a false sense of condemnation of Ivan's precept and deserves further
comment.
I can see the ab initio pilot hesitating to produce a
taildragger with one main gear, and appreciate if he chooses three wheels
particularly if he has a nice long paved flat surface on which to land.
However, for the responsible aviator, there is a price to be
paid.
those who rely on three wheels to help them through life are not qualified
to disparage those who don't.
Complete bafflement is not a quality - it is a condition.
Ferg
> There is absolutely zero
>> performance advantage to the mono, in rate of climb, in cruise speed, in
>> fuel burn, or whatever.
>
> For the life of me > I cannot understand why Ivan thought he could be
> successful
when the rest of
>> the world says it's an unstable design. The proof is in the results.
>> Europa mono's are ground looping, wheelbarrowing, bending props, running
>> off the tarmac, and generally destroying themselves with regularity. Perhaps
>> that is a smart marketing strategy........to design a product that
>> requires regular parts replacement and rebuilding, but as a pilot I'm not
>> impressed.
>
Fergus
I agree with your last remark, however there were plenty of nosedraggers
that were tricky to land and fly, you can tell us about vampires no
doubt, then there are the Grumman Groundgrippers, famous for
wheelbarrowing and knocking their props off. Plenty of 150s did that too.
Many years ago Ivan and I and a couple of other EZ builders used to
drink the odd gallon of brown medicine in the hills around Barnsley and
dream of an aircraft that could do what an EZ does so well but safely
operate from farm strips. We reasoned that it probably needed to be a
tail dragger for that. Three wheels have too much drag on the ground,
and are difficult to retract. For low drag in the air retract was
desireable. I sent Ivan off to the local gliding club, Camphill as iot
happens, one of the first in UK. "Go and look at a K6E and an RF4. By
the way, glider boys don't have hangarage difficulties, their airplanes
derig in 15 minutes" (imho, an airplane that takes hours to derig is a
complete waste of time)
Ivan's reasoning behind the mono was that the rolling resistance of one
large wheel on a soft grass field was bound to be less than three small
ones. He was right and he proved it once, he landed at Tommy Lawton's
strip in Derbyshire with his secretary Allizon in the RH seat,( remember
her? she was very good at her job) when the time to fly back to
Kirkbymoorside came the tri gear wouldn't take off, on the ground 35kts
and no more! Allizon had to climb in with Jon Tye (mono) and was flown
to the local airfield; Ivan staggered into the air and picked her up
---From the nearest bit of tarmac.
So, imho the monowheel Europa pretty well did what it was designed to
do, cruise like an EZ and fly from almost any strip. It also showed the
way for a lot of later designs. Easy derig, fast cruise, short take off
and landing. Even now, after how many years,10? it is still one of the
best touring machines, not many kitplanes will carry what a Europa does,
and cruise at 120 kts plus. Are there any?
Graham
PS, Mike, I think you would like Fergus if you knew him and vice versa ;-)
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