Citabrias, can they be flown without the door????
Dave Williams
Craig Wall
>
>I have a question that I hope that some of you might be able to help me with. I recently purchased a 1965 7ECA, and was wondering if it is possible to fl
First things first- don't do *this* ^^^^^ again, ok?
Second; of course you can fly with the door off. How
else are you going to throw that roll of toilet paper
out?
7ECAs fly just fine with the door off- but it ain't really
legal without a 337 or a waiver or something. There has to
be paperwork in the aircraft logbook stating that it's ok
according to the Feds.
I've dumped a Skydiver or two overboard. Cuttin' TP is
more fun, though.
Craig Wall
PS- Secure the rear harness if you do this solo- the belts
will beat the windows out if you don't. (Well, not really,
they just wrap themselves around the stick....)
Lee Marzke
Dave Williams <d...@dana.ucc.nau.edu> wrote:
>I have a question that I hope that some of you might be able to help me with.
them without the doors. If so, are there any airspeed restrictions, or
structural modifications such as baffles that have to be installed prior to
operation? I would also like to know if there are any Citabria clubs, or
tailwheel clubs in the Phoenix area that hold regular fly-ins.
I did run acrost an FAA Advisory Circular I believe on the above. It
seams that the Citabria is very popular for this. The AC did mention
airspeed limitations, placards etc. Unfortunately I no longer have
access to this material. Get the AC checklist or call your FSDO.
--
-------------------------------------------------------------------
- Lee Marzke CFI/ASEL/Glider lma...@mv.mv.com
- MIT Soaring Assn, Stirling MA, USA
- http://acro.harvard.edu/MITSA/mitsa_homepg.html
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Robert P. Ollerton
There are some restrictions; no aerobatics, etc. I would suggest
you contact either American Champion or the Bellanca/Champion club
for details. The Club probably has the paper work that they can
send you for the feds.
Where are you basing the plane?
bob (ex. NAU too.)
--
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Robert P. Ollerton: Chandler and Patagonia Arizona
4 Airplanes, 6 cars, no house. Need Big Dog.
olle...@primenet.com
Lou Haas
and fly the damn thing, I have! Just don't do inverted spins,
you need to pop the door to recover from those, argh!!!!
Craig Wall
That wouldn't be Lou Haas with the YellowBird Flying Club, would it?
Brian Case
land.
Brian
Craig Wall
Well, what you get is a 250 ft streamer with the tube at the bottom,
coming down *very* slowly. (You have to unroll several feet and bunch
it up and hold it against the roll, and then pull up into a stall and
throw it out the door rearwards, otherwise it rips the leader off and
the whole roll drops without unrolling.) Once you get a single streamer,
the only real worry is getting it in the cowl and overheating. A strip
draped over the airframe rips away immediately, unless you're in a Chief
or something. Then a little dive *usually* does it, although it's been
known to happen that you come back from a session kinda "festooned".
Usually the persistant stuff hangs in the landing gear.
Cuttin' Tango Papa is a very good learning experience for a number of
reasons; the main ones being that it's very sobering to realize 1) how hard
it is to see something in the air even when you know it there and where
to look, and 2) just how much airspace you're eating up without realizing it.
I *guarantee* you, you won't see the first couple rolls, and you won't hit
them if you do. Or more likely, when you do see them, you won't be able to
turn in time- you can't just toss it out and make a one-eighty; that just
misaligns you by the diameter of the circle. You begin to appreciate the
Ag pilots that have to sequence turns to get aligned with crop rows- it ain't
easy at first.
You also tend to gain or lose altitude in turns, and if you don't see it in
time, the pitch corrections tend to get uncomfortable.
The real lesson is just how hard it is to visually reacquire an object if
you have to take your eyes off of it. Fighter pilots base most of their
maneuvering with the idea in mind that they *never* want to take their
eyes off the badguy. Here, you gain perspective on negotiating traffic
in the pattern, and the difficulties the other guy has seeing *you*.
