British biplane is Cloverdale carpenter’s dream

Bryan Dorsett never suspected that visiting a vintage aircraft museum would spark a flame that consumed his life for nearly a quarter of a century.

Dorsett, a freelance carpenter, already was fascinated with the early days of aviation when he visited the Champlin Fighter Museum in 1989 in Mesa, Ariz., but the craftsman in him was drawn to the clean lines of the 1916 Royal Aircraft S.E.5a British single seat biplane, often described as the best British fighter of the war. He decided to build a replica.

“I always liked the appearance of the S.E.5a,” he said. “It was mostly the simplicity of the design, including the box fuselage structure and the straight exhaust pipes down the sides, the wood landing gear and the four wings. I also liked the paint scheme, including the wing undersides.”

Now 64, Dorsett found an original set of plans for the fighter but decided a scale replica would be a more realistic goal. Using downsized plans he purchased in Canada, Dorsett followed the original building instructions to the letter, even machining many of the parts himself. His brother Don did all the welding, and his cousin Loretta stitched the fabric on the wings.

Very little information was available on the Internet, so Dorsett turned to the Experimental Aircraft Association, Kitplanes and WW1 Aero magazine. “I also had a collection of books I used for information and historic visual references,” he said.

Construction took place inside airport hangars in Santa Rosa and Healdsburg until Dorsett bought a hangar closer to home at the Cloverdale Airport.

The finished product is an 85 percent scale model with a gross weight of 1,150 pounds. If counting just the plane, he said, the construction cost him $10,000, with about $2,500 of that amount for the engine and another $2,400 for the propeller.

Much of the aircraft-grade wood was shipped from Illinois. Dorsett also collected parts, instruments and miscellaneous components from his airport friends and associates.

“The metal parts probably totaled around 1,200 or more individual pieces and included the wing and landing gear brackets, hinges, toggles and wing fittings,” he said. “Each part was matched or traced against a precisely measured cardboard template, then cut by hand mostly using a hack saw. Some larger parts were cut using a slow cutting band saw. The metal parts were then bent to proper angle using a small bench mounted plate brake.

“Needless to say, none of the parts are authentic, and none are used in or repurposed from more modern aircraft,” he said, laughing.

He also added two inoperable mock machine guns, a Lewis made from painted wood and metal conduit, and a Vickers made from balsa wood and cardboard, painted and covered with fiberglass resin for strength. Both were made from scratch using Dorsett’s own design.

The seat is made from an aluminum lawn chair cut and riveted to form the back and seat sections.

The wheels are standard 5-inch Cleveland aircraft wheels that he purchased used, then machined. Holes were drilled for custom-made spokes that are laced to a 60” Honda motorcycle wheel.

Painting consumed over two years of the construction period. Inside the specially constructed paint booth in his hangar, for example, the fuselage was given three coats and all four wings received about nine coats of special aircraft coatings.

Before the wings could be painted, Dorsett glued Dacron poly-fiber to the leading and trailing edges. They were then coated with Poly-Brush sealant that locks the fabric into place.

Dorsett’s wife, Lisa, heard about his dream the day they met, and she gave birth to their son Tyler about three years into the project.

In addition to her and other family members, he has relied on the support of friends he met while building the plane, including the late Jim Smith of Healdsburg, a skilled pilot and craftsman who had built a Grand Champion charger and a Waco Biplane.

To support his family over the years, Dorsett built custom homes during the week - more than 300 overall - and spent weekends balancing time at home and at the airport working on the plane.

Ironically, Dorsett has never taken time to get his pilot’s license. Since the biplane has just one seat and can hold a maximum of 200 pounds of cargo weight, including the pilot, it means he is unable to fly his own creation.

“If I’d spent money on flying lessons, I wouldn’t have built the plane,” he said.

Dorsett unveiled the plane in November as part of the Cloverdale Historical Society’s World War I Speaker Series, and said he was more than a little nervous when he read the promotional flyer that invited people to “come hear the roar of the engine.”

It had never been started. The continental 85 hp engine specified in the plan set came from an original 1949 Funk tail dragger airplane, and was acquired from his friend Jim Smith about 20 years earlier.

“I wasn’t even sure it would turn over,” Dorsett said. “Fortunately, it didn’t let me down and caught on the first try.”

At some point, once he completes all the necessary safety inspections, he plans to hire a test pilot to take it for its maiden flight.

Ultimately, he said, “I may want to display it in a museum, but first I plan to get my sportsman pilot’s license so I can finally fly it myself.”

Contact Cloverdale Towns?Correspondent Mary Jo Winter at Cloverdale.Towns@gmail.com.