Badland Part 103 Pilots and Builders Forum

Forecast today was for showers after 4PM, so we loaded up the F-3 to do the trailering and (hopefully) some taxi testing this morning.


To start the trailering test, We took the 2016 Ford Escort and trailer a mile down the road to a circular drive at a nearby church parking lot (I'm terrible at backing the trailer.) On that one mile drive, my buddy Fred (3D print guy) detected no undue movements. However I noted that we had not tied-down the prop which was free-wheeling nicely at 40 mph. We secured it and decided to make the 13 mile trip to Caddo Mills Airstrip.

Luckily, very little traffic and the trip was uneventful. Roads were good so I was bale to maintain a steady 50 to 55mph on the 55MPH limit Texas 2ndary roads.

We drove out onto the ramp and when I got out I noted that it was much more windy than I'd like. However, Fred offered to walk beside the windward wing so we decided to go on with a little taxi testing.


Unfolding and rigging the wings on the trailer makes it much easier to load/unload with the ramps as the tail is more easily supported.


I entered, climbed in and strapped up in preparation for startup.


A few minutes of unease as I could not get the Polini to start. Probably the drama, but it certainly helps to have the KILL SWITCH in the off position. With that fixed she started right up.

Fred was doing videos and we are in the process of uploading them to my PC. I should be posting them in the morning.

CONGRATULATIONS!

The smile tells it all! Looking forward to seeing the videos. Let me know if you have any issues uploading them. We may need to bump the max size parameter on the forum.

Really awesome Kurt!

Todd

Fred took the documentation videos on HIS iPhone. We are now experiencing a great deal of difficulty getting those transferred to me (via either my Android or Windows PC). When I get them downloaded they go to an iCloud directory (as .MOV) files which will only SHARE the smaller videos. We are working on a mechanism to split the larger (Taxiing) files into smaller chunks ...

Just tried to insert the Unloading file (.MP4) ... no joy ... AddFiles does not list the .MP4 file for insertion ... Todd ???

Kurt, this is a landmark moment for sure! Congrats! It looks good on the trailer, and good to hear it wasn't a bad experience towing it.

I'd love to see a write-up on the behavior of the plane on the ground.

As for the upload, is Fred able to upload directly from his phone (rather than send the files to you for upload)? Of course I'm probably better off leaving this question to the expert (Todd).

Congrats again!

I've added the .mp4 extension. However, unlike YouTube and other social media, the video allows download, but doesn't play like with YouTube posted videos.

Testing MP4 upload, allows download, but doesn't play from the forum website.


Uploading to YouTube and entering the Share URL from YouTube allows the video to play while still in the forum website. For this, just enter the Share URL right in the body of the post, no need to attach anything. I have a module that automatically pulls the image (see below) from YT and displays it in the post. If you don't have or want a YouTube channel, then that's no problem either. We can arrange for you to send the video's to me and I can put them in my YouTube channel and provide you with the links for displaying them in your post. Let me know if you'd like that.





You may want to create a basic YouTube page and upload all video's there, then link to them in your post.

Todd

We are still trying to breakup the larger .MOV files into smaller .MP4 files for transfer to my PC ... will hopefully get that done this evening.

Here's the unloading video ...

Awesome. Kurt, if you manage to figure out a way to keep the tailwheel from flipping around during the dismount, let me know.

It's the biggest pain point for me with loading and unloading.

I'm convinced that the tailelwheel problems can be greatly ameliorate with stronger springs. Still searching for a spring tat I can stretch to get a mid-point and will compress to the rudder travel stop. Still looking.

Very true - I think a really stiff spring will help in both regards...now it's just a question of finding one with the right length AND tension!

I may end up needing the same for my plane...I have soft springs, but the only other set I have I thought might be too stiff. We will see when I start testing!

I have an "old timey" hardware store close to me. Stock goes back to pre-WW-II. I picked over their stock with no joy.

I've even pulled out the old Physics book to try and understand the relationships between loaded lengts, travel, compression, and tension. It's been a loooong while since I was exposed to that stuff.