Flat spin recovery in RA Aircraft

[farri]

Definition, "Flat spin", an aircraft spin in which the longitudinal axis is more nearly horizontal than vertical.

 

Wouldn`t it be better if someone who realy knows the facts and what they are talking about, explain exactly what happens in a flat spin and why?

 

Just wondering!

 

Frank.

 

 

[motzartmerv]

Jees frank. Where did that come from?

 

 

[farri]

1. (Engineering / Aeronautics)

 

 

[djpacro]

.... if someone who realy knows the facts and what they are talking about, explain exactly what happens in a flat spin and why?.

We can discuss here but I suggest reading http://www.flightlab.net/Flightlab.net/Download_Course_Notes_files/10_Spins.pdf it is a fairly long story, Frank, but the answer to your question is on page 10.14. Rich Stowell's book is the definitive book on spinning for pilots, every flight instructor should have a copy in my opinion.

A few of us in this country can take you for a spin to show you what happens if you really want to know - steep, accelerated, flat and accelerated flat. Upright or inverted.

 

 

[farri]

DJP Thanks for that and I will take a look but it doesn`t realy concern me, I just thought that if this discussion was going to continue it would be better to have the correct information rather than the nonsense.

 

As for going for a spin with you, I try to be honest with myself and I reckon I wouldn`t be able to cop that sort of flying anymore. I possibly could have done it way back when, but now, at 64 years of age, I don`t think I would have the head for it.

 

I`m very impressed with guys like you! When I watch those extreme aerobatic maneuvers, I wonder how you can remain conscious.

 

Cheers,

 

Frank.

 

 

[motzartmerv]

Frank. Ive had a good look through the post's, I can't see too much Nonsence..Care to elaborate ?? Where is the "incorrect information", so I can keep an eye out for it.;)

 

 

[djpacro]

... When I watch those extreme aerobatic maneuvers, I wonder how you can remain conscious...

SShhhhh Frank, thanks, but I don't do extreme manoeuvres these days. I leave it to the younger guys and I'm about as young as you - inspired byhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8OFZzBYqcEand Bill Finagin both well in their '70s.

 

I do spin exercises with instructor trainees (mandatory in the GA syllabus) and some surprise me - well briefed with the scope of the air exercises known in advance but I guess they are surprised and overawed when the normally docile trainer suddenly enters a spin from a mishandled turn. Power on and controls deflected from the turn quickly flatten the spin with their "student" freezing on the controls until the instructor trainee calls "taking over". Sometimes we go around several turns. Hopefully they learn to be wary about trusting students and take over more promptly (if necessary) when they see the post-stall gyrations commence.

 

 

[djpacro]

You shouldn't have started me off!

 

This video shows a 60 turn spin in a Cessna 152. (It is somewhere on YouTube too) The spin is flat - aileron into the spin causes that in this type despite many people generalising that aileron out of the spin makes it go flat (and it does in the Pitts, Decathlon, Extra, CT-4 etc)

 

 

[farri]

Frank. Ive had a good look through the post's, I can't see too much Nonsence..Care to elaborate ?? Where is the "incorrect information", so I can keep an eye out for it.;)

Now Now, Andy!...I wasn`t sugesting that there was any, I just thought I get one in before there was!

 

I`ll say three hail marys, put a $ in the poor box, promise to be good in future and choose my words better.... Instead of nonsence, I`ll say Tripe.

 

Frank.

 

 

[motzartmerv]

Oh ok frank. My bad. You did make an accurate prediction though, because now there is some tripe. ;) well done.

 

 

[farri]

Oh ok frank. My bad. You did make an accurate prediction though, because now there is some tripe. ;) well done.

Motz! One of these days I`m going to stir you up .....Lighten up! You`ll die youg.

 

Frank.

 

 

[motzartmerv]

No I won't, only the good do that...And im bad...very very bad...;)

 

 

[djpacro]

For a while there I thought that Frank and Andy were in a spiral but now I see that it is a spin.

 

 

[Guest Maj Millard]

Frank, I do remember talking with the late Bill Starke some years ago, about the Goldwing you mentioned going into the flat spin, and crashing around Woodstock. Apparantlly the owner who had purchased the aircraft from another chap, found a sizable chunk of lead-weight installed in the nose of the cunard aircraft, which he promptly removed !!...Bill believed this was what caused the crash, because it was on the very next flight after the removal that he almost came to grief.

 

The resulting flat spin must have been so stable and slow that he only suffered minor injuries, but the aircraft was probabily not rebuilt.................................................................Maj...

 

 

[Tex]

Is it possible to recover from a flat spin in an RA aircraft?

There are a few "flattish" ones in this video cut to about 2:50

 

 

 

[David Isaac]

You shouldn't have started me off!This video shows a 60 turn spin in a Cessna 152. (It is somewhere on YouTube too) The spin is flat - aileron into the spin causes that in this type despite many people generalising that aileron out of the spin makes it go flat (and it does in the Pitts, Decathlon, Extra, CT-4 etc)

Dear Uncle Dave,

May I be a pain in the ass and challenge you on calling the 60 turn spin by Katherine in the video a flat spin? This audience viewing that video will get the wrong impression of a flat spin ... she has the C152 nearly pointing at the ground in what I would call a typical C150 spin, surely if it was a flat spin she would be rolling around the horizon or above not have her nose pointing at the ground. The inspin aileron in that spin seems to hold the Cessna in tight and fast and her recovery is typical of a normal recovery and almost instantaneous.

