In April, Mark Miller spoke to a group of pilots at Schaumburg Airport about his effort to build an authentic, flight-worthy replica of the Wright Brothers airplane that flew at Kitty Hawk, N.C., almost a century ago. A man said his company might be interested in helping with the most problematic aspect of the project: building the engine.
But weeks passed without any word, and Miller figured the offer had fizzled. So many others had. Then he got a phone call and went to a meeting early this month.
Now, a respected engineering company has agreed to build the engine, estimated at $120,000, for the cost of materials–about $15,000.
“It truly is the final piece to the puzzle,” said Miller, a master woodworker from Glen Ellyn who has been working with Tom Norton and about a dozen others since early last year to build and fly the replica by the first flight’s centennial, Dec. 17, 2003. No one has succeeded in building and flying an exact reproduction of the Wrights’ 1903 Kitty Hawk Flyer, though a few companies are trying.
The company that stepped forward is Packer Engineering Inc., a 40-year-old engineering firm in Naperville.
“Everybody admires the Wright Brothers for what they did,” said Kenneth Packer, founder and principal engineer of the company, who attended a news conference Monday to announce the partnership. “In fact, every one of our guys wants to fly this plane. We want to do our part in replicating it.”
Packer, a Marine Corps pilot in World War II who holds single- and multi-engine pilots’ licenses, said he expects to have the engine ready to assemble in August. That same engine took Wilbur and Orville Wright and their mechanic, Charles Taylor, about five months to build.
Packer will use the same materials to build the engine, but the company will have the advantages of modern technology. It will use Taylor’s detailed drawings to produce a three-dimensional computer model of the engine. Then, it will use the model to program machines to cut and form parts of the engine. The company also will make a polystyrene replica of the engine, Packer said.
Employee volunteers and student interns will do the work, he said. The company is forming what Packer called a “pseudo-company,” dedicated to building the 150-pound, 16-horsepower engine. Students will run the mock company as a way to glean experience, Packer said.
Norton, a public relations executive, said Packer’s assistance “is huge, just huge. It takes us from the `woulda, coulda, shoulda’ phase to the `we’re gonna do this’ phase.”
Wright Redux Association, the non-profit group Norton created to build the plane, received about 15 casual inquiries about building the engine, Norton said. But all were expensive and required several months to complete, he said.
The rest of the plane is nearly finished. Volunteers continue to work on a lower wing section, propellers and the aircraft’s center and tail sections. Then all the parts must be assembled.
Norton said he is “quietly confident” that the replica will be ready for a test flight in late July or early August, using a substitute engine.
If Norton is successful in July, he plans to launch the plane on the front lawn of the Museum of Science and Industry, another project sponsor, on Dec. 17, 2003.