If you're going to do this, you've got to get out over unpopulated areas-
and don't think you're not going to do aerobatics, so wear a parachute and
do all that stuff or prepare to be frustrated. It's more challanging in
a high wing airplane, because you can't even begin to look for it until
you roll out of your setup turn. Surprize; it just went by on the left.
Once you get the hang of it, though, in an airplane that's up to it, it's a
blast. A grocery sack full of the "important papers" is a whole afternoon's
worth of fun- it's biodegradable, ya know... Most people eventually get to
the point of coming in overhead and doing a vertical reverse to eat it up
going straight down- but I prefer the "spaghetti sucker method", where you
pull up from underneath and go straight up the streamer- if you get stopped
partly into the roll with power on, and the airplane can hang even a second
or two with full power, you can suck it all through the prop disk. (Or so
I'm told; I never *quite* managed it in the Citabria....) Anyway, it throws
confetti *everywhichway*!! (*grin*) Be prepared to cushion the controls
in the tailslide you just bought into.
So- don't do this where you shouldn't, in an airplane you shouldn't do it
in (unless you have enough discipline to resist, uh..., sudden temptation)
and wear parachutes if it's appropriate. And take along a buddy- 'cause you
gotta keep looking for other airplanes, no matter what.
And watch that CHT!!!
Craig Wall
BRIAN C. ARMSTRONG
"Streamer Practice" as I think my log book reads, and I have a couple of
questions/comments. First, I missed the beginning of this thread (if
there was anymore), and I am curious what method you use for securing the
tube to the rest of the roll. I was using the paper clip method, but ran
into some problems, so I'm wondering if there is a better way. The
problem I ran into with the paper clip is figuring out how far to place
it from the center of the roll so that it will have enough weight to
stabilize the roll, while not having so much weight that you couldn't
catch it if you jumped out of the airplane.
> Cuttin' Tango Papa is a very good learning experience for a number of
> reasons; the main ones being that it's very sobering to realize 1) how hard
> it is to see something in the air even when you know it there and where
> to look, and 2) just how much airspace you're eating up without realizing it.
The biggest concern, obviously, is looking for other traffic. I
usually let the rolls go at about 9,000 msl (which is only about 3,500
agl up here in Boulder), and on at least one occasion I have let the
roll out, after what I considered to be an adequate scan, only to find
the streamer descending in what might be considered an impolite
proximity to another aircraft which is well below me. This is easy to
do, since seeing other aircraft below you is much harder because they
have that nice earth back drop. So keep your eyes out and DOWN!
> It's more challanging in a high wing airplane, because you can't
> even begin to look for it until you roll out of your setup turn.
No kidding! I went through about a six-pack before I could even
regain visual contact with the streamer. You're right, it just isn't
reasonable to think you won't do aerobatics, so the parachute is pretty
much a necessity. The temptation to do the ole Split-S after release is
just overwhelming. I did find, however, that this makes a pretty good
strategy in Citabrias. The advantage is that you are avoiding the "high
wing" syndrome by taking advantage of the greenhouse type visibility
offered by the skylight. The tricky part about this is the timing. If
you roll too soon, and you have a nice lazy streamer, it is possible
that you can end up flying under the streamer if you do a loose pullout.
On the other hand, if you wait too long, the difficulty in finding the
streamer grows exponentially. This is all part of the fun though.
> Be prepared to cushion the controls in the tailslide you just bought
into.
If you do happen to wander into that tailslide in the Citabria,
it just might be a God-Send to have a bag full of toilet paper with you.
I know it would be for me!!!
> And take along a buddy- 'cause you gotta keep looking for other
> airplanes, no matter what.
Plus, it helps to have another set of hands for "reloading" and
"releasing".
It's great to hear about other people trying this sport. Up here, not
nearly enough people have even heard of it.
Happy Swiping,
Brian Armstrong
arms...@ucsub.colorado.edu
Kim Elmore
where I learned to fly, at a grass strip in Oklahoma. I heard of it, asked
about it and then tried it in a Citabria but I now do it regularly in my
1946 Cessna 140. Once the knack is understood, it's quite possible to do
it with nothing worse than steep wingovers and it's loads of fun!
