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The Prez Sez
"Why is my plane doing that?"
Once upon a time your author
had a new Skybolt Bipe. On the first few days of flying it, everything
was fine. But one day, on the first flight, it required several clicks
of down trim (odd . . .) after take off, and after each turn or maneuver,
the pitch trim would be off again (VERY odd . . .) Only when it took full
down stick to fly inverted (JEEPERS!) was your authorsmart enough to realize
something was wrong. After landing, the problem was obvious: I had not
bolted the wing to the fuselage.
But the plane DID "try
to tell me." I just wasn't listening. Only new,tight-fitting wing dowels
had saved the plane from destruction-it certainly wasn't the pilot! Recapping
later, I thought of a number of things that would have caused similar symptoms;
servo or servo tray loose, bad servo centering, broken elevator hinges,
loose control horn, et cetera. The point is, ALL of those things are BAD!
And with the plane not behaving properly,
WHY did I keep flying?? |
Just suppose you're getting an occasional glitch from your radio, something
that doesn't normally happen. This could be an antenna problem. It could
be metal-to-metal vibration causing homegrown interference, or a loose
crystal. Will any of these get better while you keep flying? And speaking
of vibration, what if you start hearing it in the air? It's your plane
talkingto you-loose muffler, engine mount, worn wing dowel holes, loose
cowlmounting. Again, such problems don't get better, only worse.
One more example-this has
happened to all but the most careful pilots. Your engine goes lean and
sags at the top of a loop. It's TELLING you that the mixture is too lean.
But, you don't listen and keep flying. A minute later, while doing another
loop, you're suddenly dead stick!
The sky gods’ know-we have
enough problems that pop up suddenly, and we don't have any opportunity
to prevent them. Other times the plane "tells you" that there is, or will
be, a problem. Unless you really enjoy repairing or rebuilding, LISTEN!
Cutting a hop short to check out a possible problem is much quicker (and
vastly cheaper) than building another plane!
Until next time,
Bill. |
Club Meeting
The December Club Meeting is the Club
Annual Christmas Dinner. December 5 is the date at the Golden China
Restaurant in the Vista Square on Fry Blvd. Time is 7:00PM.
There will be Xmas gifts for all and a raffle for three (?) model kits,
so bring money to buy tickets.
FROM THE EDITOR’S DESK
HAPPY HOLLIDAYS!!
The elections are over with results
as follows.
President
Bill Hermes
V. Pres
Pete Haring
Secretary
Tom Campbell
Treasurer
Tom Fenn
Lets all support our officers
and have a good year.
I will continue to be the
newsletter editor, and would appreciate any input from anyone.
One other thing before I
close. New Years day is coming up, on January 1 (in case anyone forgot
the date). Lets have a banner turn out at the field and have a flight
to start the year off on the right foot.
Remember, if it isn’t broke
don’t fix it, but it will probably break in the near future.
Will |
