The Spirit of Aviation | www.eaa.org
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Doubling
Down on Safety
The Additional Pilot ProgramLaying the Foundation
Volunteers build your conventionDroning On
A community emergesVol.64 No.4 | April 2015
Super Cub
in Dress Blues
www.eaa.org 1
JACK J. PELTON
COMMENTARY / TOWER FREQUENCY
Congress to the Rescue
IT HAS BECOME excruciatingly obvious that the FAA’s system for cre-ating new and appropriate regulation is frozen.
It has been nine months since the FAA wrote a notice of pro-posed rulemaking (NPRM) that would modernize the class three medical standards for private fl ying. More than 10 years of safe and successful LSA fl ying by pilots using a driver’s license as evidence of medical qualifi cation has proven that the current third class medical restrictions are burdensome, costly, and unnecessary.
The FAA agrees with those of us who are convinced change is appropriate and even necessary to keep more pilots fl ying for per-sonal reasons with no loss of safety. That’s why the NPRM was created and sent to the Department of Transportation for review just before EAA AirVenture Oshkosh 2014.
The DOT review is supposed to take less than 30 days. It’s been nearly nine months, and nothing has happened. The NPRM contents remain a secret. Nobody outside government knows for sure what rule changes are proposed. None of us even know what the DOT may be objecting to that is holding up publication of the NPRM. The DOT simply won’t respond, and the FAA’s hands are tied.
I have lost all patience with the process, and I bet you have, too. Most importantly, many members of Congress who support aviation have also exhausted all patience and have introduced the Pilot’s Bill of Rights 2 to force the DOT and FAA to act.
The original Pilot’s Bill of Rights (PBOR) that was passed and signed into law about two years ago guarantees pilots basic legal pro-tections from FAA enforcement actions. The new PBOR strengthens those legal protections and requires the FAA to change the third class medical standards so that most private fl ying could be done with a driver’s license as medical certifi cate.
PBOR2, championed by Jim Inhofe of Oklahoma in the Senate and Sam Graves of Missouri in the House, has broad bipartisan sup-port. The bill would require the FAA to modify the rules so that pilots could fl y an airplane weighing up to 6,000 pounds as fast as 250 knots, at altitudes up to 14,000 feet carrying as many as fi ve pas-sengers under VFR or IFR without a third class medical
certifi cation. The fl ights must be entirely personal.
This makes perfect sense to me. There is a change in airplane certi-fi cation requirements at 6,000 pounds max takeof weight so that is the logical spot to set the medical limit. Flying under IFR as well as VFR also makes sense because IFR has obvious safety advantages for qualifi ed pilots. And the 250 knot speed limit has been long established for all fl ights below 10,000 feet, and the 14,000-foot ceiling keeps pilots below the level where supplemental oxygen is required at all times.
The senators and congressmen who co-sponsored and wrote the PBOR2 legislation have succeeded in something I never expected to BY JACK J. PELTON
see from Washington—they kept it simple. No restrictions of such things as retractable landing gear, or engine horse-power, or other issues of no real signifi cance. The goal is to assure continued safety for the public matched with logical regulation for pilots, and PBOR2 does exactly that.
I suspect that in response to congressional action we will soon see the FAA NPRM on medical reform. But no matter what the NPRM changes, the PBOR2 is almost cer-tainly a better deal for pilots. I can’t imagine the NPRM will be as broad in its changes as PBOR2. And even if it is, there will be at least 90 days to comment on the NPRM, followed by more months for the FAA to consider the comments and most likely make changes. An actual rule change would be a minimum of six months away, and more likely another year.
But if PBOR2 is passed in both the House and Senate and signed into law, it requires immediate change.
Passage of PBOR2 is by no means a sure thing, but the bill has very broad support across party lines. Simplifying regulation and removing added costs for both the govern-ment and citizens is something everybody wants.
But your voice is needed. Please go to the Rally Congress section of our website at www.EAA.org and send an electronic letter to your senators and congressman. They are read, you will be listened to, and your voice and vote matters.
If we all pull together and get behind PBOR2, it could be law before EAA AirVenture, something that just can’t happen with the FAA’s frozen regulatory system.
Contents
Vol.64 No.4 | April 2015www.eaa.org 3 A PUBLICATION OF THE EXPERIMENTAL AIRCRAFT ASSOCIATION
F E AT U R ES
ON THE COVER: Amy Gesch photographed Mark Erickson’s custom Super Cub, painted to match Joe Foss’ Chance Vought F4U Corsair. With the airplane, Mark aimed to honor the greatest generation, especially his father, Ray, who served in the Marines.
COMMENTARY
01 Tower Frequency—Jack J. Pelton
06 Letters to the Editor 16 Left Seat—J. Mac McClellan
22 Savvy Aviator—Mike Busch
28 Light Flight—Dave Matheny 32 Flight Test—Charlie Precourt
36 Plane Talk—Lauran Paine Jr. 42 Contrails—Jeff Skiles
NEWS & INFO
10 Advocacy & Safety— Governmental Issues
14 Flightline—Industry News
DE PARTME NT S
BETTER PILOT
80 Stick & Rudder—Getting It Right
84 What Went Wrong—Avionics Become Fatal Distraction 88 I’ll Never Do That Again—Splash and Dash
HANDS ON
90 What Our Members Are Building/Restoring 94 Hints for Homebuilders—Radius Repeater,
Blow Holes and Vent Holes
96 Shop Talk—Adel Clamps
MEMBER CENTRAL
For more on many of the topics in this issue, visit www.EAA.org/sportaviation. To view and submit aviation events, visit www.EAA.org/calendar. 103 Member Central 104 Pilot Caves 106 News From HQ 113 Gone West 114 Members and Chapters in Action 123 Member Benefi ts 124 FlyMart 126 Classifi ed Ads 128 EAA’s Logbook
46
Welcome to Oshkosh!Weekend work parties help get your convention ready
By Ric Reynolds
58
Common Denominators Airplane or drone, only adjectives separate pilots and aircraft
By Scott M. Spangler
66
Family Matters
Custom Super Cub honors the greatest generation
By Amy Gesch
74
The Additional Pilot Program The FAA blesses having a second pilot involved in E-AB fl ight testing
By Budd Davisson
EAA PUBLICATIONS
Founder: Paul H. Poberezny
Publisher: Jack J. Pelton, EAA Chairman of the Board Vice President of Communities and
Member Programs: Rick Larsen Director of Publications: Jim Busha Editor-in-Chief: J. Mac McClellan Associate Editor: Meghan Hefter Assistant Editor: Katie Holliday Senior Graphic Designer: Chris Livieri Graphic Designer: Jenny Hussin News Editor: Ric Reynolds Copy Editor: Colleen Walsh Multimedia Journalist: Brady Lane Visual Properties Administrator: Jason Toney Print/Mail Manager: Randy Halberg
Contributing Writers: Charlie Becker, Mike Busch, Budd Davisson,
Amy Gesch, Dave Matheny, Lauran Paine Jr., Charlie Precourt, Robert Rossier, Jeff Skiles, Scott Spangler
ADVERTISING
Vice President of Marketing and Business Development:
Dave Chaimson / [email protected]
Advertising Manager: Sue Anderson / [email protected] Business Relationship Manager: Larry Phillip / [email protected]
Mailing Address: P.O. Box 3086, Oshkosh, WI 54903-3086 Phone: 920-426-4800 • Fax: 920-426-4828 E-mail: [email protected] • Website: www.EAA.org
Vol.64 No.4 | April 2015
Need to change your address or have other membership questions, call 800-564-6322 (800-JOIN EAA).
