Head in the clouds

You're forgiven, one error in two years of posts is quite acceptable ;)

Disregarding the Ultrabat thing ... and I'm not sure when the Vampire featured but I can certainly attest that the LGT Stratos was at Mangalore in 1984 and 85. It went to Oshkosh and received an 'extraordinary' award from NASA in 1986, and was the 'feature' aircraft at Mangalore in 1987.I'm looking at the pics and manufacturer's specs taken at Mangalore published in Berger-Burr's 85/86 edition, of Ultralight & Microlight Aircraft of the World, and also the patch and memento glass from the dinner, 87, which feature the Stratos. I've still got most of those patches and glasses, Fokker Universal 86, DH Comet 85, Victa Airtourer 84 and a number of others.

In many places, where it isn't likely to get into the waterways, people mount a tank with a spreader bar onto a small trailer and collect used sump oil from the local service stations and spread it on the bare ground. Prevents weed growth and binds any dust, maintaining a smooth surface. Sounds very eco-bad but isn't really, as long as it's away from waterways. If you want to plant grass later just leave it for 12mths and the oil breaks down allowing seed germination and/or root propagation. It's been a regular outback road maintenance method in dusty areas for around 100yrs ...

I've just realised who this is. Really sad to hear it, all round good bloke - and one of the 5 UFOs I posted about a couple of years ago (United Flying Octagenarians).Fair winds Ray, and sincerest condolences to family and loved ones.

I've had a look through a few pictures of Minimaxs and it looks like they have washout, as you'd normally expect, unless they had a radically different airfoils section at the tip compared with the root, which they don't appear to have. So you're saying yours is rigged with a greater angle of incidence at the tip than at the root? If that's the case it might be rather nasty for tip-stalling, i.e. the tip of the wing stalling before the root and the usual consequence, at the normal stall, would be loss of aileron control with wing-drop/incipient spin entry. Depending on how rigid the wings are in torsion you may be able to shorten the front struts to give the wings washout, or lengthen the rear ones ... Soleair, a member on this site, has quite recently completed his Minimax build, if you send him a PM I'm sure he would be able to tell you much more about it.

I'd also go for Qld Blue Couch - which apparently is not actually a couch, nor does it come from Qld, but whatever ... I like the low maintenance and the way it spreads to cover bald patches and is soft enough to have a low rolling resistance for a plane. If you want to reduce the sowing cost for any grass type, as long as it is a variety that spreads readily and you're happy to be a little patient, I would avoid using seed altogether. As mentioned above, birds will probably eat 90% of the seed you sow, so that's a big cost in itself. If you buy about 1% of the coverage you need in Qld Blue turf, you can break the turf apart and during the wet part of your year, plant small pieces at about 300mm grid spacing. Just spike a hole in wet ground, place a small clump of turf and press the soil back around it. In a month or so, the small pieces will have started to produce runners and in about twelve months the patches should be all closed up.

Welcome B-P. Great work you fellas and ladies are doing over there. I'm sure we'd all be fascinated to hear about some of your exploits. And pictures?

Bex's sudden interest in promoting BRS to such an extent has me thinking that making/selling them is probably his latest scheme. I can't think why else, since he doesn't fly himself ...

SpaceShipTwo Bounces Back to Rubber Fuel

Yes, well I'm not an accountant either, but my father was and my wife is, so I'm used to seeing what we might reasonably expect, and the email 'report' isn't a Report at all, it might be better described as a 'Statement' - though even that would be generous. In that email I would have expected to see a link to the Profit and Loss (Year to Date) and the Balance Sheet. I haven't looked at this stage, but perhaps that's available to members on the Members Portal.

