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Bob Axsom

Well Known Member
The Sport Air Racing League has been sanctioning and reporting race results at www.sportairrace.org for three years now. I went into the site and collected the data and put it into an Excel Workbook (a tabbed collection of spreadsheets).

- If you click on the first tab you get the results in order by race beginning with the Taylor 100 in May of 2007 and ending with the Rocket 100 in November of 2009.
- The second tabbed spreadsheet is the same information sorted by race plane class including RV Red (320 cu. in.) and RV Blue (360 cu. in.).
- The third tabbed spreadsheet is sorted by speed regardless of class each entry is ranked from #1 Paul Tackabury in a Lancair IV at 348.51 mph to #491 Ryan Malherbe in a Pietenpol at 72.2 mph.
- The fourth tabbed spreadsheet is sorted by pilot and speed.

If you would like a copy of this Excel Workbook just give me your e-mail address and I will forward it to you. If you want to know the race classes go to www.sportairrace.org, click on the Mission, scroll to the bottom of the page and click on Experimental Classes for ... and Factory Classes for ...

Bob Axsom
 
No interest

I printed book of these 3 years of data and find it very interesting to review and observe how all of the different types of aircraft stack up in head to head racing (not handicapped) competition. I guess I'm unique in that interest.

Bob Axsom
 
Bob,

I'm interested but find it hard to find time to get too involved right now. I have too many interest and I'm still building the 8. I do have one question for you though. I read your posts as often as they appear and I understand that you are finding ways to split hairs to get just one more MPH. So, why did you choose to race an A model RV? Thanks.

David Watson
49FD
 
To be honest

The reason I built an "A" is my wife insisted on it. Since it is done I too like the "A" better. It sits right on the ground with a good view all the time and, in spite of what Paul Lipps says, I think a properly faired "A" is as clean as the tail dragger. One of my faster mods was the subfairing on the nose wheel - 3 kts. If I had built a tail dragger as I originally thought I would really work on cleaning up the tail wheel installation like the Hammer brothers have done with their SUPER FAST Glasair I TDs. Anyway, the real reason for the "A" was a lady named Jeanine.

Bob Axsom

P.S. The speed data does not require racing involvement but it does show objective evidence of relative speed between different models of aircraft. I lets you make up your own mind based on actual competitive results.
 
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Bob Axsom said:
It sits right on the ground with a good view all the time and, in spite of what Paul Lipps says, I think a properly faired "A" is as clean as the tail dragger. Bob Axsom
QUOTE]

Oh, Bob! I was only quoting C.A.F.E.'s equivalent parasite drag area in an old Sport Aviation of 2.32 sq. ft. with the results I got with my testing of Jim Smith's RV-6 which came out at between 2.15 and 2.2. Only 0.12 sq.ft. for a nosewheel; that doesn't seem like a whole lot now does it. Besides, with all of your cooling and wing mods you've probably got it down below that of a TD! Now if you only had one of those rad four-blade props, well....!
Click to expand...
 
Average race speeds

Just for fun I used Bob's spreadsheet to calculate average race speeds for different aircraft types. Only types with at least 5 race times were included, to reduce the influence of different winds or other race conditions on the results. The averages below are based on 437 race times recorded during 2007-2009. It should be noted that these averages aren't necessarily comparable to the performance specs of kit manufacters.

Its interesting to note that there is no discernible difference in average race speeds for the RV6/7s vs. RV6A/7As.