4 Sport Aviation April 2015
EAA® and SPORT AVIATION®, the EAA Logo® and AERONAUTICA™ are registered trade-marks, tradetrade-marks, and service marks of the Experimental Aircraft Association, Inc. The use of these trademarks and service marks without the permission of the Experimental Aircraft Association, Inc. is strictly prohibited.
6 Sport Aviation April 2015
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
JIM BUSHA’S ARTICLE “Farm Boy to Fighter Pilot” (February) brought back many memories for me of the old men and kids who were left to carry on the farming. I spent my eighth birthday driving a 1937 John Deere “B” pulling a McCormick-Deering binder on which my boss was minding the foot pedals and handles that made the contraption do its thing. Even though I was somewhat small for my age, I could push in the hand clutch with my leg and pull it out by threading my arms through the steering wheel, and steer a straight line for 8-9 hours a day. For me the job was no burden but an honor for it gave me responsibility normally reserved to older boys and men. Even then my head was in the clouds, and today I fl y a couple of older Mooneys.
_
Robert Grossmann, EAA 77000
Vero Beach, Florida
THANK YOU FOR Jim Busha’s story “Farm Boy to Fighter Pilot” in the February issue. The cover attracted my immediate attention and drew me to the wonderful story about Dr. Joseph Richardson’s mission to treat veterans to rides in his amazing warbirds.
Stories like this are opportunities for us to know the greatest generation and their contribution to the freedoms we enjoy today. _
Carmine Margo Mowbray, EAA 1014005
Polson, Montana
A FARM BOY REMEMBERS
Was It a Wake?
I’VE JUST BEEN READING Mac’s article “What Went Wrong” in the February issue of Sport Aviation, and it jogged my memory.
I spent all my working life fl ying 707s and 747s long haul for Qantas out of Sydney, and of course, frequently sat right under other aircraft for hours on end, watching their contrails form.
I remember distinctly an occasion when I was between Honolulu and San Francisco, sitting under one of those new fangled 757 things and watching its contrails forming and fading as it fl ew through variations in the atmosphere. What was signifi cantly dif-ferent was that the wake was not in the form of the spirals twisting into bigger spirals that I was used to, but was more like a series of cones, one inside the other. (It reminded me of a rattlesnake “rattle”—but that is derived from John Wayne, Robert Mitchum, Rory Calhoun, etc. westerns!)
I thought of “shedding vortices” and wondered if it had anything to do with the reputation that the 757 was then getting for violent wake turbulence—and I’m still wondering! Then there’s the poor bugger in the T-18.
Thanks for your articles—I really enjoy them.
_
Lloyd Shepherd, EAA 190354
Mulgoa, New South Wales, Australia
I HAD A WAKE EXPERIENCE in my teens when I was fl ying a Cessna 182, I believe it was prob-ably around early 1960s, and passed behind and slightly below a large airliner of the times—not sure what—but before I was aware of wake turbulence being so lasting and signifi cant! I was probably a minute and a half from passing through its wake. I was belted in, and went vertically very harshly fi rst one way, then the other, and put a large gash in my head from hitting the headliner and whatever was behind it at the time. I still remember thinking I was slightly stunned and also amazed the wings were still on!
Good article and really quite a serious danger, since it seems to last longer than one might think, and is not visible—dangerous combination. I was very lucky.
_
Pete Halsmer, 461448
IF FLYING IN THE BACK of an aluminum tube unlocks Jef Skiles’ muse, EAA headquarters needs to put him in the 40-plus rows more often. Mr. Skiles’ February commentary, “A Winter’s Chill,” (Contrails) was as close to aviation writing perfection as I’ve perused in a while. I felt a real chill as Jef delivered the reminis-cence of his younger cold-weather fl ying days and crafted the artful description of winter at Brodhead. Somewhere, Gordon Baxter and Len Morgan are smiling, nudging each other, and nod-ding in Jef ’s direction. Bravo, Mr. Skiles. Bravo.
_
James G. Parker Jr., EAA 860996
Bellevue, Nebraska
8 Sport Aviation April 2015
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
LETTERS INTENDED for publication should be e-mailed to [email protected] or addressed to EAA/Letter
to the Editor, P.O. Box 3086, Oshkosh, WI, 54903. Please include your EAA number, city, and state. All letters are subject to editing. Unpublished letters will not be returned.
SUBMISSIONS
A WINTER’S CHILL
Jack’s Right About ADS-B Cost
I AGREE WITH JACK J. PELTON’S commentary (Tower Frequency, February). I would be grateful for a rule that would allow non-ADS-B “out” aircraft to fl y into the 30 nm Mode C veil around Class B airspace between the surface and 2,500 feet AGL. This would provide a lifeline to aircraft based at six airports close to SFO, 10 near LAX, and dozens elsewhere. It would give time for owners to meet the deadline, and the freedom to opt out.
_
Bruce Cruikshank, EAA 11714
Castro Valley, California
I WOULD JUST LIKE to provide some additional home-builder perspective on the excellent article Mr. Pelton wrote on how the FAA missed the ADS-B mark for personal planes. I have been building a Jeanie’s Teenie for quite a while now. I started working on the project in 2005. When the Teenie design was released in Popular Mechanics in 1968, the single-seat VW-powered aluminum plane was designed to be an inex-pensive path to fl ight. Even now, the design can be built for considerably less than $10,000. My plane is going to come in around $3,000-$4,000. Since I will be fl ying near Class B airspace, here in Salt Lake City, I have a Mode C transponder installed, but I will need to install an ADS-B solution. I fi nd it dif cult to justify installing one piece of an electronics package that costs considerably more than my entire plane. As an electrical engineer, a hardware designer, I would love to see a way for me to create my own solution. The primary problem with that is that the solution also involves the FCC. It seems like any real solution for us homebuilders is going to involve both the FCC and the FAA. Even a $1,000 solution makes me balk a bit, so I just hope the FAA will see our perspective and provide an alternative.
_
Lance McBride, EAA 680346
Murray, Utah
Thanks to EAA advocacy the FAA has changed the rules so that equipment that meets the “performance” standards of the TSOs specifi ed in FAR 91.227 can be eligible for approval in an E-AB airplane. As you note, it’s not easy, but there is a path for owners to gain FAA approval without the full burden of TSO.—Ed.
On Page 11 of the March edition of Sport Aviation we misidentifi ed Sen. John Boozman as representing Arizona rather than Arkansas. EAA regrets the error.—Ed.
10 Sport Aviation April 2015
ADVOCACY AND SAFETY
GOVERNMENTAL ISSUESAeromedical Reform Push
THE REACTION TO THE bipartisan Pilot’s Bill of Rights 2 legislation introduced in both the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives in late February has been overwhelming and positive. At press time, more than 17,000 letters have been sent to Congress via EAA’s Rally Congress website supporting the measure. The bill would put EAA-supported aeromedical reform into effect along with a number of other protections for pilots and other airmen.
The Senate bill (S. 571) was initially co-sponsored by a strong bipartisan group, including Sen. James Inhofe (R-Oklahoma), Sen. John Boozman (R-Arkansas), Sen. Joe Manchin (D-West Virginia), Sen. Bob Casey (D-Pennsylvania), Sen. Steven Daines (R-Montana), Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Mississippi), Sen. Heidi Heitkamp (D-North Dakota), Sen. Jerry Moran (R-Kansas), Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyoming), Sen. Jon Tester (D-Montana), Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kansas), Sen. Angus King (I-Maine), and Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-New Hampshire).
