RV-8 Performance

Nope, this is not the usual report about the high speed performance of the RV family like you are used to reading about but just a reminder of one aspect of our performance envelope that doesn't usually get much attention. With today's skyrocketing fuel prices our flying habits are starting to feel the pain in our wallets but with a little juditious power management our little RVs can deliver some surprisingly good cross country fuel economy. During our last LOE trip Jay Pratt, Pat Stewart and I departed RV Central at Ft. Worth Hicks in formation with identical powerplant/prop combinations (RV-6, RV-8A, RV-8) and arrived at our weather alternate (KHOB) after 2.2 hr and after topping off there was less than 0.4 gallons difference between each aircraft. Unfortunately, weather conditions forced us to take alternate transportation to LOE-5 and on our return flight to T67 we again selected an economy cruise with our little carburated/magnetoed O360A1A's and we were home in just under 2 hrs recording exactly 7.5 galllons per hour/25 miles per gallon. That was with a miserly 5 to 10 kt tailwind component. All you builders out there, keep at it and you will reap many rewards. See following inflight panel pic and run the numbers if you wish. http://img183.imageshack.us/img183/9439/pa1600414bf.jpg

Change of Topic- Photo of Dynon

Jerry,
In the photo, the Dynon does not look very readable. Do you have issues with seeing it under a bright sky? I will have the same setup and am wondering what to expect.
Don

tinman said:

Jerry,
In the photo, the Dynon does not look very readable. Do you have issues with seeing it under a bright sky? I will have the same setup and am wondering what to expect.
Don

Click to expand...

I found our Dynon is VERY readable in direct sunlight ... even with my sunglasses on. I think it's just the camera.

Dynon

Tinman,
Fear not, the Dynon is very readable in direct sunlight. I wondered why the pic did not show that too. I had auto flash selected so it must be something with my camera. You may notice that the Dynon airspeed readout is sometimes up to 5 kt different than the panel ASI.

I can get our Cardinal's O-360A1A to about the same (7.5 GPH) now just have to work on the 160Kt's thing... I average 120