Bruce Brown
08-30-2005, 09:43 PM
When I first started to fly powered parachutes with an old Quantum 500 square wing, with no mylar inserts, it was a real thrill to leave the ground and float over the countryside. That wing was nice and slow and gave me an opportunity to learn just how this new aircraft I was flying handled. After awhile I began pushing the envelope to see where I could go with that Quantum wing. Of course this was done at an altitude of 1000 plus feet because, in those days, I didn't have any background experience in what it took to recover airspeed in a wingover, how much altitude it took to regain level flight, what if any aberrations would occur during an unloaded event, etc. I stalled that wing, full flared it repeatedly, did ever steepening spirals and generally wrung it out to see where the limits were.
Eventually I bought a new Buckeye and with it came a new Quantum Advantage 500 wing. I went out and did the same thing to that wing and found it to be slightly better in performance but still not as interesting as I was wanting.
One day Randy Snead called me and said he was coming to Washington State and bringing 3 different elliptical wings for a few of us to try. The wings he brought were the APCO Air Extreme 400, an Air Extreme 500 and a Chiron 340. At that time I was really whipping the Advantage 500 around and thought it was doing some pretty cool stuff. We put the Chiron 340 on my Buckeye DM 582 and when I took off I was amazed at the crispness of the control and instantly hooked. Looking up I saw a much finer airfoil. No longer was I flying a Hershey bar wing, this was performance. Every small gust produced a sort of searching movement as if the wing was alive and wanting to do more. My first turn was a real eye opener! With a square wing you push a steering bar and when it decides to, it begins a nice ponderous turn. When I pushed in the steering bar with the Chiron, around we went, right now, and down. Oh boy, did that sucker go into a dive! That was my first introduction to the abilities and limitations of where the Chiron wing would lead me. I finally was able to purchase my own a few months later.
Again I went for altitude and began my investigation of the limits of this new wing. I learned that if you entered a deep, tight spiral to the right and picked up lots of speed you could reverse the turn, and keeping the canopy loaded, roll upside down and do a split S. Another way was to begin rocking the wing then go to full power and meter in full left brake as you go over. Soon I was flying at what I set as my limits. I learned how to do a series of swoops each one bottoming out closer to the ground. As I became more familiar with the Chiron I began to reduce the layers of safety and flew lower swoops and lower 360 degree turns close to the ground. I knew I was getting closer to the edge and the reward of an exciting air show and fun for me was part of the whole experience.
No one comes to the top of their endeavors unless they take some chances. Like I always said "If you don't DQ once in a while, you
aren't trying hard enough." And as fate would have it on an
evening of fun a couple weeks ago, with all the safety layers removed I "DQed" in a different way. During a close to the ground swoop, downwind, I made a moments hesitation in power application and swooped just about 2 feet to low. The result was I tore off my left landing gear spring bar at the airframe. Fortunately I was at the bottom of the swoop and bounced back in the air to continue flying. Although with a damaged prop and no left landing gear or wheel. Now I began a review of emergency procedures and techniques based on a career of commercial aviation. I determined it best to land into the wind, kill the engine before I touched down to limit damage to the already damaged prop, and try and keep the left side off the ground as long as possible by making a hard right turn on touch down. All went according to plan and the landing was very uneventful. In fact I rolled on two wheels for about 10 feet, then slide on the thick polypropylene fuel tank for about 4 feet and stopped. No other damage to my plane occurred.
I have included 2 video clips. One of a very nice split S and the other of my swoop in several speeds. Let me say right up front, this was pilot error. There are many parts to this error but I don't really care to hear any armchair analysis from anyone. I have studied the video frame by frame and know exactly what occurred and why. This is offered for your enjoyment. I don't intend to stop doing swoops close to the ground. I find the Chiron fun to fly and intend to fly it to its and my limit of ability. The good thing is that unlike the Thunderbird pilot traveling 250+ knots I was only going around 25 MPH. So I was able to recover control and land safely. This and lots of other video of aerobatics will be on a new video I am working on about Powered Parachute Aerobatics.
Why do I like the Chiron? Simply, there is no other wing that performs as well as it does, no way, no how!
http://www.rainierultralightengines.com/pics.htm
Eventually I bought a new Buckeye and with it came a new Quantum Advantage 500 wing. I went out and did the same thing to that wing and found it to be slightly better in performance but still not as interesting as I was wanting.
One day Randy Snead called me and said he was coming to Washington State and bringing 3 different elliptical wings for a few of us to try. The wings he brought were the APCO Air Extreme 400, an Air Extreme 500 and a Chiron 340. At that time I was really whipping the Advantage 500 around and thought it was doing some pretty cool stuff. We put the Chiron 340 on my Buckeye DM 582 and when I took off I was amazed at the crispness of the control and instantly hooked. Looking up I saw a much finer airfoil. No longer was I flying a Hershey bar wing, this was performance. Every small gust produced a sort of searching movement as if the wing was alive and wanting to do more. My first turn was a real eye opener! With a square wing you push a steering bar and when it decides to, it begins a nice ponderous turn. When I pushed in the steering bar with the Chiron, around we went, right now, and down. Oh boy, did that sucker go into a dive! That was my first introduction to the abilities and limitations of where the Chiron wing would lead me. I finally was able to purchase my own a few months later.
Again I went for altitude and began my investigation of the limits of this new wing. I learned that if you entered a deep, tight spiral to the right and picked up lots of speed you could reverse the turn, and keeping the canopy loaded, roll upside down and do a split S. Another way was to begin rocking the wing then go to full power and meter in full left brake as you go over. Soon I was flying at what I set as my limits. I learned how to do a series of swoops each one bottoming out closer to the ground. As I became more familiar with the Chiron I began to reduce the layers of safety and flew lower swoops and lower 360 degree turns close to the ground. I knew I was getting closer to the edge and the reward of an exciting air show and fun for me was part of the whole experience.
No one comes to the top of their endeavors unless they take some chances. Like I always said "If you don't DQ once in a while, you
aren't trying hard enough." And as fate would have it on an
evening of fun a couple weeks ago, with all the safety layers removed I "DQed" in a different way. During a close to the ground swoop, downwind, I made a moments hesitation in power application and swooped just about 2 feet to low. The result was I tore off my left landing gear spring bar at the airframe. Fortunately I was at the bottom of the swoop and bounced back in the air to continue flying. Although with a damaged prop and no left landing gear or wheel. Now I began a review of emergency procedures and techniques based on a career of commercial aviation. I determined it best to land into the wind, kill the engine before I touched down to limit damage to the already damaged prop, and try and keep the left side off the ground as long as possible by making a hard right turn on touch down. All went according to plan and the landing was very uneventful. In fact I rolled on two wheels for about 10 feet, then slide on the thick polypropylene fuel tank for about 4 feet and stopped. No other damage to my plane occurred.
I have included 2 video clips. One of a very nice split S and the other of my swoop in several speeds. Let me say right up front, this was pilot error. There are many parts to this error but I don't really care to hear any armchair analysis from anyone. I have studied the video frame by frame and know exactly what occurred and why. This is offered for your enjoyment. I don't intend to stop doing swoops close to the ground. I find the Chiron fun to fly and intend to fly it to its and my limit of ability. The good thing is that unlike the Thunderbird pilot traveling 250+ knots I was only going around 25 MPH. So I was able to recover control and land safely. This and lots of other video of aerobatics will be on a new video I am working on about Powered Parachute Aerobatics.
Why do I like the Chiron? Simply, there is no other wing that performs as well as it does, no way, no how!
http://www.rainierultralightengines.com/pics.htm