Jon Meyer wrote:
Sorry,

I am not confused about the issues concerning flutter.
Flutter is dependant on TAS. IAS is an arbitrary value
based on sea level air density. I still believe that
the reason you are confused is that the VNE of the
'high performance' aircraft you describe is specified
as IAS at cruising altitude - not at sea level. Therefore
your calculation of TAS being higher than VNE is flawed
because you have taken the wrong air density as your
datum.


So Vne of power planes is a figure which
describes Vne at the highest cruising altitude? So
this means that actual Vne at a lower altitude may
be faster? Hmmm...this seems to make sense for power
planes...

Unfortunately gliders don't have an altitude limited by
power. So this is much stickier. I noticed the PW-5
initially had a 15,000 foot altitude limitation (1998?)
and there were some vigorous complaints. Then
apparently the limitation was removed (don't know
exactly why). Perhaps test pilots determined the
"flutter" was caused by gaps in the elevator connection
and not actual "flutter."

But what this seems to suggest is that a manual which
does not specifically address Vne and altitude should
be viewed with skepticism. A grob 102 at 49,000 feet
pushed to Vne makes you a test pilot...

Excellent discussion! Fantastic fountain of (sometimes
varied) opinions and advice. It's also nice to
see the thoughts converging, and I can visualize
a lot of readers shuffling through arcane texts
asking "is that really true?" Thanks for your posts...