eastmeg2

Just send her up for a flight in a trike in winter and she'll never complain about the Gazelle being cold, ever again. I wear an industrial freezer suit rated for -30 centigrade. Combined with the touring screen and polar fleece bar-mitts I'm still not cold when flying in -1 centigrade air at 55 knots. Cheers, Glen

FANTASTIC !!! That's a great result. I'll spread the good word amongst the other property-with-airstrip owner/pilots I know in the area. Cheers,:big_grin: Glen

Ross, I'm sure we'll see each other at Goulburn some time, though I don't fly in there very often. I'll probably be wearing my Northern Territory floppy hat. Probably at one of the monthly BBQ's. Which weekend of the month are they on again, Sat/Sun? And I did stop by to admire your Cheetah at Natfly. Drink Ian's tea and eat his biscuits. Cheers, Glen

Well done Chris, I hope that it all goes well for you and the strip fits. Was in half a mind to drop in at your place on the way to Narromine last Thursday, but the conditions were a bit challenging and your place a bit east of track and further into the hills, so decided to stick with the task at hand - getting to Narromine. Are you still keeping your trike for when you're in the mood for "Low-N-Slow", or passing it along to help fund your new Jab? I've not sat in a J160 yet, but did sit in the J120 and J170 at Narromine and found the J120 a bit squeezy getting in & out and only about 1 inch between my dome and the roof. The J170 was more agreeable to my size (181cm 100kg) and had an extra inch or 2 above my head. Would be interested to hear of any Jab-Warming party you might have planned for a fly-in. Cheers, Glen

This was my 2nd year at Natfly and the first time I flew there in my trike. Flying from our private strip south of Goulburn, getting out early while I could before the wind came down to the ground (20kts headwind from NW @ 500ft AGL when I took off) I met up with Ian Willis and his son Matt in their trike (From Nowra) at Crookwell. We managed to get up high out of the stronger headwinds and increase our groundspeed from 30kts to 40kts (for 60kts IAS) and landed at Cudal to eat our sandwiches and drink hot tea from my thermas. A quick assesment of our fuel showed that I might make it the remaining 70Nm to Narromine, but Ian would not. So we diverted to Parkes. Parkes advisory radio on the CTAF was very accommodating and gave us a straight in approach low level on RWY22. Now one of the great things about 4 stroke trikes compared to the 2 strokes we used to fly was the ability to taxy up to the Avgas bowser and "fillerup". I'm not complaining about the 171.9c/l price with that kind of convenience. To that point we'd flown in what was probably the worst conditions I've flown x-country in in a trike for headwinds and bumps. Parkes-Narromine was easy. Flying time 5.5hrs for 200Nm. I won't write about the time spent at Narromine since others have already covered that off. I originally intended to make the return flight either Saturday afternoon or Sunday morning. The weather dictated that it was Sunday morning. After packing up my soaking wet tent and watching the weather gradually clear from the North I got in the trike and taxied out, to queue up for departure. Even on a Megafauna fly away I have not seen so many aircraft queued up on the taxyway. I was impressed. From takeoff I quickly climbed to 1000ft AGL, still over the runway and turned south. This time the GPS ground speed was 70kts and stayed at 70kts all the way past Parkes, Forbes, Grenfell and Young. It was not until I got to about Binalong that my ground speed started to drop below 65kts and the smooth air stopped. Tracked north of Yass, north of Gundaroo (staying outside Canberra 3500ft CTA step), across lake George and before I knew it was doing my low level downwind over our strip to scare away to Roo's, then turned back to land upwind. Flight time was 3.5hrs for 200Nm - 2 hrs less than before.

Have seen the DFS trikes website. The problem with Single seat trikes in USA is that they fly under FAA Part 103 which does not require and licensing or registration of UL's & trikes that are less than 112kg empty weight. Kind of like Nanolight trikes under 70kg empty weight here in Oz. So unless the empty weight limit on nanolight trikes here in Oz also comes up to 112kg you're asking for a lot of paperwork for a "maybe". I've looked into this and with the current rules you would have to try to register one under CAO95.10, which may or may not be allowed depending on what approvals the manufacturer has with their country's aviation governing body. The only glimmer of hope I've seen is that one of the USA FAA Part103 trike manufacturers is working on an FAA approved 51% kit and this should satisfy CAO95.10 requirements.

Hi Ian, Am hoping to fly to Narromine on Thursday and therefore praying for good weather. There might be a trough passing over the ACT/Goulburn area on Thursday when I plan to fly, so might have to delay by 24hrs and get a nice tailwind all the way from Goulburn to Narromine. If you're 1800 watt urn is set on low, then chances are that it would only use 900 watts or less on that setting. I take my coffee white with 2 sugars, I take my tea white with no sugars. Cheers, Glen

I'll have what he's having . . .

