Joking aside, what a great start to our regular meetings! We were joined by Jim Boxmeyer, who had an excellent presentation on composite lay-up and materials.

Jim started with a practical demonstration in the hangar, where he showed us how a practical composite structure can be put together using simple tools and techniques available to the average builder.

Once the demonstration piece was prepped and left to cure, we moved to the meeting room for a brief chapter business presentation to the membership.

We were also joined by our three 2024 scholarship recipients (two of which have already taken and passed their checkrides), who thanked the membership and the chapter for the opportunity they were given and discussed their flight training experiences and future career plans.

After that, Jim continued with his presentation, including a show and tell of different materials and construction techniques. We were quite impressed by beams using carbon fiber rods in a truss configuration, embedded in a foam matrix. You think you’ve seen everything in carbon fiber? Well, we got to see a few carbon fiber nails, driven into a 2×4.

After the presentation we went back to the hangar to take a look at the finished and cured demonstration piece. This was also a great time for a Q&A session, before calling it a night around 9pm.

Thank you all for joining us tonight, and a special thank you to Jim for delivering a very interesting presentation for us. We have a couple fly-outs scheduled in March, as well as a VMC/IMC session, before we get together again for the April membership meeting. Check our events page and we hope to see you at one of these events!