Sapphire

Just watched that on 60 minutes. An a/c was converted from a crop duster to skydiving operations without any check done on the c of g. When the plane crashed as a result of being out of c of g, it was "pilot error" The head of the NZ regulatory authority accepted no blame-the pilot [who can't defend himself] should not have flown that a/c. When I fly , I check that it has a certificate of airworthyness and from that I assume that when the a/c is loaded according to the fligh manual, it is within correct c of g. Another trick is that after the accident regulations have been tightened up requireing all a/c to be checked after major modification. Reminds me of the Air New Zealand Antarctic crash long ago. After the trial the judge commented that he was continually presented with a litany of lies

A lot of things were invented in the 60's and earlier and just improved on recently. I survived in those days. No pilots were harmed in the making of this post.

I can live with out the mod cons. I switch off my GPS because it's so boring. Steam guages tell me all I want to know.

Sharing a big container is quite cheap. The difference in price of sending a small container and a big container that can hold two planes is very small. How long will it take to build the Cosy, downunder?

Gee, doesn't any body have the stomach to know what happened to the guy who got sucked into the jet engine? He didn't come out the back end looking like rasberry jam. Part of his clothing got snagged as he went in and prevented him from going straight through. Whenever I have a bad day I think of him and it becomes a good day.

dazza, I hear that NASA's space shuttles will soon be government surplus for sale. You"ll need a special dough mixer as well to make up the solid fuel boosters. Other than that, it should be pretty conventional.

Takes a very experienced person. When I had the preflight inspection done on my Varieze the examiner tried to look for some repaired damage. Couldn't point to anything and gave up. Yes it's been on Gumtree a long time.

You need a special lic. to be qualified to land there. The circuit has to be done at precise speeds and altitudes.

Keep it up Liam. Is that you inside the engine? I saw a video of a guy standing next to a jet engine and then being sucked into it like a rag doll.

Yeah Scotty, I personally would not buy a home made plane unless at least the owner would do a demonstration flight in it.

You still seem keen-guess now it's a matter price. I just had a look at some of it's performance figures. Fifteen hours endurance on 52 gal. petrol flying economy cruise at 130 kts giving nearly 2000 mile range. Thats the approx endurance of a 747. If you like to cruise, that's your plane [if you can sit that long]. I did not look much at the Long Eze in Jandakot. It was pushed up to a wall with lots of misc. stuff. The plus side is you can do certified work on the engine but you don't want to give your time away. Say you pay $30000 for the plane and do $45000 work on the engine[in value] the plane would cost you $75000[including your tiime] Calculating what it's resale value is at that point is hard to determine since there are few around here. Those a/c are not so popular here because of the runway requirements. People phoned me up if they can fly it off their 600 foot grass farm strip. In the USA they have lots of long paved runways. Finding a buyer can be very hard but lot's of dreamers. Also, pilots are importing a/c from USA because of their cheap price and big choice over there. If that Long Ezy at Jandakot was advertised for $15000 I would still be looking at knocking him down further. That's if it even passed further inspection on the airframe which is another story. They are all home make a/c and vary a lot in quality of workmanship. If the wings, canard etc are not accurately made and set up you can have a plane that has serious flight problems. If it was hardly flown, I would have concern on that fact alone.

Amazing, and I visualized you being at some lonely spot thousands of miles away. I have seen the fuselage at his premises-live within walking distance. The Narrogin Gliding Club overhauled their Pawnee Lycoming and cost about $45000. Even the 447 and 503 Rotax cost thousands in parts and last only 300 hrs. The converted Vw engine is supposed to be cheap to overhaul and has a tbo of about 1200 hrs. Another option is to import one from the USA like I did with the Varieze. At Oshkosh there were long rows of Long Ezes but only counted 3 Variezes. Though, its pretty expensive if you go over to have a look and it's no good. Guys do up these engine with cheap old parts then sell them as being zero time overhauled. Lucky to last 200 hrs. Well Scotty, buying or selling a/c needs a lot of patience-like years. I am looking around for another one, but in the meantime bought a sailboat for thrills. Going from 150 kts to 6 kts will take some getting used to.

Is that Long Eze the one advertised in Jandakot? Rutan has years of newsletters on the development of the Varieze some where on the internet? I learned some time ago to be patient in buying anything. Buy in haste and repent in leisure. Plenty of a/c sitting in sheds for decades but not economical to fix. Even a 0 hour 20 year old engine will leak like a seive and have internal rust. Wait for him to go down with the price. if you want a high labour project.

http://www.cozy1200.com/geeklog/filemgmt_data/files/Long-EZ%20POH.pdf Above is the manual for the Long Eze. The lyco 0-320 is not a recommened engine for this a/c. It would not have been extensively flight tested with this engine. When you say "mods" do you mean directives? There is a Long- Eze for sale in Aust. asking $70000 plus. In USA they can vary 20 to 40 thousand asking depending a lot on engine hours. Since parity of the AUD and USD, value of planes here have dropped a lot.

