FIrst FLights

Congratulations to James on his new RV-14A. He writes: Flawless first flight ! What an awesome experience. It flys so good! The 390 EXP 119 was smooth and ran cool. Couldn’t be happier.

Congratulations Mark! N94MS received its airworthiness certificate on March 7, 2022. On March 20, 2022 it had its first successful flight. The Thunderbolt IO-390 exp 119 and Hartzell 3-blade composite performed amazingly well. Thanks Van’s for great design. As a repeat offender this kits went together very quickly. Thanks to my many friends for their help […] Read More

Congratulations to Chris on his new RV-9A! He writes: Dear Folks at Van’s, I’m pleased to announce that the thirteen-year build of my RV-9A, S/N 91756, N111CT was recently finished, and the first flight was performed on January 11th with the very capable Mr. Tom Berge at the controls. The flight went quite well and […] Read More

Gerard and Susan wrote in to let us know about the first flight of their RV-14A: Our aircraft took to the sky in Inverell NSW Australia on the 15th March 2022 – under the Southern Cross. Time of flight was approximately 16:40 Australian Summer Time. Test pilot was David Brown (RV10 owner) from Caboolture Australia. […] Read More

Nice work Ivan! He writes: 22 months from first rivet to first flight. It has been an amazing experience once again, this is the second RV build, the first one was an RV-10 which was completed in 2010. The RV-14A was a SB fuselage and a QB wing. The first flight was 2.1 hours and […] Read More

Congratulations Thomas! He writes: Most people say this is a show plane. The color is custom, a mix of glass flake sapphire of the crystal alliance series, a one of a king paint job. The color changes from black to blue and a few different colors in between. Full IFR panel, two Garmin G3X touch, […] Read More

Congratulations to Glen on his new RV-7! He writes: I thoroughly enjoyed building the aircraft. I learned so much and gained so many new skills. There was frustration but more often a huge sense of accomplishment. Much of the enjoyment of the build came from having an incredibly supportive wife. She encouraged me to start […] Read More

Ulay writes in to tell the world about the first flight of the new RV-10 that he and his wife Kelly built! Finally, after 3 years and 9 months, we had our first flight. The exhilaration we felt made all the hard work and painstaking effort worth it. Thanks to my wonderful wife and building […] Read More

Join us in congratulating Jim on the maiden flight of his new RV-14A! “First flight was at 2:22 on 2/22/22. It was short due to an oil temperature indication anomaly. After re-terminating the wires to the temperature sensor another, longer flight was successfully flown.”

Congratulations to Kevern on his new RV-10! He writes: A month or so ago I had the privilege of doing the maiden flight on my friends RV-10, Today was my turn. Arrived at the airfield without any expectations, methodically cowled the aircraft up and went through all the attach points one last time. I had […] Read More

Congratulations to Paul and Kacy on their new RV-7! Paul writes: Kacy and I purchased our RV-7 kit just before the pandemic hit while we were both in New Zealand, her for work and myself for leisure. Work from home allowed me to sneak into the garage between meetings to keep the pace high during […] Read More

Congratulations to Dennis! He writes: I bought an RV-9A kit with quite a bit of the heavy lifting already accomplished in January 2019. After working in my garage for 2 years and 9 months, I was able to move the completed fuselage and all the bits and pieces to my hangar at KTRL. Two months […] Read More

Congratulations to Paul on the first flight of his RV-12iS! He writes: 18 months to the day after pulling the first rivet, the first flight of ZK-DOL was carried out by Bill Henwood , which all went smoothly and without a hitch. With the late summer weather holding on we were able to complete the […] Read More

Congratulations to David! He writes: Slow build C-GCOA was completed almost exactly two years after the tail kit arrived but delays with the paperwork over the Christmas holidays meant we couldn’t legally fly it until February 12. First flight was flawless and conducted by my building partner Gene with myself monitoring the engine gauges and […] Read More

Congratulations to Brian on the first flight of his RV-7, he writes: I flew my RV-7 for the first time on March 1, 2022. She flew perfectly with no anomalies noted on my first flight which was about 1 hour and 45 minutes. I built this airplane from a slow build kit over the past […] Read More

Another RV-12iS has taken to the skies for the first time, and this one is in Germany! Congrats to Thomas, who writes: The amazing part is, that there is not much of a story to tell. The test pilot, who had never flown a Rotax powered RV, asked about the engine handling, climbed in the […] Read More

Congratulations to Richard on his new RV-14A and its first flight! He writes: A beautiful, but cold day in southeastern PA for the first flight. N628DF jumped off the runway in less than 600 feet and flew beautifully…straight and level. Only stayed up long enough to make sure all engine indications and flight characteristics were […] Read More

As they say, a picture’s worth a thousand words! Congrats to Mark, who writes to explain the results of his first flight in his new RV-14. Sometimes fewer words mean more: “Wow” Enjoy your new airplane, Mark!

A big congrats to Richard on the first flight of his new RV-14! This is his second RV, and not his last! He writes to tell us about it: It was a superb first flight and behaved just as a RV should – beautifully. The aircraft has now completed 8 hours and I am still […] Read More

Congratulations to Igor on the first flight of his new RV-10! He writes to tell us all about it, and about a person without whom it would not have happened: What an amazing performer! The 1st flight went well and lasted 18min. The RV grin came right after lift off 😉 Thank you Van’s Aircraft […] Read More