xplanes:

While we wait for a record breaker, another (potential) one caught my eye the other day:

“An amateur aircraft designer can tailor a plane to fit his or her precise requirements, no matter how outlandish. Take David Rose. Inside his hangar at Montgomery Field in San Diego, this former airline pilot is building a machine that he hopes will earn him aeronautical immortality.

If all goes according to plan, a thunderously overpowered racing machine called RP-4 will reach a straight and level speed in excess of 528.3 mph and become the world’s fastest piston-driven plane. The 22-year-old record is held by a modified World War II—era Grumman F8F Bearcat.”

from Popular Mechanics, 12/10/2011. I cannot find any update on the status of this aircraft since then.

(bottom photograph by Jake Stangel. Other great ones from the same shoot can be found here.)

(via maxforcepatrol)

http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/aviation/diy-flying/diy-flight-meet-the-daredevil-pilots-who-build-their-own-planes