Thx. to all who replied to "Flying a heavy Europa XS?"
I owned a 1948 Cessna 170 for some time. When landing within what a
reasonable crosswind may be (POH) full stall or wheel didn't matter much,
both relative straight forward.
Now if you were landing in what is considered unreasonable by most, the
best approach I found was to fly the airplane unbelievable fast 80MPH plus
and try and get the side slip to match the crosswind. The faster you fly
the faster you are flying sideways. I have landed where I had full right
rudder in a sideslip with left wing down and still needed a crab to keep
things going down the runway. As long as your timing is superb as to kick
it straight at the right second, it was a very controllable landing.
I suspect the Europa is the same, you need to time things just right.
Since there are a number of Europa fliers out there who fly Cessna 140s
perhaps they can pursuaded into modifying their planes to more resemble a
monowheel and allow some prospective pilots a try ??
What I am talkin bout is toe in. The Cessna 170 steel axles are prone to
cracking. The cessna 170 club made harsh warnings to switch to solid
aluminium ski axles. I allowed my A+P to make the change. HE DIDN"T
REALIGN!!! It had a little toe in. I have never flown an airplane so
touchy in my life. It ended up since my plane was a 1948 there was no
cross for wheel shims so i needed to trig things out and used measured off
the shelf cessna shims for other craft.
Since I was set up and foolin I was able to try different amounts of toe
in. Better to start with Max toe out that is reccomended, this way when
plane begins to pull Gs in a turn it gets thrown out of the turn. If you
have toe in the opposite happens! Anyway just like aft CG, the less Toe
out you have the more "Responsive" your handeling will be. I think it
would be easy to have 2 sets of shims, 1 training and 1 set near
europalike. If you have too much toe out, you would not want to lose your
brakes when landing in a crosswind.
Ron Parigoris
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