lml@lancaironline.net Mailing List Archive

Dan, I fly my piston IV-P (N7VG) just as you anticipate doing. Longer trips are FL210-250. Shorter trips 15k to 17k...such as San Diego. San Diego is a little over 1 hour. I pick up about 3 kts per 1000 ft of altitude. What sometimes stops me from flying the mid flight levels is weather. I live in the SW (Phoenix) and generally if I am in weather at FL220...the weather is very bad and I generally cop the attitude that I go around yellow returns and all red returns. If going around is not practical I stay VFR and go under. The aircraft handling in the flight levels is superb. The pressurization is the greatest. Just before Christmas I got slammed down by ATC.....2000 fpm and it was no big deal. I never feel tired after a 3 hr flight at FL250. A great traveling airplane with some weather limitations. I would like FL410 and full de-ice but that presents a budget problem.

The IV-P is a GREAT airplane. For me, it took effort to learn the airplane but a great airplane.

Craig Berland

As I build my IV-P kit, I’m always watching with anticipation the other IV-P planes out there and how you guys are using them. One thing that has struck me is that it appears most of you with piston IV-P’s are flying them around in the low- to mid-teens rather than in the flight levels. I’m curious why this is the case… Trips not long enough to justify the climb? You want to stay VFR? Performance or handling issues up high? Etc.

Would love to hear from some of you on the operational practicalities of using your IV-P as a X/C traveling machine. My expectation is that I’ll be using mine a lot on lots of 1,000nm X/C flights and am planning to fly in the FL220-FL250 range.

Thoughts?

Dan Olsen
N320DK – 320MKII, 700hrs
IV-P in progress