It's as official as it's going to get. This evening I took my newly finished plane out solo. I put in 7 flights with my engine builder to get me completely comfortable handling the plane. I decided to leave him behind today and went out for some circuits resulting in 9 decent landings (out of 9). Greased the mains every time, bounced the nose wheel a little a couple of times.
This really is an easy plane to fly, I'm probably a little fast, final at 75kts, touching down at about 65. No problem getting down to those speeds with my c/s prop. I'm finding it to settle down very well, sinking exactly like I'd expect it to. I haven't used full flaps yet, 1/2 (18 deg) is good enough.
Flying solo showed a bit of a heavy left side - not there at all dual. I had a full left tank as well, so I would have been surprised if the wasn't some heaviness to the left. Didn't need to adjust anything to fly it like that other than a touch of right stick that I hardly noticed.
This also marked the first flight where my CHTs stayed below 400F all the way. I hit 399 on #1 on the first circuit, it peaked in the low 380s after that. Fuel flow was 8-9 gph on downwind while indicating 103-110 kts.
The most surreal part of the flight tonight is that I didn't need to schedule anything and I didn't need anyone's permission. I can get used to that! I'm looking forward to starting on some of the actual testing over the next few flights. The grin may be permanent.
This really is an easy plane to fly, I'm probably a little fast, final at 75kts, touching down at about 65. No problem getting down to those speeds with my c/s prop. I'm finding it to settle down very well, sinking exactly like I'd expect it to. I haven't used full flaps yet, 1/2 (18 deg) is good enough.
Flying solo showed a bit of a heavy left side - not there at all dual. I had a full left tank as well, so I would have been surprised if the wasn't some heaviness to the left. Didn't need to adjust anything to fly it like that other than a touch of right stick that I hardly noticed.
This also marked the first flight where my CHTs stayed below 400F all the way. I hit 399 on #1 on the first circuit, it peaked in the low 380s after that. Fuel flow was 8-9 gph on downwind while indicating 103-110 kts.
The most surreal part of the flight tonight is that I didn't need to schedule anything and I didn't need anyone's permission. I can get used to that! I'm looking forward to starting on some of the actual testing over the next few flights. The grin may be permanent.
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