Ross

Hi Rob I don't have many hours in the Jab LSA 2200 but have flown two very different feeling ones. One is at Griffith and the otherwas at Hoxton Park. I hardly ever seem to be able to keep the front wheel upon landing the Griffith machine whereas the Hoxton Park machine was easy to keep the front wheel off when landing. The main other difference was the feel of the "trim" it is very solid in the Griffith machine and very light in the Hoxton Park machine. An extra factor I just remembered is that the Hoxton Park machine has a batch of cushions available for passenger and pilot. I used one there and never have at Griffith. The Griffith machine has no extra available cushions. I find it is much easier to steer a straight line with the rudder at 50 knots than steering the the front wheel with the rudder pedals. When I fly at Griffith I note that my elbow rests on the divider and I have to make a conscious effort to get full back stick particularly if I have experienced any stiffness in the shoulder joint of the right arm! I will have to try a thin cushion on the normal seat but this will change the landing view so I will have to adjust my perception there. Regards Ross

Hi Paul The owner of the Griffith online Jab tried it I don't know which product. We have lots of "Catheads" around this area and the original 4 ply tyres used on the Jabs were hopeless against them.I subsequently flew it with violent vibrations as soon as you were airborne cancelled by brake application. About 100 hrs TT then. He has either discontinued using the product or changed to another. I think it even carries a spare wheel now as well as a spare tube. I think it was up to about 770 hrs TT on my BFR on 30-08-2006. The owner Norm Raworth (pronounced rayworth) is fairly easy to talk too is a L2 and is about to take on instructing at Narrandera once his new J160 arrives in October I think. His mobile is 0427180740. I have heard that some people have used 6 inch 8 ply tyres on ultralights. I had once done a search to find the Jab sizes in 8 ply made in Indonesia. You would need to check that when inflated there would still be clearance from the UC particularly the front wheel. Regards Ross

Hi All I run an automaticMagna to a Sydney suburbfrom Leeton two or three times per year around 560 km and it never returns the same fuel consupmtion in both directions. I always check tyre pressures before leaving. The last trip was an average one with the following figures. The last trip a couple of weeks ago was Leeton to Sydney 9.5 L/100km. The return trip 8.54L/100km which included diverting to Wollongong and climbing the McQuarie pass to go through Roberton and Moss Vale to return to the Hume highway. Maybe it is the Coriolis forces but I mostly go East or West but Brisbane is either a North or South trip for the previous post! To my knowledge no ethanol was involved. The distance is a bit over 200 nm by air. Regards Ross

Hi Big Pete YTOC can even be recognised on Google Earth. It made my instructor a bit nervous a couple of years ago with concurrent operations of gliders and tug on left hand circuits and the Jabiru on a right hand circuit on parallel runways, one on grass and the Jab on bitumen. We left Griffith on a 39 degree C day. We were going YGTH-YTOC-YBLT. Navigation was easy until we crossed the border into Vic then there were just so many roads and towns. That was my first flight into Victoria. I had to learn to ignore the detail and look for the major landmarks - no GPS allowed. I thought I was doing a training flight - my instructor was treating it as a test! Ballarat also was another RAAF training field and still has the leftovers of a lovely big paddock and a couple of loverly big long strips and a couple of massive hangers to go with them plus plenty of taxying space. It even has a dedicated run up area. Next day we left Ballarat around mid day after the fog lifted to arrive back in Griffith late afternoon to be greeted by a 45 degree C day. Regards

