At 06:36 09 April 2015, Jonathan St. Cloud wrote:
In the war bird community we had hangar flying sessions where we
talked
abo=
ut the emergencies we experienced and how we handled them.
These were
pric=
eless sessions! I learned what other pilots did in situations I had
never
=
thought of. So here is my first post about something that taught me
a
less=
on. Hopefully others will share their experiences too. This should
be a
ju=
dgment free thread for learning and sharing.

Here is something that taught me about flying. I had purchased a
brand
new=
Ventus 2C (I think it was 2000 or 2001). As part of the options I had
the=
CG adjusted for pilot weight at the factory. When my shinny new
glider
ar=
rived I was keen to get it in the air. My first big mistake was to trust
t=
he factory W&B! I had never flown an aircraft out of the CG range
except
o=
nce when a passenger lied to me about their weight (by 60 Lbs)
while
flying=
a helicopter. I ran out of aft stick on landing, not a big event on a
pav=
ed runway. Anyway back to my story. My plan as always with a
new (to nme)
=
glider was to take a high tow, do a few turns and stall or two, I was
even
=
planning on a spin. Well on tow I noticed my new glider (first and
only
ti=
me I purchased a new glider) was rather pitch sensitive, off tow, it
was
al=
l I could do to keep it between 45 knots and 75 knots. Fortunately,
the
da=
y was booming so staying up was not too difficult. I immediately
abandoned=
my plan of some turns, stalls and maybe a spin. I thought the
problem
was=
with me as I had not been flying fixed wing aircraft much in the
prior
two=
years. I flew for four hours, got a bit better controlling the speed.
I
=
entered the pattern about 4,000 AGL and practised flying the pattern
keepin=
g my speed to within as small a speed deviation as I could. After
landing
=
I thought the problem was with me and possibly the brand as I had
heard
the=
first Ventus' were not known to be easy to fly. I thought nothing
more
th=
an I need a bunch more time in this glider and never even
mentioned my
spee=
d control problems to my fellow pilots as I was too embarassed. I
put
abou=
t 20 hours on that glider in two months and even had a few notable
interest=
ing XC flights. With time I got much better at the speed control
(used to
=
fly an all flying tail glider), but I never felt comfortable. Finally I
co=
nfessed my experiences to another pilot and that I thought
somehow I could
=
not fly fixed wing aircraft anymore. Well, this pilot mentioned that it
so=
unded like a CG problem. That had never occurred to me, nor did I
have
any=
experience in this area. Looked at the aircraft logbook again and
had a
W=
&B done. The logs and W&B calculations done by the factory
showed I need
1=
1 lbs of tail weight, the weight from the factory in the tail was 11
kilogr=
ams!!! I seem to remember NASA losing a Mars lander with JPL
using metric
=
calculations and NASA using English system

What did I learn: 1) Always perform a W&B on a glider that is new to
you;
=
2) Never be shy about admitting your flying problems to fellow
pilots;
3)=
do not plan to perform stalls and spins on the very first flight; 4) do
no=
t make excuses for the glider or how it is flying or how you are flying
it,=
tell someone about it! =20

Maybe someone else could add a few comments about what they
would have
done=
and anything else I could learn from this. Also, share your own
story
so=
we might all learn.

I completely agree about thoroughly checking out brand new gliders.
My experiences a

One delivered with a blocked tail tank dump valve and 2 litres of
water in the tail tank.

One with a tailplane rigging knob that was inside the fin at the base
of the rudder by the starboard rudder control horn and interfering
with full right rudder deflection.

One with the TE tube disconnected from the fitting in the fin which
required a hole to be cut in the fin to fix.