Reklaw Fly-In, October 2013

The Reklaw Fly-In is hosted every October by David & Marcia Mason at their Flying M ranch located in the piney woods of East Texas. www.reklawflyin.com/

This year was my first trip there. A group of us from Angleton flew & drove up and camped together under the wings of our planes. Dave Turner flew his Taylorcraft, Lee Jordan flew his Piper Cruiser, & I flew the 750 up. It's about a 2.5 to 3 hr flight depending on winds, about 230 miles from Angleton.

"Camp Angleton"

I'll try this. Long night for a wus.

There must have been 400 plus planes there of almost every design short of jet powered. the weather was great on Friday & Saturday, but was predicted to deteriorate  overnight & early Sunday with rain moving in. We all decided the smart thing to do was break camp & book-out Saturday PM.

It's a cool display of what's great about America to go to something like this. Ingenuity and creativity are abundant in Experimental and General Aviation. Think about it,  we can jump in a plane we built, fly it across the country and gather with like-minded people without having to do anything but just go do it. No government clearance, TSA lines, baggage fees, flight plans etc., just go. Pretty cool and precious in my opinion.

Friday night I found that a Gin Martini tastes pretty good out in the country under the stars. They help you sleep on the ground, provide relief from the cold, and they make you really smart. The last discussion I remember dealt with the structure of the Universe.   :-)

Here are a few shots of the Fly-In:

August 2013 update:

I have been flying N75ZX for 1 year now. I had the first annual inspection done on the plane this weekend, everything checked out fine. Compression check on the engine showed 79-79-78-78/80 which is excellent. I've made a couple of weekend trips to the Dallas area this summer and quite a few Texas area fly-ins this spring. As of 8/03/13 I've got 215 hrs. of flight time on the plane. Fuel burn is averaging around 5 - 5 3/4 gal per hour.

The 750 is very easy to fly. I've gotten comfortable with all the different landing configurations such as no-flaps, full flaps, no power, power on, crosswind, downwind, etc. Stall speed is around 36-40 mph, depending on weight and air density. The stall turns into a "mushy wings level sink" with no nose drop like most aircraft, which I assume is due to the slats on the leading edge of the 750's wings. I typically cruise it at around 2200 -2300 rpm & this produces around 78-84 mph. Maximum continuous cruise rpm of 2470 rpm produces 88-90 mph, and redline 2625 rpm gets it right at 100 mph. I like the lower rpm settings. It's not stressing the engine at all, better fuel economy, and at the higher rpms the extra 5-10 mph is just not worth the effort.

One of the trips to Dallas I encountered some bad weather. I took off on Sunday around 12 noon after a pretty serious line of T-storms had moved through the Dallas area that morning. Later that day, I ended up catching up with the squall line from behind just NW of the Houston area. I detoured to Navasota, landed, and took a nap under a covered fueling area while waiting for the line to clear on out. About an hour & a half later I took off and flew her on in to Angleton. Here are a couple of photos of the back-side of the squall line as I approached it from behind.

Here are a few other photos from earlier this spring:

Early February of 2013, nice cool weather.

Mustang Beach Airport at Port Aransas, TX, late April

Ft. Parker Flying Field near Mexia, TX in late March.
The fellow that lives in the house on the hill hosts a few
Fly-ins each year. A lot of older, classic light planes are
 showcased such as Taylorcrafts & Cessna 120 & 140's. 

Next month on the weekend of Sept. 20th & 21st, I plan to take a week off from work and fly to the Zenith Factory in Mexico, MO.  http://www.zenithair.com/   Each year they hold an "Open Hangar Day" event where builders fly their planes in. Looking forward to it!

Dec. 2012 Update:     N75ZX now has over 112 hrs of flight time and she continues to perform beautifully. The only change I have made since the last post is an adjustment to the prop to gain more climb power. Since I have a ground-adjustable prop, I "flattened" the pitch approx. 1.5 degrees which allows the engine to reach it's maximum-rated 2625 RPM in straight & level flight, which produces more power, just like downshifting in a car. 

I took a great 3 day cross-county trip from Angleton to Fayetteville AR in mid November. In total I flew about 1175 miles, taking 15 flight hrs, and burned 82 gal of fuel. Here are some photos of the trip: 

Just NE of Dallas, all #'s in the green.

My friend Frank who lives in Fayetteville & is building a Zenith 701.  I heard he flew it in mid-Dec.! This photo was taken in mid-Nov.,, just one month prior to his 1st flight.

Some of Frank's buddie's hangar @ Weddington Woods Field.

N75XZ frosted-in on the early morning of Nov. 16th.