Hi Geoff & Darren I generally agree with what Geoff has said. I am building a J160 in our double carport which has a ceiling that is about 50 mm above the top of the tail of my J160 when the front wheel is on the ground. This makes rollingthe aircraft very difficult once any part of the tail assembly is attached. So the first point is to ensure that you have at least (I was going to say "a couple of feet") 600 mm space above the tail and preferably a lot more. For mixing epoxy and hardener in a ratio of 3 to 1 by weight I use an old pair of Post Office scales. I use about 50 only 5/16" nuts as the weights to balance the scales. So I start with a pot on each side to balance the scales then justmake abatch with various starting points like 3 nuts weight of epoxy and 1 nut of hardener, or 6 nuts of epoxy and two nuts of hardener etc. Apparently the relative humidity is important for the curing of epoxy. I think it needs to be below about 70% but check it out and temperature needs to be above 16 degrees Centigrade preferably above 25 degrees. Apparently curing if stopped by low temperature will continue once the temperature rises again but the job needs to be kept in alignment or contact untill the full curing has occurred. Lifting or supporting the fuselage in a sling could be an option. I got a slingmade by our local tarpaulin manufacturer from the material that seat belts are made from, about $50. SoI can lift one endor the whole aircraft using an "engine crane"and gradually rotate the fusein its sling before lowering it onto a trestle or its wheels. The most usefull hand tool I have bought is a carbide tipped paint scraper with a replaceable blade anda nice plastic handle. It is great for dressing up epoxy,epoxy-flock and epoxy-microballs. It has saved me heaps of sanding. I have yet to replace the blade. I also found a very good scissor type tool at a local hardware shop for about $22 that will readily cut fibreglass cloth. It has on blade finely serrated which stops the fibreglass cloth slipping out when being cut. An ordinary pair of scissors is hopeless for that job. Anotheruseful tool isa simple board with a handle like a concrete trowel for holding sandpaper especially 400 grit paper. A good orbital sander is a must but make sure that it takes standard width rectanular shaped paper so that you only have to cut for length not width as well. Cutting up good quality sandpaper with your wife's scissors won't do them much good or you. The orbital sander needs holes through the paper and base so that sanded material can be continuously removed by its own dust extraction system. Despite that alwayswear a dust mask when sanding even when using the hand powered version. When using the hand powered sander I periodically tap contact the full face of it onto something like a towel and that will remove most of the cut material from the sandpaper. If you let that material build up it can start marking the job as well as producing an uneven sanding. I buy my sandpaper in rolls of either 50 metres or 100 metres. You canprobably geta 50% discount compared to buying a couple of metres at a time. I have spent around +$2,000 on paint and accesseries so far. I discovered that high fill undercoat paint needs a different nozzle size to the final coat after I bought the spray gun. Probably a gravity gun with the resevoir on top is a better buy than the standard type gun. Because the paint is expensive (and carcinogenic), especially thetwo part stuff, I also bought a small touch up gun so that I can do small parts or touch up an area and have better control of it. Two part paint is difficult to mix because it has to be mixed in fairly accurate amounts. I use a couple of different size poly measuring containers and cylinders all the way down to 50 ml. The trouble is that they have to be cleaned as soon as you use them so that you can read the scale next time it is used. The alternative is to purchase the proper mixing gear or to get a paint shop to do that for you. The trouble is that two part paint has a limited pot life so that youneed touse all the paint you have mixed or chuck it out before it turns your spray gun into a piece of furniture. Buy acetone in a 20 litre drum to get a reasonable price around $100. It is handy for cleaning anything to do with paint. It is also used to clean gelcoat before paintingand fibreglass before applying epoxy or epoxy-flock. It can be used to as a solvent to clean any epoxy mixing pots or tools. Ventilate the area well when using acetone. As I wear glasses, I had trouble getting a facemask to cope with glasses and not interfere with them. So I eventually bought a full face mask type that has a battery powered filter to feed clean air across your face and eyes - very expensive. It will run a full 8 hours on a single battery charge and has audible warnings for clogged filter or low battery etc. The supplier sells replaceable plastic material to go on the outside but somebody told me to justa roll of ordinary kitchen type "Cling Wrap" to protect the working side of the face mask from paint and dust. By the way don't foreget ears when sanding - use earplugs to keep out carcinagenusmaterial or just plain fibreglass dust. Other tools hard to buy here are countersinks to suit csk rivets in fibrelass. I think the rivet head angle angle is 110 degrees included angle. Normal countersinks are 90 degree included angle to suit timber screws. You need it for the poprivets holding the retained nuts and the rivets forrudder, elevator and ailerons. I did a stint of working for St Vincent de Paul society and got a great supply of rags sheets and a few blankets, all veryy handy when handling composites. I think I had better shut up at this stage. If you find this useful let me know and I will try to think of more items. Would a few photos be any use of some tools if there is a question about them? By the way, I can see that Geoff's shed at Wagga is much more builder friendly than my carport with a tempory door/wall is in Leeton. Regards Ross

