10,000 and climbing and some formation flying

[C5Engineer 1170]

This morning I filled my tanks full put on my winter clothes and took off headed for 10,000ft. I took off at 120ft MSL with an OAT of 10C. I set my power at 6000rpm and 60mph and I leveled off at 10,000ft 26 minutes later. I was still climbing at 300-400fpm and was not even wide open. I was impressed. I did some left and right turns and it felt solid. It didn't feel like it was hanging at the prop at all. My EGT's were at about 1000 degrees and I taped off half my radiator before taking off to keep my water temp up.

After a long descent at power to keep the temps up I landed and met up with a guy from another forum in his Rans S-7S. We did some formation flying. This is the first time I've done this and had a blast. We played for about an hour and then he headed home. Here's some pics. It's hard to tell but look at the littlest hand on my altimeter. My GPS was reading 10.2K.

The Lake was socked in

This was landing out in front of my hangar when I got back. Not sure I would like being at the mercy of the wind.

My buddy in his very nicely equipped S-7

He had a killer camera. I can't wait to see the pics he got of me.

[Av8r3400 1179]

That's too KOOL, Joey!! Gettin' high on Avid!

I was doing a bit of formation work yesterday, I was part of a high speed flight of three (1-Champ, 1-Chief, 1-Kitfox) to a local grass (snow) airport - 68C, look them up - for their weekly Friday lunch-feed.

(Funny how a lot of the local flying here revolves around food...)

Joey's met me, he knows I'd never pass up a good meal...

Edited 14 Feb 2010 by Av8r3400

[C5Engineer 1170]

Short video I shot..

[akflyer 1427]

10,000 you were running way rich and leaving lots of power on the table. I have the Arctic Sparrow in flight, and one turn on them is about equal to changing one clip position on the mid range needle. Even at 5000' and say 5800 RPM I can crank it in 2 or 3 turns to keep the EGTs the same and keep the fuel burn under control. you just have to remember to crank them back out on the way down or look for a place to land real quick when the whirly gig quits turning. I dont think I have had mine over 6000 yet and that was only to clear a mountain cause I wanted to go direct and not through the pass. Me thinks I will take her up and see what I max out at when I get home this time.

Cool vid and pics too

[C5Engineer 1170]

Ya Leni I'm running rich all the way around. I have my air screws backed almost all the way out and it's still got a miss at idle. The highest I've ever seen my EGT's at WOT is 1150. I'm thinking of dropping the idler jet one, and maybe my mains a number also. Any idea how many degrees I'll pick up at WOT by dropping the main jet one? I've got 162's in there now. My Grey head had 159's in it when I sent it off. My EGT's at 10K were barely 1000. I'll never go that high again I just wanted to do it once to say I did. I will have to get to 9500 to get over the mountains when I go to Idaho this summer but that is short hop.

I think if you were light weight and running WOT you would pass out before she would stop climbing. I had to push over when I hit 10K today. I'm sure she would have kept on going and I had 25 gallons of fuel on board.