 

What we need to point out is that a true flat spin is potentially fatal and can be caused by several factors one of which is an aircraft with the COG too aft, I know from past chats with you on this issue that the Pitts can be put into a flat spin and I have heard you can actually put a C150 into a flat spin, God knows how ... the Citabria 7GCBC will not flat spin with either inspin or outspin aileron, but maybe if you you knew exactly what spin mode would do it you could find a way to do ... but not for me thanks unless you were with me. LOL

 

 

[David Isaac]

There are a few "flattish" ones in this video cut to about 2:50

 

Tex,

There is nothing flat about those, look at the longitudinal axis of the aircraft relative the ground and compare that with the horizon position, that is a good nose down spin.

 

 

[Guest Maj Millard]

Lovely stuff...............................

 

 

[Tex]

Tex,There is nothing flat about those, look at the longitudinal axis of the aircraft relative the ground and compare that with the horizon position, that is a good nose down spin.

Flat"ish" David "ISH" ..... I just wanted to put the video up

 

 

[farri]

Hopefully they learn to be wary about trusting students and take over more promptly (if necessary) when they see the post-stall gyrations commence.

DJ You`ve reminded me of an experience I had in the Drifter, with a student in the front seat. The exercise was stalls so from straight and level, I got the guy to to gently pull back on the stick until the aircraft began to stall but instead of lowering the nose again he pulled the stick back furthur, so I said,

 

"Lower the nose, quickly".

 

He pushed the stick completely foward and because it wasn`t what I was expecting, before I could take over, the aircraft droped the nose and we went down verticle for 300 feet, in an instant.

 

From then on, I would say to everyone, " Ease the stick foward, gently ". It never happened again.

 

You shouldn't have started me off!

On the contrary, You have a lot to offer.

 

Frank.

 

 

[djpacro]

..... surely if it was a flat spin she would be rolling around the horizon or above not have her nose pointing at the ground. ...

Take another look at Catherine's spin, David. As a spin goes flatter the motion becomes less rolling and more yawing. In an accelerated flat spin of a Pitts where the aeroplane is pretty much horizontal there is no rolling motion at all.

 

* cg within the normal range

 

 

[farri]

Sorry to get off topic but when I saw that Dragonfly, I just had to. That`s my old Chook, I built. Flew damn well too. I could stall it, hold the stick all the way back and by working the rudder so it wouldn`t drop a wing too far, I could have brought it all the way to the ground,fairly gently!

 

 

Frank.

 

Ps, I built it in the middle of the harvesting season, completely from scratch,making most of the parts by hand and I was so keen to get it in the air that I`d work on it every spare moment I had and finished it in three months...If anyone wants to know where it is now, just ask and I`ll tell you!

 

 

[farri]

Frank, Apparantlly the owner who had purchased the aircraft from another chap, found a sizable chunk of lead-weight installed in the nose of the cunard aircraft, which he promptly removed !!...Bill believed this was what caused the crash, because it was on the very next flight after the removal that he almost came to grif....Maj...

Ross, That`s how I remember it, but I wasn`t certain of the exact facts, so I left it at that.

 

Dear old Bill!... It was, Bill Stark, Pat Magrath, ( Not sure I`ve spelt it right ) Carlo Prette and Myself, as AUF instructors under the supervision of Lee Wakeland, that got it all going, from Townsville north. Eventually we all got our CFI rating and ran our own school.

 

Frank,

 

Ps, Have you any idea what`s happened to Pat...I communicated with him a fair bit when he was N Qld. area rep but I`ve lost him.

 

PPs. For those who might like to know! Pat originally owned a Thruster and he and Lee came here to my strip, with the Thruster to help get "The Far North Queensland Ultraligh Association" going before we had an aircraft ourselves.

 

 

[David Isaac]

...If anyone wants to know where it is now, just ask and I`ll tell you!

So where is it now Franko?

 

 

[farri]

So where is it now Franko?

Goodonya David! I was hoping someone would ask so I could tell the story. I just love to tell stories, True ones, that is.

 

In December 1990, Cyclone joy formed off the coast outside of Cairns. By the time I realised that we were going to cop it, the wind had picked up to a point where I couldn`t pull either the Chook or the Drifter appart. I tied the Chook down as securely as I could, tied the Drifter down in the middle of the strip and had to leave them there, hoping that they would survive.

 

Joy didn`t come onto the coast here but sat outside of Cairns, intensifying for several days. The wind peaked at more than 220 klm phr, at wich point it broke the wind speed gauge on Fitzroy Island, off Cairns. We coped it here constantely for 3 nights and 2 days, before it moved furthur south.

 

The Drifter survived without any damage but the chook. had broken wing struts on one of the wings. A star picket that I`d used to tie it down with, went through the wing. The wind wreaked the shed I`d made for it so I pulled it all appart and hung it up in the shed where it stayed for several years.

 

A husband and wife who had both done their flight training with me, twisted my arms until I let them have it..I rebuilt it for them, modified the engine mount and fitted their new Rotax 582 engine to it, made new skins for it, and they got it registered again..They flew it for years until a few years ago they decided to import an X-Air kit from France... They wanted the motor and prop off it for the X-Air, so it sits dismantled at their house in Cairns.

 

Frank.

 

Ps, I`ll bet you thought I was only going to tell you where it was.