If this is your first visit, be sure to check out the FAQ by clicking the link above. You may have to register before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages, select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below. |
|
|
Thread Tools | Display Modes |
#11
|
|||
|
|||
New Butterfly Vario
I have an old J-8 gyro attitude indicator and a static inverter to feed it
400 cps AC (yup, it was cycles per second before they bestowed the honor on Prof. Hertz). I'd mount it in my panel but it takes a large hole (80 mm?) and the weight would probably put my CG past the forward limit or, as a minimum, break my carbon panel. It's also a totally black sphere except for the yellow "targets" at the plus and minus 90 degree pitch attitude points, and there's a yellow horizon line which moves independently of the sphere, and a yellow airplane symbol. It's probably radio active with radium paint and, therefore, probably illegal even to own (do I hear black helicopters?). Somebody make me an offer. It works, but I don't know how much current it draws... Also, it's so old that most people wouldn't even think that it works and, therefore, wouldn't think to protest its presence in the panel. This is a full-fledged mil-spec attitude indicator, not a wimpy turn indicator... "Eric Greenwell" wrote in message ... On 2/17/2012 8:07 PM, Sean Fidler wrote: Tom, Why do any gliders have gyro's at all? 40 years ago, almost nobody did, because they were expensive ($1000 for an AH when gliders cost $20,000), drew an amp, and were big and heavy, and most people didn't have a real use for it. Now, they they are cheap ($500 when gliders cost $100,000), use very little current, and are small and light, so even though people don't have any greater use for it than 40 years ago, they like the look of it and think it might help some day. Some power pilots seem to feel naked without them, having had one for hundreds or thousands of hours in their airplanes. I used to have a gyro T&B in my panel, because I got it dirt cheap, and it looked prettier than the empty hole in the panel. I thought, maybe some day I'll get stupid or have some really bad luck, and maybe it would help me descend through a wave cloud that closed in. I never worried about being sucked into a cloud, though. And some people use them to cloud fly, illegally and legally. -- Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA (change ".netto" to ".us" to email me) |
Thread Tools | |
Display Modes | |
|
|
Similar Threads | ||||
Thread | Thread Starter | Forum | Replies | Last Post |
Butterfly iGlide | Reed von Gal | Soaring | 4 | May 2nd 12 06:00 PM |
WTB: 57mm Cambridge Vario/FS: 80mm Cambridge Vario | ufmechanic | Soaring | 0 | March 24th 09 05:31 PM |
TE vario | G.A. Seguin | Soaring | 8 | June 8th 04 04:44 AM |
WTB LD-200 Vario | Romeo Delta | Soaring | 0 | June 4th 04 03:08 PM |