Hello there all you flying Europa owners!
I am now a test pilot and I would like some input, if you could. I have now
flown the Mini U2 (motorgllider) 2 flights and 1.8 hours. It has gone very
well, except for today's near disaster landing. I have not explored the
slower speeds enough and was too conservative on the approach speed. (too
fast). The rest of the story, I will not tell, as it must be obvious. It
ended up OK with a go around.
The troubling thing I have encountered is that I can only trim to about 65
knots minimum and that is at full aft trim. I have not refined this exactly,
but it is close. The airplane acts as if it is at a too far forward CG. My CG
sits at 59.4, which is wwell within the envelope for the short wings. I
susect the long wings may have some adjustments here. I have checked again
all the controls and trim system movements and they all check out fine. My
question to the group is:
With the short wings, what is the minimum airspeed you can trim the airplane
- especially at a forward CG?
Also, in the videos of takeoffs, I see the tailwheel come up well before the
airplane main leaves the ground. I am paranoid about keeping the stick aft
and was wondering what those experienced with this configuration find during
takeoff for the tail coming off the ground. My airplane has been leaping off
the ground abruptly as I am keeping that stick probably too far back too
long.
Flight #3 coming up in a few days, with a more aft CG!
Dave
A227
Mini U2 (undamaged!)
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