that only burns about 2 gallons an hour in flight.

The ultimate bonus for me was that I was able to pay tribute to both Morry Hummel and my father.

All done, the plane rests in the hangar.

And so it begins…

I am fortunate enough to have a very large basement with an 8-foot sliding door that is a walk out to my back yard. The slider provides for a 7 foot, 8 inch opening when the doors are removed, which makes it easy to bring sizable projects in and out of the basement. Somehow, I think I knew this when I built the house!

This basement has been the home to three of my aircraft projects, the largest being an RV-6A.

For those of you who have ever built an airplane you can imagine the benefit of having your temporary hangar in the basement of your house. This set-up can shorten a project’s time by as much as 50%. No trips to a cold hangar that needs to be warmed up to work or cooled down because the outside temperature is in the 90s. No running back to the house to get a tool you need to finish up what you are working on. No calling it a day and closing up shop because you have things to do at home.

The UltraCruiser design is a derivative of Morry Hummel’s Hummelbird, which in turn was a derivative of Calvin Parker’s 1969 Teenie Two design that was featured in Popular Mechanics back in the early 1970s, so the basic design has been around for more than 50 years.

This type of progression lends itself to the availability of a pretty good set of plans vs one-off designs, and the Cruiser comes with a very nice plan set.

The UltraCruiser can be purchased as plans-only, partial kit, or full parts kit. We decided to go with a full parts kit.

On With The Build

The UltraCruiser kit is well laid out and very easy to construct. You start at the aft end of the fuselage and work your way forward, building five successive fuselage sections. Each assembly/section is comprised of a single bulkhead and its associates wrap around skin. You simply move forward section by section until you reach the firewall.

The UltraCruiser kit is well laid out and very easy to construct.

All the assemblies are match drilled to accept 1/8-inch clecos, which provides for perfect alignment and quick assembly. If you can follow a plan and pull a blind rivet, you can build this airplane.

The first three fuselage sections with two more to go. As everything is pre-drilled and, therefore, pre-aligned, there is no requirement to construct alignment jigs when building the UltraCruiser…a big timesaver!
The final two fuselage sections are built with top and bottom skins rather than a single wrap around skin. This process is actually a little easier than having to wrap a single skin around a bulkhead.
A self-leveling laser with both a horizontal and vertical beam is the best way to align the tail feathers and wing sections on an airplane. The Bosch laser I have is a relatively inexpensive tool that proves to be invaluable in heading off bothersome trim issues when it comes time to maiden the aircraft. The Cruiser was no exception…it flew hands off from day one with no requirement for trim tabs.
The motor box being constructed…everything at and forward of the firewall is assembled using 1/8 inch Stainless Steel rivets. This is a high vibration area and Stainless Steel rivets are used for added strength. On the average a 1/8 inch Stainless Steel blind rivet has about twice the holding power (both in shear and tension) as a 1/8 inch Steel Shank Aluminum rivet.
I found it very helpful to mount a simple hand winch above the work area…notice the blue strap around the front of the fuselage that leads up to a winch above. This set-up helped in the positioning of the aircraft during different stages of construction. You can also rotate the project as needed, so it is easier to get to those hard-to-reach areas when riveting.
Bottom skins being fitted to the center wing section…there’s the hand winch coming in handy once again. At this point the wing shins are predrilled and the builder needs to draw an alignment line centered on the rib flanges, which is used to center the rib while being drilled out for 1/8 inch rivet. This is the only part of the project where a lot of drilling is required.

The wing spar comes completely assembled, aligned and match drilled for your specific kit from Hummel Aircraft.

This includes setting of the wing dihedral and is a huge savings of time and effort on the project. If you are building an UltraCruiser from plans only, this is not the case.

Here is the project starting to look like a real airplane. The aluminum skins on the Cruiser are only 14-thousands thick aluminum, which I am told is too thin to be alclad coated, so we tried to polish the skins as we were building to keep the project looking good, plus it helped to motivate us towards its completion.

The thin aluminum skin tends to dimple slightly when riveting and there is no way around this. It is simply the nature of the beast, when using thin skins to save on weight. If you want an all metal Ultralight, this is a concession you will have to accept.

The UltraCruiser is powered by a 37-hp (½) Volkswagen engine.

The engine bolts in place with four bolts and lord mounts. Our engine is a 37-hp (½) Volkswagen built by Hummel Engines. The engine weighs in at 80 pounds, including everything except fluids.

If you want to make the ultralight weight limit of 254 pounds, you need to keep the engine at 37 hp and forgo the customary dual plugs and ignition setups and a few other things like electric start…it’s just the price you have to pay.

Also, if you are thinking about building a Cruiser or the H5 Experimental, the current wait time for an engine is over a year. Ours took 10 months and we ended up waiting on the engine to complete the project.

This is Taz, my full-time helper, who helped me when my partner wasn’t around. He wasn’t too good with a rivet gun but was quite good at reading plans, especially turning the pages. He was with me for 18 years and three airplane projects, but unfortunately has gone west.

The Move

The work at home is done and we are off to the hangar for project completion.
Finally at the hangar. All that’s needed now is about 45 minutes for final assembly and several hours of engine ground testing before the maiden flight.

Time to Fly

My partner Brandon Burnett priming the engine for me while getting ready for a late afternoon flight.
First flight for the UltraCruiser was Sept. 17, 2022.
Back in the hangar after the maiden flight.

This is a really nice airplane. It may be an ultralight, but it flies like the real thing… I refer to it as the Little Plane That Could.

For more information: HummelAircraft.com

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Comments

  1. Kay Stecklum says

    November 30, 2024 at 1:41 am

    Nice, Job! Congratulations! your pics are very valueable for me as I am building an Ultracruiser too. It’s a scatch build project in Germany and after years of preparing the components i am about to rivet all together. would love to see more from you guys.

  2. Mária Zulick Nucci says

    February 3, 2024 at 7:48 am

    Congratulations, Dennis; your dedication paid off. Sorry for your loss of Taz (I’m a Cat Mom), but his 18 years were a good long life well lived, and he has been promoted from helper to co-pilot.

  3. Randee Laskewitz says

    February 3, 2024 at 7:41 am

    Great article. Beautiful little airplane.

    • Jon Devlin says

      February 3, 2024 at 4:32 pm

      Hello Dennis from Brisbane, Australia… I just wish we had a reason to build a basement like yours here! Make the door even bigger for bigger aircraft.

  4. Dave says

    February 3, 2024 at 7:31 am

    Looks a little like an oversize Piper Skycycle !

  5. Chris Hiatt says

    February 3, 2024 at 5:11 am

    What a fantastic read and thank you for paying it forward. Absolutely beautiful bird.

  6. Daryl Austermiller says

    January 29, 2024 at 8:25 am

    Fantastic Article – Very inspirational and motivating for new builders – and I had to pause and shed a tear that for you losing Taz. Thanks and God Bless !

  7. Brandon Burnett says

    January 28, 2024 at 4:49 pm

    Great Job Dennis,
    It’s been a pleasure building and flying with you.
    You inspired me to become a tailwheel pilot!

    • Glenn Swiatek says

      January 29, 2024 at 7:40 am

      Very Impressive. Take great care of that fabulous aircraft.

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