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RV-6 forced landing...

suburu power...

Hello everybody... I am so glad to see the pilot walked away. I've seen this airplane up close a couple of times and I know it has been for sale. It really turns some rpms on takeoff.. maybe 5k or so... not sure about the amount, but it's really a screamer on takeoff. I know it had a fairly substantial Suburu engine in it.... apparently there is a small engine that would fit but this is the bigger one. Being a bit nervous about putting a car engine in this airframe, I asked the owner (who is actually a very smart guy on things (other than airplanes) that I have known for a long time from my perspective) about putting a Suburu engine in an RV and was told it should be ok since the larger engine does not have to work as hard. I politely declined the offer to purchase it as I would like one that uses a Lycoming and that there was another gentleman on the field that had been though 10 or so suburu engines in an RV-4 until he switched to a lycoming. I see an engine problem was listed as the cause... but you really never know until after the examination. I hope the owner will post to the forums with the exact cause of the accident so we all can learn from it. I'm not trying to start a flame war about car engines in airplanes but I just do not get the "warm and fuzzy" about doing that. I'm thinking that if you turn an engine at 5 grand rather than 2500, that the forces are 4 times as much.. am I right?
Best
Brian Wallis
 
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brianwallis said:
I'm not trying to start a flame war about car engines in airplanes but I just do not get the "warm and fuzzy" about doing that. I'm thinking that if you turn an engine at 5 grand rather than 2500, that the forces are 4 times as much.. am I right?
Best
Brian Wallis
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Glad everyone is ok and it would be interesting to find out the root cause.

The stroke on a Sube is considerably shorter than on a Lycoming and the weight of the reciprocating parts about half as much. Overall, the forces are lower on the Subaru. Bottom end failures on Subarus are extremely rare unless some bonehead didn't put it together right. 5000 rpm on takeoff and 4500 rpm in cruise is nothing. Race and modded Sube engines routinely run over 8000 rpm and 400+ hp on the stock bottom end with good reliability.
 
Yep, the Subie engine itself is probably not the problem. The gear box, a hose, or some other issue is more likely to blame.
 
As a matter of fact it was a problem with the engine. The engine threw a rod on one of the front cylinders (not sure which side).

This airplane is based three hangars down from mine. I don't know a whole lot about it except to say that it is a custom conversion and has a belt-driven PSRU on it. When I get a chance I'll speak with the owner and try to get some particulars for the benefit of our Subaru brethren.
 
Jamie said:
As a matter of fact it was a problem with the engine. The engine threw a rod on one of the front cylinders (not sure which side).

This airplane is based three hangars down from mine. I don't know a whole lot about it except to say that it is a custom conversion and has a belt-driven PSRU on it. When I get a chance I'll speak with the owner and try to get some particulars for the benefit of our Subaru brethren.
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Jamie,

Thank you for offering to do this. As a Subaru "brother" I am quite interested to learn as much as possible about any Sube engine failures, especially a lower end failure.

Randy C
 
Whew!!

Man-oh-man, he was being watched over for sure. That particular quadrant of the Atlanta area is covered up with houses and apartments with few or no open fields available.

Thanks, Jamie...
 
Here is where he put it down.

Map.

It's a sod farm in the flood plane for the Chatahoochee River. That's the only reason it hasn't been developed.

The airplane is completely undamaged, as was the sod field they put it down on.

Pierre is right, other than this little stretch of fields, there's really nowhere to land. In fact, this area of little fields was in my Phase I area so I did a good bit of testing over this area. One day I was over the area testing and I looked down and saw a Cessna sitting in that same field and didn't think too much about it until I dialed up Gwinnett Tower on the radio. They were asking anyone in the area if they had the Cessna in sight. I called them and told them I had it and they asked me if I could see if everyone was alright. I descended down to 1000ft AGL and I could see two people on the ground waving at me as if to say "we're OK". The tower asked me to ident, which I did and I told them it looked like everyone was OK and the plane was unharmed (later I learned that the plane was damaged but reusable because it went through a fence).

Regarding the Subie RV-6, when our guys from EAA went to help recover the airplane the sod farmer told them that was the 5th airplane to put down in that field.
 
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Jamie said:
Regarding the Subie RV-6, when our guys from EAA went to help recover the airplane the sod farmer told them that was the 5th airplane to put down in that field.
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Wow - I don't think I'm going to fly over that field anymore! It's an aluminum magnet. :eek:

Attaboy to the pilot. Suburban Atlanta doesn't offer much in the way of off airport landing options.
 
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