Builder Of Airplane Gets A Big Surprise While Testing Craft

Bill Gothmann remembers his home-built airplane’s maiden flight much the same way a dog owner might recall his hound’s first time on a leash.

Gravity’s rein was just too short - and this experimental puppy wasn’t about to behave.

The date was Dec. 12, 1995, and Gothmann was making high speed taxi maneuvers at Felts Field. He makes one thing clear: he did not want to fly.

“All of a sudden, I found myself 10 feet in the air,” says Gothmann, 59. “A good description of my feeling? Sheer terror.”

Despite the surprise, Gothmann banked over the Spokane River, returned to the runway and landed uneventfully - even “perfectly,” he recalls. Two days later, the 180-horsepower single engine RV-6A made its official debut.

The all-white craft, made from a popular Van Aircraft kit, took 3,600 hours and $53,000 to complete - about twice as long and three times as expensive as Gothmann had originally planned. But considering the plane survived the October 1991 firestorm that rolled down Browne Mountain and into Gothmann’s Ponderosa back yard, the Eastern Washington University computer engineering technology professor considers himself lucky the plane ever got off the ground.

He’s got pictures of the charred metal shed that housed the plane while it was being built. The fire surrounded the building, then miraculously left the contents inside largely unscathed.

“None of the parts that I’d already constructed were damaged,” he says. “There were a whole bunch of raw parts leaning against the wall that were destroyed and I had to replace.”

Even though the plane was complete in 1995, Gothmann spent most of last summer “ironing the bugs out.” First, the radio didn’t work properly. Then, a voltage regulator went on the blink. He consulted with Dick Smith, another member of the Experimental Aircraft Association here, for technical assistance.

Smith is the parts department manager at Felts Field Aviation. He inspects many of the planes built by EAA members. After seeing Gothmann’s completed plane, Smith was unequivocal in his praise.

“As my father used to say, it’s not too shabby,” Smith says. “It’s a great airplane.”

Smith said that most people are daunted by the thought of putting together their own plane. But it’s not as difficult as you might think, he says.

“A lot of the guys in the club don’t even work on their own cars,” Smith says.

Gothmann admits that even though he’s a computer engineer, he wouldn’t consider himself mechanically inclined. He says one of his biggest projects before the plane was building a five-shelf bookcase.

With the plane finally flying smoothly - a flight two weeks ago went without a hitch - Gothmann is looking forward to a summer of cross-country trips. He has friends to visit in California, in Las Vegas, and on the Washington coast. His wife, Myrna, enjoys sitting next to him in the plane’s side-by-side seats.

Now, about all Gothmann has yet to do with the plane is give it a name. Any ideas?

“Well, I’ve thought about calling it the ‘Myrna Marie,’ which is my wife’s name,” Gothmann says, chuckling. “But then, ‘Trial by Fire’ wouldn’t be bad either.”

MEMO: Saturday’s People is a regular Valley Voice feature profiling remarkable individuals in the Valley. If you know someone who would be a good profile subject, please call editor Mike Schmeltzer at 927-2170.