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The prop finally arrived today. What a relief. I was told late on Friday that Customs had finally released it, but this saga has taken so many strange turns that I wasn’t really sure that it was true.

The prop was supposed to be picked up yesterday, and I had asked for it to go to the Day and Ross depot, to be held for my pickup. But, that was the info I had given them a week ago today, when I had understood that they could pick it up on Wednesday. That plan fell apart, and the pickup was placed on hold. Today I was planned to drive to Kanata, a suburb west of the Ottawa core, for a day of meetings with CMC Electronics. The city bus drivers are on strike, which has really fouled up rush hour traffic, so the meeting was scheduled to start at 10 AM, to allow people to do an off-peak drive. I was having a quiet coffee at home at 8:15, working on work e-mail, when the door bell rang. I looked out the window, and saw a Day and Ross 18-wheeler at the end of the driveway. Somehow the “hold for pickup” bit had fallen through the cracks, and the prop came straight to the house. Fortunately I was at home - on any normal day both Terry and I would have already been at work.

There was a foot long puncture mark in the box, which the driver kindly pointed out, suggesting that I open the box before signing for delivery. But, the puncture mark was no where near any of the prop blades, and everything inside looks perfect. I’ll leave it in the garage over Christmas, and drag it out to the hangar sometime in early January.

The prop came with a custom fibreglas spinner - very nice.

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The MT prop shipping has turned into a classic Customs nightmare. The prop was supposed to be shipped to Ottawa, and I intended to handle the Customs clearance myself, as I did for the original Hartzell prop. The process was quite simple - I picked up the paperwork that came with the prop, then went to Customs, handed them the paperwork, paid the sales taxes, then took the Customs clearance paperwork back to the warehouse, and they gave me the prop.

I know that the North American distributor told MT to ship the prop to Ottawa, as that note is on the invoice that I got from MT. But, for some reason, the prop ended up going to Toronto, and with Toronto as the final destination. It was supposed to arrive the week of 1 Dec, but the shipping got delayed, and it arrived on the weekend of 6-7 Dec, in Toronto. Fortunately, I was scheduled to be in Toronto for three days of meetings on 9-11 Dec, and the Customs office at the airport is open 24 hours a day. The agent for the international receiving warehouse faxed me all the paperwork, then phoned in a panic to tell me that there was an error, and they would fax it again, with the correction. I marked the first fax as being in error, and took the second pile of paper to Customs on the evening of 9 Dec. The Customs officer was very friendly, very helpful, and extremely cute. Things were looking good. I paid the sales taxes, and got the magic piece of paper with the Customs Release stamp.

Wednesday morning I couriered the Customs paperwork to the warehouse, and arranged a truck to ship the prop to Ottawa (the North American distributor agreed to pay the trucking costs, as I had paid for shipping all the way to Ottawa). Then, in the afternoon, everything blew up. I got a phone call from the warehouse agent, very angry, saying that I had given the first fax to Customs, and the Customs agent at the warehouse had refused to release the prop, due to the error on the form. It turned out that the last page in the second fax was a repeat of the incorrect info from the first fax, and that was the page that Customs had stamped to give me the release. It took two days to sort out that mess - I finally got a phone call late on Friday saying that the paperwork was sorted out, and that Customs had released the prop, and that the trucking company would pick it up on Monday. I’m keeping my fingers crossed until I get confirmation that it is actually here in Ottawa.

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The engine arrived at the Day and Ross depot on the weekend, so I picked it up late this afternoon. There were no signs of distress on the crate from the accident that the trailer was in. When I got the engine to the hangar, and popped the top off the crate, everything looked just fine.

Sharp visitors may note that the engine is now a slightly different shade of red. Originally, I asked Aerosport Power to paint it a VW Mars Red, as that red is close to the red in the Golden Hawks paint scheme. But, later, I saw what their standard red looked, like, and it is equally acceptable. When I pulled the baffles off the engine, some of the original paint came off in large areas, so Aerosport repainted it at no charge. They asked if they could use their standard red colour, and I agreed.

