I suppose I qualify at 150 lbs.
Std 360, battery in the footwell, Hartzel CS prop.
Generally, I make a point to NOT have all fuel in the
header on a lightweight landing. Having it 1/4 to 1/2 full is safe
enough.
What happens is that I run out of aft stick travel in the flare and
will have a hard landing if I'm not very close to wheels down.
The further foreward the CG, the faster the landing speed must
be. Mostly, it's just hard on the tires.
The problem was aggravated by the Hartzel AD requiring a beefed up
prop hub. The prop shop claimed only a 1/2 lb increase but it felt
like more to me. I think the new hub puts the prop a little further
forward as well.
Also, check that you actually get full elevator travel according to
the build manual. Those last few degrees of up elevator are critical
here.
An obvious solution might be to move the battery aft but the aft CG
range has other problematic issues as well. This way gives me
the widest utility.
Once again, the higher performance Lancair design is a wonderful
thing but requires a pilot to do more planning than flying that spam can
where you can be more careless about loading.
.
Mark Ravinski
360 1447 hrs 1077 of it mine.
PS - Is there a really skinny flier out there that was aloft with a
heavy prop, no baggage and header fuel only? How was the
landing? Has everyone calculated the minimum pilot weight to stay
within the forward
CG?