the wings are on

Yesterday was August 15th and i went out to the WAAAM to help with the Pusher project.  Last weekend the crew managed to attach the tail , rudder and two wings.  Its amazing to see how the tension of the wires supports so many things in this airplane.  It is basically a v-8 powered kite.
Today Jay was working on manufacturing the ailerons for the airplane.  This airplane is very different from the Wright flyer in that its has true ailerons suspended between the wings.  The Wright aircraft used wing warping which was very inefficient for banking.  In fact the Wright  brothers tried to stop Glen Curtis from selling and making airplanes by suing him for stealing their invention of wing warping .  Curtis fought this in the courts until 1913 when the government stepped in and had the parties settle the suit.
So jay asked me to work on squaring up the middle wings and and removing the bow in the lower wing caused by the weight of the engine.   Both of these tasks were accomplished by changing the tension on the wires supporting the middle wings.   To do this I worked with another volunteer loosening and Tightening the wires until the wing moved.  It was amazing physics in practical terms

This view shows you the wings attached to the mid section. Notice the vertical struts they are off of a WWI Jenny.

Here you see the radiator on a chair the pilots eat and the ox-5 Engine.  Note the exhaust pipes come straight out with no mufflers.

This the tail section with original id numbers and markings.

In this picture you can see the wires coming down and attaching to the engine stand. They are tightened with a turn buckle.

To take weight off the center wing we blocked up the landing gear with scrap wood.