Formation Flight Speeds in an RV?

[ronschreck]

Mark,

All bets are off if you have more than enough horsepower at low RPM. If you are comparing your Rocket to RV's then we are talking apples and oranges.
(Were you the last guy in our 37-ship formation for some reason?)

PS: Whatcha flyin' these days?

[jclark]

Originally Posted by ronschreck

Mark,

All bets are off if you have more than enough horsepower at low RPM. If you are comparing your Rocket to RV's then we are talking apples and oranges.
(Were you the last guy in our 37-ship formation for some reason?)

PS: Whatcha flyin' these days?

Yes, he was.

I was "India 4" and he was "India 5" in the 37-ship. He has TWICE+ the horsepower as me so we had some interesting chats about power settings.

With a lot going on in front of us (:-) ), we had to be (as Falcon would say) "Johnny-on-the-spot" with the throttle and with anticipation. He mentioned that there was no way could he run at the 2600 RPM I was using. First he would be down around 2" MP (kidding) to go as slow as we were and his surging and braking would be significant with each throttle change.

And I remember the time he really wanted MORE braking. :-)

[F1Boss]

Originally Posted by ronschreck

Mark,

Can't agree with you unless you are talking about cross-country formation flying. If doing any kind of maneuvering one should have at least 2400 RPM on the prop and if doing aerobatics one will need it all in at 2700. If pulling the power off is enough to worry the guy behind, perhaps the throttle technique is too abrupt.

Hey Ron:

I wrote:
A tip from an old fighter pilot: strobe your prop against leads: sync up with him and you should be fine thru all maneuvers.

The above is something I remember being told by a fella who was taught by our government to fly P51s. Kinda sounds like we agree.

Carry on!
Mark

[F1Boss]

Originally Posted by ronschreck

Mark,

All bets are off if you have more than enough horsepower at low RPM. If you are comparing your Rocket to RV's then we are talking apples and oranges.
(Were you the last guy in our 37-ship formation for some reason?)

PS: Whatcha flyin' these days?

Hey Ron:

I'm a CP on the Devil Dog B25, and still flying the Rocket. The Beech was bashed at an airshow by the prop blast from an AN2, so it's in the process if getting repaired. I'm looking forward to getting beck into the family Champ (my brother is not flying it, so it's coming back here) -- I used to fly that one when I was very young.

Nah, I'm not comparing anything other than RPM, as concerns aero braking. More turns = more braking ability, but in reality, it should not be necessary to use that much braking,, and it is quite possibly dangerous, but at minimum it is bad form. My point it that it's easy to inadvertently push your tailwheel into the windshield of the plane behind you when you have a bit too much RPM dialed in. Match leads' setting and things will go smoother and easier.

Yes, James an I had a discussion on that specific point, as his plane was not smooth at anything less than 2600, so I asked him to be extra careful with pulling the 'GO!' Knob backwards. For the most part, it worked out. Being #37 in a 37 ship formation is not the easy spot, that's for sure.

Then again, if this formation stuff was easy, everyone would be doing it!

Carry on!
Mark

[ronschreck]

Originally Posted by F1Boss

Hey Ron:

I wrote:
A tip from an old fighter pilot: strobe your prop against leads: sync up with him and you should be fine thru all maneuvers.

The above is something I remember being told by a fella who was taught by our government to fly P51s. Kinda sounds like we agree.

Carry on!
Mark

Mark,

OK, if the government says so I guess that must be the best way to do it!

That's a great way to match lead's RPM but you may not want to match his RPM in all situations. For example, I could lead you through a barrel roll doing 2000 RPM. If you match my RPM you will never stay with me. (Leave your Rocket out of this. We're talking about two similar airplanes here!)