I'm afraid you're amply demonstrating your 'armchair viewer' status. The aircraft that NT5224 and his lovely young wife was flying, did have what you might describe as 'bush plane' landing gear, and the strength of it is well demonstrated by the fact that it's still attached and apparently undamaged following the mishap. In fact the strength of the whole structure is shown, in that the fuselage is fully intact, the wings are still where they should be, and the occupants relatively unhurt. And - the article you linked to, for whatever reason, is a load of bunkum. I did read it all, though I wasn't inclined to after the first paragraph contained this piece of priceless wisdom - "If you had an engine failure in a 4 seat ordinary light aircraft, there effectively is nowhere to land unless there is a deliberate runway, AND it would tend to plummet not glide ! " ................. 1@NT5224[/uSER] - it looks like you and your good lady did an excellent job under the circumstances, and hopefully there will be little or no damage to the plane and you'll be back in the air soon. If you can manually flip it back upright and get it lifted out by helicopter it can be landed back on its wheels without damage at the destination. Previous similar recoveries have shown that if you can arrange a three-point lifting attachment to each of the forward wingspar-to-cabin attach points and the third to the rudder post, with lengths organised so that the plane hangs about 5° nose low then it should behave quite reasonably on the hook. In any event avoid it hanging nose high or it will want to fly and become uncontrollable. In case you have any doubts about your handling of the matter, thinking that you could somehow have prevented the overturn, I'd suggest not to beat yourself up over it. I had an almost identical occurrence 32yrs ago. I was on approach to land at the Surfers Paradise Raceway (gone now, it's a housing development called Emerald Lakes), and had special permission to operate from there as long as there were never any 'problems'. On long final I had a section of the cabin roof come loose and it started flapping uncontrollably which gave some disturbing effects on control due the the varying airflow over the tail. In retrospect I should have just landed but being mindful of my obligation I decided to power on and go elsewhere. It quickly became clear that the increased airflow from the prop-wash was making the condition much worse so I cut the engine and chose what looked like a large grassy area a mile or so to the west. As it turned out it was an area of swampy tall (2m+) grass in the grounds of the Gold Coast German Club - but you couldn't tell that from the air. I set up for a very slow landing which all went fine and was touching down when I had a very peculiar sensation just as you described. It seemed like the smoothest landing ever but then, as the plane descended into the grass everything turned green and then a very disorientated feeling - in my case I didn't realise I had inverted. It was the softest landing, completely cushioned by the grass with absolutely no damage to the airframe. In seconds I was out and wondering how to get the plane moved out of there and in minutes a friend had flown over and landed nearby and was helping me work it out. A few minutes after that the news and police helicopters were there, and that's when the only damage was done, as the police clumped around in their boots on the underside of my wings 'searching for casualties' - it was a single-seat plane but that was too much for the local constabulary to process, it seemed. Being close to a road we were able to detach the wings and carry it out with the help of a few friends, and I was flying again a few days later.

Umm? As I understand it stainless must never be welded to CRMO because the joint will be very brittle. I'm no metallurgy expert but that's what research indicates ...

I don't think it is, unless they've used a different font for the rego on each side.The undamaged one has italicized numerals, the damaged one doesn't.

Well, so I am right and I am wrong? I guess it's good to know where you stand on this ... And, umm - Paralysed? I've spent a lifetime flying helicopters and planes, I have a yacht and a powerboat and a 4WD and for thirty-five years I've been using some or all of them running explorations into some of the world's remotest regions - without ever having a mishap. Yup, you must be right, that's one hell of a paralysis I'm suffering. I don't have imaginary fears Bruce. Over the years I've seen so many avoidable tragedies and near disasters happen, and they're often caused by people meddling with things they don't know enough about. I have absolutely no problem with suitably skilled people doing whatever they want, my only concerns are inept people who put other unsuspecting peoples' lives at risk when they tinker with things they don't know enough about. Far from 'needing to fight against' me, if you knew a little more about me you would know that I was one of the first to begin and maintain the fight to uphold our right to build and modify our own planes; starting from the first days when the AUF was formed and 'rules' began to be introduced - but it needs to be done right with appropriate knowledge and skill or people get hurt and these days litigation always follows. And that hurts all of us. Why should I have my rights and privileges affected or curtailed just because some untrained, unskilled johnny-come-lately thinks he has the right to mess about with things he would be better staying well away from? "A Perfect Safety Record Is No Accident"

Well ... you have to choose first - you want to fly or you want a wife. Often you can't have both ... Tough decision, welcome to the forum anyway.

