Stealth Pilot wrote:
guys
if you stall your aircraft with power on what does it do?
are there any situations where a T18 will do other than a descending
dive after a stall?
also what aerofoil was used on your aircraft?

nothing sinister about this. we suffered a double fatality the other
day. there is a lot of utter nonsense floating around about this but a
perusal of a video take during the last minutes suggests that the
aircraft flipped over into a loop for some reason,the video then shows
that it rolled inverted during recovery and then made a ballistic
descent to the impact site.

my interpretation is that the aircraft stalled, either with power on
or as a result of recovery efforts, flipped over backwards then fell
out into a stalled loop, one wing unstalled causing the aircraft to
roll inverted, then when inverted stalled again. from there in a
stable inverted stalled condition the aircraft curved down in a
ballistic trajectory until the planetary collision.

I'm reasonably certain that I can explain the flight behaviour in
sound aerodynamic terms but I'm unsure of the initial stall behaviour.
the comment that the T18 can flip over onto it's back comes from two
T18 owners. are their aircraft typical or atypical?

I'd appreciate any first hand comment from T18 pilots.

Stealth Pilot
I'm a former owner. It's a great flying plane (90% of an RV-6 at 1/2 the
price) but it has a relatively sharp leading edged airfoil & will bite
if provoked. It's not a 'certified' design & it's not required to meet
the nanny level of flight characteristics of a C182 or Cherokee.

I'm building an RV-7 (bigger cockpit, higher gross weight) but I'd own
another Thorp in a heartbeat if one came available.

Charlie