I for one find great merit in the circular. Having recently completed my RV-8, I plan to take advantage of it. I had a very qualified pilot perform the initial flight and additional flights while working out the bugs, and since, I?ve made a couple of flights in it as well. Regardless, I will feel more comfortable and likely increase my skills faster in the plane with a QP/coach along with me.
I fall right in that category of low time pilots (with a newly minted TW endorsement) with an airplane I built that desperately wants to fly it. I think this is a good alternate path to fly the test phase and build proficiency at the same time. Fact is, there just aren?t a whole lot of LODA holding transition trainers around. For folks like me with limited resources, flying airplanes is an extravagant hobby, and having to travel to another part of the country, staying in a hotel and paying for an instructor and his airplane for a week is a major expense that frankly I don?t have the money for.
For me, even though my airplane has about 4.5 hours on it, squawks have been fixed, I?ve flown an RV-6 for a few hours to transition
and I?ve flown my new RV-8, I still see benefit of having a QP on board. Here?s a few of them.
1. Exploring aft and max gross weight limit corners of the WB envelope.
2. Exploring stall and slow flight characteristics.
3. Expanding my personal crosswind abilities in this particular aircraft. (as well as polishing landing technique)
The one area I don?t personally agree with is having two aboard for the initial flight. I understand the ?I built it and I?ll be da**d if I?m going to let anyone else make the first flight? attitude. (That being loosely akin to turning your new bride over to a more experienced guy on your wedding night?.) But it just doesn?t make any logical sense. Of course this hasn?t stopped many from sticking their necks out there and flying it themselves regardless of their capacity, and I hope this AC has a positive effect on those folks. I just would never be one of them.
So my plan moving forward is to take advantage of this Advisory Circular. While I will probably make solo flights as well, for the items listed above I will utilize a QP or OP as appropriate to conduct the full AIT and BPML. I believe this is a much better plan toward not becoming a statistic as compared with going it alone.
Also, I have no problem with the acronyms. After giving the document a serious read it?s just not an issue. Much easier to deal with than making the first landing in your new airplane.
![Roll eyes :rolleyes: :rolleyes:](data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP///yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7)