OK, this normally comes much later in the construction cycle for most builders, so it’s normally more of an event, but my Cozy is now officially in its hangar! We moved over the weekend, and while there’s still a lot to clean up, and still a lot to BUILD, this feels very good. It’s a big step, and it feels good.

I’ve also been getting in some flight time. Nothing loggable, but I’ve been spending some time in the right seat in John Slade’s bird, and learning a huge amount from the experience. Not just about flying the Cozy, but about the build cycle, too. I think the most valuable aspect of this (in addition to the experience) is that it’s showing me what I cared about before that just isn’t important and what I wasn’t even thinking about yet. I can now shuffle my priorities to address things that are actually meaningful.

Oh, side note. We’re also probably one of the only hangars in the world that’s fully carpeted. =) We were required to tear out the carpet from our old office when we moved, and it seemed a shame to throw it out. John insisted on this, over my objections, but I’m sold now. It’s much nicer to stand on than bare concrete, and will help insulate the floor slightly when we work on cold winter days. We’ve laid down some scrap aluminized insulation sheets to catch oil drips for safety’s sake.

This coming Wednesday John and I will return to the old office with the pickup to get any last items we may have missed. John is out Thursday (build nights are now Wed and Thu), so I’ll use that time to start arranging the build space in the hangar and mounting all the work tables. As it turns out, we have rather a lot of work surface. I love using door panels for these, and have collected quite a few over the past few years. They’ve now all ended up at the hangar, so I think we have 9-10 of them to use as work benches. I just need to build legs for the ones that don’t have them yet.

With any luck, we’ll be back to building full time by the following week!