Ultralights

the hang glider pilot will not move as his feat are providing his motion against the ground, and therefor airspeed, whereas the aircraft is using a propellor or jet engine pushing against the air to gain forward speed, so it will fly no matter how fast the conveyor is going.

news travels fast doesnt it these days! good to see all ended reasonably well considering.

damn, sadly i dont have any real television where i am.. hope its in the papers tomorrow, will be interesting to see the reporters take on events.

cool thanks, how has the ATC application gone?

where are you getting the YSBK feed from? i clicked the link on the basair site, and get nothing but a text message scrolling across the screen.

thats an easy one, i have flown there many times..... though im not going to give the answer here, so some of the non locals can guess.

a little unknown fact is that Sunlight, or more specifically UV will aid in the curing of some of the more common epoxy resin systems..

I think an AH should be used even when you only fly VFR, i have flown on a number of occasions in VFR conditions, where there has been no visible horizon. mostly on days where it is 8/8 cloud cover, hazy with scattered showers. even with the cloudbase at 3000ft, there was still no discernible horizon.

if the view over the nose is already good without flap, and its only required to produce drag, then a simple Split flap will suffice.

another little thing i have discovered and looked into with my Vampire, after i bought it, i gave it a good going over, and discovered quite a few rivets have failed. not because of corrosion, but the rivet head had work right through the aluminium skin, creating a hole the same diameter as the rivet head itself. after talking to the NDT guys at work, i have been told the cause is, being a polished metal finish, is the polish itself, when the aircraft has been polished, and it has on a regular basis, the polish which is an abrasive, is forced under the rivet heads, where is stays and through the movement and flex of the skin in flight and handling, the abrasive polish has worn a hole through the skins!!

so now after replacing a few wing skins on the vampire, polish is kept well away, and i now use a non abrasive Wax to maintain the shine..

i was thinking about the paint weight drawback, i was thinking, if a 4 ltr tin of paint weighs 4 kg, how much of this paint actually is added to the part, i know when i spray paint things, im sure 90% of the paint doesn't ever reach the job, and is lost as overspray or just ends up on the filter paper in the booth.?

Standard procedure for Boeing, Airbus, BAE and Augusta westland is..

1 treat all aluminium parts with an alodine or alochrome solution, some are brush on and dry others are a 2 part mix which is rinsed off with water.

2 parts are then painted completely in a zinc chromate primer

3 parts are installed/joined using a sealant or joining compound, sealant is a must on all areas exposed to air flow, rain, heat, oils and other fluids, otherwise just a joining compound will do.. joining compound is to ensure gaps and between metal parts are filled so water cant condense in the voids

final parts are painted in a interior or external paint.

when an aircraft is "marinised" all components are painted in 2 part polyurethane paint before being assembled "wet" with sealant on all components.

Titanium and steel components are treated by Passivation instead of Alodine/alochrome solution.

we are currently modifying the Navy Sea King fleet to improve crashworthiness, even though these helicopters are reasonably old, and have spent most of their operational lives at sea or flying low over salt water, we are yet to find any trace of corrosion anywhere. yet the Bae Hawk 127 aircraft built in williamtown, were all test flown with only a coat of primer, after their testing flights, they were panted in RAAF blue and grey camouflage, these aircraft are only just 6 yrs old now, and are riddled with corrosion, some to the point of complete part failure.

if at a minimum, paint every part!!

anotehr thing i have been thinking independently is, corrosion needs 3 things to start, but an electrical current is the primary cause, i am wondering, instead of wiring earth connections to the airframe, then the battery, wouldnt the risk of corrosion be reduced if the earth was routed directly from the component, to another bus to the battery? as this would remove the electrical path from the airframe? and no, im not an avionics expert. just structures.

as for making large baths for treating, in the field we use a large plastic bin, and to spray bottles, one with the solution, and the other with water, and spray the parts while they are in the bin using appropriate PPE of course. or you can purchase the alochrome pens which is a wipe on and let dry solution.

if that was me, i would be checking the powerline status crossing that dirt runway, opps driveway in the second pic.

Night VFR has its advantages, i had mine quite a few yrs back., there is nothing to compare with flight at sunset and into the evening on a full moon night! i find the best time to do circuits is in the hours before last light, no one else is out, the air is calm, and the views as the city lights are turning on is surreal. though the next upgrade to my PPl will be the PIFR. one day i will get to a doc and get my medical reinstated..

is the nose attitude created by the creation of too much lift at cruise speed requiring nose down attitude to reduce AoA? or is the wing at a higher incidence angle to the fuselage?

edit, i just had a closer look a the pics, seams to be the latter.

i think a lot of pilots make flying IFR unnecessarily difficult, during my PPL training many yrs ago, i had to do 10 hrs under the hood, once you get a routine scan up you can maintain it pretty easily, but if something happens to upset what you expect to see from the instruments, such as hitting a bit of turbulence, then you do tend to fixate to try and correct it, My instructor gave my this tip, i have found it invaluable. when in cloud or passing through cloud, remember, the aircraft is designed to be stable! it WILL fly hands off pretty well! if you find you are fixating and over correcting in turbulence, that almost always accompanies passing through cloud, let the aircraft fly itself! let it ride the bumps, obviusly keep an eye on things but and fly with a light touch and let the trim do the work ( if its trimmed straight and level, it will tend to return to trim... straight and level)

is every part identified in the kit? and is every part as described in the plans/manual.

see post in the video section

http://www.recreationalflying.com/forum/showthread.php?p=36048#post36048

what do you think Ian?

plenty of lollies for the kids for every trooper saved?

great shots! nice looking cheetah as well, cant wait for the video!

i have a work email address, never been used outside of the restricted network at work, and also a defence force email address i have never sent from, yet both regularly get spam.

my last trip to narromine, last year, i counted 9 savannahs. guaranteed there will be the same if not more this year.

isnt the Rotax 914 only 1.3 ltr capacity? yet produces 100 hp?

awww group hug....

ahh yes, hangar fees, part of the reason i chose the vampire was hangarage, or lack of its requirement, though now i only put the vampire on the trailer and bring it home when i need to do a major service on it or repair, hngarage is pretty cheap depending on where you go, at cessnock i was paying just $30 a month, yet at Hoxton park it was $300 a month, though an outside grass spot is just $15 a week, goulburn, the most likely place the vampire will be is about $100 or thereabouts. though just thinking about it, the vampire would be partly protected under the wing of the savannah if its going to be outdoors.... hmmmm might need a bigger cover made up..

i know what you mean! it is very sensitive, though at the time i wasnt long out of a Piper, which requires a bit of movement to get things happening so i guess i was your typical GA flyer back then, feet on the floor type flying.., though now after a few yrs have past, a few hundred more hrs in the Jabiru and technam, and the little vampire, im sure i could be able to relax with it. though gary did say the Joey 2 was a lot more sensitive in pitch than the Super diamond. at the time the cheetah and Sierra were just a dream gary had. good to see he has made those dreams come true.