It's easy to assume there's a problem with the method, and to assume that there's enough resistance with plugs removed, that the airframe will move and that the method therefore won't work. However the fact is, if you're careful, the method works very well. I've assisted quite a few times using the "laser attached to the back of blade projected onto floor" method, and it's simple, quick and very accurate. And results in a smooth-running airscrew provided the blades are of equal weight, balanced end-for-end, and track reasonably well. If you do happen to bump the plane or if it moves during the pitch-setting process, then it's very easy and quick to go back to the first set blade and check or re-do the other(s). For the last one I made up a holder for a laser pointer that clips onto the blades, it has an adjustable rod that can be hooked over the blade tip or rested against the hub to ensure it locates similarly on each blade. If you want a double-check that the airframe hasn't moved during the process you could just add a second laser pointer to the firewall or engine mounting frame and mark the point on the floor where it projects. If that doesn't change, nothing else has ...

After looking at some pics taken from a U2 at 70,000ft I was looking at the Beale AFB in California and saw the following pics. I wonder if anyone can explain them? The first shows three aircraft and the white long winged one intrigues me particularly, bigger span than the U2, but I'd be interested to know what the small one is as well. Starfighter? The second pic is a bit strange, piggy back U2s (?) or it just a pair of overlaid Google images that aren't quite properly registered? The third show another of those high aspect ratio things which almost looks like some kind of cruise bomb but appears to have a single seat cockpit. And the last image shows the same plane with another U2 nearby. It's certainly not small and obviously intended to fly high. Does that mean it's another high level surveillance aircraft replacing the Blackbird perhaps? I expect there'll be some folks on here that will know the answers, thanks.

I knew Werner Bekker well, in Victoria, he passed a year or so ago, interesting fella. Never met this one you mention, but would like to if anyone has details of how to contact him. The older fellas have the best tales to tell, though are often reluctant raconteurs. Most older folks would like to write their memoires but have little confidence in their abilities to do so ... and then there are also many trained and skillful writers without a tale to tell, for want of an introduction, often. The real tragedy is that their stories die with them and are then lost to the sands of time.

One of our AUF/RAA and SAAA/AOPA members, Erwin Felkl, was a fascinating fella and good friend. He was a proud Austrian with a penchant for building things, which he did with a standard of craftsmanship that I envied greatly. He built the most glorious home in the forest near Jimboomba, it was a place as if from a fairytale, built from selected timbers of many kinds - and which would make the most fastidious boatbuilder green with envy. Having completed that, he built a KR2 to a similar standard. I loved listening to his tales, he was one of the few people who didn't have a problem talking about 'the war', although he had some very distressing times during it - he was a Luftwaffe pilot. The stories I most enjoyed were about his flight training, his instructor was Hannah Reitsch - and he maintained a friendship with her 'until the end'. Sadly Erwin passed in his KR, caught in bad weather and downdrafts/rotors, didn't make it over the range ...

You can get them cheaper on ebay. Best to buy in bulk unless you only use short sentences. I don't, I tend to use long ones, if you know what I mean, and I run out of them, regularly, and then have to wait, impatiently, for a delivery of them, and that's only if they're not on back order, or unavailable, or lost in the mail, you know?

I raise you another SAAF Lightning and two Typhoons -

They're a high quality shackle, you don't need to replace them. BUT - you certainly shouldn't sand-blast them or plate them with anything, chrome or otherwise, plating can change the metallurgy of tensile steels and make them brittle. You could soda-blast them but if it were me I would carefully use an abrasive nylon brush like this in a drill - available from Bunnings, Josco brand, for about $17. Then paint them with a rust inhibiting epoxy.

Could you post a photo? All the Drifters I've seen, including mine, had standard marine bow shackles. They used the bow type to allow wires to pull off-angle from the ends of the strap under the pan, because the strap end couldn't be at the right angle for both the inner and the outer flying wires, so it was set at half way between each of them.

My Shorai LiFe battery has been in a box under the house for the last four years awaiting the completion of DooMaw. Amazing battery - when I packed it up it was fully charged at 14.4V, I dug it out about a month ago because the engine is in now and I'm building the panel - and it's lost hardly any charge, it's still 14.2V. Treated like that, most lead-acid types would have reached the stage whether they might not take a charge again, at all.

It is a plastic nut. And mine is also a helicopter helmet with the single plug but like many of us that fly both we just have a converter cable where the single plug plugs into a single female inline socket with a short cable to double male plugs that suit the aeroplane configuration.