The House bill (H.R. 1062) was co-sponsored by Rep. Sam Graves (R-Missouri), Rep. Dan Lipinski (D-Illinois), Rep. Todd Rokita (R-Indiana), and Rep. Collin Peterson (D-Minnesota). The bill expands the original Pilot’s Bill of Rights passed by Congress in 2012 and signed by President Obama, and further advances the aeromedical reforms fi rst proposed in the General Aviation Pilot Protection Act of 2014.
A major provision of the new legislation is expansion of the FAA’s current exemption from third-class medical requirements for sport pilots to cover general aviation aircraft up to 6,000 pounds, carrying up to fi ve passengers, for both VFR and IFR fl ights at up to 14,000 feet. The bill would also prohibit FAA enforcement for third-class medical certifi cate violations unless the FAA has issued regulations within 180 days of the enactment of this legislation.
In addition to expanding on aeromedical reform, the Pilot’s Bill of Rights 2 will also:
• Expand due process protections to include all certifi cates issued by the FAA (not just pilots); increase protections for certifi cate holders during an FAA investigation; require the FAA to release a copy of enforcement investigative reports when serving an
enforcement action; and reform FAA record-keeping policy, among others. • Include provisions that limit
re-examination of covered certifi cate holders, with an appeal process to U.S. District Court; expedite updates to the NOTAM program; apply the Freedom of Information Act to contract tower communications; extend civil liability protection to aviation medical examiners, designated pilot examiners, and all other FAA designees; encourage fl exibility for resolution of FAA
enforcement cases; and provide liability protection for volunteer pilots.
EAA is particularly pleased to see Congress acknowledging the crucial role that designees play in the aviation safety system, conducting what had previously been federal governmental activities. These designees deserve the liability protection af orded to government employees performing functions such as checkrides, certifi cate issuances, and engineering and airworthiness approvals.
EAA, which with AOPA introduced the aeromedical reform concepts in 2012, played a large role in crafting this legislation in collaboration with Inhofe and his staf . We continue to strongly encourage EAA members to urge their lawmakers to co-sponsor and support these bills. At the same time, we continue to push the Department of Transportation and Of ce of Management and Budget to approve the long-overdue aeromedical rulemaking package for public comment. We will keep you updated as the bills make their way through the legislative process. Second ‘Pilot’s Bill of Rights’
REDUCING BARRIERS, bringing down costs, and enhancing safety were among the key goals at the annual EAA/FAA Winter Recre-ational Aviation Summit at Oshkosh in Feb-ruary. EAA and FAA teams focused ef orts on the issues that matter to EAA members dur-ing the two-day session.
Highlights include:
• The FAA supports rulemaking to reform aeromedical certifi cation and is waiting for its rulemaking package to return from DOT review.
• FAA support for allowing amateur-built aircraft to develop and install ADS-B equipment that meets performance ADS-B “out” specifi cations, but does not necessarily hold a TSO.
• A barrier to ultralight participation may be crumbling as the FAA is willing
to solve a training situation that keeps potential pilots from fi nding instruction in ultralight category machines.
• The FAA welcoming a petition that would allow sport pilots to operate light-sport aircraft powered
by electric motors, expanding innovation of electric-powered aircraft. • EAA recommendations
were included in the new Order 8130.2, which covers operating limitations for amateur-built and experimental/exhibition category aircraft.
There were also extensive discussions on continuing to improve amateur-built
safety, including how to properly collect and measure such data. EAA and FAA of cials agreed to maintain regular updates on the major action items and review them during EAA AirVenture Oshkosh 2015.
AS FAR BACK as 1986 with the fi rst proposal of the recreational pilot certifi -cate, it was envisioned that pilots should be able to attest to their own medical condition with a companion requirement for a valid driver’s license. The idea of medical reform in GA is nothing new. The FAA has responded favorably to repeated EAA advocacy ef orts on this issue only to have the Department of Transportation block the ef orts. The notable exception was the sport pilot rules that EAA helped pioneer and championed and laid the foun-dation for where we are today. Now for
the fi rst time, we have a favorable political landscape and a companion set of bills on Capitol Hill that could potentially push aeromedical reform into reality.
What started with ef orts by Rep. Todd Rokita and Sen. John Boozman in 2013 in their General Aviation Pilot Protection Act has now been included in the broader Pilot’s Bill of Rights 2, authored with EAA input by longtime general aviation supporter and EAA member Sen. James Inhofe. EAA member and avid pilot Rep. Sam Graves has introduced an identical companion bill in the House. S. 571 and H.R. 1062 have considerable initial bipartisan support and are gaining traction in both houses of Congress. EAA staf has worked hard to bring
us to this point, but we need our members to help push it over the goal line. Make your voice heard now through our Rally Congress tool. Just a few years ago, many in aviation had all but given up on the notion that we as a community could change the regulatory landscape and fl y without the requirement of a periodic visit to an aviation medical professional and the burdensome bureaucratic process behind medical certifi cation. The truth is we can. Every other form of personal and recreational transportation has shown it to be safe and feasible including sport pilots for the last decade. The statistics support aeromedical reform, and it is the right thing to do for the betterment of GA. Let’s get it done!
www.eaa.org 11
MEDICAL REFORM—WE HAVE NEVER STOPPED FIGHTING
BY SEAN ELLIOTT, EAA VICE PRESIDENT OF ADVOCACY AND SAFETY
EAA/FAA SUMMIT: PROGRESS ON KEY GA ISSUES
PHOTOGRAPHY BYJASON TONEY
EAA IS EVALUATING and will fi le comments to the FAA’s proposed rules on the operation of small unmanned aircraft systems (sUAS) weighing up to 55 pounds. Among other provisions, the NPRM requires that line-of-sight contact be maintained with devices, op-erations are restricted to below 500 feet AGL, ATC permission is required for operations in Class B, C, D, and E airspace, and basic
operator certifi cation, including a knowledge test and recurrent training, is mandatory.
EAA’s priority is preserving the safety of and access to the national airspace system. The NPRM is a good start. The proposed rules can be found under docket number FAA-2015-0150 on www.Regulations.gov. The comment period is open through April 24, 2015.
Sonex Aircraft
Delivers First
SubSonex Kit
SONEX AIRCRAFT ANNOUNCED the fi rst SubSonex JSX-2 jet kit shipments from its Oshkosh factory in February. An ultra-quick build kit for a customer in Durango, Colorado, was the fi rst in a series of seven kit deliveries included in the initial kit production run.
Other orders were destined for Ontario, Canada, Pennsylvania, Missouri, Kentucky, and Oklahoma, and well as New South Wales, Australia (via ocean container). Orders are now being accepted for the second run of SubSonex Quick Build Kit production, to commence in August 2015.
14 Sport Aviation April 2015
FLIGHTLINE
INDUSTRY AND COMMUNITY NEWS
For more information and direct links to Flightline stories, visit www.EAA.org/sportaviation.
SPORTY’S UPDATES
LEARN TO FLY COURSE
SPORTY’S HAS UPDATED its popular Learn to Fly Course to include nearly four hours of new high-defi nition video content and animations along with improved features for the popular written test prep application.
New video content includes training in cross-country fl ight operations that focuses on airspace, chart interpretation, planning, and detailed weather analysis that takes advantage of the latest products and technology available from the Aviation Weather Center and Lockheed Martin Flight Service. Real-world cross-country scenarios examine pilotage and dead reckoning while also incorporating GPS and modern iPad EFB applications.
Sporty’s has also improved functionality within its written test prep application making it easier to earn the written exam endorsement directly from the course. Test prep allows customized study sessions and simulated exams to be created with access to plain English explanations written by Sporty’s instructional team.
