Flight Log: 07/10/2011

Holy Toledo Special, there's an Intruder in da house. Took the TS and Intruder (and Apache) to the field today on another calm and sunny day. Awesome fun again. Had abouit 3 flights on each, and maybe a five minute thermal again on the Apache at the end of my time at the field. The Intruder is on rails everytime and I practiced a bunch of slow and 4pt rolls, and a few rolling circles. I will perform these during the Wings Over Keizer show in two weeks. Should wow the crowd, hopefully. Toledo Special died on the first two partial flights, then I got her tuned better and had no deadsticks after that. Tad had 3 nice flights and all good landings with his Extra 300, and starting was a piece of cake each time. Also, I took up Brandon's Funtana at their request to make sure it is airworthy again, and to trim it out. On the first flight, the engine started to lose power after a couple minutes in the air. I brought her down and looked her over. Mike checked the glow plug and found the top coils all distorted. Threw that away and put in a new OS Type F, and it ran like a champ the rest of the day with Brandon flying it.

Flight Log: 07/09/2011

Great weather made for great flying today! Took the Yak-54 and Shoestring out to stretch their wings. Had 4 flights on the Yak and 3 on the Shoe. All were great with no misfortunes. Almost had a mid air with Jeremy and his Extra 300. I had right of way on a low pass over the runway because I was first over the runway and I have the slower plane. I was going to flip to inverted at show center, and made it to KE when Jer almost ran through me. You can take the same line as someone else before you only if they are in front AND FASTER. You cannot take the same line when you are much faster and you are behind. YIKES! Luckily I did not get hit, but it was total shock and my brain fortunately recovered the plane in KE. Had a first landing with the Shoestring that was much too bouncy, but made adjustments and had great landings on the following two flights.

We had two maiden flights today. Bob Ross maidened a new Ultrastick 40 but had a deadstick then floated the plane into a pit table and totaled the left wing and broke the fuse at the LE of the stab. OUCH. Good thing nobody was pitted at that table! Quang maidened his electric Sundowner 36. It has small wheels and had a hard time taking off the runway, but once up, Zoom Zoom Zoom! That is one slippery little devil that seemed as fast as his prop jets! It came in hot but he made it safely and nicely down on the runway.

Me and My Red Corvette!

Took Sandy to Spirit Mountain yesterday! We got up early and were out of the house on a simply gorgeous morning by 7:30AM. It was just a perfect drive over and back with the Corvette running smoothly and powerfully. Drove a little slower than usual, just over 60mph for an ultra relaxing cruise, and just talking to Sandy. The car is an excellent road trip vehicle, I think, due to the smooth ride and the comfortable interior. My preferred end spot at SM was taken, so I chose another end space and hugged the side. When we came back to leave, an SUV had parked in the space next to us, but was nicely centered and did not crowd the Corvette. :) I washed the Corvette this morning so it is perfecto again.

An Ultimate 4th of July!!

I maidened the AW Ultimate today, the 4th of July, 2011! It was not a real favorable start when I discovered upon unloading at the field that I apparently forgot my wing bolts to hold on the bottom wing! (Later found them.) After drumming some replacements up from Bob Ross, I then proceeded to assemble the plane. I initially attached one cabane to the top and bottom wings with the four bolts backwards. Discovered the issue on the second cabane, so went back and corrected all of them. This was the first time to assemble the plane at the field, and it took almost an hour, bah humbug! It WILL get faster, lol.

Then Tad brought up mixing the oil with the gas, and asked if I remembered that one bottle of oil goes with TWO gallons of gas. OOOOOOPS, I mixed it with just ONE gallon of gas. Another bah humbug, so Tad let me fill up for my flights from his can. I will have to remix mine with another gallon of gas to get the proper ratio.

