Paul,
Neutral means many things. The Europa aircraft should indicate nearly
dead beat return to trimmed speed when the stick is pulsed upward
sharply and released. Quickly pull the stick back about one inch at
about 90 Kts. (I hold my forearm against my knee and pulse the stick
with my fingers) and release.) If the plane corrects back in less than
one oscillation cycle that is what is meant by dead beat over here.
If the nose basically stops in a climb or very slowly continues up, and
the stick does not return exactly where you had it and it does not
return to the trimmed speed, you have friction in your pitch system and
it must be worked out with lube, or whatever is necessary.
If you pulse the stick up and the nose continues up but does come back
to trimmed flight after a bit, your stabilator counter weight is a
little too heavy (acceleration forces pull the leading edge down). If
you pulse the stick back and the correction is quite quick back to
trimmed level, your counterweight is too light and the acceleration has
pulled the stab trailing edge down causing a nose down pitch. This
makes flying in turbulence fatiguing.
I suspect you have friction in your system. Please try the following.
In the hangar and no wind, push down on the dorsal fin area just forward
of the stabs, bouncing the aircraft briskly, and watch your stabilators.
Normally they will move a bit as you bounce the aircraft but
essentially stay where balanced. If the TE of the stab goes down, the
counterweight is too light and vice versa. If the stab doesn't move at
all, too much friction. If you move the stick or the trailing edge of
the stab, the tail plane should move easily with little or no friction
or stickiness. The bearings may still have dirt from finishing in them,
or your trim tube could be dragging a bit, and must be clearanced.
Vague trim is an indication your Flettner strips are too small and the
trim tab can't feel the change in air pressure and transmit that to the
stab.
It's a start. Hope it is something simple.
As for checklists, I was a standardization pilot for years in the
military and used to build/update operations manuals, checklists and
local procedures manuals for quick reference.. I made a personal
checklist for my Europa trigear or mono or glider, equipped with an old
914 or 912 series engine. I plastic coated it for durability and have
it as a ringed flip checklist. There have been changes over the years
but basically it works OK. Take a look. In my feeble brain, it works
to my logic.
This is a personal checklist, it is for my use only, I still carry the
engine manufacturers operational checklist and the Europa checklist in
the aircraft. I do not intentionally deviate from anything in the
operators handbooks. Many items are excessively abbreviated and may not
suit other pilots. It is my belief that we all should have a personal
operators quick reference card that can be accessed quickly, similar to
the one produced by Europa, and refer to it often. I fly with this one
next to me at all times. An excel spreadsheet is attached. You may
use the format if you see fit. As everyone knows, I can't do anything
briefly so it is a number of pages...
Bud Yerly
Custom Flight Creations, Inc.
Tech support.
----- Original Message -----
From: Europa<mailto:europa@pstewart.f2s.com>
To: europa-list@matronics.com<mailto:europa-list@matronics.com>
Sent: Friday, October 08, 2010 2:40 PM
Subject: Europa-List: Test flying
<europa@pstewart.f2s.com<mailto:europa@pstewart.f2s.com>>
A couple of questions.
1. while at cruise speed the aircraft is neutral in pitch. At low
speed
(flaps down) it tends to hold any pitch input (nose up or nose down).
Anyone
any thoughts?
2. Does anyone have recognised check lists for a 914 mono?
Regards
Paul
G-GIDY
http://www.matronics.com/Navigator?Europa-List<http://www.matronics.com/N
avigator?Europa-List>
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