N7WE flies 3 hours today!

[seneca2e]

Still beating the air into submission . Note my left front skid ever so slightly sticks on the one takeoff. It was about 30 today. It started right up the FIRST time!

[Ron Spiker]

Nice. Great to see you flying so much now. Looks like great flying weather for you.

I'm cancelling at least 50% of our scheduled flights a week now due to the weather. Single digit temps today with about a foot of snow on the ground. Snow, wind, low visibility, whiteout conditions, etc. all making for pretty poor flying conditions.

Keep at it. Have fun.

[seneca2e]

Yes I've been checking your weather up there and see it's been rough! Saw some old posts and pictures of where you flew with your son in some really cold temps in the past-seems like around 8 degrees or so-that is COLD to fly . At least the Brantly performs a lot better in cold temps.

[Ron Spiker]

Yes, I fly all winter, when conditions permit. I Just make sure the helicopters are properly warmed up prior to starting them. I don't do much auto training in the winter though, because I don't like the "cold-shocking" of the engine over and over again. Usually winds or icing are causing us to cancel flights this time of year, not just snow.

With a fresh 1" of powder on the ground Tuesday it was a good teaching environment for snowy conditions (watch out for: spinning while on ground as adding throttle/torque, sliding due to sitting on snow/ice, stuck skid/dynamic rollover, whiteout during pick-up, hovering, take-off, approach to hover, etc). But, it ended up being way beyond my student's level, and since the airport didn't have the taxiway or runway cleared, (so all ground ops were risking whiteout), we cancelled the lesson after just a couple of patterns and run-on landings. The blowing snow was also starting to freeze on top of the bubble, so not a good day for flying that day.

But yes, great performance by the old girl when its cold out.

[seneca2e]

That sounds like it would be great training though. Of course no matter how good you are those are darn challenging conditions!

[Ron Spiker]

Finally had a decent day here in PA. I flew for 4.2 hours today, training in 3 different helicopters. Nice to finally get some sun and light winds. And alternating 5 flights between different helicopter models helps keep it interesting.

[seneca2e]

That was a great day Ron! Two Brantlys and the Enstrom I presume. I think you've got the best helicopters going. It's hard to beat those two make and models! I had fixed wing students today and it broke my consecutive days of flying the Brantly-I had planed to fly out to a nearby farm but by the time I got done it was too late and the rain was starting to spit down lightly.

I still am amazed at just how different the Brantly's cyclic is positioned between single and dual! The nose just drops down and to the left with a passenger in there(especially a big passenger) and you've got to be ready for it. Also feels a little unusual when you touch down first front skids then back and the tail settles to its normal position from where it took to hover motionless I can see why Bryan liked putting that weight on the tail. I ran some numbers and 10 pounds back there moves the cg close to an inch which is huge on a Brantly. It would have to make it handle more "normally" though it is within weight and balance legal limits without it with most passengers. I just can't bring myself to 100% trust the velcro straps at this point though I'm still pondering it.

[9121u]

ED is your seats in the aft position flying heavy. you may want to reset the seats to back more. every half inch would help.I Had to move mine up more than normal because I am very light by myself this helped me.get CG in.

[Ron Spiker]

That was a great day Ron! Two Brantlys and the Enstrom I presume. I think you've got the best helicopters going. It's hard to beat those two make and models!

Yes, my Brantly and the Enstrom we have here, then flew to another airport to train a Brantly owner in his. Between the two regular Brantlys and Enstrom we train daily in, we had over 7 hours yesterday. Then I had an additional 1.2 in the other owner's Brantly.

[seneca2e]

Tom I do have my seats all the way back. Might need to double check my swashplate rigging which might be off a hair-we did a rough check on it and it was in the ball park so we didn't do any adjusting. Besides when you're trying to fix one thing it's generally not a good idea to change a lot of things. Good point on those seats for others to be aware of for sure.

Ron that was a great day of flying! The old saying about "Making hay when the sun shines" comes to mind!

[bryancobb]

Ed,

The type weights I had did not really rely on the velcro to hold them on. The strong strap looped through a steel buckle and back 180 degrees where the velcro latched. Th buckle and the strong strap was what was doing the "HOLDING" it on. The stab and the conical shape kept it locked in position against the leading edge. If it ever did come off, if you were not at negative G, it would fall. Too heavy for T/R blowing it around.

[seneca2e]

Bryan thanks for the further explanation. I looked at some at Wally world and the only ones that looked even half way durable were a pair of 10 pounders which had removable weights zippered in so you could subtract weights and make them whatever you want. In retrospect although the straps didn't look super strong I really think they'd probably never fail. There's no doubt that the cg shift would be welcome with bigger passengers! I concur that should they somehow become detached the weights should drop down at the speeds we're looking at here.