N195AK Construction Log

I am going to school with Garrett.... he sent me the link to your site. I am envious of the workshop. Top Notch!!

Thanks... Garrett and I went to school together years ago. I've been working on the shop for over 3 years now... so glad to be getting close to finished! It's an enourmous task to tackle by yourself. Sort of like building your own airplane I guess. Keeps me out of trouble!

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Just wanted to say I envy you! Your shop looks great and I hope thatypur planes turns out wel too.

Good Luck

Thanks Dennis, the shop has been an enoumous undertaking... considering that I'm a computer professional, and not a contractor by trade. I did spend 10 years working on aircraft in the military, so I'm confident that the aircraft will display a much higher level of craftsmanship then the shop does! I'm very happy with how the shop is turning out... but there are certainly things I would do differently were I to start today.

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I'm a huge fan of murphy kits. Looks great man! All the best to you

Cheers,
Mike W

Thanks Mike... you should check out the Rebel Builders List archive web site too then. There are hundreds of photos, and nearly 20,000 messages archived.

https://www.dcsol.com/login?mode=HTML

Enter username=rebel and password=builder when prompted.

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hi mike......
i went through the construction log and it makes me want to get going as soon as i can. that is some awesome shop you have.

i can see that i will be able to get a lot of ideas on what i will need. as you will be able to tell from this question......was that a air riveter you are using in the photos of you assembling the horiz? i have some co-workers that are in the process of building planes and i am going to try and hook up with them to see if i might help them. when really it will be a free learning experiance for me. my wife is as anxious as i am to get started on this too.

gary

Hi Gary, the riveter is air/hydraulic. There is a hydraulic piston inside that actuates the pulling motion... the piston is moved with the air though. Very nice to use, very quiet compared to bucking solid rivets. However, the fact that Murphy airplanes are built with Avex pulled rivets is probably the number one prejudice against them. You just have to remember that they were designed for that type of rivet, and the designer took into account that they aren't as strong as a solid rivet and therefore used more of them.

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Hi Mike,

Glad to see you're back at it. There's something to be said about being able to work indoors in a heated environment during an Alaska winter! Congrats on your progress! I'll be looking forward to following your build. Some of us have to be content to build vicariously through the efforts of others until such time as we can get in the game ourself.

Happy building,

Tim

Thanks Tim, I understand what you mean... I started the Rebel Builder's List in November '97, but didn't pick up my own kit until July '02!

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Hi Mike,
I am from Hamburg, Germany. I like the idea with the Murphy Moose kit.
My idea is to move to Uruguay one day and live there. Cosz of living is very high here in Europe and flying is very expensive. I have my PPL, but never flew here in Germany. All my flying experience I had in the U.S.
My dream is to have my own airplane and while I was browsing through the www I happen to visit your page. It is all super exciting and interesting to see how you put this plane together with "just" the help of your wife. Looking forward to the report of how the installation of all that technical "stuff" was /is done. If I see how you do this I want to do it as well. How much does the "KIT" cost, ex works ? Do you have to buy all the other parts separately ? For e.g. seats, wires, engine, bolts, etc. Or does Murphy offer those kits as well. Any idea?
Well, good luck and success for the new year 2005.
Have fun.
Best wishes,
Jochen

Hi Jochen,

The Murphy web site says contact sales for current pricing right not, but I believe it was right around US$36,000 before they took the price off their web site. They were planning about a 6% increase I believe, so that would put it around US$38,000 now... but I'm not sure.

That price includes all the airframe components from the firewall aft. That's sheet metal, rivets, nuts, bolts, etc. No chemicals, wiring, paint, apolstry, etc. Murphy offers premade seat apolstry that just slips onto the seat frames as an option. But most of the required parts to complete the airplane will come from somewhere else. Murphy also offers firewall forward kits for some of the popular engine choices... these include the engine mount, certain hardware, exhaust system, and the cowl. I believe Murphy has some instrumentation available too, but most people build their own panel, or go to an avionics shop and have one built.

Bottom line, while the Moose kit will cost you somewhere under US$40,000, you'll most likely have over US$100,000 invested before you're done... and that is if you don't have to build a workshop first like me!

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