Hello all,
First congratulations to Graham and co on a succesful first flight
last week. Gives the rest of us something to look forward to.
Kit66 flew on sat 15 dec in Germany. Norman Adam and his inspector
Dave Rae took 2 years to finish it, with the most impressive, yet
lightweight panel, extralightweight lining and super leather cockpit!
Norman is a retired RAF engineer, and the details and workmanship are
superb. Andy Draper and Ivan came over to RAF Bruggen, Germany, for
the flight and Andy did the honours: It flew beautifully he said.
The testing, spins etc wont be completed until the end of January,
when Normans test pilot will next be available, but builders might be
interested to know that the Hoffman 3 blade constant speed prop works
a treat. It still needs the fine pitch stop adjusting to the plane but
according to Norman with the speed set at 101KT, the throttle was
pulled way back and the plane just cruised along. GPS (skymap) worked
fine with the standard aerial in the rear fuzz and they will probably
put the transponder aerial (short stumpy one) outside, under the rear
fuzz.
Engine is 912, the prop weighs about 10kg and a small amount of
lead was needed in the back. AUW was around 790 lb. They too had
problems with the trim servo pushrod binding (see note from Thomas a
couple of days back), so check this carefully before you put the top
deck on. BTW, Hoffman constant speed is experimental I believe, but
for those interested, around DM 11,000..... Worth having though if you
have the readies.
chus, dave
kit67
PS After the europa delegation had gone Norman asked his test pilot,
Chris Heames, a RAF Tornado pilot, what he really thought: 'bloody
superb - a real hooligans machine': Those of us who have flown a
europa know exactly what he means.
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