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U S National Aerobatic Championships

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PAUL161

PAUL161

Great Pumpkin
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September 22nd to the 28th, North Texas Regional airport. We'll be there for the week. Eisenhower State park is a great place to park your RV, not that far away. Our son will be flying this. It's new and he hasn't had much time to practice the mandatory routines. Flying aerobatics, you have to, "wear" the aircraft and fly it as if it's part of you! You can't think of anything else but doing the routine perfectly. National champion in glider aerobatics for three years running, this is his first contest in a powered aircraft. It's a hot little thing, she comes in at 110 mph over the fence! PJ

 
Paul-
Best of luck to your son.
 
I'm sure he will do well, good luck to him
 
Looks cool with the graphics also under the wings and it's "Pumpkin" background. That's what's on the can. Can you imagine an aircraft painted Pumpkin? :highly_amused: PJ

 
Paul- you must trust your son...but there must be a little apprehension with so little time on the plane!!

I wish him well!!
 
DNK said:
there must be a little apprehension with so little time on the plane!!
Click to expand...

:lol:


Yeah, there is a slight chance he may not get national champ this year. :smirk:

Somethin' tells me all parties involved know exactly what they're doin'. :wink:


His Pa says he can do it, rest assured; the boy can. :yesnod:
 
Billy- I would think you would know better.
You don't sit a race driver in a car on a track where both are unfamiliar ...

Paul has to be a bit "concerned"
 
DNK said:
Billy- I would think you would know better.
You don't sit a race driver in a car on a track where both are unfamiliar ...
Click to expand...

We did that with an unknown/untested ITE M3 that was just put together outta boxes (literally just completely put together outta boxes) by a guy who never worked on anything like it before (me) and lapped EVERYBODY at night ! We went on the next morning to pass the entire field from dead last ( because we missed qualifying as I was still putting the car together) in the first 12 laps, held the lead for the next 11 1/2" hours and won by 8 laps. ( We were up by 13 but the boss came in for a bathroom break in the last 30 minutes).

In either case, you either know what you're doin' or not and you don't get to that point by guessing, accident, or apprehension. :wink:

If there was any concern to be had, then there wouldn't be a post to show concern in to begin with cause they wouldn't be goin'. :whistle:
 
What's the power to weight on that little beast?

Best of luck to your son!
 
Thanks guys, much appreciated!
Saxman, I'm not quite sure of the power to rate ratio, but it will run out of steam topping out from a 180 mph pull to 5000 feet AGL on a vertical climb. He's going to up the power somewhat this winter to get a little more out of it. Ideally, 250/300 hp with a constant speed prop would make it a bear. It's a great little plane, but it has one flaw in it's design. It's hard to get it to do an inverted spin, (required maneuver), as you have to give it a nudge to stall inverted, otherwise, it will hang at 80 mph and mush. At 78 mph, it'll stall! It's due to the laminar flow deep chord wing and position of the horizontal stabilizer on a short coupled fuselage, if you get my meaning. PJ
 
Usually, reluctance to stall/spin is a good quality in an airplane. I guess not so much when you're performing aerobatic maneuvers.

I'm not a pilot, but an avid enthusiast. I've also "turned wrenches" on a couple of warbird restorations. I was actually going to buy a plane and learn to fly, but the partner who I was going to go in on this with backed out due to his financial problems (Better to find out before than after!) and then the Mrs. hit me with the potential cost for her Master's Degree. The dream of plane ownership has been postponed for a while. However, the silver lining was that I decided to purchase a '69 Sprite Mark IV, so it wasn't a complete washout.
 
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