WingedFrog
Well Known Member
I was almost at the end of a relatively smooth 1 hour routine flight under Auto pilot when all of a sudden and over a few seconds I got several "trim down" that I could not satisfy fast enough, then "Slip" flashed and the plane started to nose up at which point I disconnected the autopilot. On A/P disconnect the plane nosed-up even more and I had to apply a strong forward push to bring the nose down. As I had never faced the need for such a strong force on the stick, I wondered a short while whether something was broken in the elevator...
. Eventually the force subsided and things got back to normal. I studied the flight data and it looks like I faced a strong updraft which I suspected but the force to apply on the stick was a big surprise to me (I have about 80 hours of flight on my RV-12) and I still cannot figure out how an updraft can cause it.
In hindsight I should have been aware that the flight might not be that smooth based on the METAR for the time I flew:
16009G15KT 130V190 10SM CLR 25/15 A3001 RMK AO2
. Eventually the force subsided and things got back to normal. I studied the flight data and it looks like I faced a strong updraft which I suspected but the force to apply on the stick was a big surprise to me (I have about 80 hours of flight on my RV-12) and I still cannot figure out how an updraft can cause it.In hindsight I should have been aware that the flight might not be that smooth based on the METAR for the time I flew:
16009G15KT 130V190 10SM CLR 25/15 A3001 RMK AO2
