Categories: all aviation Building a Biplane bicycle gadgets misc motorcycle theater
I contacted the current owner of my old Ninja 250, and asked if he'd trade seats with me for the trip to Montana. Sure, he said, and we traded.
I thought to myself, "Whew! That's one load off my mind!"
Then I rode it home.
Yep, you guessed it (ain't foreshadowing great?), it's not very comfortable. But, how can this be? I hear myself and my colossal readership asking. Answer: I don't know. It may be the basket on back pushing me forward, and certainly that's part of it. However, the basket is smaller than the bags I'm intending to put on the back, which means I'll be shoved even further forward.
The question now is, what do I do? Honestly, it's starting to feel like the stock seat will be the best choice. The hard, flat stock seat. At least it doesn't press uncomfortably into my legs or hips. Maybe I can find someone selling a scrap of sheepskin suitable for use as a seat pad (the Airhawk sheepskin seat pad is supposed to work wonders).
I'm feeling stuck at this point. Due to multiple time-robbing committments, I've got more riding to do today. I guess I'll do that on the old seat and see if I can figure out something to make it more comfortable.
This is definitely not how I wanted to feel before a major, 3000 mile trip.
Posted at 18:48 permanent link category: /motorcycle
I've recently joined the Fishnet mailing list, a list for people to discuss Fisher Flying Products airplanes. The model I'm looking at, the Celebrity, is a FFP kit.
Anyway, among the first things I asked about (if you click that link, you can read the list archives) was cockpit size. The consensus seems to be that I'll probably fit as the pilot, but I might well not fit as the passenger.
That's kind of a problem. A number of people I'm imagining as passengers are about my size. If they can't fit as passengers, why am I building a plane with two seats? It'd be much cheaper, and just as satisfying, to build a smaller airplane, with a smaller motor, with a smaller weight envelope, and with one seat. Granted, it'd just be me, but this project is really about what I want, and not what other people want. It just happens that one of my desires aligns pretty well with some other people's desires: for both of us to go flying in the plane I built.
So, I think that before I commit any money to anything, I need to find myself a Celebrity with a completed cockpit and mounted wings, to see how hard it really is to get into the passenger seat. If it really is improbable, I need to move on and keep looking.
The other thing I need to look at long and hard is my intended mission. My current flying regimen breaks down about like this:
It's actually a bit more biased in favor of the touch-n-go flying, but that's pretty close as far as how things line up in my mind, whatever may be in the logbook.
If I built a plane, what would I want it to do?
How about passengers? Right now, I've got about 40 hours in the logbook since I got my license, with about 60 spent in training. Discounting training as a special case (which it is), of the remaining 40 hours, I've probably spent 5 to 7 of them with one passenger, and perhaps 3-4 with two or more passengers. That's 10% with two or more passengers, almost 20% with one passenger, and 70% by myself.
But, what would I like to do?
I know I want to fly with one passenger. That's a no-brainer. Whether it's my girlfriend, or a friend who wants to go up, or a parent or brother, I want to be able to accomodate them. But some of those people I just listed are my size or bigger, either in height or breadth, so I must be able to be a passenger without much trouble in order to ensure that they can too.
I don't need to carry more than one passenger. If I need to do that, I just go rent a plane from Larry's SpamCan Rental, and we go wherever in certified comfort. It'd be cool to be able to fly groups in my own airplane, but then we're getting into serious money and time to build. Both are things which will prevent successful completion of a project like this. I'll just do the occasional rental for that, it's way cheaper in the long run.
So, my mission includes at least 10% distance flight. For distance flight, you want at least moderate comfort. Is that comfort afforded by a small wooden biplane? Probably not. My mission includes at least 10% local flight, and probably more once I realize I can do it and how much fun it is. All you need for that is appropriate clothing and a tough enough butt to last 30-60 minutes in the cockpit. Pretty much anything will supply that. I could fly to Orcas in a powered hang glider if I really wanted to. Night flight poses the same requirements as local flight, with the addition of some weight for lights.
The interesting one is mountain flying. I think mountain flying, and I think of big, powerful airplanes. But I realized that part of the reason I think that is because I think of climb rate. To put this in perspective, the Piper Cherokee I usually fly has a climb rate of about 440 feet per minute (fpm) at 4000 feet, which is about what mountain passes require around here. At 4000 feet, a Piper Cherokee Six (the little Cherokee I fly, but scaled up a bit), probably has a climb rate over 1000 fpm. That's good, and that'd make me feel comfortable flying through the mountains -- if things go wrong, shove that throttle forward and climb out to air that's free of things like clouds and rock.
The thing is, if I put that Jabiru 3300 engine in a Celebrity, it would climb like a kicked mule. It'd probably top 1500 fpm at sea level, and be above 1000 fpm at 4000 feet. All that wing plus a generous dose of HP and low weight means you can go up fast.
So mountain flying doesn't actually mean big plane. It means plane that can climb well. The Celebrity would score well on that scale.
That isn't remotely all there is to it, though. That's just one of the factors which occurred to me. I probably wouldn't want to do any serious mountain flying without a much more significant investment in instruments than the Celebrity will allow, among other things. It's just an interesting thought.
The bottom line is that the Celebrity is right for a few things, even most of the flying I'd want to do. But it may well fall down when it comes time to pack a 6' 2" friend into the passenger seat. I'll just have to see one in person. Anyone have a Celebrity I can come see in person?
Posted at 13:59 permanent link category: /aviation
Categories: all aviation Building a Biplane bicycle gadgets misc motorcycle theater