Hey Dudley, detailed analysis of these?

Dudley Henriques wrote in
:

Viperdoc wrote:
Great work! Saw your photo in the IAC mag. There was a while when I
was going up at least five days a week, and twice a day practicing on
the weekends. However, it soon stopped being fun, and started feeling
like a responsibility.

Then, a bunch of us were going to hire a coach to come up and
critique, and I suddenly realized that it was getting too intense,
and the fun aspect of flying acro was going away- it had become a
second job.

Now, a bunch of us use the box, and we go out and have fun, and
frequently hook up on those summer evenings and fly formation.
Afterwards, we go to one of our hangars and cook out, have a few
beers, and tell stories.

So, I realize how much work and effort go into all of your practice
sessions, and it obviously did pay off! Congrats again, and best
wishes in the future.

Good luck next year!
JN


You'll never know how much I both envy and respect you new guys.
You're flying equipment that we in our time only dreamed about, and
you're doing things with these airplanes we envisioned but didn't have
the planes available to us to make it happen.
I never flew competition acro as military stuff was basically my venue
but I got a piece of what you guys can do today in the Pitts.
It was what made flying fun then, and I'm sure you guys feel the same
way today.


There;s a down side to them if they start in them from scratch. It took me
about two minutes to see that a Pitts S2 was a real bad airplane to be
teaching aerobatics in. You can slow roll it just by banging the stick to
the side. It's not a slow roll, of course, but I couldn't see the thing
teaching any kind of management at all.
A good friend of mine who does instruction and displays in a Chipmunk
recently took a guy up in it who had bought an Extra 300 as his first
aerobatic aircraft and learned aerobatics in it. He couldn't get the
Chipmunk to do anything (and the Chipmunk is an easy airplane to aerobat)
A simple hammerhead ended up in a near inverted spin entry. Nothing wrong
with these new airplanes I'd love to fly one! Just not great primary
aerobatic trainers.


Bertie

Dudley Henriques wrote in
:

K l e i n wrote:
On Nov 18, 9:01 pm, Dudley Henriques wrote:
Viperdoc wrote:
Great work! Saw your photo in the IAC mag. There was a while when I
was going up at least five days a week, and twice a day practicing
on the weekends. However, it soon stopped being fun, and started
feeling like a responsibility.
Then, a bunch of us were going to hire a coach to come up and
critique, and I suddenly realized that it was getting too intense,
and the fun aspect of flying acro was going away- it had become a
second job. Now, a bunch of us use the box, and we go out and have
fun, and frequently hook up on those summer evenings and fly
formation. Afterwards, we go to one of our hangars and cook out,
have a few beers, and tell stories. So, I realize how much work and
effort go into all of your practice sessions, and it obviously did
pay off! Congrats again, and best wishes in the future.
Good luck next year!
JN
You'll never know how much I both envy and respect you new guys.

Hehe. I should have mentioned that I also won the "Old Buzzard
Award" which goes to the highest % scoring pilot, power or glider,
who is 65 or older. ;-) Nevertheless, I am only an egg.

K l e i n
Hey...congratulations anyway. In this case I should simply say;
"We "older folk" have to stick together" :-))

I*s that a wrinkle/velcro effect sort of thing?


Bertie

"Viperdoc" wrote in
:

Agree completely. My first TD was a Super Decathlon. Things happen
slowly enough that you need to use your feet all the way around in a
roll, and landing in a crosswind with all of the side surface area and
high wing takes a lot of technique.

By comparison, the Extra has no forward visibility on landing, and a
pattern is flown pretty quickly. Anything less than 90 K on base and
short final and the sink rate gets too high. Rolling an Extra still
takes rudder input to do it right, but might be hard to appreciate the
difference from the ground. Although it can happen, it would be pretty
hard to do an inverted flat spin entry from an attempted hammer unless
someone was really not feeling what was going on.

Yes, but th epoint I was making is that it's just as difficult to do
aerobatics properly in one of those things as it is in say, a clipped
cub, but the hamfisted will get away with sloppy technique in one of
them and will never learn to do anything properly. Like the guy who went
with my friend in the Chipmunk.

On the other hand, I've gotten a burble going straight down at 190 K
when trying to pull too hard doing a downward quarter loop. The stick
pressure seems to get a slight bit lighter during a pull just before
it stalls.

A guy on our field bought an SU-29 as his first tail dragger, and was
"checked out" in less than six hours. His only previous experience was
in an SR-22. On the first day he dropped it in on a landing attempt,
and destroyed the MT prop and damaged the tail. It took thousands of
dollars (new prop, paid cash) to repair and over a year. He is just
now getting back into flying it, and he does stuff that you could do
in a clipped wing cub or Stearman.


He'd be better off in either one. The Stearman is a great first
aerobatic trainer. It's nearly indestructable for one thing ( we used to
play "see how fast you can fly past the office" in them and nobody ever
did it at more than about 130) and it's difficult enough to get it do
what you want it to. Energy is hard to come by so you learn economy and
when you get it right you're rewarded with world tumbling around framed
by those gorgeous wings. Not to mention the noise the thing makes.

So, I agree completely- an Extra or Sukhoi are not great primary
trainers for a TD or intro aerobatics. Our small field has an Extra,
three Pitts, two Sukhoi 29's, and two Yaks, so there is quite an acro
following.


Sounds it! Al that competition around has to be a good thing as well!


Bertie

Viperdoc wrote:
Agree completely. My first TD was a Super Decathlon. Things happen slowly
enough that you need to use your feet all the way around in a roll, and
landing in a crosswind with all of the side surface area and high wing takes
a lot of technique.

By comparison, the Extra has no forward visibility on landing, and a pattern
is flown pretty quickly. Anything less than 90 K on base and short final and
the sink rate gets too high. Rolling an Extra still takes rudder input to do
it right, but might be hard to appreciate the difference from the ground.
Although it can happen, it would be pretty hard to do an inverted flat spin
entry from an attempted hammer unless someone was really not feeling what
was going on.

On the other hand, I've gotten a burble going straight down at 190 K when
trying to pull too hard doing a downward quarter loop. The stick pressure
seems to get a slight bit lighter during a pull just before it stalls.

A guy on our field bought an SU-29 as his first tail dragger, and was
"checked out" in less than six hours. His only previous experience was in an
SR-22. On the first day he dropped it in on a landing attempt, and destroyed
the MT prop and damaged the tail. It took thousands of dollars (new prop,
paid cash) to repair and over a year. He is just now getting back into
flying it, and he does stuff that you could do in a clipped wing cub or
Stearman.

So, I agree completely- an Extra or Sukhoi are not great primary trainers
for a TD or intro aerobatics. Our small field has an Extra, three Pitts, two
Sukhoi 29's, and two Yaks, so there is quite an acro following.


I concur as well on the primary question. Rating aerobatic training
aircraft as I have experienced and used them over the years, I would
rate without hesitation the Decathlon as my ultimate choice for
aerobatic introduction through primary.

One can make the case in most any direction when it comes to acro
training really. I've seen pilots buy an Extra or a Pitts and start
right from there, going on to become highly proficient acro pilots.

My personal choice however has always been to take a new acro student
through a good solid basic airplane like a Decathlon, then transition
them into higher performance aircraft. In my opinion, this path allows
an easier and smoother introduction to the general basics which I
consider the rock foundation of aerobatics; then on into advanced stuff
with the student armed with this solid background of basics in tow.



--
Dudley Henriques