• Vortex generators: I have had them on my wing for 5 years and swear by them. We intend to go back to Idaho this summer and do some back country flying. We were there two years ago and I needed to slow down the airplane. The VG's not only slow me down for approach, but give me a lot more authority on the stick upon landing.
  
  I can make an honest approach speed dragging in on power at 62 or 63 mph for a short or soft field, that "real" nosewheel lets me do things and not have to worry about just paved airfields. It still leaves me the authority with the stabilator at those speeds and the bottom doesn't "drop out" on me. I have no fancy test equipment, just my butt in the seat to tell what's going on. A couple years after I put the VG's on..... I took them off for testing again, just to see if my memory was correct. I put them right back on after the bottom dropped out and banging the plane on the runway a couple times. I can get the indicated down into the 50's when slow flying. I also have VG's on the underside of the stabilator.
  
  Here at Meadow Lake we are at 7000', our standard degree day is 39, today is near 50 so we are at 8500 density, in the summer at 75 we are near 10,000' Ft density. I needed the safety margin and I don't think I gave up anything on the speed side to get it. Of course, again that's anecdotal, but I was testing high end speed when I removed them from the wing. I made numerous timed runs trying to determine speeds and finally decided it was too small/marginal to calculate, so I put em back on immediately and have tinkered with them from time to time as to their location.
  
• A bubble windshield and door windows. I made them in the kitchen oven. They are larger and give us great visibility and more shoulder room.
  
• A Grumman nose strut, fork, wheel etc. I just could not live with the Scott tailwheel up front. It was too darn small, spooled up too fast on landing. It also had a lot of weight on it with the 0-360 and constant speed prop.

We have had our "4" from the Atlantic to the Pacific and Canada to Mexico. It's been to Copperstate 3 times, Rocky Mountain Regional 3 times, Oshkosh and Golden West Fly Ins, Reno Air Races twice, not to mention all the local pancake breakfasts and all. We have enjoyed our plane a lot, it flies great, it is economical and we encourage others to consider this design.

I just stepped down as President of EAA Chapter 72 in Colorado Springs, Colorado, while my wife Sandy and I are starting our 5th year of doing the newsletter, they are archived at EAA72.org and our home web pages at http://home.sprintmail.com/~wemartin/. We live at Meadow Lake Airport , just east of the city of Colorado Springs. I also work here and we welcome any other BD 4 folks to stop in for a visit.