The BRS chutes I've seen only have a safety pin on the firing handle. The GRS chute I have came with the same safety pin on the handle as well as a safety bolt through the firing mechanism on the rocket. I use both when I finish flying.

Hi Red, I think you'd find that the Youtube trike video you saw had some home improvised chute system, and the trike itself was a Nanolight trike probably with a home made base. In the USA single seat trikes under 112kg empty weight don't require registration or any kind of certification. One good thing about trikes is that if we do bend something, it's a tube that can be replaced by ordering a replacement one from the factory. With metal/composite??? 3 axis aircraft I think it's a different story and have been told by some pilots that once they deploy the chute the insurance company owns the plane because it's back would be broken. I think you would need to read up on the literature that each ballistic chute maker produces for the particular model chute you are considering. They all have different deployment speeds and minimum deployment altitudes depending on what type of aircraft it's for. All ballistic chutes need to be treated like a loaded gun once the safety pins are removed. Rgds, Glen

The example I've seen Bob Bailey fly at Rylestone uses a Rotax 582 (65hp) and with an aricraft that light which flies that slow (25kts) it no suprise it's got good towing capacity for HG's. As for maneouverability, definitely yes from what I've seen.

Hi John, I'm pretty sure I've seen the report before and it still does not make any conclusions about what caused the leading edge spar to fail. I'm hoping that this accident may have had competent witnesses who can provide their input to the investigation. While I appreciate the concern of MISASA, it seems a bit of an over reaction to ground all Airborne Edge aircraft in South Africa until the cause can be determined. By my reckoning there must be approx 200 Edge XT's and probably in excess of 1000 Edge X's flying in various parts of the world. This accident becomes probably the 4th attributable to possible leading edge spar failure, which we know is possible if the flight envelope is exceed, but the question remains whether it was in each instance . . . Rgds, Glen

In case anyone thought I was trying to promote that kind of behaviour with my previous post, I'll just say that the Trike starring in that Youtube clip came to a very soggy end. Cheers, Glen

It seems there were witnesses, a quote from the 2nd link which is rather disturbing . . . "From the bit of news from the scene, it appears the wing folded on one side. Maybe a leading edge or spreader bar. We will know more after CAA have completed their investigation." I think I'll be checking more closely for signs of fatigue on my own leading edge spars and practicing my quick draw technique for my ballistic chute handle. Rgds, Glen

But in their utter disdain for excessive regulation nothing could be farther from the truth. They were waving at him to get out of the way of the RPT about to taxy over the top of him while screaming abuse at him on the PAL frequency . . .

It will be very interesting to see if any real conclusions can be drawn as to the cause of the wing failure. Is it known if there were any witnesses? There was a fatal XT-912 crash near Cessnock NSW in Jan 2006 which we still don't know the real cause of and failure of the outboard section of the wings leading edge spar was a possible cause, but it's still not known what caused the spar to fail.

Methusala, Thanks for posting this note that this is going on, we'll be more cautious next time we fly over Currandooley checking for any activity on the ground. Would hate to cop a face full of RC without having even known they were here. Rgds, Glen

Don't know where Talbingo is, but go onto Youtube and look up "Low flying record". It might put a smile on your dial.

. . . spend a night with Bronwyn Bishop. It's listed in the Hitchhikers Guide as amongst the foremost things that can happen to you that are worse than death. The last thing to go through the mind of the bowl of petunias just before it hit the ground was . . .

Hi Ian, I'd say it depends on wind rating and resistance of the cover to UV exposure. And, Does the front entry open higher to let trikes in ? ? ? Cheers, Glen

Hi Len, I'll PM you with his contact details. Rgds, Glen

Hi Len, Welcome to the Australian Microlighting scene. There is a Trike instructor at Somersby who's also from SA and shares your name. Cheers, Glen

Well, now we need to know whether we are talking about a Low-Wing or High-Wing plane . . . obviously the lower air closer to the conveyor belt would be more affected by the movement of the conveyor than air higher up.

Sounds like a Trike and happily it sounds as though the pilot escaped injury. Anyone got any further info? http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,23238730-29277,00.html Rgds, Glen

Setting N=zx+N is artificial restraint of the equation, you won't slip that one past me. I was hoping you'd come up with limit f(x) as x approaches infinity = f'(x) with x=infinity. Or was it 0? With ski's on ice there's no wheel distruction, then we can dispnse with the calculus and revert to z=f/m, sorry Biggles.