RIP MARTY TIBBITTS!

[MIflyer]

I've held a Cessna 150 in a power-off stall with just me on board and it just sat there. On the other hand I decided that power off stalls were old hat and tried one with 1700 rpm and 20 degree of flap - which seemed to me to be a more realistic situation - and had it start to wind up. I did not just relax pressure but shoved the wheel forward and pulled some G's diving out of it, then decided I had enough for the day.

My F-80 pilot's manual says it spins very nose down, which is got to be disorienting.

 

[vikingBerserker]

Man I'm so sorry to hear this, Blue Skies...…..

 

[XBe02Drvr]

I've held a Cessna 150 in a power-off stall with just me on board and it just sat there. On the other hand I decided that power off stalls were old hat and tried one with 1700 rpm and 20 degree of flap - which seemed to me to be a more realistic situation - and had it start to wind up. I did not just relax pressure but shoved the wheel forward and pulled some G's diving out of it, then decided I had enough for the day.

My F-80 pilot's manual says it spins very nose down, which is got to be disorienting.

You shoved the nose down and set yourself up for a sleigh ride. With the 150 that's overkill. Just relax back pressure, center the ailerons, get the rotation stopped with rudder and SMOOTHLY feed in back pressure once the rotation stops. The trick is to get light to moderate G on before your speed builds too much, but not to jerk it into a secondary stall. Get an experienced CFI on board, strap yourselves in TIGHT, and spin it again and again until you no longer get an adrenaline surge when the world goes topsy-turvy. You want to WEAR that airplane, not sit loosely in it. Did you have your A&P inspect the flap tracks and actuating linkages after your little exercise?

BTW F-80s don't have anywhere near as much polar moment of inertia as T-33s with their longer fuselage and larger tiptanks. Once they're wound up all that inertia is going to be harder to overcome in a recovery.
Cheers,
Wes

 

[MIflyer]

That experience was in 1977 while I was still a student pilot. I had learned to just release the back pressure, but when that airplane pitched down and rolled to the left, I took definite positive action to put a stop to it.

A few years later an instructor had me enter a spin as a warning about keeping the ball centered when turning right crosswind.

 

[XBe02Drvr]

I had learned to just release the back pressure, but when that airplane pitched down and rolled to the left, I took definite positive action to put a stop to it.

That's the nice thing about Cessnas; you can stall every other airfoil on the plane, but the rudder is always effective. The drawback is that the rudder is effective even when you're not thinking of it and unwittingly abuse it. Then ailerons can get you in deep doodoo, muy pronto! Most pilots, if they're at high AOA and the plane wanders off heading, will instinctively crank in some aileron to correct and then be startled when it wraps into a spin in the opposite direction.
But you Ercoupe drivers don't have to worry about any of this stuff. Your kiddy cars take care of all that for you.
Hey, do you remember that Air Progress article back in the late 60s about a couple of their editors who arranged a "dogfight" between an Ercoupe and a Luscombe? BION, the Ercoupe won!
Cheers,
Wes

 

[MIflyer]

I recall that Luscombe versus Ercoupe article, but I think they were more comparing flight characteristics than dogfighting.

Yep, there's a huge advantage to flying an airplane that will take care of you, no matter how tight you turn. With an Ercoupe you can stall it and just keep the wheel back. The airplane will recover on its own, stall again, recover again, and keep doing that until you either start flying it again or you hit the ground. Not only that, but while in the stall you can roll it into a steep bank and it's still keep doing the same thing, at a higher airspeed and faster rate of descent.

There was one guy who insisted he could make an Ercoupe spin. He managed to jam the controls and not spin but spiral at a steep angle into the ground. That produced a recommended mod to the nosewheel steering connection, which is what jammed.

I read that one guy got the rudder-aileron mixer control connections wrong so it was giving opposite rudder. He flew around for a while with it hooked up that way, until one day his Ercoupe was parked next to another one and an A&P walked by, did a double take, and said, "Something is wrong! The nosewheels are pointed the same way on these two airplanes but the rudders are opposite!"' I had a very high experienced aircrfat restoration expert (Silver Hill) tell me it was impossible to hook up the rudders backward, but over 20 years later I took the mixer control out to referb it and managed to do that very thing - TWICE. I noted it because the control cables were rubbing and I started looking at why.

 

[XBe02Drvr]

I had a very high experienced aircrfat restoration expert (Silver Hill) tell me it was impossible to hook up the rudders backward, but over 20 years later I took the mixer control out to referb it and managed to do that very thing - TWICE. I noted it because the control cables were rubbing and I started looking at why.

No matter how idiot-proof you try to make something, some idiot will find a way to screw it up. Idiocy is more powerful than prevention. The observant eye is your only salvation.
Cheers,
Wes