Furniture?

There are a couple of companies out there taking wings, putting some legs on them, calling them a table and charging an obscene amount of money for them. Since we were interested in having a conference table made out of a wing for our new facility and a customer was interested in one for his new hangar we decided to get into the furniture business, sort of. So, in between wing sets, tail feathers and waiting for glue to dry, the guys are making some wing tables that will knock your socks off.

Dan and Steve our resident wood workers, a title that does not begin to address their talent, are quite creative and gifted. These guys can make anything happen when it comes to working with wood, they are true artisans. This same craftsmanship goes into every wing, stringer cage and other wood parts on our re manufactured to new standards restorations. No production type wood work in our as good as new airplanes. I've included a couple of photos of their handy work. Enjoy!

Finito!

N173E is complete and YELLOW! Rolling another one off the shop floor is a big deal at RARE Aircraft. Its big because we take pride in different and meeting our customers expectations while maintaining our standards. It comes down to one simple fact, we don't build airplanes with a cookie cutter that only gives options with panel and paint. We remanufacture airplanes to better than new standards while customizing it to meet customer expectations. This F-7, N173E is an example what our recipe can render. With a total of 10 field approvals and countless other details this airplane is very custom. Hope you enjoy these photos from the first run and taxi last Friday. Be sure to check back for more!

Last week our new hangar doors were installed by Schweiss. The building is now fully enclosed with one door sheeted last week and the other is being covered today. The office spaces have been heated for over a week now so the concrete work will begin this week. Everything is on or ahead of schedule for completion which puts the move on the calender for March. I think today's meeting with the contractors to pick out interior colors and furnishings will put a touch of reality on how close we really are.

Pack 'em up!

This week we prepared the QCF and F24 for shipment to Brazil. The guys came up with great ideas for packing the airplanes and implemented them perfectly. Fitting these two airplanes into a 40' container was a challenge and then some! Everything fit into place the airplanes have began their journey which will take well over a month. To St. Paul via truck, east coast by rail and to Brazil by ship they will go! Here are a few shots of the birds being loaded into the container. They have been checked, double and triple. An accelerometer and GPS have also been placed into the container so we can track their progress during the journey. It is now in the hands of the shipping company, we'll see 'em on the other side so now, back to work on making some more airplanes to fill the hole in the hangar!

Our new facility continues to take shape every day and, is on schedule. Here are some photos of this weeks progress. It has been a challenge for sure since we had sub-zero temps all last week and the substantial snow fall the week prior. It has been quite impressive the see the contractors in action. With the temps in the 30's this week I think I saw a guy at the job site in shorts. Stay tuned for more updates on the building and other happenings since it had been a very busy week at RARE Aircraft Ltd.

Cabin Candy

As promised, more of the EGC-8 photo shoot. Enjoy.

Progress!

A couple more photos of the building site. More structure up last week and planning on the "other half" to be possibly complete this week. They are keeping it open to accommodate a crane for installation of the concrete slabs that will make up the roof portion of the offices. Once these "slabs" are in place the rest of the structure will be up and the process of enclosing the building will begin!