The Learn to Fly Course is pro-vided free to EAA Young Eagles as a part of the EAA Flight Plan. Visit www.EAA.org/YoungEagles for details.
The course (or Learn to Fly App) is available for $199 through www.Sportys.com or by calling 1-800-776-7897 (1-800-SPORTYS).
NEW AIRCRAFT SHIPMENTS RISE IN 2014
GENERAL AVIATION Manufacturers
Association (GAMA) companies delivered a total of 2,454 aircraft in 2014, up from 2,353 in 2013. Total billings were $24.5 billion, compared to $23.4 billion in the previous year.
Piston airplanes delivered rose to 1,129, an increase of 9.6 percent over the year before. Business jet deliveries also increased from 678 to 722. But turboprop numbers declined from 645 to 603. Cirrus
was the highest volume piston airplane maker delivering 308 airplanes worth $217 million. Gulfstream led all member companies in billings with the 150 business jets it delivered worth $7.81 billion.
Helicopter shipments showed a sharp 24.7 percent decline from 1,290 in 2013 to 971 in the past year. Weakness in the global oil business is thought to be one of the reasons demand for helicopters dropped during the year.
Among the manufacturers showing stronger years were Socata, which delivered 51 of its new TBM 900 fast single-engine turboprops, and the combined Beech and Cessna Textron company that delivered a total of 672 airplanes worth $2.92 billion. Included in the Textron deliveries were 155 Skyhawks, 32 G36 Bonanzas, 40 B58 Barons, and 22 Cessna TTx piston singles.
See the complete GA Aircraft Shipment Report at www.GAMA.aero.
QUEST AIRCRAFT ACQUIRED BY JAPANESE COMPANY
QUEST AIRCRAFT COMPANY, maker of the 10-place Kodiak turboprop, has been acquired by Setouchi Holdings Inc., part of the Tsuneishi Group, a global transportation corporation headquartered in Japan. Quest corporate headquarters and manufacturing operations will remain in Sandpoint, Idaho, and the existing leadership team will continue under CEO Sam Hill.
Setouchi Holdings’ subsidiary, Setouchi Trading Inc., is an authorized Kodiak dealer.
“Over the last few years, we have experienced steady growth, and with new fi nancial capitalization and a shared understanding of the potential opportunities in the marketplace for expansion, we are looking forward to signifi cant growth for Quest in the years ahead,” Hill said.
Quest posted a record year in 2014 with 30 Kodiak deliveries. The company plans further expansion for its facilities and employees as it ramps up production.
//
L-3’S NEW LINE of Lynx ADS-B “out” equipment is aimed at a broad range of airplanes, listing from $3,467 for a basic remote-mounted unit to $6,800 for a unit that is both a transponder and ADS-B “out” and includes a display of traffic and weather.The Lynx units include three versions of a remote-mounted box and two that are panel-mounted transponder replacements. All versions include a WAAS-aided position sensor and a transmitter. The more basic remote-mounted units broadcast on the UAT frequency while the panel-mounted transponder system uses the standard 1090 MHz transponder frequency. UAT is
suitable for flight below 18,000 feet, but after 2020 a 1090 MHz ADS-B “out” will be required above that altitude.
//
DYNON AVIONICS has created a compact Wi-Fi adapter that links its SkyView glass avionics systems to the ForeFlight flight-planning app running on an iPad. The Wi-Fi link is bidirectional so ForeFlight planning data on your iPad can flow into the SkyView while the Dynon system exports GPS, attitude, and other data into ForeFlight.The Dynon Wi-Fi adapter plugs into the USB port on the avionics display with no need for other wiring changes. The adapter is priced at $35.
//
GLENN BRASCH, EAA 151265, of Tucson, Arizona, has developed a smartphone app for Android and iOS called Airport Courtesy Cars that lists airports with available courtesy/crew cars for GA pilots. The retired professional pilot and homebuilder got the idea while planning his fl ight to AirVenture last year in his RV-9A. “I started compiling a list, going through AirNav and putting out requests for car locations,” Brasch said. “As the list grew I published it on my website, and as it approached almost 1,000 listings I thought it would make a good app.”After several months of development the app lists more than 1,250 airports, organized by state, with Google Map capability to view airport locations.
J. MAC MCCLELLAN
J. MAC MCCLELLAN
COMMENTARY / LEFT SEAT
SOMETHING MOST OF US want in our flying is a new challenge. A new skill to add. Something to do in our airplanes in addition to riding around enjoying the scenery. And that’s why so many pilots have taken on the challenge of earning an instrument rating.
Over the past dozen years ending in 2013—the most recent sta-tistics available—the percentage of all active pilots holding an instrument rating steadily increased from 58 percent to 65 per-cent. The FAA reports that all ATPs are instrument-rated. No surprise there. Ninety percent of all active commercial pilots also hold instrument ratings. And of the estimated 180,214 active pri-vate pilots in 2013 the FAA says 59,909 were instrument-rated, almost exactly a third of the total.
The statistics show that instrument-rated pilots are remaining active in larger numbers than those who are not rated. In 2002 the FAA estimates there were 545,434 active pilots with a private certificate or higher, and 317,389 of those were instrument-rated. By the end of 2013 the active pilot population had declined to 473,739, a drop of 13 percent. But the number of instrument-rated pilots dropped from 317,389 to 307,120 over the same period, a decline of less than 4 percent.
There are certainly many factors contributing to the shrinking number of active pilots, but the numbers clearly show that those who are instrument-rated are more committed and are remaining active longer.
It’s important to understand that the number of instrument-rated pilots says very little about how much actual IFR flying occurs in general aviation. In the piston fleet the number of hours flown on an IFR clearance is a very small minority. Nobody knows the actual number, but I doubt it is even 10 percent of the total hours flown.
And having the instrument rating is only the first step in instrument flying qualification. Again, nobody knows absolute numbers, but I’m positive only a small minority of instrument-rated GA pilots maintain the required currency to legally fly an IFR trip this afternoon.
In the chaos after 9/11 all sorts of draconian proposals were being tossed around at various levels of government, and one of them was to ban all VFR flight, at least to ban it near
or over metropolitan areas. Several of us, including people from aviation advocacy groups, tried to estimate what percentage of GA pilots were fully qualified, not just instrument-rated, to fly IFR. A consensus emerged that the number was less than 10 percent.
So why should you learn to fly IFR if you’re not going to actually fly in the sys-tem? Or at least not going to fly on a clearance very often? My answer is that learning to fly instruments will make you a better and potentially safer pilot.
When I’ve been asked which certificate or rating was most important or most diffi-cult to earn I always say it was the
instrument rating.
The commercial certificate is really a glorified private course. You must learn to fly a few new maneuvers such as lazy-eights or 720-degree spirals, but mostly you fly the same maneuvers you did to earn the private but to a higher standard.
The ATP is really the instrument rating all over again but to a tighter tolerance. And earning type ratings is flying the type that is new to you to the same standards as required for the original ATP.
But the instrument rating requires you to learn an entirely new set of skills. You must learn to create a constant mental image of the airplane’s attitude and position based only on what the instruments show you. You must learn an entirely new method of navi-gating and maintaining safe altitudes. And you must learn more about the weather than is ever necessary when you simply avoid all clouds and low visibility.
