Building Planes With Flying Colors Two Santa Clarita Men Build And Fly Their Own Aircraft

On a warm February morning, heat rose up from the blacktop at Whiteman Airport in Pacoima.  Dozens of planes were parked in lines, like birds standing at attention.  Hangars lined the football field-shaped parking lot, and a runway lay in waiting on the other side of a chain link fence.  In front of an open hangar that proudly displayed the American flag, two white and electric blue tail draggers gleamed in the sun, canopies open.
As the aircraft stood now, it seemed unimaginable that they were once nothing more than crates of parts in a couple Santa Clarita garages – a project more maddeningly time-consuming than even complex.  But in the most frustrating moments, these two hand-built planes still represented a passion that runs much deeper than the casual attraction of a hobby.  And today, as they stand in their glorious completion, the two aircraft represent the freeing possibility of afternoons in the sky.
“Aviation was in its prime when I started flying,” recalled one plane owner and Santa Clarita resident Gary Bertz.
Gary started as a United States Army helicopter pilot, flying in the Vietnam War, and went on to work as a helicopter pilot for the Los Angeles County Fire Department for 27 years.  Accomplishing a longtime goal, Gary built his RV-8 tail dragger aircraft from the ground up.
“Ever since I was a little kid, I was always around aviation,” said the second plane owner and local resident Alex Margheritis.  “My grandfather traveled frequently, and we used to take him to LAX a lot and watch the planes.  I guess I developed a passion for it.”
The supervisor of flight operations at LAX, Alex started as a flight mechanic when he was 20 years old.  Though he did some rebuilding with a Cessna he owned previously, his first hand-build also was the RV-8, a centerline tandem-seating plane with a fighter-like feel and design for aerobatics.
Even with extensive aviation careers, the task of building a plane seems daunting and tremendously complex; one man, however, has made the task doable, though not for the faint of heart.
It all started in the early 70s with a skinny, young small-town engineer from Oregon: Richard “Van” VanGrunsven.  Unsatisfied with all the home-build planes on the market, he started from scratch on his ideal model, the RV-3.
Producing full aircraft build kits and several subsequent models, Van’s Aircraft created the opportunity for almost any flight enthusiast to build a plane; the only element this project truly requires is not an engineering background or in-depth knowledge of flight mechanics – but unwavering dedication and a whole lot of time.  To date, there are more than 9,000 Van’s Aircraft flying globally and more in progress.
“None of this is hard to build, but you have to find the time to do it,” Gary said.  “There’s a time you get so sick of it that you can’t even look at it.”
After about 1,500 hours of building across the span of three years, Gary clocked in at a pretty good completion time.
“I’ve seen people build for 12 months, and I’ve seen people build for 30 years,” Gary recalled.
Quickening the pace, however, Gary shared the build with longtime friend Gary Lineberry, who died of cancer in 2013.  With a knack for wiring, radios and other electrical work, Gary Lineberry hosted the build in his garage – and sometimes the rest of his house.
“We had wings in his living room; he could care less,” Gary joked.
Manning the project alone, Alex took about four years and nine months to complete his plane, which he personalized with a special registration number: N214MK, his daughter’s birthday and initials following the regulated “N,” designating each plane registered in the United States.
Though the project was meaningful to both Gary and Alex, it took steady coordination and a system to reach completion.  Assembled in a series of kits from Van’s Aircraft, the standard build progresses from the empennage (tail) to the wing, fuselage and finishing kits, respectively.  From there, the builder must provide the engine, instruments, propeller, avionics and upholstery.  As an alternative, pilots can instead choose the “quick build” option, which is comprised of pre-assembled parts.
Choosing the standard build, both Gary and Alex completed their planes in 2007, just months apart.  And once they finished, they were more ready than ever to let those birds tear through the sky.
“We get up there and chase after each other,” Alex said of his weekly flights with Gary, often to airport restaurants throughout California.  “We do loops and spins.  One will get just a little bit ahead of the other, and the other will try different flight paths to see if he can catch up.”
With more than 1,000 flight hours each, the two are just getting started.

photos by Joie de Vivre Photographie

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