Hi TechMan An interesting shot. I would like to know what model and serial number Jabiru that wheel came off. I know that my wheels look qute different and the axels have been modified with a larger radius fillet at the root which is probably the point of failure in your photo. Also the axel is tapered from the fillet back to where the bearings are mounted. That should result in a substantial reduction in the stress concentration in the area of the fillet. See my photo below which does not show the axel but the considerably different wheel. It is from Jabiru kit J160 serial number 14 despatched in Dec 2004. See attached pic. The brake calipers are not attached at this stage. Regards Ross

Hi Chris Information like this is probably fairly basic and obviousfor you with your training. But itcan be vitally important to us amateurswho are building and maintaining our RAA aircraftin many cases with no training in this field. I for one would like to see a lot more of this basic information or tricks of the trade if you like. Maybe a basic printed text of fundamental principles of maintenance etc or regular articles on the forum. Personally, I think printed texts are more useful as they can be carried around and lkely to be perusedmore easily than starting up the computer to look for some particular item. But both could be complimentary. This is obviously getting more complicated with the advent of a whole new range of composite materials used in construction and about which nobody seems willing to put pen to paper. Even the Jabiru construction manual that I have is very short on detail about the curing of fibreglass epoxy materials. The information on it isalmost an exact copy of the manufacturerstest figures that are publishedon the internet. I for one did not build a fibreglass canoe while I was at school fifty years ago. See the emphasis on metal work in articles in the "Kitplanes" magazine on rivetting on metal aeroplanes. I think this is great material and would be extreemly useful to anyone buiding a aerooplane. But there is still a need for the basic information like the note that you have put in about looking after theRotax springs. Jabiru 2200shave a few springs on them as well to "secure" the exhaust system and air ducting. I am also aware that silicone should be kept away from epoxy based composite materials. I am reminded of an occasion when an ultralight pilot builder was looking at another non RAA builders aircraft and noted that the lock wiring on the propellor hub bolts was wired up so that the tighter the wiring was it would tend to undo the nuts. The way the lock wiringwas done,the nuts could undo a full turn before the lock wiringcould have any effect if anyof restrainingthem from coming looser. The lock wire should have been set up so that it would get tighter if there was any tendency for the nuts to come loose! Regards Ross

Hi Don AVDATA Pty Ltd are engaged by some airports to collect landing fees. They have a website with a list of charges - see below http://www.avdata.com.au/AirportChargeRates.pdf or just do a Google search on "AVDATA" to see a list of related sites. Regards

Hi Rodger I'm with you Rodger. I think I would rather fly with a pilot who has a vested interest in keeping himself alive. Regards

Hi All The first fire photo above was taken from near Gogeldrie rice shed,between Leeton and Whitton. The two below were taken of the same smoke but from just North of the village of Murrami. [ATTACH]565[/ATTACH] The same smoke above about 20 minutes later and taken approx20 miles northof the fire. The smoke appears to have moved along the ground. The village of Murrami is in the middle of the pic just behind the small isolated hill. [ATTACH]566[/ATTACH] Zoomed in a bit probably twenty seconds later. Part of the village of Murrami can just be seen behind the hill in the foreground. Don was not volunteering to fly his Kitfox into the smoke. As far as I know he has never done any gliding ( I should say soaring). The smoke seems to have reached the inversion layer and stopped rising. Rice stubble fires are often notveryhot compared tosay a wheat stubble firebecause the straw is often damp with a dryflag and the ground is probably quite wet underneath. Regards Ross

Trying a different edited photo. This is one of the features of our landscape after the rice harvest. Most ricestubbles are not burnt nowadays. Taken from my brother Don'sKitfox on one of his visits to Leeton. Note what is probably a rice header in the foreground. You can just see the small hill behind Murrami village on the horizon just to the right of the smoke. Ross

