Transition to Tailwheel RV-8

Dbro172 · Oct 19, 2016

As I make progress on my RV-8 I keep wondering how difficult it might be to land and what type of transition training would be appropriate. I only have 10 hours tailwheel in a Legend cub, a couple hundred in RV-9A and a few hundred more in other types. I thought my -9A was better in learning directional control on landing than then the legend cub and certainly a lesson in delicate control input. My home field regularily sees 18 gusting to 27 of which 50-100% of
That could be a direct crosswind. Doable, or am i kidding myself? My Mooney runs out of rudder before my 182 or -9A did.

BCP Boys · Oct 20, 2016

Doable? Sure but it will take time, practice, experience. I fly a -7 and my hanger mate has an -8. I really love the center fuse feeling so I asked if I could fly it with one of our friends who is an instructor. I have almost 300 tail wheel time, most of it in my -7, so I thought this should not be concerning. Well I was in for a surprise. With an adult in the back seat, the ground control was tough as the tailwheel wanted to be in the front. The weight in the back seat absolutely changes the characteristics of the -8. I will let folks who have transitioned in to an -8 tell you their experiences but for me, I know it would take many hours in the -8 with a passenger to be comfortable in 15+ knots of cross wind.

acam37 · Oct 20, 2016

I too got my endorsement in a legend cub. I went straight to RV transition training in a RV-7. Took about 4 hours to get proficient enough to fly my RV-4. The first few landings were a disaster but didn't break anything, just my ego. I have about 25 hours in a -4. Then I got an RV-8. Different animal landing than a -4. Read all the posts on landing the -8. It helped me tremendously by knowing most people's techniques. I did my first landing on the mains. No surprises and after a few touch and goes took my wife for a spin. The added rear weight actually helps.

David-aviator · Oct 20, 2016

Dbro172 said:
As I make progress on my RV-8 I keep wondering how difficult it might be to land and what type of transition training would be appropriate. I only have 10 hours tailwheel in a Legend cub, a couple hundred in RV-9A and a few hundred more in other types. I thought my -9A was better in learning directional control on landing than then the legend cub and certainly a lesson in delicate control input. My home field regularily sees 18 gusting to 27 of which 50-100% of
That could be a direct crosswind. Doable, or am i kidding myself? My Mooney runs out of rudder before my 182 or -9A did.

Derek,

The challenge of learning to fly tail wheel can be difficult but once you get past a certain point in the learning curve, there's no turning back.

I have a life time of nose wheel experience which became second nature. Transitioning to tail wheel was not easy getting rid of old habits but in the end I would never go back to trike RV. I had a RV-7A.

You don't have a lot of old habits to set aside. If you go with 8 tail dragger and start out conservatively with regard to wind, you will master it and not regret it.

There is plenty of stuff written in RV-8 section on flying the beast, check it out first.

rv8bldr · Oct 20, 2016

I had 4 hours of tailwheel training on a Stinson 108-3 (and a total of 140 hours) before I started flying my -8 almost 12 years ago (actually, 12 years on 4 Nov). I really, really struggled trying to three point my -8 even on calm days. I started doing wheel landings and my problems quickly went away, even on stiff crosswinds.

There are a bunch of threads here on VAF on landing the -8. There are proponents of three point and proponents of wheel landings. For *me*, a slightly tail-low wheel landing is what I do EVERY time. I'm of the wing-into-wind/ side slip crosswind approach as opposed to the crab/kick the rudder at the last second approach as it allows me lots of time to monitor what the airplane is doing in the wind.

Again, this is what has worked for me for 500+hours. YMMV, contents may have settled, batteries not included....

Chkaharyer99 · Oct 20, 2016

David Domeier (AKA: David-aviator) has written much here on the subject of landing the RV-8 Tail wheel.

If you only read one, I suggest: "RV-8 wheel landing...." (#2 below). But #6, "14 Gusting to 20...." might be more relevant to your question,

David and all the others who contributed to these threads did a great job of explaining how its done.

Dbro172 said:
My home field regularly sees 18 gusting to 27 of which 50-100% of That could be a direct crosswind. Doable, or am i kidding myself?

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Transition to Tailwheel RV-8

Dbro172

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BCP Boys

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acam37

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David-aviator

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rv8bldr

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Chkaharyer99

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