Lancair Legacy: 294 mph
SX-300: 288 mph
Polen Special: 272 mph
Glasair III: 261 mph
Glasair I: 255 mph
Lancair 360: 250 mph
Berkut 360: 245 mph
EVO Rocket: 240 mph
F1 Rocket: 238 mph
Vari-EZE: 228 mph
Glasair IISFT: 223 mph
RV-8: 220 mph
Cozy: 214 mph
Velocity RG: 212 mph
Long-EZ: 206 mph
RV-6A/7A: 202 mph
RV-6/7: 202 mph
RV-4: 199 mph
Lancair 235: 198 mph
Tailwind W10: 195 mph
Mustang II: 192 mph
Midget Mustang: 165 mph

Bonanzas: 201 mph
Mooneys: 182 mph
Grumman AA5B: 172 mph
Cirrus SR-20: 169 mph
PA-28R: 166 mph
Cessna 180/182: 156 mph
 
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Bob Axsom said:
The reason I built an "A" is my wife insisted on it. Since it is done I too like the "A" better. It sits right on the ground with a good view all the time.
Click to expand...

The "A" does have that certain look of sleekness. Imagine all of those sleek and speedy looking biz jets as taildraggers. Wouldn't look right....would it? :p

L.Adamson --- RV6A
 
Bob for fear of starting the old battle between the taildraggers and nosedraggers; Why was your wife so insistent on a nosedragger? I've certainly heard of wives insisting on a side by side rather than a tandem for obvious reasons (mine included...and I don't blame her!) but have never heard of one not wanting to get in a taildragger.

- Peter
 
L.Adamson said:
The "A" does have that certain look of sleekness. Imagine all of those sleek and speedy looking biz jets as taildraggers. Wouldn't look right....would it? :p
L.Adamson --- RV6A
Click to expand...

But you may notice that those biz jets are so ashamed of their landing gear that they "hide" it as soon as they are off the ground.
That was my story when I owned my Mooney.
 
She simply didn't like the looks of it

N200PF said:
Bob for fear of starting the old battle between the taildraggers and nosedraggers; Why was your wife so insistent on a nosedragger? I've certainly heard of wives insisting on a side by side rather than a tandem for obvious reasons (mine included...and I don't blame her!) but have never heard of one not wanting to get in a taildragger.

- Peter
Click to expand...

She simple didn't like the looks of it. She has no interest in one over the other from a functional stand point but she said it just doesn't look right with the nose up in the air not being able to see where you are going. Sitting normally and being able to see effortlessly are important to her.

Bob Axsom
 
Bob,

Do you think you would be faster if you had made identical modifications to the taildragger version? I realize I'm stepping on forbidden ground here and I'm not trying to back you into a corner......I'm just curious to know what you think.

David
 
It would be cool if you had a flying buddy with a 6 the same weight and setup that you have so you could do the same modifications to it as you do to your A....(excluding the nosewheel mods of course) so we could measure the difference between the two airplanes. I know Van's figures are very close in stock confiduration...it would be cool to see the difference after modifications.
 
Power and alititude settings?

Hey Bob Axsom,

How do you decide the best altitude to race at for a given event? I'm assuming you guys use full throttle/RPM at all times? Or not...

Inquiring minds, etc...



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Bob
Would you please send me a copy of the SARL results xcell sheet? I am interested in checking out all the results. Spring will be here soon and I am starting to think about next years activities!
 
That is part of the challenge

Jerry Cochran said:
Hey Bob Axsom,

How do you decide the best altitude to race at for a given event? I'm assuming you guys use full throttle/RPM at all times? Or not...

Inquiring minds, etc...


>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Click to expand...

That is part of the challenge. Yes WOT and Max RPM. Altitude is typically minimum unless the winds are better for higher including the loss in climb and the gain in descent.

Bob Axsom
 
Bob
It is interesting to look back in time over the data. I added the first Rocket 100 results in 2006, before SARL, to see how I have done in four years. That first race my speed was 236mph and the last race of this year, four season's later my speed was 256 mph. A TWENTY mph increase in four years clearly shows what can happen with a little fun competition. My personal techniques have improved and that accounts for a good portion of that improvement but the largest single increase came with a prop change. The rest has come from airframe and cowling clean ups.
Those modifications are helping me to save fuel dollars in all my cross country flying and have been well worth the time and effort. I appreciate your efforts in promoting this new sport.
 
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