Bruce Layne Long-EZ  N86WK
Long-EZ N86WK was built by Willis "Joe" Kusy, a retired Air Force test pilot and instructor, in his Dayton Ohio basement and garage.  He spent over 3000 hours building this foam and fiberglass plane.  The plans were made available by Burt Rutan in the late 1970's.  It's difficult to believe this design is over 25 years old. This Long-EZ was purchased by Bruce Layne in 1996, as a fun and fast method of travel.  The Long-EZ can fly 1200 miles before refueling, so it's very good at it's main mission - cheap and comfortable long distance transportation.  From central Kentucky, it's four hours to central Florida, five hours to the Florida Keys, and a little over three hours to Oshkosh in central Wisconsin.  At 10,000 feet above sea level, there is almost nobody else nearby, making for a very relaxing trip.  It's 3-4 times faster than driving, depending on how indirect the roads are.  The plane gets about 24 MPG, which is pretty good when you consider you're going 175 MPH. The Long-EZ has a fun responsive feel, like driving a sports car, yet it's very stable and is easier to fly than almost any other small plane.  The unconventional geometry, with the small canard wing in the front and the main wing and engine in the back allows the plane to be stall proof.  Unlike other small planes, if the Long-EZ pilot slows down too much, there will be no stall that can cause a rapid drop in altitude.  With the Long-EZ, trying to fly too slow will result in a gentle bobbing of the nose. The pilot can see the canard when looking to the side, but it's barely visible when looking straight ahead.  The unrestricted view above allows the pilot and copilot to look straight up and see the clouds! What's the designer been doing lately?  Burt Rutan won the $10,000,000 Ansari X-Prize for commercial space flight.  He's designing space ships to take tourists into space.  His space ships are built using the same composite materials and methods that were used to build the Long-EZ.  Pretty neat, huh?
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