Constant Speed Propeller Maintenance
Over the years, I’ve noticed that pilots tend to give insufficient attention to two critical airframe elements: tires and props. I’ve already covered tires, so today let’s look at the perils of improper maintenance on a constant-speed propeller. On January 23, 2003 at about 4:20 p.m., Rob Cable — the grandson of Cable Airport founder Dewey Cable — took off from that airfield to perform a post-annual test flight in his twin-engine Beech 95 Travel Air. Six minutes later he was killed when the Beechcraft crashed in Rancho Cucamonga. This accident was big news in the Southern California flying community. Cable Airport bills itself as “the world’s largest family-owned public-use airport” and anyone who’s been there...
Read MoreAviation Myths, Part 3
[For the rest of the series, see Part 1 or Part 2] Myth #11: Aerobatics are dangerous. Aerobatic flight has played a prominent part in many fatal accident reports. Sadly, that has given acro a bad name. A more thoughtful analysis, however, clearly shows that many — perhaps most — of those crashes are due to intentional low-altitude maneuvering. When aerobatic flying is pursued in a prudent, intelligent manner with sufficient altitude, the risks are far outweighed by the benefits. Many fatalities come from the world of air shows. Air show flying can be extraordinarily dangerous because there’s virtually no structure or limit on what a pilot is permitted to do. As long as pilots don’t direct the energy of the aircraft toward spectators, a...
Read MoreBest Bang for the Buck
With a title like that, you’d think I’m about to expound on the virtues of a massage parlor which offers the proverbial “happy ending”. Alas, it was only the alliterative qualities of the title which I was after, and so we’ll be sticking to aviation topics today. And P.S., please get your mind out of the gutter, my friend. Anyway, aviation is a tough place for the dollar store crowd. When it comes to bargains, the list is short. Nowhere is this more true than when it comes to owning an airplane. The first thing any veteran aircraft owner will tell you is that there’s no such thing as an inexpensive airplane when it comes to overall cost of ownership. Sure, you can buy a piston twin in today’s market for almost nothing,...
Read MoreWill This Thing Roll?
Periodically, students or co-pilots will broach the subject of flying an aerobatic maneuver in an airplane which is not designed and built for that purpose. Typically they’ll ask me if, as an aerobatic pilot, I would ever consider performing a barrel or aileron roll in the aircraft. I used to just give them the short answer: “no”. But over time I’ve started explaining why I think it’s such a bad idea, even for those of us who are trained to fly such maneuvers. I won’t touch on the regulations, because I think we are all familiar with those. I’m just talking about practical considerations. Let’s assume the airplane we’re flying is a Cirrus SR-22. Non-acro planes tend to have non-symmetrical airfoils which were...
Read MoreMarried!
Hello there. Yeah — you. The one who thought I was MIA/AWOL/just plain dead. I will be the first to admit that I’ve been remiss in keeping my site up to date. As a former professional web developer, the kiss of death for any site in my bookmark list was always when a site was no longer updated on a timely basis. Sort of the way this one has been of late. After all, why should I pay more attention to a site than the owner does? So who knows what sort of readership I still have left for the House of Rapp — if any. In my defense, however, I’ve got a great excuse. I went from being unattached to dating to engaged to married in a little over a year. If you know anything about me, you’ll know I’m very methodical about important...
Read MoreGyroscopic Precession
Do you fully understand the famous “turning tendencies” which act on propeller-driven aircraft? It’s one of the first things primary students are taught when flight training commences. And the concepts are not all that complicated. Yet I’ve found that even long-time instructors often lack a proper understanding of at least one of these forces, specifically gyroscopic precession. Here’s an excerpt from one of Bob Miller’s Over the Airwaves newsletters: “An unexpected stall, coupled with four powerful left-turning tendencies of a single engine airplane in a steep climb and insufficient right rudder, could easily produce a left hand spin.” I wrote Bob to tell him that I only count three “left” turning...
Read MoreMOA Flying
There are many types of “special use” airspace out there. One of the most prevalent is a Military Operations Area, or MOA. According to the Aeronautical Information Manual (Sec. 3-4-5): a. MOAs consist of airspace of defined vertical and lateral limits established for the purpose of separating certain military training activities from IFR traffic. Whenever a MOA is being used, nonparticipating IFR traffic may be cleared through a MOA if IFR separation can be provided by ATC. Otherwise, ATC will reroute or restrict nonparticipating IFR traffic. b. Examples of activities conducted in MOAs include, but are not limited to: air combat tactics, air intercepts, aerobatics, formation training, and low-altitude tactics. Military pilots flying in an active MOA...
Read MoreTime for a Beat Down, Becker
Talk about art imitating life. I snapped this photo today while Sunrise’s chief mechanic worked on the Becker com radio in our Extra 300. I had taxied out to the non-movement boundary and been attempting to contact clearance delivery (and ground, and tower, and company, and…. you get the picture) to no avail. It was curious. We seemed to receive transmissions perfectly well. There was side-tone. The radio indicated that it was transmitting. Now on the one hand, if a radio is the weakest part of your airplane, life can’t be too bad. On the other hand, it costs about $6 per minute to operate this aircraft, and the only other person on board the plane is the guy footing the bill. And he came all the way from Thailand to get some professional...
Read MoreBack in the Saddle Again
“Riding the range once more, toting my old Pitts S-2B…” Doesn’t quite have the same ring, does it? No matter. It was so nice taking the Pitts up today — I made two practice flights at the Blockhouse, concentrating on the Intermediate Known sequence for the upcoming season. It’s a bit tougher than last season’s sequence. The total K value (difficulty) is about the same, but this year it’s front loaded with harder figures, while at the end of the sequence the K values drop off significantly. My practice strategy seems to differ from most aerobatic pilots. For whatever reason, most pilots begin by working with individual figures. On the surface this seems like a logical building-block approach. However, I prefer to run...
Read MoreThese Are A Few Of My Favorite Things
Now is this a sweet looking pair of machines or what? A 1993 Pitts S-2B and a 2008 Honda Accord Coupe in matching paint: I had the opportunity to get back into the Pitts yesterday and when I saw the two of them together I had to take a picture. It’s so rare that both the car and the plane are clean at the same time. I was out at CNO to take Dan for a flight. His flight review (an FAA-mandated recurrent training requirement) was due and I owed him a favor for ferrying me out to Borrego last fall. I had needed to get out there to retrieve the Pitts after the Acrofest. I was the Contest Director for that competition. And a competitor. And a judge. And… I’ll never do that again. It was a crazy time, even by my standards. Anyway, Dan wanted to try...
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