--- On Sat, 6/18/11, Sanjay Dhall <sdhall@...> wrote:


From: Sanjay Dhall <sdhall@...>
Subject: [Q-LIST] First Flight !!
To: Q-LIST@...
Date: Saturday, June 18, 2011, 3:09 AM


 



It finally happened !!!
My Quickie Q-200 took to the air today for the first time. What a thrill!
After months of taxiing and tweaking, and with considerable apprehension in
my ability to deal with the unknowns, and after listening to the advice of
several of you, I finally took my Q-200 on its maiden flight today.
It had been a great day for any flying, with winds below 5 knots all day
with temps in the 70's. I felt bummed all day that I missed the early
morning opportunity to make the first flight, and somewhat dejected at
myself for not being able to face the reality of actually making the first
flight. The thought of handing the job to a test pilot did cross my mind.
But my EAA flight advisor was available this evening. I had proposed that I
fly this evening. He came over to the hangar and spent time with me
generally gaging my state of mind. He gave me many outs. A friend came over
with a video camera.
I had spoken to the tower before the flight and they were ready with
emergency vehicles, and were ready to assist as needed, and were OK with
flying directly over the airport above pattern alt.
KYIP 7:30pm. temp 78. Willow Run is a pretty big airport with long and wide
runways. I decided on RWY 23L 7500 x 150'.
Taxied out, did an engine run up, and mag check. Left mag sputtered. oops.
Do I turn back.
After running that mag a few extra seconds it cleared up, and ran smooth. I
can still turn around and go back. Kept on rolling towards the runway.
Lined up at the very end of 23L. One last check of engine temps, pressures,
gages. All in range.
Decision point. Deep breath. Applied full power. No turning back now!
Concentrated on staying on the centerline and watching for any nose up or
tail up tendency. A quick glance at the airspeed ~80. The nose dropped a
little, so pulled up slightly and it was off the ground and going faster.
The left canard dropped just a little, and easily corrected. Airspeed
quickly crossed 110, so I started climbing out. Quickly climbed to about
2000' AGL airspeed about 140mph as I turned crosswind, then downwind. Engine
showed 2600 rpm. Cut back to 2300 rpm. Still climbing, cut power some more
and leveled. Since Willow Run is underneath the Detroit Class B airspace,
could not climb too much higher.
Performed a simulated landing at 2000' right over RWY 23L. During this
process I noted that the speeds were just not coming down as quickly as
required. Arrived at 2000' alt. approximately at midpoint of the RWY. This
was useful at it told me that for the actual landing I need to make a
shallower approach and reduce speeds further.
Descended into pattern alt, cut power. The Q does not seem to want to lose
speed and alt together quickly. Still going 115 on final turn. But did make
a fairly shallow approach. Crossed the threshold at about 95. Once below 95
I did note a tendency to rock back and forth in the roll axis. Left canard
down, left canard up, left canard down... Maybe it was me over correcting.
Dont know what my speed was now but seemed a whole lot slower than the rest
of the flight. Just kept on approaching the runway. And then it was down, a
slight bounce, but it stuck, and now the familiar part from the last many
months of taxiing. Taxied back. Total flying time ~12minutes. Friend and
onlookers were cheering. BTW, the friendly tower folks who had been watching
and assisting me in my taxiing up and down the runways in the recent past,
must have been relieved. Many surely wondered if this thing was ever going
to fly.
Well, today it did!
I am thankful to so many of you, for your help, advice and support. Today's
flight would have been far more difficult without it.
thanks
Sanjay