Flap handle poition

[jflindner]

Mark, Yes that is the case with the flap handle on this aircraft. If it were not for this I would not be able to get to the flaps. With all of the suggestions you guys have given me this problem will go away. If you think of any others, please send them along
Jim Lindner

[DemoDollCate]

I did some Bearhawk comparison flights, thanks to Scott Williamson and his BH (509).
We both took turns flying each other's airplanes. When Scott flew mine he couldn't get the last notch of flaps. When I flew his, he could and so could I. When I flew mine it took my other hand to get the last notch. I wanted to know why.

When we got on the ground I walked between the two planes and saw that 509 had a longer flap handle. By 4" it turns out. That explains the difference. I chose to lengthen my handle by 5". Lots of room to do so and why not 1"up Scott while we're at it.

Kevin did the welding for me and now full flaps is a breeze. I still wait until I get under flap speed for each notch of course and the pull is much better.

I've seen the EZ flap in a Maule. Works fine, looks busy (clunky) to me. I am very happy with the longer flap lever.

[jflindner]

DemoDollCate,
Do you recall what the overall length of the flap handle is??????????????
Jim Lindner

[DemoDollCate]

The original was 13", Scott's 509 is 17", mine is now 18".

[whee]

I really like this handle that the builder put on his flap handle. It made reaching for that first notch of flaps very comfortable. When I extend my flap handle I'll probably add something similar.

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[DemoDollCate]

New and old...
The fuel selector is an issue either way. So adding length didn't affect that. If I could find a "both" selector with a lower profile I'd install it.

[James]

Can I ask a bit of a naive question... why do you guys keep referencing MPH for stall speeds, flap speeds etc?
Surely a wing stalls at a certain number of knots IAS...?

Can you buy airspeed indicators in MPH in the US?

I assume the real advantage in talking MPH is in working out your ground speed relative to a terrestrial map or something.

I'm not judging anything, I'm genuinely confused.
Is Australia living in some aeronautical backwater, or is this a US idiosyncrasy, or something?
All the US military aircraft I've ever worked on use knots, and all of our nav charts are marked in NM.

(there's a reason why they keep aircraft maintainers on the ground )

James

[AKKen07]

I have a theory about the origins of this in the US. I can’t substantiate it though. In the 40s when companies like Cessna and Aeronca, Bellanca, and Piper were developing lots of relatively affordable small airplanes to sell to the public who, for obvious reasons, had little experience with general Aviation they published speeds in MPH to make them more relatable. For example, my Citabria has mph in the POH. I am betting that this just carried over since then for the same reason - much like the current US usage of old fashioned imperial units. The appeal of bigger numbers (like Mark said) may have encouraged the trend. Just a guess.

[svyolo]

For a few years , 40+ years ago, children were also taught the metric system in school in the US. A small percentage of us can speak metric, english, and nautical. Unfortunately that is the closest most of us come to being multi-lingual, although the Brits would probably argue that the language we speak barely passes as "english".

[Russellmn]

In this particular case (why we're referencing MPH for flap speeds) it's because that's what Bob used when listing the speeds I imagine. Now, I don't know WHY Bob used MPH rather than knots, but he did.

[500AGL]

MPH looks faster. One reason to fly a Bearhawk is that's faster than a cub. But even in a cub, I'd never want an ASI to show how many knots I was flying at 85 mph.. Perception often means a lot.

[James]

Right - so the ASI is marked in MPH then?
Well, that makes more sense. I guess it doesn't matter what the numbers are on the dial, it's the position of the white and red lines that matter :-)
Thanks everyone - you learn as you go :-)

[zkelley2]

Most EFIS let you pick any system of measurement you want. Even crossing between. My temp is in C as is aviation standard, while engine pressure is in psi because that's standard in everything I've flown. Fuel in Gallons because that's how it's read at the pump, etc.
Airspeed is in knots because that is aviation standard and makes using charts a LOT easier.

You only see MPH on really old airplanes and experimentals where people want to feel like they are going faster then they are in their "I could have driven here faster" cub.

[PaulSA]

Using mph makes absolutely no sense in an aviation environment. Using knots and nm makes so many mental calculations easier because of the 1:60 rule. The happy coincidence that (in round numbers), there are 6000' in a nm, 6 radians in a circle, 60 seconds in a minute, Sin60 is close to one etc mean that, if you use knots you can do easy mental calculations.

For instance:

- the required rate of descent for a 3 degree approach is 5x groundspeed - 80kts=400fpm
- max drift (wind on beam) is wind speed divided by TAS (nm/min). So 20kts wind, TAS 120kts, drift is 10 degrees. You can then factor that. So 60 degrees or more off the nose, use all of it (Sin60 is around 0.91 so close enough). 45 off = 3/4, 30 off half, 15 off 1/4. I haven't used a whizz wheel in years because this is so accurate.
- 1nm in 60nm subtends a 1 degree angle

There are many. many other examples which simply don't work if you use mph.

Let's face it, the US uses different systems for everything - temperature in F, imperial measurements, USG. They even insist on a different date format (month, day, year) where everyone else in the world uses day, month, year. And before you say "So what?" I can give you 2 examples of serious cock-ups. There was an Air Canada (I believe) 767 which became a glider partly because of errors in doing the conversions during refueling. And a NASA Mars probe that crashed due to a mix up with metric and Imperial units - very expensive and embarrassing .....

Flame suit on .....

[zkelley2]

The Russians use kph for airspeed on old stuff. I'm sure they'll have an airspeed indicator for you. They also use meters for altitude which is far too big of a unit, and then it's in QFE. The person that thought that was smart outside skydiving is an idiot.

[svyolo]

Using meters for altitude has a strange but positive effect in Asia, at least IMO. When talking to ATC, or vice versa, with pilots using very tonal languages, they screw up the altitude read backs and clearances much less when altitudes are expressed in meters. Seems weird but I found the Vietnamese and Chinese pilots and controllers did much better with meters, even when talking to other.

Anywhere else it would offer no benefit.

[zkelley2]

That may be, but I think everyone having to carry a conversion chart and referencing that for every single altitude has a wildly higher likelihood of an error.

[Nev]

- the required rate of descent for a 3 degree approach is 5x groundspeed - 80kts=400fpm

Or Groundspeed divided by 2 and add a zero.......just sayin’

[Russellmn]

Funny how this thread started as a question about flap handle positioning and length and has somehow turned into a debate on the best unit of measure for speed... I think I'll use feet/hour just for the hell of it! lol

[PaulSA]

Yeah - bit of thread drift here ....

[JimParker256]

Someone used furlongs per fortnight in another thread. I was not at all surprised to learn that there's a "units" converter site that does that conversion (knots to furlongs/fortnight). The other day, I was flying along and ATC was asking everyone for their "Mach speed". I dutifully reported in at "Mach 0.13" for them...

[zkelley2]

That's because everyone flies Mach numbers at altitude due to compressability effects on the IAS and Mmo limitations. So for ATC to do en-route spacing at minimum intervals, they need to know your mach speed to keep separation.
You might also hear an instruction like maintain .84, transition to 290 in the descent. That means maintain .84M until 290 indicated = .84M on descent and then 290 from then on, which effectively slows you since 290kias at the transition is going to be like 450ktas, but as you get lower, 290kias gets closer to 290ktas, so by maintaining 290kias, you are slowing as you descend.