AVOCET

You probably feel like an expectant father. Hope all goes well!

Looks like a couple of guys had to walk back to their planes , Probly left the master switch on !

Cheers

Mike

Good to see some real aviators in action.

By the way , I had a fellow fly in for some work on a cracked jab flap horn , and he got my old southern cross generator going again after 30 years of sitting there ,

Nice to be able to have spare electrical generation.

Cheers Mike

Note the EGT and CHT values at the end of a 30+ day in SLC.This is a jab 6 running the standard pusher scoops in a Tornado S.

 

Thanks mike

When I made the the Avocet I had originally had intended to have an aircooled tractor on the turret, but it would have ment having the prop arc over the top of my head ,

I resolved myself to a pusher and was concerned about the cooling of the 3300 jab

I couldn't believe my luck when I heard about LCH and was the third person to install a test set of heads , ( first pusher ) any way , long story short was they worked straight out of the box with quite a small radiator , I had had made , every thing including hoses and pumps fit snugly into the turret ,( see my photo album on my site , just press avitar. ) so on a tractor instalstion jabby there's plenty of room under the cowls .

I know of at least 4 installations in j 230 's that work great and turn the jab engines into a 6 cyl type rotax , the weight penalty isn't that much , and the jabs have plenty of power and capacity .although , I had to put a 30 amp alt , the one that goes on the vac outlet, and leave the jab alt for a back up ,

It adds more cost , but you end up with a reliable engine and duel every thing .

Like any thing , time will tell , but at the moment I carnt speek highly enough of LCH

Like most things , LCH , fuel injection ,electric ignition ,is the way of the future , way of the future , way of the future ......... The way of the future.....

Cheers Mike

Ps quote last line of post : The Aviator . ( the film of Howard Hugh's )

Just picked up on eBay $14.00

UNDERSTANDING AND. FLYING

ULTRALIGHS BY FRANK C BAILEY

Early days flying in Australia when they were flying at 300 agl and the new regs alowing them to 500 ft .

There's an interesting chapter of teaching yourself to fly these , emagine the liability of publishing these instructions today !

Does anybody know where you could get a set of plans for something like the BI-RD ultralight ? I wouldn't mind having a go at building something like that , cheep flying .

Cheers Mike

What brand of Mogas ?

Mike

It's beginning to sound to me that these laws were written by a bunch of Pharisees ,& to keep themselves employed by arguing the interpretation thereof ,

If there not clear enough for the average pilot to understand ( for which they were ultimately written ) after 17 years of flying I've probably got enough black marks to put me away for life ! But I really don't think they care that much .

I remember when the amateur home built rules came out , I really think they where penned to stop joe blow from setting up shop and building lots of kits to flog to the general public , it didn't stop some people from offering builder assistance to folk and that in general was a good thing and that stopped a lot of crap examples from getting into the air ,or being totally rejected buy the inspection process ,

And after all ,the AUF was keen to get as many aircraft flying to boost their numbers ,

I think it worked out well .

I guess my point might be that some of these rules are their to stop some people from taking it to far , like trying to set up for example , starting a fleet of U/L freight planes ect . But really folk going about their own buisiness & minding their own buissines ,don't really show up on their radar all that much , and the odd ramp check is casa's way of reminding us all ,who's in charge , and that ,when all's said and done:, as the saying goes , there's more said than done!

Mike.

I guess the next question is how can the taxman condone an activity that's deemed illegal by casa , another gov . department ?

When push comes to shove .

And since when is the taxman allowed to knowingly tax illegal activity?

Still confused Mike.

What about all the folk who claim their travel & their plane u/l against their tax

IE ,aircraft manufacturers going to airshows , doing demo flights

I was always under the impression as per Raa acknowledgment that you could ,as a self employed person , just like flying schools

I also know folk who enquired to their accountants before they built or bourght aircraft ,

& got the ok .

Unless aircraft are 95-10 there not really ultralights , are they

Cheers Mike

Yep figured that was the case. Had a good look around at the last 100 hourly and can't find any joins seeping fuel. Doesn't worry me at all just an observation really.

So if i'm reading this right , this means I carnt load my motor scooter in the back of the avocet and have ground transport upon arrival ??

Or as far as " goods "are concerned it would seem that nothing at all can be carried in a rec aircraft , not even an Ersa or mobile phone?

I'm a bit confused !

Cheers

The fuel smell in the cockpit with Mogas is the fuel seeping through the fuel lines , doesn't mater if there silicon or rubber ,

The best fuel line to use with Mogas is the Teflon hose system , they use it in drag racing ect because nothing reacts with it .

Or you've got a seeping join or fuel tap , quite common in jabs .

Cheers

What about all the aircraft that fly to NATFLY , Ausfly , Avalon ect to set up trade stands and sell goods that they've carried there in their a/c , like hats , stickers , posters ect ect .

This has been going on for years and as far as I know , nobody's ever been challenged ,

I'm sure their are lots of examples of this happening every day .

Cheers Mike

Ok........good read herefurther matters........the 4 cyl engine, mods..........replace valves and guides with different type/brand, cut end off muffler, remove some baffleing ( more free flow ), reweld up, revamp air flow into/out of engine compartment....

 

hanger goss is telling me that these mods do wundrous things to the engine ...........and use a different engine oil other than that jab recommended, ( one in particular to use, but changing to it, is not a matter of just pouring it into the engine )......which oil ???

Danger Will Robinson

Beware of hanger talk .

