Page 23 - Dec21T

After thousands of hours in nosewheel aircraft, my level of acceptance for poor forward visibility has changed.
CIES
f ly that obediently go exactly where they are pointed. This airplane seemed worse than most, probably because its original 230 horsepower engine was replaced by a Continental 550, putting out a bit over 300 horsepower – a huge increase in power. Due to the extra P- factor and torque (both of which were on the very edges of my aeronautical memory), the airplane really was like a cantankerous child heading its own way down the sidewalk and into the street. I tried adding power slowly, but it still did the same thing, only at a more gradual pace. You learn this tendency is counteracted by leading with the right rudder, but how much input is initially a guessing game. Too much, and you go off the runway on the right. Too little, and the airplane heads for the runway lights on the left. Now, having a CFI’s intellectual knowledge of the how and does not really help much as the control inputs need to be done by neuromotor ref lex.
Like flying a helicopter, that can only be learned with practice.
Luckily, with 300 horsepower mounted on a 1,800-pound airframe and a bunch of STOL mods on the wing, the airplane got into the air before I could get too far astray or do damage to the runway lights. But as soon as liftoff occurred, another funny thing happened. The airplane immediately went into a 30-degree bank to the left, all on its own. This happened because the torque from the clockwise turning engine, which was being absorbed by the left land- ing gear being solidly on the ground, was now suddenly free to rotate the airplane about its longitudinal axis in the opposite direction. After many tries, I get this under control by rolling in a fair amount of right aileron upon liftoff. Of course, that also requires fairly substantial right rudder input to keep the airplane coordinated – lots of stuff to do.
Once in the air, climbing around 65 seemed slow to the point of being foolhardy compared to the 160 knots I am used to in a Lear. But the airplane was happy with it, climbing at 1,500 or so feet per minute. Doing some slow f light and stalls seemed pretty docile, so I returned to try my luck at landing. Accustomed to much higher approach speeds, I somewhat ginger- ly set up the approach at 75 knots. But when nearing the runway, I was f loating for what seemed like forever and somewhat up and down because I was overcontrolling in pitch. The landing turned into a series of bounces until slow enough that the wing would no longer keep the airplane in the air.
Skyway
December 2021 / TWIN & TURBINE • 21