Maybe It’s Time for an
Instrument Rating
In my day the instrument rating was pretty far into the future of a new pilot. As I recall you needed to log at least 250 hours total, and much of it had to be cross-country fl ying to be eligible for the IFR. That didn’t make a lot of sense to many because fl ying trips is when you are likely to encounter marginal weather and benefi t from an instrument rating. So the rules were changed so that you need to have at least a private certifi cate and have fl own at least 50 hours of cross-country as pilot in command. Before the IFR checkride you will need to have logged at least 40 hours of actual or simulated instrument flying of which at least 15 hours must be with an instructor. The FAA has gone back and forth on how much training time can be flown in flight-training devices and simulators, but some is allowed. And if you do your IFR training at an FAA-approved school, hour require-ments can be different.
You will also need to study for and pass an IFR written exam. I know, we’re sup-posed to call it a “knowledge test” or something like that, but calling it the writ-ten makes so much more sense.
Whatever you call it, the IFR written is one of the toughest you’ll ever face as a pilot. I think it is still also the longest in terms of number of questions. And just about every area of fl ying is covered including IFR proce-dures, of course, but also lots of weather, regulation, and airplane-performance topics.
In the old days the IFR written was greatly feared. Its toughness more than any other test helped to grow the concen-trated long weekend ground courses. The weekend courses worked, but more impor-tantly they paved the way for creation of the very effective home study courses we have today. You will still need to apply yourself and actually study the courses, but the risk of flunking the IFR written is
tremendously reduced compared to decades ago if you make the effort.
REQUIRED EQUIPMENT
The equipment required to fl y IFR, particu-larly for training, is very basic. Most standard category airplanes will have the essentials, and a very large percentage of homebuilts do, too.
18 Sport Aviation April 2015
J. MAC MCCLELLAN
But the instrument rating requires
you to learn an entirely new
set of skills. You must learn to
create a constant mental image
of the airplane’s attitude and
position based only on what the
instruments show you.
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www.eaa.org 19
What the rules require are the basic “six pack” of attitude and directional gyros, a turn and bank indicator, altimeter, and air-speed indicator. The only radio requirement is a comm and a nav receiver. You will also need to have a glide slope receiver along with the VOR/LOC so you can learn to fl y a precision approach, the ILS.
Advances in electronics are actually making it more cost-effective to equip for IFR flying, particularly in homebuilts. Several companies offer integrated flat glass avionics systems with non-moving attitude heading reference systems (AHRS) in place of gyros. These glass cockpit display systems eliminate the need to install a vacuum pump and plumbing to spin old-fashioned mechani-cal gyros. And the primary flight display (PFD) shows all of the information and more from the old six pack of steam gauges on a single glass display.
There are also cost-effective upgrades for standard airplanes, particularly from Aspen. The basic Evolution 1000 fits in the space of the old attitude and directional gyros to give you all PFD functions in a single box. The mechanical airspeed, altimeter, and turn and bank can remain in place as backups. The Aspen unit has an internal battery that powers the Evolution if power is lost and also contains an emer-gency GPS feature.
If your budget is bigger, Avidyne, Garmin, and others in addition to Aspen make flat glass systems that are certified in a wide range of airplanes, offer a long list of capabilities, and connect to many exist-ing avionics systems.
There are some fi ne points in the rules when it comes to using GPS for IFR fl ying. Most of your training fl ights will be con-ducted under VFR rules, even though you are wearing a view-limiting hood or other
device and fl ying published IFR procedures. Under those conditions a GPS navigator does not need to be IFR certifi ed in the air-plane. But if you fi le a fl ight plan and accept an IFR clearance, your GPS navigator needs to be certifi ed to use as primary guidance such as when fl ying an approach.
Nearly all of the popular GPS naviga-tors are eligible for IFR certification, but it is a two-step process. The navigator itself must be IFR-approved, and then the installation must be approved, which brings along a flight manual supplement and other documentation.
The other requirement for an airplane to fly IFR is that the altimeter and tran-sponder be recertified every two years. But there is a two-year recertification require-ment on all transponders and their Mode C function anyway.
Oddly the basic equipment rules for IFR fl ying do not require a transponder,
but do require a clock with a sweep second hand or digital presentation. The reality is that a transponder is essential to fl y in the system even for IFR practice approaches fl own under VFR. You can, of course, fl y approaches and holds to your heart’s content in unregulated airspace without talking to controllers and without receiving radar vectors, but that would be a very incomplete IFR training experience.
A WAY TO GET STARTED
If you want to dip your toe into IFR flying without any commitments to schools or instructors, it’s perfectly legal and logical to put on a hood and try it out with a pilot friend in the right seat. There have been lots of hairsplit-ting discussions about the required qualifications for the safety pilot and who can log the time, but the bottom line that always meets the rules is that the person in the right seat is fully qualified to command the flight while you are under the hood.
If your friend is IFR-rated, that’s great because he can offer tips and advice that isn’t formal instruction that can be logged as such, but gives you time to see what IFR flying is all about. I know some pilots who just hated being under the hood. They got through the couple hours of hood flying required to earn a private, but just didn’t want to do any more. But then many, even most, find flying instruments a great challenge and something they want to master.
At one time it was possible to earn an IFR rating and never fly on a clearance in the IFR system, and many pilots did. They simply flew all of the practice approaches and other procedures VFR even though they were often work-ing with controllers, acceptwork-ing vectors, and so on.
But that rule changed, and now you must fly at least one trip of 250 miles or longer on an IFR clearance in the sys-tem with an instructor. That trip must include flying at least three different types of approaches such as an ILS, VOR, GPS, LPV, and so on.
There isn’t a requirement to fly in actual instrument meteorological conditions (IMC) during your training, but most instructors will do their best to make that happen. It can be a problem in some parts of the country during some seasons when low clouds or visibility are rare, or when clouds are icy or thunderstorms, but seeing the inside of a cloud for real the first time is best done with an instructor. I know IFR flying is not for every pilot any more than aerobatics or gliders or antiques attract all. But I hope you will at least consider learning to fly IFR. I promise it will change the way you fly forever no matter how good the weather on your trip.
J. Mac McClellan, EAA 747337, has been a pilot for more than 40 years holds an ATP certifi cate, and owns a Beechcraft Baron. To contact Mac, e-mail [email protected].
20 Sport Aviation April 2015
IF EVERY ONE OF OUR landings were a “greaser” and if runways never had bumps or potholes, then the landing gear on our airplanes could be dead simple. Wheel assemblies rigidly attached to the airframe would work fi ne, just as they did on the toy wagon and roller skates I had when I was a kid.
In the real world, some landings involve embarrassingly fi rm touchdowns. Some of the runways and taxiways we use are not exactly pool table smooth, either. That’s why nearly every airplane ever built has been equipped with shock-absorbing landing gear designed to survive considerable abuse.
Lightweight aircraft can often get away with a simple spring-loaded gear. Many older designs (like the venerable Piper Cub) use a simple hinged gear leg with stranded rubber cords used to absorb the shock of landing. Mooneys use a stack of shock-absorbing rubber doughnuts for the same purpose.
22 Sport Aviation April 2015
MIKE BUSCH
COMMENTARY / SAVVY AVIATOR
Oleos
Oleo pneumatic shock struts use hydraulic fl uid, compressed gas, and darn clever engineering to improve our landings
FIGURE 1
Many aircraft, notably Cessna singles, use shock-absorbing spring-steel gear legs, an elegantly simple design pioneered and patented in the 1930s by air racer Steve Wittman. Cessna licensed the design from Wittman in the 1940s, introduced it in 1946 on the Cessna 140, and has used it on its single-engine aircraft ever since. Some recent lightplane designs (e.g., Cirrus SR20/SR22) employ a similar spring-leg approach using composites instead of steel.