Hi Jabiru J type Kit flyers and builders I am assembling a J160 kit and have heard of this uneven fuel flow problem in wet wings before but not only for the J160. I have yet to hear of an engine stopping from one tank being dry but it could give quite an uneven load on the wings. Is this a problem? In the J160 kit #14 version each wing tank has two feed outletsthat go to its own twin inlet single outlet valve before continuing in a single tube to a Tee piece behind the seats where it is joined by the single tube from the other wing tank with a similar feed and valve arrangement. From the tee piece behind the seatsa single feed continues to the header tank under the passengers seat from where any air should escape back to the wing tanks.. The wing tanks are joined by a tube across the cabin ceiling that connects to an uluminium tube in each wing tank that goes inside the tank to the top of theextreme outer end of each wing tank. If this tube is not full of fuel it should allow the fuel pressures from each tank to equalise provided that ......... The header tank has a breather outlet that should allow the header tank to fill with fuel and any trapped air or air coming in with fuelto escape back tothe tube across the cabin ceilingvia a tee piece in the ceiling in that joining tube between wing tanks. Since the wings are at aone degree dihedralthe outer ends should be higher than elsewhere. So if there is any air in the tanks that is where it should be in the outer end of the wing tanks connected to the other wing by the breather tubeacross the cabin ceiling (provided we have balanced flight). There aremany combinations of possibilities here of where the fuel might go depending on the positions of the breather tube(s) in the wings, the fuel cap vents orientation, the cleanliness of the finger filters in the tank feeds, the diameter of the fuel lines and tubes (capillary action), the location of paper filters in the system, the trim and rigging of the aeroplane and which way up is the aeroplane. Are the fuel cap vents set up to be air pressure positive, negative or neutral? If the resultant tank pressuresare differenr fuel must flow from one wing tank to the other. It could move via the tee piece behind the seats or even via the breather tube across the ceiling unless the breather pipe across the ceiling has a shut off valve each side of the header tank tee piece connection. An extra two valves would then make the fuel system more complex but allow each tank to be operated independently but would increase the risk of engine failure due to fuel starvation and uneven loading of the aeroplane. If anyone knows for sure what is the cause of this problem please let me know before I get my J160 airborne. Regards

In a proper aeroplane! From an unbiased jab pilot Regards Ross A.

Hi Ken I usually find that I have foregotten a setting usually the white balance as well. So I almost always take a trial shot or two or three to get the white balance right together with the depth of field etc. Zooming in especially to 12X is difficult without a tripod even more so in a Jabiru. I would like to go up some time when there was a clear blue sky. Every time I go up lately half a dozen people seem to have decided they are going to burn some stubble. When I flew glideers before they changed the rules some years ago Leeton rubbish tip was a great nav aid with it's plume of smoke almost always present. Iwas going to insert a couple of pics here but for some reason it won't let me - I don't have sufficient rights! Regards

Hi Steve I saw some of The Red Bull Race Turkey Edition on our Channel 10. The camera work was pretty impessive with shots in the planes and fantastic zoom shots following the planes around the course. You see closeups of the pilot and planes all around the course. The most impressive aerial photography I have ever seen. The crowd seemed to be very close to the competitors and would have had a great view but I think the TV shots would have been much better. It was a bit like seeing the cricket closeup with a TV shot versus watching it fromthe back of the stand. The planes all with smoke trails turned on would start out by diving at the first gate to get some extra speed before passing through them. Thegates appear tobe inflated tall pear shaped balloons with some of the gates not wide enough to go through with level wings. Most passes that I saw through the gates appeared to have the planes actually past a 90 degree bank so that they were actually using back stickto get lower as they passed through the gate. Course or lap times were in the order of 11 seconds. I did not see the whole show so do not know all the details. The participants would have had an extreme adrenalin high! Regards Ross Arnold Ross

Hi Nosmo You have just put my mind at rest besides I just checked to find that the side windows are clear. I appreciate your point about landing into the sun. :big_grin: I still have vivid memories of landing the Leeton ES52 MkIV Kookaburra into the sun at Brobenah and the frontal view being virtually invisible from the glare of a well scratched perspex windscreen. It was reassuring to look out the side window and watch the surface from there. It turned out to be a very smooth landing. Regards Ross Arnold

Hi Ken I use a Panasonic Model: DMC-FZ5 and am still having some trouble getting good photos with it. I think I made a mistake ordering tinted windows in my Jabiru J160 kit. I will find out eventually. Regards Ross Arnold

Hi Geoff Did you fly over yesterday? Would hav beeen a nice day for it. Regards Ross

First one scanned from negative. Others scanned from photos 35mm SLR. A warm day in Phoenix and Southern CaliforniaJuly 1985 bottom left. NSTC TV 400 lines per inch. [ATTACH]597[/ATTACH] What they used to look like in November 2000. [ATTACH]598[/ATTACH] Late final LAX November 2000. [ATTACH]599[/ATTACH] Regards Ross

This is a scanof aphoto I took in 1986from an ANSETT flight from Brisbane to Sydney just as the crewcut the power for a descent into Sydney. I think we were at about 45,000 ft abeam Singleton at the time.

