Kaldragon
Member
Good afternoon all, I've been thinking about buying an RV-4 or -6 for a while now (really a year or two...), and now that Im starting to get to the phase of asking for people to do pre-buys, I'm starting to question the safety aspect.
So far, I've been under the assumption that if I have an experienced RV mechanic do a pre-buy, as well as look over the aircraft with a mechanic friend of mine, that we dont find anything structurally wrong, the build looks good/decent, and I do some transition training, that I'll have something that is roughly equivalent in safety to a certified aircraft.
Now, I do understand that the accident rate of experimental aircraft versus certified is higher, but that many of those accidents are due to mechanical failure within the first few hours of flight testing, or from lack of transition training after purchasing a used experimental aircraft.
Now, thats not what Im overly concerned about due to the above, what I'm wondering is if I could safely do "gentleman aerobatics" in an old RV.
When I brought up the topic of doing aerobatics in an RV (after I had bought it of course), both a mechanic I had asked to do a prebuy, as well as a seller had seemed hesitant to say they were comfortable doing them in old RVs. I've also seen posts about others not feeling comfortable doing aerobatics in something "I haven't built", and I've heard what I've heard many times (and myself have said) in certified aircraft, "it's an old airframe, are you sure you want to test it?".
Reading through the statistics, I understand that more often than not, its not structural failure, but loss of control that leads to accidents in experimental aircraft. I dont know if thats from there being no old bold pilots, or if the structure itself is inherently safe. I understand that test RVs have been loaded to upwards of 9 Gs, so at least a properly assembled, new RV should be perfectly safe within the set limitations. So assuming I get aerobatic training, am I just as safe doing say a loop, spin, inverted flight etc, in an RV with inverted oil, as I would be in something like a Citabria? What do you guys think?
Sorry for the text wall!
So far, I've been under the assumption that if I have an experienced RV mechanic do a pre-buy, as well as look over the aircraft with a mechanic friend of mine, that we dont find anything structurally wrong, the build looks good/decent, and I do some transition training, that I'll have something that is roughly equivalent in safety to a certified aircraft.
Now, I do understand that the accident rate of experimental aircraft versus certified is higher, but that many of those accidents are due to mechanical failure within the first few hours of flight testing, or from lack of transition training after purchasing a used experimental aircraft.
Now, thats not what Im overly concerned about due to the above, what I'm wondering is if I could safely do "gentleman aerobatics" in an old RV.
When I brought up the topic of doing aerobatics in an RV (after I had bought it of course), both a mechanic I had asked to do a prebuy, as well as a seller had seemed hesitant to say they were comfortable doing them in old RVs. I've also seen posts about others not feeling comfortable doing aerobatics in something "I haven't built", and I've heard what I've heard many times (and myself have said) in certified aircraft, "it's an old airframe, are you sure you want to test it?".
Reading through the statistics, I understand that more often than not, its not structural failure, but loss of control that leads to accidents in experimental aircraft. I dont know if thats from there being no old bold pilots, or if the structure itself is inherently safe. I understand that test RVs have been loaded to upwards of 9 Gs, so at least a properly assembled, new RV should be perfectly safe within the set limitations. So assuming I get aerobatic training, am I just as safe doing say a loop, spin, inverted flight etc, in an RV with inverted oil, as I would be in something like a Citabria? What do you guys think?
Sorry for the text wall!