RECOIL
Spring-type landing gear designs like these have some compelling advantages when used in lightplanes. They’re cheap, light-weight, require few parts, and are
essentially maintenance-free. Rubber shock cords and doughnuts require periodic replacement, but Wittman-type spring-steel gear legs often last the life of the airframe with zero maintenance.
Unfortunately, spring-type gear designs also have two significant disad-vantages. First, they don’t scale well to heavier aircraft. As the weight of the air-craft increases, the size of the rubber, steel, or composite springs required to absorb the shock of landing tends to get impractically large.
Second, and perhaps more important, spring-type gear legs aren’t very good at damping the recoil of a hard landing. The harder the landing, the more energy the landing gear springs absorb, and the more energetic the ensuing recoil. The result is that a hard landing on a spring-type gear
ILLUSTRATION BY CHRIS LIVIERI
An oleo pneumatic (air oil) shock strut consists of two telescoping tubes with sealed ends partially fi lled with hydraulic fl uid and partially with compressed air or nitrogen.
Fully Extended: 0 pounds Static (Taxi): 2,500 pounds Fully Compressed: 7,500 pounds
300 psi
Fully Extended: 0 pounds Static (Taxi): 2,500 pounds Fully Compressed: 7,500 pounds
www.eaa.org 23
often results in a bounced landing— which at best can be embarrassing, and at worst can result in loss of control and damage to the aircraft.
Consider Charles Lindbergh’s his-toric New York to Paris fl ight on May 20-21, 1927. His custom-built Ryan NYP monoplane was adapted from Ryan’s M-2 mail plane, which used a shock-cord-type landing gear like most aircraft of its day. But the custom-built NYP car-ried 450 gallons of fuel and had a maximum takeof weight of 5,250 pounds—nearly twice that of the M-2. The gear of the NYP still used shock cords, but was massively beefed up to support the additional weight.
The result was obvious to anyone who has seen the old motion picture footage of Lindbergh’s takeof from Roosevelt Field, New York, and his landing at Le Bourget Field, Paris. The takeof was a heart-stopping sequence of bounces, and the landing was also badly bounced. Both were fi ne examples of the recoil problem inherent in spring-type landing gear designs. As aircraft got larger and heavier, a more forgiving landing gear design became a necessity.
ENTER THE OLEO
The answer was the oleo pneumatic or “air oil” shock strut, originally intro-duced in the late 1920s by the Cleveland Pneumatic Tool Co. Cleveland’s Aerol strut quickly gained acceptance in the 1930s, and was the landing gear technology of choice by the time aviation exploded in the 1940s, trans-forming Cleveland Pneumatic Tool into one of the nation’s largest wartime industrial companies.
The oleo strut uses compressed gas combined with hydraulic fl uid to absorb and dissipate the shock of landing, and to damp the recoil to minimize bounced landings. The strut consists of two tele-scoping tubes with externally closed ends (Figure 1). The upper tube is historically referred to as the “cylinder” and the lower tube as the “piston.” The telescop-ing tubes form a variable-displacement chamber that contains hydraulic fl uid on the bottom and compressed air or nitro-gen on the top. As the strut is compressed during landing, the incompressible hydraulic fl uid maintains constant vol-ume, while the gas at the top of the strut is compressed to smaller volume and
FIGURE 2
An orifi ce plate divides the strut into two chambers. Fluid passes through the orifi ce as the strut compresses, absorbing energy and damping recoil. A tapered metering pin constricts the orifi ce as the strut compresses, providing softness at initial touchdown and increased damping as the strut compresses.
24 Sport Aviation April 2015
higher pressure. The compressed gas acts as a spring, and per-forms the same function as the shock cord or spring steel of a spring-type gear.
The bottom of the upper tube (cylinder) is equipped with a high-pressure seal to prevent fl uid or gas from escaping from the chamber as the strut compresses and extends. For light-duty struts, the seal may be a simple O-ring; for heavier-duty struts, it tends to get a bit more exotic. Just below the seal is a scraper ring to prevent dirt from damaging the seal as the strut compresses. The seal and scraper ring are typically retained by a snap ring.
TAMING THE BOUNCE
The purpose of the hydraulic fluid in an oleo strut is to damp the action of the gas “spring,” slowing the rate at which the strut absorbs landing shocks, and slowing the post-impact recoil to
minimize the chance of a bounced landing.
To accomplish this, the strut is equipped with an orifi ce plate that divides the lower fl uid-bearing part of the strut into two chambers (Figure 2). As the strut compresses during land-ing, the fl uid is forced through the orifi ce from the lower chamber to the upper one, and as the strut extends during post-landing recoil (or takeof ), the fl uid is forced back through the orifi ce in the opposite direction. The size of the orifi ce and the viscosity of the fl uid limit the rate at which the strut can com-press or extend.
Now here’s where things get really clever: Most oleo struts employ a tapered “metering pin” to vary the size of the orifi ce and therefore the rate of fl uid fl ow from one chamber to the other. The more the strut com-presses, the smaller the orifi ce becomes, and the more resistant the strut is
Cutaway view of an oleo strut. The reverse-taper “knob” at the top of the metering pin provides increased damping at the very end of the extension stroke to lessen the mechanical shock when the strut reaches full extension during takeoff .
www.eaa.org 25
to compress or extend. The result is a landing gear that starts of very soft at touchdown, and becomes increasingly stif as the strut compresses and the energy of landing is dissipated. When near-fully compressed after landing, the strut is highly damped and recoils slowly and with great reluctance.
While the metering pin gradually tapers from bottom to top, it normally has a larger-diameter “bulb” at its extreme upper end. The purpose of this odd-looking swelling is to slow the extension of the strut on takeof just as it reaches full extension, thus slowing strut extension just before it hits its mechan-ical stop after liftof .
DESIGNING A STRUT
A widely used rule of thumb is that the com-pression ratio of a main-gear oleo strut should be about 4-to-1 between the fully extended and static (taxi) position, and
about 3-to-1 between the static and fully compressed position.
The fi nal fi gure comes from FAA certifi -cation requirements, which require that a landing gear be designed to handle a hard landing with a sink rate of 10 feet per second (or 600 fpm). A simple calculation shows that for a main landing gear strut with a typ-ical maximum throw length of 12 inches, the required deceleration from such a landing is about 3g’s. Thus, the strut needs to be able to dissipate a worst-case landing force equiva-lent to about three times the aircraft’s normal static weight.
There are other constraints on gas pres-sure. If the minimum pressure in the strut when fully extended is less than about 50 psi, the O-ring seal at the bottom of the cyl-inder may not seal tightly enough against the piston to prevent the strut from leaking. Conversely, if the maximum pressure in the strut when fully compressed is more than
5,000 psi, the seal might blow out on a hard landing. Finally, if the pressure in the strut in its normal static position is more than about 1,500 psi, it will be impossible to add gas to the strut without jacking the aircraft (since nitrogen bottles typically have a maximum pressure of 1,800 psi when full).
Given these constraints, a working pres-sure of about 1,200 psi under static (taxi) load is a good compromise. At full extension (with a 4-to-1 compression ratio), the pres-sure drops to about 300 psi, and at full
In the real world, some landings
involve embarrassingly fi rm
touchdowns. Some of the runways
and taxiways we use are not
exactly pool table smooth, either.
26 Sport Aviation April 2015
compression (with a 3-to-1 compression ratio), the pressure rises to about 3,600 psi— easily within the necessary constraints.
The required strut diameter can be easily determined based on the weight of the air-craft. For example, my Cessna T310R has a maximum weight of about 5,500 pounds, which means that each main gear needs to support roughly 2,500 pounds under static conditions (with the nose gear supporting a bit as well). At 1,200 psi, this requires a main gear piston cross-sectional area of a bit over 2 square inches, which translates into a pis-ton diameter of about 1.7 inches.
