Back in the Air ! #424

Not Me!

Amazing Shot with a Go Pro

After being blown out two days in a row last week the weather finally cooperated and gave me a beautiful afternoon.  I stopped at Simms on the way to Chip's house.  The ruts from the spring are mostly gone and part of the lz has been graded.  The wind was light from the east shifting to the south.   I set up and waited for it to swing back to my bearing.  The launch was good except that the wing overshot and I had to damp the surge.   The 4 stroke runs up slow and it is difficult to modulate the speed so Next time I'm going to try fluttering the throttle and see if that helps.  It would have been nice to damp the surge and taxi a bit before hammering the take off.

The first thing I noticed was that Mike Bennett ties his brake lines 6 or 8 inches tighter than I.  I'm surprised that I did not notice this at Bubba's.  It's good that the toggles are always snug to the pulleys but I'm not sure I like the brake lines this tight.  After a couple of flights I'll decide which I prefer.  There was lots of lift and lots of sink.  At one point I was climbing at 450 ft/min and at idle I was dropping at 580 ft/min.  The air was mostly smooth except close to the hogbacks and C-470.

I stayed up for an hour and noticed that the RPS decreased 200 RPM to 3400.  I do not think it was a problem with the motor but more likely that the RPM's decrease as the motor heats up. I will re-pitch the prop anyway.

I think it was a good thing to take a break.  My numbers are going to be way down this year but I payed attention to the details and today  ...  it was  ... ALL GOOD.