Hi All As a teenager a few years ago (don't ask how many) I was given a book called "The Role of Science and Industry in the Second World War" published or sponsored and sold by the Australian War Memorial probably about ten years after the end of WWII. There was a series of books from them in a similar vein. One point mentioned was that the Australian invented and war time established coastal radar stations were not manned on weekends. No doubt that policy was probably changed after a few raids on Darwin. Amongst the topcs covered in that particular volume was the fact that Australian timbers were tested and certified for use as construction material for wooden defence force aeroplane construction. I am surethey were were matched against their overseas equivalents. My guess is that the timber research work was probably done by the CSR the precursor of the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation. I no longer have a copy of that volume much to my regret. Being the eldest child in the family, I left home first and my books disappeared as the family later moved homes. Regards

Hi Crew This is what I love about flying. The Transition from an awkward earth bound machine to the air at Leeton's Brobenah airstrip. This was my first flight in a Jabiru J160 owner built courtesy of Geoff Hamilton and Geoff Waddleton from Red Cliffs near Mildura about ten seconds before Geoff said those magic words "Your aircraft". Can you imagine letting someone you had just met to actually fly your own personal aeroplane. Thank you Geoff & Geoff. All the white things on the ground are plastic bags from the Leeton rubish tip on the edge of the aerodrome which is about to be closed and cleaned up.A new modern tip has been set up a few Km east of the town to be opened in mid August. Ross

I see that my J160 pilot side rudder pedal stop photo has been used. Please note that the base will be extended each side of the tubes and extra bolts through the firewall added to secure the base of the stops. If the stops are fitted as shown to go close to the middle of the pedal when the pedal is fully depressedwith excessive force there should be a very low bending force transmitted tothe welded junction of the pedal and the tube. Thus most of theexcessive pilot leg force would be balancedby the pedal stop without excessively loading up the welded joint. Two instructors flying could still be a problem but maybe one of them has a parachute. If the stop is mounted, incorrectly in myview,behind the pedal lever tuberather than the pedal itself the full force of the leg action will be exerted on the pedal tube weld junction and the weldwill eventually fail. The rudder pedal assembly comes with a test certificate. There are two sets of (rudder) pedal stops and a set of stops for the rudder at the aft end of the fuselage. If all the stops and cable ends are set correctly the welds are protected as well as the rudder push pull/cable and the rudder from over travel. Thefront wheel steering is set byadjusting two push rods to the front wheel UCconnected to the rudder pedal tubes not the pedals. So steering is also protected by limiting the pedal travel. The steering on the Jabiru J160 is quite different from the earlier Jabiru LS55. A point to note here is that if either steering rod were to fail then you have no left rudder pedal and depending on how the steering springs were set up the rudder could be biased to left or right. So it is essential to check that there is no bending of these vital adjustable rods and their ball joints and that they are secure. So if you losethe front UC in a landing it is probably not safeto abort andgo round if you have not got a rudder under control. Regards

Hi Blueline As a mature age student I did my initial RAA training in an early model Jab.That Jabhad 5 hours on it whenI started in 2004 with low flying experience in mostly gliders of about 200 hours going back to 1971. It drove me nuts for a while especially in the verticalpitch. I purposedly took most of my lessons in mid afternoon. One of the cross country training flights was to Ballarat where I tucked in behind a local Jab doing crosswind landings on 23. I have had one flight in a J160 with a 2200 motor of about half an hour duration and it is a different aircraft in pitch compared to the 470 Kg MTOW Jab.Not nearly as twitchy as the early model Jabs. A few more horses would be nice with the increase in MTOW. Despite being quite different from the early Jab I felt after that short flight in the owner built J160that it was just like the early model jabs to fly but without the instability. That may or may not be a good thing from an instructors point of view in trying to get a student to keep alert as to what his aircraft is doing. Regards

Hi Nosmo Did you apply to CASA or RAA for your ASIC. So far I only have a receipt for my application from RAA dated 9-03-06 Regards