The fully extended main gear on my T310R has a throw of about 12 inches. At a 4-to-1 compression ratio, the static extension is about 3 inches. In a hard-landing scenario— say I forgot to fl are and drove the airplane on at a 600 fpm sink rate—the strut would theo-retically compress to about 1 inch extension with an internal pressure of 3,600 psi (3-to-1 ratio) and an opposing force of 7,500 pounds. A typical nose gear oleo on a tricycle-gear airplane handles a lot less weight than the mains, and has a shorter throw and lower working pressure. But its ability to dampen landing shocks with minimal recoil is perhaps even more important than for a main gear. Consider that a nose gear recoil pitches the nose up, increases the wing angle of attack, causes the airplane to want to start fl ying again, and can easily lead to divergent pitch oscilla-tions (often referred to as PIO or pilot-induced oscillations) that have been known to wrinkle fi rewalls, curl prop tips, snap of nose wheels, and generally give owners a bad hair day.
That’s probably the principal reason that although tricycle-gear Cessna singles still use the simple Wittman-type spring gear for their mains, they use an oleo strut on the nose.
STRUT INFLATION
Your aircraft’s service manual provides detailed servicing instructions for your oleos. Typically, a specifi c infl ation pressure is given for servicing the strut when it is fully extended (i.e., airplane on jacks), and a strut-extension measurement is given for “airing up” the strut with the aircraft “on its feet.” These servicing instructions are also contained on an FAA-required placard af xed to each strut. For
example, the main gear struts on my airplane are placarded for a no-load infl ation pressure of 320 psi, and for a static-load extension of 3 inches. For the nose strut, the corresponding fi gures are about 50 psi and 1.5 inches.
But be careful: If you notice that your strut extension is a bit lower than it should be, the temptation is to “air up” the strut a bit (using a nitrogen bottle or strut pump) to bring it back up to the specifi ed height. But before you do this, stop and think about it for a moment. How do you know whether the strut extension is low because it needs more air/nitrogen pressure, or whether it’s low because it needs more hydraulic fl uid?
If the strut is actually low on fl uid (because some seeped out past the O-ring seal between the cylinder and piston) and you compensate by adding air/nitrogen, what you’ve done is lower the compression ratio between static and fully compressed positions of the strut. Repeat this a few times and you might wind up with a strut that’s suf ciently short on fl uid and long on air that will physically bottom out on a hard landing—and that could get expensive.
Remember, the function of gas in an oleo is to provide the strut’s spring force, and the function of hydraulic fl uid is to provide the strut’s damping force. A useful test is to rock the aircraft up and down and see how the strut reacts. If the strut bounces up and down freely with relatively little damping, then it’s most likely low on fl uid. If the strut moves stif y and shows little willingness to bounce, the fl uid level is probably adequate and the strut may just need a little air or nitrogen.
If there’s any indication that the strut may be low on fl uid (i.e., it’s “bouncy”), you
should defi nitely check the fl uid level in order to preclude the possibility of damage during a fi rm landing. Low fl uid is poten-tially a lot more serious than low air. Incidentally, the most likely time for a strut to lose fl uid is in frigid temperatures, so be especially vigilant during the wintertime.
SERVICING
To service an oleo strut with fl uid, jack the aircraft until the wheel is of the ground. Open the fi ll valve located at or near the top of the strut to fully defl ate it.
Once the strut is deflated, attach one end of some clear plastic tubing to the filler valve, and immerse the other end of the tubing into a pan of MIL-H-5606 hydraulic fluid. Slowly pump the strut up and down a number of times. Each time you extend the strut, it will suck fluid up the tube and into the strut. Each time you compress it, it will expel gas that is entrapped in the fluid (plus excess fluid) into the pan. Continue pumping until you’ve eliminated as much entrapped gas as you can and the expelled fluid comes out relatively free of bubbles.
At that point, compress the strut fully once more (to eject excess fl uid), then dis-connect the plastic tube. Extend the strut fully, and then service the strut with either nitrogen or dry compressed air to the rec-ommended pressure. Close the fi ller valve and install its protective cap.
After the strut has been serviced, remove the aircraft from jacks, rock the just-serviced strut up and down, and check that the strut extension is reasonably close to the static extension values given in the service manual and on the strut placard. A little variation is okay, but if the strut is signifi cantly under or over the recommended static extension, you might consider adding or removing a little air or nitrogen.
Mike Busch, EAA 740170, was the 2008 National Aviation Maintenance Technician of the Year, and has been a pilot for 44 years, logging more than 7,000 hours. He’s a CFI and A&P/IA. E-mail him at mike.busch@savvyaviator. com. Mike also hosts free online presentations as part of EAA’s webinar series on the fi rst Wednesday of each month. For a schedule visit www.EAA.org/webinars.
The takeoff was a heart-stopping
sequence of bounces, and the
landing was also badly bounced.
Both were fi ne examples of the
recoil problem inherent in
spring-type landing gear designs.
ILLUSTRATION BYDAVE MATHENY
Running out of gas is, umm, unwise
28 Sport Aviation April 2015
IN OVER THREE DECADES of fl ying, I have inevitably seen cases of pilots running out of gas, but the one I always think of fi rst concerns a guy who ran his fuel tank completely dry right in front of the usual handful of pilots who show up at my fi eld on nice summer days. Ted—not his real name—was one of those people who just have to get some airtime in every day. That’s a completely understandable mental state (in fact, I wrote about it recently) as long as it doesn’t lead to doing stupid things. He was also strapped for cash on the day in question, so he hadn’t bought any fuel for the Quicksilver MX Sprint he was fl ying. He just rolled it out of the hangar and took of , but stayed almost within gliding distance of the fi eld.
We saw that he had taken of with only about a quart of fuel— in an aircraft that burns about 3 gallons an hour in cruise. He kept
fl ying for an amazingly long time, doing stalls, steep little turns, near-chandelles, and all sorts of fancy, fun stuf . He was also doing all this fun stuf at an appallingly low altitude: never above 400 feet, and work-ing his way constantly lower. Although he didn’t exactly have an audience—most of the people at the fi eld were pilots and not unduly amazed by his fl ying—there was a growing awareness that he had to be com-ing perilously close to runncom-ing his fuel tank dry. There was muttering along the lines of “He should have run out of gas 10
Running on Empty
minutes ago,” and “How long has he been doing that?”
When the silence came, it was not with a sputter, just a dying away of the sound of the engine. He was at about 80 feet, way too far away to glide to the fi eld even if there had not been a major freeway between him and us, and over a rough but unpopulated stretch of terrain. There was no rush to get into cars and go rescue him. The unspoken attitude was: Let him fi gure out what to do. He showed up on foot 20 minutes later and col-lected a few people to help him drag the MX to a road. Some kind soul brought along a jerrycan of fuel. No damage had been done to the aircraft in the forced landing, and Ted took of from the road and fl ew back.
STUPENDOUSLY OBVIOUS
Running out of fuel is uncommon in any form of aviation, and maybe even less com-mon acom-mong the people I’ve fl own with over the years. Probably that’s because most
ultralights and very light aircraft have their fuel tanks situated in such a way that, when fuel is running low, that fact is stupendously, forehead-smackingly obvious. There’s usu-ally only one tank, and it’s right there. In Ted’s case, the Quicksilver MX series fuel tank is just above and slightly forward of the pilot’s head. Checking fuel state is about as hard as it is for the driver of a car to see if the sun visor is up or down. Even in my own Quicksilver GT400, with the tank behind the pilot and within what’s called a pylon cover, there’s still a big window in the cover
to allow a visual check—that is, for any pilot willing to turn around and look. Ted’s vague excuse was that he had become so absorbed in what he was doing that he just forgot.
