Date: Mon, 17 Jan 2000 20:45:05 +0100 From: lecoqben Subject: COZY: Taking the airplane to the airport. Hello everybody. Happy new year to everyone over the word from France.     I have been very busy this beginning of the year to try to finish up the bird. I think I was quite successfull because this week-end was a very busy one after all electrical wiring was completed.     It was time for the fuselage to go to the airport. It is indeed a huge task for me.     The airport were I bought a hangar lot is called Nangis and is 40 miles away from my home. This is quite a long drive when you have that big thing on a trailer at the back of the car.     The whole process took three days.     On friday the 14th, I met with Yves Pranal ( another Cozy builder) at home to review our plans for the trip.     I still had a hope to get the airplane out of the garage through one of the doors by tilting it . I had made a small hard paper mock-up of the fuselage and the garage doors. Remember: I am one of those with a two doors for two cars garage with a pole in the middle. So I haven't been able to get the fuselage out since the fuel strakes are set up.And I was able to flip the fuselage over inside the garage for finishing the bottom.     So now I was with a finished fuselage weighting around 700 pounds because the engine is on fully wired. I did not want to remove this engine because it was now a lot of work.     We talked around a few times with the small mock up to see whether it was reasonable to tilt it. But with the engine on, it was not. So the decision to cut the middle pole was made.     So on Saturday, we started early, sustained the main door spar with standby steel poles at a reasonable distance from the center on one side and started cutting  the pole at a height matching the strake height and thickness . By 12 AM , the block needed was off and we managed to roll the fuselage out nearly straight on her wheels. This was done by 1 PM .     Of course, we had previously unscrewed the whole garage doors so they would be out of the way.     We then took my car and went to the airport to pick up the specially designed flat trailor that was lent to me for the trip.     I had called a lot of friends to come and help loading the bird at 4 30 PM.     We were back home at that time with the trailor.     We then manage to load . I had to have the fuselage with the nose down ( Nose whell retracted) and strakes tilted 40 ? to minimize the wideness of the whole thing. It was still very wide because we were 3 meters (10 feet)  wide and french regulations allows 2.55 meters ( 8 feet 4 inches) . We had the end of one strake quite high on the middle side of the road and the other quite low on the outer side of the road.     No way we could do better. I had one gear leg on foam on the wooden engine stand designed by Nat when the engine is not on the bird.     So the next morning ( We had choosen early morning on Sunday to minimize traffic and the chance to meet with police) we started driving that whole thing to Nangis. We had one car ahead of my car with warnings and one car at the back  with warnings. We had very carefully recognised the road. Everything started very smoothly. But about half way we were stopped by police!!!! Of course we were outlaws, of course it was too wide , of course he was right, he could stuck us there, fine us and so on and so on !!!!     Well we were lucky . The guy was a light airplane pilot. We started talking around, and we finally ended up proceeding on to the final destination with just the promise I would take him up for a flight in the bird.     So now the bird is now at the airport, getting close . Not one scratch during the trip.     Hope you will hear from me soon.     Yours sincerelly.     Beno?t LECOQ.