Several folks have emailed me that www.krgathering.org is up, and yes, I knew that. The link I was referring to that no longer works is www.flyboybob.com which is the link to his plane and pictures that Cheryl alluded to, and is the link on www.krnet.org that would get there until recently. The www.flyboybob.com domain expired in January, and was snapped up by somebody that's now willing to sell it (without the content) for $985. Below is the text from Bob's main KR page, gleaned from an archive site (sans photos and links) from a snapshot made in 2013. It gives a pretty good idea of the KR project we're talking about. Read details below. I'm working with Cheryl to get the original content off of Bob's web server, which is independent of the domain name, is where the content of his website resides, and where the domain name used to point. I'll save it to www.krnet.org when I get the contents. ------------------------------------------------------------ Performance: To help provide input to the various design trade offs that must be made in the project I develop a spread sheet to project aircraft performance given the many designer choices associated with building your own aircraft. The first worksheet describes the other pages in detail. Basically there are tables of data that are used to calculate aircraft performance and from these tables aircraft performance graphs are plotted. You can take a look if you have excel by clicking on this link: acperfrm.xls Requirements: The mission and performance characteristics of N52BL set the following aircraft system requirements: Turbo-charging, oxygen, autopilot, cruise prop, 1800 NM range plus reserves, eleven hour endurance, food and water supply, over water safety gear, relief tube, redundant navigation equipment capable of searching for closest available landing site along the planned route., Day/night IFR capability, heater, cabin CO sensor.
Description: N52BL is a plans built KR2 using a Great Plains 2600cc Type IV VW engine that I have inter-cooled and turbo-charged with a custom built AirResearch turbo-charger capable of sustaining rated power to FL250. N52BL uses the stock retractable landing gear in the tail-dragger configuration. The wing is built to plans dimensions except for substitution of the AS5046 airfoil section for it's improved cruise performance. A three axis electronically controlled trim system is employed that is integrated into an autopilot capable of heading and altitude hold with yaw damping. Flight Test: N52BL will have a formal flight test plan. That plan is currently under development. The draft plan is described in the Operational Documentation Manuals section under Flight Test. The flight test area is shown in sectional chart format as a twenty-five nautical mile radius from LZU, Gwinnet County, in Lawrenceville, GA. Objective: The objective of this project is to use my avocation for aviation to develop skills in managing extremely complex projects and balancing the difficult choices required to make progress in all areas of my life. Mission: The mission of N52BL is to set the single engine under 100HP record for a flight from Atlanta, Georgia, USA to Saint Thomas, USVI. This requires a range of 1755 sm. and an endurance of over 11 hours. Equipment List: The following list of equipment is mandated by the mission of N52BL: Autopilot, Turbocharged engine, Wing Tanks, IFR equipped, In Flight Adjustable Prop, Relief Tube, Three Axis Adjustable Trim. Oxygen, Over Water Emergency Equipment Performance: In order to develop the requirements for N52BL a spread sheet was designed that calculates performance across a wide range of airspeeds and altitudes. The spread sheet has a switch that determines if the engine is turbocharged or normally aspirated. The resulting data is graphed to provide: R/C, Angle of Climb, Power, Fuel Flow, Range, Glide Distance from Altitude, Lift over Drag, Endurance, Miles Per Gallon, Thrust Required vs Thrust Available vs Altitude, and a VN diagram. Download acperfrm.xls Design: N52BL is a plans built KR2 using the stock retract gear system, an AS5046 wing, and a Great Plains Aircraft Supply 2600cc VW type IV engine that is turbo-normalized. See more on this at https://web.archive.org/web/20100115012643/http://kr.flyboybob.com/index.html , a link to an archive of Bob's KR2 website, with links to subpages. Unfortunately the photos, spreadsheets and other links are dead. Mark Langford ML at N56ML.com website at http://www.N56ML.com --------------------------------------------------------