I am very happy to have the engine back in Smiths Falls, but won’t be completely comfortable until the prop has arrived too. The prop is currently sitting in a warehouse in Toronto, waiting for Customs release. There was quite a screw up with the prop shipping. I had very specific written communications with the North American agent for MT prop who I bought the prop from. He agreed that the prop would be shipped to a depot in Ottawa. But, somehow the folks who shipped the prop from Germany thought that getting it to Toronto was close enough, and they made no provisions for onward shipping from Toronto to Ottawa. I called the North American agent this afternoon, and he agreed to reimburse my costs to have the prop trucked from Toronto to Ottawa. I will be in Toronto for meetings the next three days, so tomorrow evening I will go to the Canada Customs facility at the airport to give them their pound of flesh (and two pounds of paper and a big wad of cash) so they will release it.

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Sorting out the details of the expected arrival of the engine and prop are driving me crazy. I hadn’t planned it this way, but the scheduled arrival dates for both the engine and prop were on the same day, and in a very busy week. Plus I needed to pre-position an engine hoist at the hangar, so I would be able to get the engine crate out of the back of the pickup truck I would borrow. It quickly become like one of those classical puzzles where you have a dog, cat, and a mouse to get across a river, and only a small boat that won’t fit everyone at once.

I expended a lot of mental energy coming up with a plan of how I would make this all work, then it all blew up in slow motion. First, the pickup truck I planned to borrow needed unplanned maintenance, so it was in the shop for several days, and I couldn't use it to pre-position the engine hoist. Then, yesterday, I learned that rather than coming direct to Ottawa as I had thought, the prop was going to go via Toronto, arriving there today. This was important, because it would slow the arrival in Ottawa down by at least a day, and could foul up my plan to handle the Customs paperwork myself. I still don’t know if I will need to hire a Customs broker, and pay them several hundred dollars to do 20 minutes of work. I did the Customs stuff myself when the original prop arrived in Ottawa - it was very fast and simple.

Then, this morning, I called the trucking company with the tracking number to get an update on the engine, as I expected it should arrive today. They told me that the truck and trailer that have the engine were involved in an accident near Thunder Bay, Ontario. They couldn’t tell me anything about the status of the stuff that was in the trailer, or what the new arrival date. I got a message from them late in the day that the goods in the trailer were OK, and that they would arrive in Toronto on Friday, and then onward to Ottawa sometime after that. I hope the engine will be ready for pickup on Monday. I’ll be on the road Tuesday through Thursday, so I hope to get all this stuff sorted out before then.

Today, after work, I borrowed the pickup truck, drove to RV-9A builder Phil’s place to pickup another builder’s engine hoist (thanks Mike), and took it to the hangar.

I will be very, very glad when all this stuff is finally safely in the hangar.

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I was on the road almost all week, leaving Saturday evening, and getting back on Thursday. Flew all night Saturday night, two nights in London and two nights in Cologne. It was a good chance to compare British vs German beer. For the record, while I do enjoy German beer, the English ales came out on top in the evaluations. I especially liked the Old Speckled Hen. This week I will be in town all week, which will be a nice break after three weeks on the road.

The engine left Aerosport Power on Friday, and is on its way back to me. I expect it should arrive in Ottawa late this week, but it could be next week before I can pick it up. The prop should ship from MT in Germany sometime in the next two weeks, according to the last update I got. I plan to order the prop governor tomorrow - the group buy has now gathered enough buyers to get the best price offered.

Today I spent the afternoon at the hangar. First I spent 35 minutes shoveling the snow off the hangar lead in. I don’t need to have that area clear until January, but I know that if we don’t keep ahead of the snow, it will become hard packed and be very, very difficult to clear later.

After I got my exercise clearing the snow, I removed the throttle cable. It had received some heat damage during the first flight, before I realized that I needed a heat shield to protect it. I figured this was the best time to replace it, as I have better access to the firewall with the engine out of the way, and the aircraft is grounded anyway, so maintenance down time doesn’t cost me a flight. Getting the old cable out wasn’t too bad a job, but getting the new one threaded through the landing gear box was fun. And we won’t even talk about getting the pin back in through the cable clevis and throttle arm, or the extreme fun of getting the cotter pin bent. I still have a bit more work to do to finish the job, but I have completed all the really tricky parts, I think.

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The engine arrived at Aerosport Power about 10 days ago, and was disassembled last week. I just got word today that it was inspected, and no internal damage was found. Woo Hoo!! Great News!