I finally calibrated the AOA in my ES today with the help of Pat Brunner (N98PB-IVP). Thanks again Pat.

 

It was something I intended to do early on but with one thing and another ….(blah blah blah).  Finally, with the admonition of one of the regular contributors to these forums, and some decent weather I finally got it done. The zero G maneuver was rather fun, but certainly is something different for those of us who use our machines to get from A to B, usually with the wife sitting next to us.  There were two eye opening events which took place right afterwards that I’m writing to relate.

 

First, to make sure the warning (ANGLE ANGLE PUSH PUSH) worked I slowed and slowly pitched up to trip the threshold. Right as the system was starting to yell the elevator forced started to fall off sharply, and to keep the angle of attack from increasing too far I had to sharply reduce to force on the stick. Perhaps if I had trimmed most of the force out prior rather than just use the Armstrong method the change wouldn’t have been so noticeable. All I could think of was the advise/caution given by one of our more experienced brethren who comments that they wouldn’t fully stall an aircraft they were testing if they noticed this characteristic. I only know what I’ve been told, but this appeared to me to reinforce the advice that some of these aircraft have stall characteristics you may not want to experience personally.

 

The other thing I noted was on the downwind to base turn, when at 90kts indicated and ~15 deg flaps the AOA was tickling the top yellow bars, getting far closer to the red area than I ever considered prudent. A slight relaxation of pressure and everybody was happier. What I learned is the AOA isn’t in the panel because it has pretty colors and looks cool. It’s there to be used.

 

As a side note, I finally reweighed my ES, now that the last accessories, paint and interior have been added. I was surprised to find the plane has taken on a characteristic of the owner and gained far more weight than I realized (203#!). While I don’t know how much was paint/interior, verses other additions, if you think the increase is insignificant you might be in for a surprise.

 

Paul Bricker

N63PB