Pete advised that their Bocian VH-WOH had its first flight after refurbishment last weekend – congratulations!

Looks great guys!

To make sure ours won’t be too far behind being flyable again, we bit the bullet today and ripped the fabric off the rudder. The paint had become brittle and created fisheye cracks wherever it was “thumbed”.

The structure is in excellent condition, like brand new.

Tried to get an idea of delivery for new Polyfiber materials for both rudder and elevator from Aircraft Spruce in Melbourne and was told 90 days ex US. Will try and find a quicker alternative.

We also spent some time doing a few repair jobs, chiefly at the bottom of fin and rudder. We are using West system 206/105 epoxy for all glue jobs, with microballon filler as required.

We had a good chat about the paint job ahead. We intend to use the Norglass system comprising Norseal epoxy sealer, Shipshape high fill primer and Northane 2-pack polyurethane top coat.

Laurie wants to practice the spraying of the polyurethane on something other than KYU, and it so happens that I have a boat project on the go which needs, well, painting. He’ll be able to practice-paint about 10 m2 of plywood, and I’ll get a nice blue or white (maybe blue AND white) twin hull paddle boat out of it. How good is that!