N80SH back in the air!

[av-mech]

Friends,

Would like to report that Varieze N80SH has returned to active duty.  The Vari was originally built by Seth Hancock who flew it for about 17 years.  Later it was owned by Ron Reynolds of Enterprise Alabama who also flew it for many years.  It suffered a engine out landing and kocked the MLG out.  I found it in a hangar in Zellwood FL where it was being offered for sale.  It looked sad sitting on a little trailer with no gear, the wingtips (lower) ground off, a hole in the scoop (male).  The paint was faded, just generally in sad shape.  I negotiated a price that would be the envy of most any buyer.  I took it home a slid it in the garage where it sat for a year.  I had various other projects going at the time so it had to wait.

Fast forward to April of this year (2011) and I read about the salute to Burt Rutan during Oshkosh this year.  About 10 microseconds elapsed and I decided to get it flying and take it to Osh.  Seemed like a daunting task but I test flew two weekends ago.  Since April 1st I have done the following.

1.  Reinstall the main gear
2.  Paint entire airframe
3.  Build new panel and rewire entire airframe

[av-mech]

4.  Install O-200
5.  Complete final installation and systems test
6.  Test fly.

The results were a perfect test flight with no safety problems.  There are several small issues that I had to work on but they were minor in nature. 

1.  Too much noise in the cockpit sets off intercom
2.  Overpropped by about 150-200 rpm
3.  Oil breather hose routing resulted in some oil in the cowling.

Thats was about it.  So I now have 6 hours on the airplane, weather here in central florida has kept me in the hangar this week.  Hope to fly more on Sunday.

Arnold Holmes
Av-Mech.com

[ekusafetyman]

Congratulations on getting her back in the air.  I wish you many years of enjoyment.

[Bill James]

No rush Arnold, but when you catch your breath, please run through the things that were beneficial in preparing yourself. Or if you had already flown ezes, were there things you did back then to get ready for your first front seat or solo flight?
Congrats!
Bill James

[magnum]

How much of a job was it replacing the main gear and cost?
 Press on!!
 Magnum

[av-mech]

Bill,
There's not a short answer to that.  My preparations came from several different directions.
1.  Airframe
2.  Engine
3.  Pilot
4.  Flight test
5.  Chase pilot

1.--A lot of work happened in a short time.  Being an A&P and IA and having my own shop gives me the advantage of getting this work done in an expedited manner.  Despite this advantage its always possible to overlook something when you are up against a timeline.  For airframe prep's I did two things after I had decided I was ready to fly.  First, I called up a fellow IA who is also an experianced builder.  I had him over for the day, gave him a note pad, pencil and ask him to tear it apart.  He found a few items which I was able to correct, none were safety of flight items but it was valuable having a second set of eyes.  I consider this a must.  Second, I have another IA on the field who is a very critical person and takes great pleasure in finding something wrong with anything, although I do not have a great relationship with this person, I hired him to go over the airframe an provide a report.  Despite his best effort he was unable to provide any safety of flight items, being impressed by my efforts he did not charge me for his time.  With these two inspections done I was satisfied that the airframe was as safe as I could resonably expect it to be.  Of course I had a pitot/static/transponder cert done to be sure those items were ready to go.  Also I used a set of electronic scales to do an accurate W&B, this as you know is CRITICAL.


 

[av-mech]

2.  The engine went through the same treatment as the airframe.  Additionally I took the time to verify that my CHT/EGT/OT probes were ready accuratly.  I did several ground runs both with the cowling on and off to check for possible oil/fuel leaks and also to see if there were going to be any immidate cooling issues on the ground.  I had two props to use and ended up mounting the Aymar-Demuth 68-74, which as you could guess was too much pitch.  I can only get 2650 WOT at 2500 MSL. More on that later.  Since I do Dynamic prop balancing and vibration anaylsis as part of my business, I took time to smooth the O-200 up as much as possible.  I went from .386" ips down to .024" ips and the spectrum anaylsis showed no harmonic anomolies present.  I torqued the prop bolts to 190" in/lbs per the Varieze POH, I did this a week out from flying and then checked it two more times prior to flying.  Each time some of the bolts took torque.  I just checked it again after hour 5 and they all seem to be holding fine.  I built a new exhaust due to not having the original and I had to modify the cowling at the last minute.  The exhaust is working fine but the lower cowling is in rough shape and will not be fixed up until after OSH.

