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OK, I'll kick in my $.02. I've gotten about 5 hours of dual in a Citabria the last few days and am feeling pretty confident with the taildragger. So figured it was time to fly (past time?). Got a couple of friends out to observe and help if needed. Changed the oil and a last minute checkout of things. Then off to the runway.
Power comes up smoothly and tail is up in a couple of seconds. The RV handles much nicer than the Citabria up on 2 wheels. A glance at the RMI uEncoder - rats airspeed reads 0. GPS says groundspeed is 48MPH and I'm directly into a 6Kt headwind so should be indicating around 55MPH. So rather than fly a first flight without any indication of airspeed I back off the power and settle back to 3 points.
As I'm slowing I get a pretty severe shimmy in the gear and tower reports it's the right main. Pretty typical RV - my old 6A also had gear shimmy issues.
Now I'm back in maintenance mode, but feel quite a bit more confident of the RV taildragger handling. Once I got the shimmy stopped I powered back up and ran pretty much the full 8000 length of the runway on the mains at about 40MPH back to my hangar.
If I can get the airspeed and shimmy situations addressed I may be able to make another try this weekend.
Oh, should mention that with the extended (8,000') taxi to the departure end, runup, a 5 minute wait for traffic to clear, and then my high speed taxi back to the hangar, oil temp was stable at 175 and coolant at 180. I'm feeling pretty confident in the cooling system also.
Mike Wills
N144MW
----- Original Message ----- From: "Christopher Barber" <CBarber@TexasAttorney.net>
To: "Rotary motors in aircraft" <flyrotary@lancaironline.net>
Sent: Wednesday, December 31, 2008 11:27 AM
Subject: [FlyRotary] List activity?
Ok, am I just missing any activity on this list over the last week? Snce I have hopefully got my strakes repaired I am back to working on the engine and really like knowing you guys and gals are around for support, insight and encouragment.
Hello?
All the best,
Chris
preparing for a busy night serving and protecting.......
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