SE Oklahoma's Washita Mountains just south of Poteau, OK

Oct. 15th update:  I now have over 45 hours on the 750. She continues to fly and handle very nicely and I am getting more comfortable with her everyday I fly. In addition to standard airport pattern work, I've now done a lot of full-flap landings (which can be very short into the wind!) and practice engine-out landings,  along with both downwind take-offs & landings. I've had a couple of minor issues come up with the plane, and seem to have both of them solved now.

The first was a broken bungee cord after only 2.5 hrs. of flight time. The bungee acts as a suspension system for the front nose gear and I apparently was shipped a defective one with the kit. I've had the new one on for over 42 hrs now and it seems to be holding up well.

Second issue has been my oil temps. They started out getting too high, 225 degrees and climbing, & would exceed the temp. limits if I did not back off the throttle. It was in the upper 90's when I began the test flights plus I was breaking in a new engine, both factors that contributed to high oil temps.  I have made cowling modifications to improve & increase the airflow around the engine and I now have the oil temps in a managable range of 197-212 degrees, depending on how hard I'm running the engine. 

I've got to re-paint the cowl to make her presentable in public again. After that, I plan to take a week off from work in November, throw a tent & sleeping bag in the plane and move about the country a while. I may end up in Kentucky, Missouri, & Arkansas if I've got the time and the winds are favorable. This has been one cool thing to do, so glad to be flying now & fortunate to have the opportunity. I want to get involved with the EAA Young Eagles program to help introduce young people to flying. As a kid, I always loved aircraft & the world of aviation, but never really had a chance to go up. Now is my opportunity to do something about it.

August 10th, 2012:  First Flight

Since this was my first experience at being a test pilot, I took the day off from work so I would have zero distractions. I picked Friday because I did not want anyone at the airstrip other than my two building buddies. No need for an audience, just a couple of dependable friends in case of an emergency. Danny and Dave were at the hangar when I arrived at 6:30 am and already had N75ZX rolled out. I went through my preflight inspection and climbed in the cabin. She started right up, and right at this point it was all beginning to sink in that I'm about to try & fly in a machine that I built that has never left the ground. I knew this was going to happen, and I had replayed it in my mind in the previous few weeks prior. I would remind myself that I've built a proven design, the same design has flown on many previous occasions, and this is what I signed up for. This is the mountaintop, the finish line, the time to put it to the test.

I taxied out to the strip, nodded to Danny and slowly put the power in. The plane surged forward and the engine roared to full power. at about 400 ft. of roll out and a little back pressure on the stick she lifted off so smoothly. It was right at this point my plan was to check for any abnormal control issues and abort the take off if things were goofy, but I pretty much knew within a fraction of a second the plane was handling very well. I continued to climb out and get the speed up, and I turned left at 500' AGL to stay in the traffic pattern over the airstrip. After getting up to 1800', I kept the engine rpms at 2250 -2300 for around 45 minutes to break the engine in while I marveled at what I was in the middle of doing. Looking around the cockpit, smelling the paint cooking off the engine and the aroma of new upholstery, seeing the gauges working in response to the plane flying, well all I can say is it was just one great feeling of accomplishment. 

Monday, July 30th:  Today the FAA designated airworthiness rep (DAR) was scheduled, a very nice guy named Brian Ingraham. Brian works on helicoptors and other aircraft as an A&P and constantly travels all over the USA and overseas in his work and can be hard to get a hold of.  We met at the hangar after playing telephone tag over the last week or so. He spent about an hour going over the plane and asked to see the paperwork, which I somehow managed to have in order. After reviewing the Operating Limitations with me, he handed me the pink copy of the Airworthiness Certificate which makes the aircraft legal to fly! I have to fly off the first 40 hrs. solo and stay within a 100 mile radius of the home base, which is a pretty generous chunk of real estate. Now I need to get 3 hours of dual time in another 750, get the insurance in place, and go fly!

Sat. July 21:   Today I pulled the 750 out of the hangar for the first time in a completed state. I needed to do some run-ins on the new engine, and the plan was to follow engine break-in proceedures spec'd by ECI, an engine parts manufacturer from whom I purchased most of the new engine components. The proceedure is to run the engine up to 1200 rpm for a couple of minutes and then let it completely cool down. Next you run it up to 1800 rpm for a couple of minutes and let it cool down again, never letting the cylinder head temps go over 400 degrees or the oil temp over 200. The last test is to tie the plane off and run it up full power to see if it makes proper RPM of 2150 -2250. She made 2250, so the required power is there for flight. From this point on there will be no more engine runs until the first flight, as the engine must be broken in while flying to provide maximum cooling until the rings seat. All I'm waiting on now is the Airworthiness Inspection scheduled for this upcoming week. Once I get that, I need to log 3 hrs. of dual time in another Zenith 750 to satisfy the insurance company, then it's time to fly. It was a great feeling getting her outside and run that engine good and hard. She looks better than ever outside in the sunshine, and needless to say I'm a little pumped up. I doubt if I'll sleep very soundly tonight.