Now, I have to add that I never tried it before I had aerobatic
training and a complete appreciation of aerobatic loads and limits. We
used to have informal "contests" where we'd define a "hard deck" at 1500 ft
AGL with a prescribed release altitude (about 2500 ft above the hard deck)
and see how many cuts we could get before either 1) there wasn't anything
left or 2) we were at the lower altitude limit. It's not as easy as it
sounds. In my 140 I've found that the best strategy is to keep things
rather slow -- about 80 mph or so -- and, counting to three after releasing
the roll, making a steep, descending turn back towards the roll.
The trick here is to just cut the top few feet off of the roll with
the wing; as others have pointed out a direct hit on the prop spinnner
isn't wise because of the havoc that can be wrecked on cooling. If the
roll is cut near the bottom, the entire streamer becomes just a wad and one
hit turns it into confetti. The "spaghetti sucker" and "vertical dive"
strategies would net only one cut by our rules :) Though, I must admit
that the spaghetti sucker would get bonus points for style!
It is truly amazing how much space it takes to get turned around
and lined up: turn too close and the target won't be seen in time so that
sufficient room isn't available for lining up.. Turn too far away and the
the target either will be lost altogether or too much time will be used
thus decreasing your score. There's an art to just getting the top few
feet, too.
While it *is* quite possible (and tons of fun) to do this in a
utility category aircraft without ever exiting the envelope, I do strongly
urge anyone to either 1) do this with someone who's qualified or, better
yet 2) get aerobatic training and do it in an airplane certified for such
stuff.
There's something else we've done, but it requires a ground crew:
balloon busting! In this, the airplane approaches at about 200 ft or so
and someone on the ground releases a helium-filled toy balloon. This takes
some practice for the ground crew. But talk about something that's hard to
see *and* hit! That itty bitty balloon is *really* tough! They do this
every year at the Stearman fly-in, in St. Francis, KS. I've hit balloons
before and seen them go through the prop and bounce off of the windshield,
unharmed! There is *no* chance to find it again (they are *TINY*) and,
besides, they typically outclimb most lightplanes. Such an event, BTW,
counts as a miss. Only burst balloons count! It's amazing to see this
happen to either yourself of someone else. I'd have sworn it a very rare
event, but it happens a lot.
The most cuts I ever got on TP was about 8 or so (I ran out of TP
before I ran out of altitude) and the best I've ever done with balloons is
two out of four. The best I've seen is four out of 6 but Stearmans have
more weaponry *:) and the record in St. Francis is 8 out of 10 (so I've
been told; I wasn't there). You're allowed two misses before you have to
quit.
I've shown this to a few instructors and they've liked it for lots
of reasons and have been willing (even enthusiastic) about showing it to
their more adventuresome students. Besides, it's cheap, safe,
biodegradeable fun! I usually carry a roll with me, should the urge
strike! One bit of wisdom: white TP is invisible if there is any snow.
Pink seems to do well overall. Finally, keep an eye peeled for traffic!
Kim Elmore, [N5OP, PP ASMEL/Glider 2232456]
* _._. __._ _.. _.._ _.. . _. ..... ___ .__. _. ..... ___ .__. _.. _.._ _._ *
* Said by NQ0I while working on his shack: *
* "All these *wires*! Why do they call it `wireless'!?" *
* _._. __._ _.. _.._ _.. . _. ..... ___ .__. _. ..... ___ .__. _.. _.._ _._ *
Craig Wall
>
> I've done a good bit of TP chasing in my days. I learned the craft
>where I learned to fly, at a grass strip in Oklahoma. I heard of it, asked
>about it and then tried it in a Citabria but I now do it regularly in my
>1946 Cessna 140. Once the knack is understood, it's quite possible to do
>it with nothing worse than steep wingovers and it's loads of fun!
Kim! Old BUDDY!! Tulsa Skyhawks, remember? Craig Wall, and Gary?
Jim Rhine? I think every kid that ever came out of Harvey Young Airport
cut Toilet Paper... And Terry Boehler was the instigator....