[av-mech]

3.  I started my pilot preps weeks before by reading the POH fore and aft until I had all the good stuff memorized.  Speeds and emergency procedures getting the most brain space.  A few years back I ferried a Speed Canard from Florida to Maine and in the process of getting checked out in that, flying it around for a few weeks and then doing the ferry, I accumulated about 40 hours in it.  This was my main perspective on what to expect.  I generally have an opportunity to fly various different airframes and true to the Rutan POH, this helped quite a bit as well.  I spent two hours with Steve Wolf in the Pitts S2-B just to get my brain speed up to max.  Although the airplanes a quite different the speeds at which you need to make good decisions helps knock the cobwebs out and had me ready for whatever might happen.  Steve told me a story about building the Gee Bee for Delmar Benjamin that I used for my test flight.  I ask him how Delmar prepped for that first flight, since there was no one around who had flown one.  He said that among other things, Delmar simply sat in the cockpit for hours, hands and feet in the correct places and spent a lot of time visulizing what he thought it would be like.  Taking time to think of emergencies and where he might move his hands to deal with those.  He apparently did this a lot and it helped.  I did the same thing over the course of putting this bird back togther.  When I flew it the first time I felt like I had been in the cockpit for 100 hours.  Everything fell right to hand and my eyes knew exactly where to look for the needed information.

[av-mech]

flight test and chase pilot....

I know from experience that a simple test flight is often the most productive.  I put together a plan that kept me within gliding distance of the airport, at a high enough altitude to try corrective action if something should go wrong.  My areas of concern were fuel flow, engine temps and control continuity(in no particular order).  Once I had a handle on how well those things were or were not working I then spent time simply letting the airplane fly and making mental notes on what I need to adjust or change.  I did not take a note book with me, I did not want an extra distraction.  Concentrating on the airplane is the most important thing on a test flight.  There was no space in the schedule for high power runs, fly-by's or victory rolls.  I was fortunate to have Kathy Hirtz of Wing Over Aerobatics fly chase with me and we spent some time talking about the pattern and procedures I expected to execute during the test flight.  She video taped the whole thing (it's on youtube search for N80SH).  We flew the test as briefed, had no problems and the aircraft only required minor adjustments on none critical systems.

So that's how I prepped for test flying N80SH.  I was anticlimatic, as it should be and to be fair the airframe had accumulated over 800 hours prior to me owning it and the engine came out of my flying Cessna 150.  Still I leave nothing to chance.

[av-mech]

Bill,

I did want to add a few comments concerning the Varieze and it's reputation.  I have spent my working life around experimentals and so I have a lot of friends in the industry as well.  When I started talking about flying this airplane I was shocked at the response I got from various people.  Ranging from why would you want to fly one of those???  To "those things are squirrly and dangerous".  I mulled over these comments that came from people I considered experienced and educated on the subject and decided that they were not considering the facts in their comments.  I don't know if others on this list get these kind of reactions and comments from others but it just bothered me.  I was amused by the people I talked with on various subjects like engine cooling or propeller design, who tried to convince me that Burt could design an airframe but he was no engine guy or prop guy or whatever else........Seems to me that I flew this Varieze as a bone stock O-200 powered well built airframe and it worked perfectly.  So how is it that these people consider Burt an idiot on their particular subject.  I don't think Burt has any apologies or excuses to make to anyone.  I just really shake my head at all the bogus information, wives tales and downright lies that are told.  The facts speak for themselves.

[av-mech]

Some additonal info

N80SH
Built by Seth Hancock in 1981 (did a great job)
Continental O-200
Aymar-Demuth 68-74 wood, two blade
721 lbs empty, I retained a starter and battery, non alternator
no mods to the airframe, no wheel pants or gear cuffs at the moment
2650 RPM WOT yields 143 KTS indicated at 2500 MSL
Climb at 90 KTS yields about 1300 FPM
22 gal in strakes and 2.5 in header
Panel includes:  Dynon D-6, Grand Rapids EIS 4000, KT76 Transponder, FL-760 comm, Ifly700 GPS, and an XM radio reciever.  12V battery recharged via trickle charger after flight.
No controls in backseat, no upholstry.  Were did all the weight come from?

[av-mech]

Magnum,

The gear bow itself was undamaged but the fiberglass tabs the connect it to the mounting brackets inside the aft fuselage were torn.  I was able to grind away the old tabs completly without damaging the bow and then rebuild the tabs.  I went by the plans, using the original Varieze gear configuration because I believe that if you operate the aircraft correctly then there should not be a problem with the original design.  I did a lot of research that suggested that I should change to the Longeze set up but in the end I just stuck with what Burt designed.  It feels solid and safe now that I'm flying the aircraft.

So the cost was some epoxy, some 7725 cloth and a couple of days to get it all done.  I had the fuselage inverted and made some "A" frames to hold the gear up in position.  I'd have to go back and check but I think I set the axels at sta 103".  It was not hard to do.

Arnold

[saybeengineering]

Congratulations on your achievement. You words will serve as inspiration to many who surf the web and these forums for credible information to commit to a project or the aircraft. The bottom line, after you land, you will always hop of the aircraft with a smile......! Godspeed!

Afif Saybe
LONG EZ, HR-ATQ

[av-mech]

Afif,

Thanks for your comments.  Credible information is the hardest thing to find but easily the most important. 

Arnold

[Bill James]

Wow. Great stuff.