Other than those little snafus, the maiden day was flawless. The DLE-55 started up perfectly both time, and ran flawlessly. It idled low, transitioned smoothly without burbles, and hit high ends powerfully. The flight was easy, and the landing was perfect on the first try. This plane lands slowly and with the nose high as long as some throttle is maintained. Seemed very slow to me and there was no indication of a desire to stall. I tested stall speed up high at first, and the stall is just a gentle mushing. The plane must be tail heavy because it really wanted to tuck to the LG in both level flight and KE whenever rudder was applied, and because NO down elevator was required to hold inverted level flight. This would also explain the lack of nosing over on the grass field. I am going to see if I can move the batteries forward at all. The plane also wants to roll out of KE, so I will need to check on that situation after I get the CG where I like it. I think I will eventually need to program some aileron to counteract the situation.

2nd flight was as fun and enjoyable as the first, with another takeoff and landing that were very sweet. It was a fantastic maiden and 2nd flight, made more memorable with both Tad and Jeremy there to witness it. I do think I like this 50cc plane more than my Extra 330L.

Update: Today I programmed in 10% up elevator whenever rudder is input, and 5% more aileron in the direction of roll, when rudder is input. Hopefully these mixes go a long way towards correcting the tuck in to the LG and the roll out whenever rudder is input for KE. I will probably leave the mix off for the first flight with the CG moved forward a smidge. If the CG solution does not do enough, I will turn on the mix to see what happens.

Flight Log: 07/03/2011

Flew my Giles 3x and Intruder 2x today, plus let Jer take the Intruder up for a try. Too bad the screw came out and released the belly pan way out in the sod farm, and ended flying that plane today. Jer retrieved the pan, and I found a screw, lock washer and flat washer at home to secure it better. It flew well, as did the Giles. The muffler on the Giles keeps getting loose, so I had to take the cowl off and tighten the three bolts holding it on after 2 flights. I checked after the 3rd flight, and one bolt was already getting loose. Gonna use red thread lock on them today to end this silliness. I tried the ratchet roll today and it is hard! Not as easy as it sounds, but it will be awesome once I get it down pat. Besides Jer, only Mike came. Actually Harvey tried his electric plane but could not get it off the ground due to the small wheels and the cross wind.

4 More Yak Flights

Today was a really fine day for flying! Probably 70F by the time I got to the field early at 8:30AM, little or no wind and it was down the runway from the west when it did blow. Sun shone the whole time. Needed dark glasses and sunblock, which I had both. Got in 4 flights with the Yak-54, probably the best four flights ever on that plane! The bearings are fine, and the 16x8 MAS prop seems to make the Yak very happy, with good speed, and the best vertical climb it has ever had. It runs out of speed but can still be steered vertically with the rudder and elevator. Best maneuver today...all were good, but I made good progress on the rolling circle. I did not have to bail out when flying towards myself. Now I will work on making just 4 rolls in 360 degrees. Stall turns were very nice, slow rolls awesome. I am working my way lower and lower on the latter, but not as low as Jer! All landings were sweetness.

Oh, the Statesman Journal sent out a reporter today, by arrangement with Ron. She took a lot of pics and maybe I will get in the paper, but she had lots to shoot because Mike had his bipe and crop duster there, Ron had his now smoking Hog bipe, Bob B had his UCanDO, and Brandon had his youth to show off, haha. She took names of pilots and planes, and I think she interviewed Ron. She did not talk to me. We should garner some nice coverage to advertise our Wings Over Keizer event coming up three weeks from today.

Just One Yak Flight

It was windyish at home, but I wanted to get some fresh air anyhow, so I went to the field with my Yak-54. I really wanted to at least run it. Been flying it two years with a 17x6 APC and it just runs so slow, but the performance was decent. After replacing the bearings, I decided to try different props to get the OS 120 Surpass III to wind up more, run faster. Tried the 15x8 MAS and the plane hardly moved to me. I think too much of the prop blast was erased by the large cowl of the plane. Next tried the 16x6 MAS and it seemed to be beating the air up good without going anywhere. Today I tried the 16x8 MAS, and I think I found the winner. The plane flies faster and climbs just as much if not better than the low pitches tried before. I took just one flight since it was windy and there was a JB mower on the far south end of the field. I accomplished the prop decision, and that was my main goal. I'm anxious to try it on a calmer day!