The first option will save you a lot of money. The second option would have to be done in heaven or hell-which ever one you qualify for.

Reminds me of the old candid camera series. Some of the jokes didn't work on the occational person.

Not a good thing to happen if you bring home a chick for the night. That would "shorten" your relationship.

Scotty, you'll be learning till you hang up your head phones. The plane is forgiving and if it were any safer it would be boring. I would do high speed taxiing down the runway time after time raising the cunnard. Then when you think you are ready on a nice cool morning with a light wind straight down the strip, lift it off. When I did, I was taken back by the apparent high nose attitude, but even with that was maintaining only 500 feet but travelling over 130 knots. The normal climb attitude puts the canard and nose so high all you can see are the helecopters hovering above you [you're getting your first flight on video?] Do your circuit as planned and plan to go around. You'll know when you have enough experience. When the a/c you are flying is getting boring and you are looking for some more hot action, then its time. A note on the high speed taxi bit. If you have wheel fairings, the temperature inside can get so hot as to disintegrate the composite strut and the wheel falls off. Take your fairings off for the high speed taxi practice. I wrapped the strut with heat insulating material and drilled some holes in the bottom of the fairing as recommended in one of Rutans newsletters. Also, Continental engines are notorious for icing. Install a carby temp guage.

I owned a Varieze for two years but only did one flight in someone elses Long Eze which has more storage space. I would have more nasty habits than those two a/c. Do big circuits, especially in the beginning. They have large turning radius so turn onto final with plenty of space and moderate angle of bank. To reduce landing distance, round out over the gravel and hold off till you are over the bitumen. A lot of pilots dont use the air brake. It makes for about 20% less landing distance and protects your prop when taxiiing. I deployed the airbrake on early final. My circuit procedure differed from the Varieze manual. I would desend on crosswind doing 150 kts for better visibility downwards. Turn downwind and reduce speed to 120 kts. Turn base and reduce speed to 100 kts. Turn final and reduce speed to 80 kts and deploy airbrake. The manual has you apply airbrake on downwind. The catch is the airbrake is designed to retract automatically at speeds over about 90 kts. so your circuit would be slow, lack downward visibility, and not have as good contol turning. You will have to adjust the airbrake by trial and error so it retracts at the right speed. Make sure you have enough runway to do a landing without airbrake. When first I got my Varieze, the air brake retracted at 60 knots and was impossible to use untill re adjusted. The first time you fly, you will be test pilot and it will be your first solo. You'll have your hands full.

The definition of ignorant is someone who lacks knowlege,such as yourself who has never flown these beutifull machines,but are very quick to critisis them:roflmao: Actually, it's my knowledge that keeps me out of dangerous situations, like following the proverbial sheep over a cliff:roflmao:

I always like stories like that with a happy ending

Interesting questions Sain. I havn't done a high speeed stall in this aircraft which would stall the main wing. During flight testing they were able with great difficulty to stall the Varieze and put it into a spin. It took over 12 turns to recover. Late in the development of the plane some pilot had an uncontrolled wing drop while just flying straight an level. Wasn't really dangerous as the plane instantly recovered with a change of speed. Rutan did many flights over a long period to reproduce it. Eventually it was discovered that wing drop could happen at a certain speed and aft c of g. and corrections were made. This a/c has been so extensively tested that in my opinion it is one of the safest to fly and easiest.

I remember seeing video of a chute collapsing and the then coming good again once it left the turbulance. I am sure this sort of flying gives you a big thrill, but for me I would sooner get my thrill on Blueberry Hill.

The guy who lic his first Varieze as an ultralight in Australia had to do many trials and some modifications to prove it could fly at or below 45 knots. Others like me could then get it passed just by signing on the dotted line. When I talked to Steve Bell on the phone he wanted to know what the stalling speed of my Varieze was as it was not listed on his information sheet for that type of a/c. I told him it didn't stall and there was silence and a bit of mumbling on the end of the line. It got sorted out eventually. Variezes are built a bit longer and shorter. Lots of wind tunnel tests and test flight were done over a long period of time and changes were made even as people were building them. With the nosewheel extended before climbing in, the a/c will want to tip back agressively taking out your prop and probably landing on the wing tips nose up That and the hand starting means you need lots of disipline even before you get into the air.

I flew in one for one and a half hours with a 12 inch tear in it.I dont know how much more I can really say. I"ll say it-no thanks