He didn’t get much sympathy. Pilots expect a certain rock-bottom minimum of ourselves and each other. We expect that anyone who takes an aircraft into the sky will have fi rst made sure of some things: Is there a thunderstorm with baseball-sized hail on top of me right now? Are the wings attached, or have I thoughtlessly left one at home? Is there enough fuel aboard to do
www.eaa.org 29
We expect that anyone who takes an aircraft into the sky will have
fi rst made sure of some things: Is there a thunderstorm with
baseball-sized hail on top of me right now? Are the wings attached, or have I
thoughtlessly left one at home? Is there enough fuel aboard to do this
thing I am attempting to do?
this thing I am attempting to do? Any pilot who strays out-side these basics is going to get some stony looks when things turn out badly.
Usually, when I write about the various blunders that pilots make and the lessons we learn from them, I can of er examples of similar blunders I have made. But running out of fuel has never happened to me, not because I’m such a paragon of vir-tue but just because I’m kind of obsessive about it. I will top up the fuel tank even when the tank is half full and I’m only plan-ning to fl y for 15 minutes. The only time I don’t top up my tank is when I am guessing this is the last fl ight of the season, and I don’t want to have to throw away several gallons of old gaso-line-oil mixture in the spring. Even so, I have never taken of without at least three times the amount of fuel I will conceiv-ably need. (And so I usually do wind up having to throw away some fuel in the spring.)
MANY WAYS TO RUN OUT
Possibly my illustration is unkind. There are many reasons other than plain stupidity for running out of fuel, most of them having to do with complexities in the system or misunderstanding the fuel system. An NTSB study of fuel-starvation accidents from 2005 to 2010, published in this magazine in 2011, listed 177 fuel-starvation accidents. Of these, 112 were attributed to “improper fuel-tank selection.” Stupidity is not necessarily the reason in every case. The more complex the aircraft and its systems, the easier it is to select the wrong fuel tank or to mismanage the fuel pump or some other part of the operation.
In other words, there are many ways to run out of gas. And the competence level of the pilots covered in the study ranged as high as air transport pilot, and the average number of hours was more than 3,000.
One of the most fascinating cases of fuel exhaustion is known as the Gimli Glider. In 1983, an Air Canada Boeing 767 ran out of fuel at 41,000 feet on a fl ight between Montreal and Edmonton. The captain, a highly skilled and resourceful pilot with sailplane experience, elected to glide to an aban-doned airport at Gimli, Manitoba, and was able to make a successful landing there, despite being without hydraulic pressure and therefore unable to extend fl aps and slats. The nose wheel collapsed, and the resulting high position of the tail when the airliner fi nally ground to a halt meant that the emergency aft passenger-evacuation slides when deployed did not reach the ground, so some passengers were injured when departing the airplane. Even so, it was an amazing example of airmanship. The mistake was caused by a misun-derstanding about how much fuel was supposed to be in the tanks. Canada was going through a conversion to the metric
DAVE MATHENY
30 Sport Aviation April 2015
Running out of fuel is the easiest evil to ward off ,
ever. You don’t need crosses and garlic, or even an
advanced degree in aeronautics, just common sense.
system; the fuel pumped into the tanks had been measured in pounds while the crew had been led to believe it was in kilograms, which made them think they had more than twice as much as they really did.
LISTEN UP NOW, CLASS
It would be interesting to teach a ground school class and have the stu-dents complete this sentence: “The only reason I would ever run out of fuel would be…” That ought to be thought-provoking and enlightening for the students; get them thinking about their Achilles’ heel. We each have one, I would bet.
In fact, let’s play this game. I’ll go fi rst. The only reason I would run out of fuel would be…because I fl ew to a place, landed, discovered I had a fuel leak, and there was no way to get more—so I took a chance on getting to a destination that turned out to be too far. That would be a pretty good reason, is my guess, but when put in those terms, it would shine a light on the simple fact that there’s almost always an alter-native. In this case, staying on the ground and fi nding some other means of getting fuel.
I am afraid, though, that all too often the answer would be, if the stu-dent were being completely truthful, something along the lines of, “Because I trusted the fuel gauge, which was malfunctioning, rather than checking the fuel level with a dipstick.” Or, “Because I got distracted and didn’t change fuel tanks.”
Running out of fuel is the easiest evil to ward of , ever. You don’t need crosses and garlic, or even an advanced degree in aeronautics, just common sense. There are so many complicated, dif cult-to-understand things that can go wrong with an engine—spark, timing, fuel-air mix-ture, lubrication—but this one is caveman simple.
Dave Matheny, EAA 184186, is a private pilot and an FAA ground instructor. He has been fl ying light aircraft, including ultralights, for 34 years. He can be reached at [email protected].
ANGLE OF ATTACK INDICATORS have been in wide use in military aircraft for decades but never had a lot of play in general aviation until recently. The March 2015 Advocacy and Safety section of Sport Aviation highlighted studies by the General Aviation Joint Steering Committee that found loss of control to be responsible for 40 per-cent of GA aircraft fatalities. The GAJSC also prioritized angle of attack (AOA) indicators as a top recommended safety enhancement for both new and existing aircraft. The FAA has now taken steps to make it easier for these systems to be retrofi tted into our existing fl eet; they can be a great addition to the cockpit for enhancing situa-tion awareness and avoiding fl ight too close to stall. Like any other cueing device, however, they must be understood and used properly to be ef ective.
“AOA systems are not in wide use in GA. The GA community should embrace to the fullest extent the stall margin awareness bene-fi ts of these systems. To help the GA community understand the safety benefi ts of AOA systems, a public education campaign should be developed by industry and the FAA. GA aircraft manufacturers should work to develop cost ef ective AOA installations and retrofi t systems for the existing GA airplane fl eet. Owners and operators of GA aircraft should be encouraged to install AOA systems in their aircraft.” GAJSC: Loss of Control, Approach and Landing, Final Report
In many military high-performance aircraft the weight of fuel and weapons can be a signifi cant percentage of the gross takeof weight. We fl ight-tested the F-15E to a gross weight of 81,000 pounds. Of that about one-third was fuel, and another third was external weapons capability, which meant the appropriate speed to
fl y fi nal approach varied dramatically depending on how much fuel and weaponry you had remaining.
Even the much lighter T-38 at 12,500 pounds’ gross weight had nearly a third of that weight in fuel. Final approach speed at nearly full fuel calculated out at 185 knots— but for normal end-of-mission fuel levels we fl ew fi nal at 155 knots, a dif erence of 30 knots. We typically calculated the approach speed before each landing using a memory aid, based on fuel remaining, but with the AOA indicator on board we fl ew fi nal at the same AOA indication regardless of the weight or confi guration dif erences, dramat-ically reducing pilot workload and keeping us constantly aware of our margin above stall. We trained to cross-check the expected airspeed with the AOA indicator, giving us independent confi rmations we were where we wanted to be on approach.
Even if most GA aircraft don’t have very large variations in optimum fi nal approach airspeed with gross weight and confi gura-tion changes, we can still extract the same benefi t of increased awareness of stall mar-gin. AOA systems typically have three
CHARLIE PRECOURT
COMMENTARY / FLIGHT TEST
Angle of Attack Indicators
BY CHARLIE PRECOURT
32 Sport Aviation April 2015 PHOTOGRAPHY COURTESY OF ALPHA SYSTEMS AOA
