By Michael Stephan
As our second social gathering this year, Chapter 168 members and friends traveled to Flower Mound to visit Aaron Garinger and his Sling Tsi project. It was impressive to say the least.
Living in a Vans world these days, it is not often that we see a different kit manufacturer. This is the first Sling kit that I have seen and it is a very well designed and executed a kit. In some ways much better than what Vans produces. My favorite part was the upholstered glareshield. The top fiberglass cabin area looked ready to install. The kit uses blind fasteners and with the kit being prepunched, it looked great.
The finished wings lay still in the cradle awaiting the day to be installed. All the tail assemblies were laid out for inspection, primed and ready for attachment to the fuselage, which was mated to the tail cone.
The build instructions for the kit are very similar to the method Van employs now, which is a page by page “drawings with the instructions” for the assembly being worked on. Sling additionally used pictures as well as drawing to make it easier to understand the current task.
Enough about the airplane lets talk about lunch. One word….Delicious. Aaron and his family prepared hamburgers, hotdogs, beans, potato salad, chips and cold beverages for the crowd that showed up. Sitting outside eating lunch with a cool breeze on a sunny afternoon talking airplanes and stuff made for a pleasant way to spend a Saturday.
We thank Aaron, and his family for hosting and we also thank the large group of airplane enthusiasts that showed up to make the day extra special.