Cheers Mike

I think the wings on J160 are the same as J200 and J400, approved to 700kg in Experimental.125kts with 3300 and decent prop @ 2850rpm, easy cruise 128+ with a few more rpm

Longer wing was to decrease stall 45kts @ 600kg "clean" for over seas markets. However short wing stalls @ 48kts with 700kg with flaps so SFA difference under local rules.

 

Jab believe they didnt loose much cruise with longer wing - different profile altogether. Was some strut problems though and max manouver speed dropped a lot.

1 mtr cord including flap for the 230 & 200

4ft cord for the 250 wing

The 230 has longer flap & aileron

The 250 has same length as 230 but is proportionally wider .

250 wing is not an option on j160/170.

Cheers .

Cheers

I agree with ultralights' post # 2.When I had my 230 I always felt that the 230's wing was happiest cruising at about 7,500 to 8,500 or a tad above. It just felt sweet & balanced purring along around 120 knots ....... like cruising a BMW bike at 180 (kph). And at that level the nice cool air was great for keeping the heads happy.

 

But the governing factor for "long cross-countries", which is the key criteria of this question, has to be wind direction vs height (but also perhaps turbulence on rough or marginal days).

 

When on a longie my practice is to plan for the best winds and if not as predicted, or if varying over the 400 - 500 miles of the sector, go up or down chasing best wind and hopefully be able to then move to an appropriate cruising level with that wind. And if that happens to be up near 7500 - 8500 then woo-hoo.

 

But Huey didn't play the game too often and my 230 attracted adverse wind direction most of the time. Why is that?

Cheers Mike

Does that casa requirement cover the dressing of the timber ? I've found that's where some if not most of the trouble starts & then the glue up .

.the people that do the dressing Probly don't even know who casa is .

Cheers mike

I guess this posts almost done ,

My wife's French , always handy for a quick translation .

I'm a pattern maker and had a fine furniture buisiness for 25 yeas in bundaberg , (no I'm not giving my résumé )

I've had a lot to do with timber and jabiru props and the kiln dried hoop pine that is used is not a constant product , seasonal growth diferance from year to year , trees that have been stressed in storms many years before their cut down ,can have quite differant carracturistics in the final plank , even planks from different trees & differnt parts of the tree can effect warpage ,

I've seen hoop boards that are planed flat and then days or weeks later look like a propellor ,. The way jab used to plane their wood was to put rough sawn timber into a thickneser

And then glue the laminates together , . The correct way is to plane one side flat on a plannerand then use the thickneser , this way the board has a better chance of staying flat but is very "time " consuming .

Timber is a fickled thing and takes a keen eye to decide what planks to use .

Props that end up warping on there own have more than Likely timber that going to warp no matter what .

Many a good looking plank carnt be used for making furniture or props

With the jab props it's been the luck of the draw

Cheers mike

Point taken sorry .

I've had to do some remedial work since the first couple of flights ,

The oil temp was getting to high after about 1/4 hr , I've installed a different type and today flu for 1/2 hr with stable oil temp 89 deg .( I'm running an oil temp thermostat .)

Also I've taken the winglets off , it was just an experiment ( that didn't work to well)

In short they made the aircraft yaw & difficult to handle in mild turbulence

When I thought it through , a center mounted engine has less yaw dampening than a front mounted engine so any disruption on the wing tips , in turbulence translated into unacceptable yaw .they seemed ok in still air.

With the wing tips off it flys great and very little yaw due to the fatter vertical fin I fitted this time ,( all experimental)

Cheers Mike

Ps I've booked into Ausfly in September

Starting to get nervous !

The decline in spelling and grammar is a result of the dumming down of education. NASA and JPL have both mentioned that education is so poor these days there is little chance we'll ever get anybody on the moon again let alone Mars. I have read reports from Uni graduates that appear to have been written by 12 year olds. Yes, there are folks on this forum that do not use English as a first language and there are folks who have problems, I was dyslexic at school - hell for me. If we do not try to undo the damage then how far will it go? Fancy getting onto a plane and the pilot can only communicate with grunts, the way things are going that is probably likely. We must rise above the 'bogan is okay' attitude and strive to better ourselves and society. It's pretty easy once you get started. I've been around long enough to see how backwards we have become, folks who do not know the times tables and cannot perform simple arithmetic without a calculator! (My local checkout chick). You may throw your shoes at me or rocks on my roof, but I shall soldier on rewardless until every child can spell Antiestablishmentarianism without hesitation!

How about you , do you know what it means without looking up a dictionary ?

Signed : dum arse

And I thought we where talking about solinoids,

( that's what the spellcheck dribbled out this time )

Mike

I tried to sell them 12 cubic mts of class A coach wood some years back , but the price they were paying for the hoop was a gift !

Same old same old

Actually , virgin hoop pine on a large tree is quite hard and approved as aviation timber

Mike

Maj , it's the soft wood , plantation hoop pine

I've seen some variation in the hardness in that timber , I planed a couple of cubic meters for the guy who used to make their props years ago . Plus they only run 3 laminations on the 4 cyl & 4 on the 6 cyl

, lots of jabs 4/6 running sweet apple , Brent Thompson NZ they use ash and you can tourqe them to 12 ft /lbs and don't give many problems

Mike

The spell check POLICE are at it again :

Just

between you me and the man upstairs :

They should do something aviation like ,

Go build an aero plane or something

Or maybee fly a kite

Mike

Ps (joke joice )