There's nothing better than flying your own airplane late in the day when the air is smooth as silk and the sun is dropping low on the horizon. Taking off after the control tower has closed down for the night and with little to no traffic in the pattern makes it feel a lot more like it must have in the barnstorming days of the 30's and 40's--although having the choice of 3 separate runways sort of kills that fantasy. The other night I flew late in the day with the sun going down and although I wished the pattern was completely empty, there were three other fliers who were taking advantage of the beautiful evening. Fellow pilots, talking to each other over the radio while they flew in the pattern, doing their best to stay out of each others airspace and mixing it up with short approaches, high speed low passes, right and left patterns on the same runway, it made things interesting and kept everyone on their toes.
The biggest challenge to the Experimental RV fliers is dealing with our station wagon brothers called the Cessna 172's who can't help their situation and fly at a much slower, painfully slower pace, than the experimental club. There were at least two of us, me in the RV7 and another in an RV6 that were constantly crawling up the 172's six and having to do 360's to give spacing. On one turn to base I was following the RV6 who was on short final I decided to do a low pass at about 125 just to watch the birds on the ground disappear beneath me as I pulled a hard 45 up and dumped the stick to the left for a crosswind back. What I didn't realize was that the RV6 wasn't doing a full stop and was now on the roll for a straight out departure. So I immediately moved the stick to the right, keeping an eye on the RV6's flight path. When he suddenly pulled right I realized he would have no idea I was above him on his climb. So, being nimble and smart, I moved the stick hard left and crossed overhead and crosswind for a left downwind while the RV6 headed for a right downwind. I called my position, told the RV6 I had him in sight and was passing overhead and everything was back in sync one again. 3D space, rockets with wings, boys in their toys--how could life get any better for man who thanked God he was not born a hundred years ago when the fastest powered machine available was found in a Model T whose top speed was about 23. Manned flight is barely over 100 years old. Thank you God for allowing me to be born at a time and in this free country where I'm allowed to fly 200 miles per hour amongst the clouds and mountains, over rivers and green valleys. Pinch me, I must be dreaming.
So, after touching down and parking near the hanger, I was introduced to the man who built the engine on my airplane--his name is Kim. I had a lot of questions and he answered every one of them and what I learned was that I had a top notch, reliable power plant that was going to serve me well for many years to come. We talked about flying inverted, acrobatic maneuvers, losing oil pressure, negative G's, and the two maneuvers I plan to learn next which is the full loop and what Kim calls the "Rat's Ass"
Up to this point I had done plenty of aileron rolls on both sides of the stick including a few maneuvers with my brother Blaine that we're still getting some feedback on from our F16 Fighter pilot friend, Don "Hollywood" Lossee. We think we performed a split S, but we're waiting for the drone surveillance tapes to come back from CentCom. Watch for a posting later on regarding that one.
So now that I've masted the aileron roll and somewhat of a snap roll, I was eager to get some advice on a full loop. Kim was kind enough, albeit it was 10:30 at night, to give the proper procedures for a full loop and one of his favorite maneuvers called, once again, the "Rat's Ass"-- sorry to the kids who may be reading this blog, I'm just giving credit to the maneuver where credit is due. I could hardly rename such a maneuver the "Rats Bottom" or the "Rats Hind End" or the "Rats Bum Bum". Okay, I'm digressing--so here's the procedure as described to me by Kim.
First and Foremost:
Kim told me that all aerobatic maneuvers done in an RV can be easily done in less than 4 Gs. Some pilots think they've got to be pulling 6 Gs to get things to work right. That's simply not true according to Kim--and because I don't want the wings coming off my airplane during an aerobatic maneuver I'm going to keep to Kim's recommended Max 4G scenario.
Second and Foremost:
First, make sure everything is secure in the cockpit. Passenger seat buckles are locked and secure and that your own harness is snug and secure. Don't invert and hang and bang your head on the canopy just because you forget to snug up.
Full Loop: nose down to achieve 170kts IAS. Pull back on stick smoothly into your stomach, hold and keep you head looking out over the nose until you see the horizon appear in your view, then pull power and at the same time push the stick forward to keep the plane flying inverted for 2 seconds then slowly pull back on the stick once again until it's in your stomach. Once the plane is level, release pressure on the stick and fly straight out in preparation for whatever you next maneuver might be. Push power to normal.
"Rat's Ass":
Nose down to achieve 160kts IAS. Pull back on stick until flying vertical, stay vertical by releasing back pressure on stick and dump stick to the left, or right, depending on your preference, to perform a standard aileron roll, This should take no more than 3 seconds to return to start of aileron roll. At this point, push the stick forward to level off the plane. At this point, you should be very close to stall speed where the plane wants to drop out from underneath you. This is the floating feeling Kim described which is very cool after coming out of an vertical aileron roll. Let the plane drop out from underneath you as you nose over and perform the standard procedure for recovering from a power on stall.
And there you have it. I'll be testing this out soon so watch for the video and posting later.
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