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ct9000

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About ct9000

  • Birthday 03/14/1954

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    email greg.merritt@outlook.com

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  • Location
    darraweit guim vic.aus
  • Interests
    Martial arts, finance, grandkids, and of course flying
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    Male

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  1. Re reading this incident I remembered when my LS was first assembled. The fuel hose at the tank connection takes a right angle bend because there is not much room for a gentle curve so the hose is very prone to kink at that point. The symptom was good flow at the gascolator but a long time to fill the header tank when drawing from one tank but the other was ok. Can't remember which was the bad tank. Problem solved by careful repositioning of the hoses. The hose end is molded to a bend so is really hard to see if it is kinked. Hope this is food for thought.
  2. With full flap a tail strike is not likely, with little flap the landing angle is greater so a tail strike is more likely. I would suggest that it is very difficult to hit the tail with full flap. Another comment on the CT / 172 is that a CT will go around or take off with full flap quiet safely. A go around with full flap in a 172 will quickly raise nose and possibly stall as soon as power is applied.
  3. Tom the problem is that there is a serious shortage of capable mechanics so you are at their mercy. It is not so easy to just "take it some where else". Also your system allows the operator to make some decisions on what maintenance to have done ours does not. At least I suspect that we win the flag for the worst general aviation regulator. The US regulator seems to encourage aviation. Our system is hell bent on grounding as many pilots as possible 'cause if no one is flying there will be no accidents. Even traditional flying schools are getting hard to find. We have gone from about 60,000 current GA pilots to about a quarter of that.
  4. We are probably a bit lucky using Rotax engines. A friend of mine had his Mooney grounded for a full strip and inspect because the mechanic did not like the grass stains on the prop, called it a prop strike. Cost thousands of $$$. At least the Rotax gearbox inspection is easy and not expensive.
  5. With respect Ed, each to their own. I always used 40 deg. The extra drag is a big help and at 40 does not contribute much lift at all. In rough air you can use some power to help other control surfaces without eating up lots of runway. Adding power with 30 will increase landing distance a fair bit. In my defense I almost always fly off short grass strips.
  6. if it's floating a bit with full flap you may still be a bit fast. although not my favorite method you can carrry more power, keep the nose up then chop the power on touchdown so that you are controlling descent.with power. But I guess you already know that. Ps I am taildragger pilot as well
  7. Hi Andy, just to clear up the confused messages. The 2300 hrs. was my total at the time. The failures happened on the new CTLSt. At delivery it had less than 4hrs. on the clock. The first engine failure happened on the second circuit after ground runs so at about 4.7 hrs. Happy that now no more engine failures.
  8. The first one, the engine went to idle power with little warning turning downwind on climb out on the second circuit test flight. Completed the circuit landing on the departure runway, landed a bit long but no problem just as nervous as hell The second failure was with some warning after low fuel pressure alarm then running very rough and could only get about 3000 RPM not enough to maintain height was able to put it down on a model aircraft club facility. The next two I shut down and did a forced landing into open farm land. The glide performance with the prop stopped is marginally better than idle but not really much. I managed to get through my first 2300 hours without an engine/power loss then four in the next 30 hours. Since then another 250 hours and no engine problem..
  9. Problems basically caused by lack of quality control at factory. Aircraft sat half finished for a long time due to financial problem at FD. 1/ A lot of carbon fiber dust in tanks caused fuel pressure loss. Gascolator connected backward and screen blocked up instead of debris going into bowl. 2/ Fuel pressure loss due to pumps clogging with carbon dust. 3/ On test flight after swabbing out tanks and a full system clean, forced landing due to fuel pouring out of roof lining due to fuel line fitting at bulk head not done up. 4/ Loss of oil pressure, cause was only a sender fault. These were the forced landings but there were a number of other faults as well. To their credit FD sent an engineer out from Europe on two occasions to fix various faults. As I said these problems were mainly caused by financial woes and delays and not systemic or design fault. Ps. it is a CTLSt not an i
  10. Both are very docile in stalls etc. The CTSW is not difficult to land if handled correctly, but the most common problem pilots new to the CT series have is coming in too fast and the sight picture is a bit different because of the wide cabin with the short nose. In my opinion the SW is more capable in difficult conditions once you get the hang of it.
  11. For what it's worth I had my SW for about 1200 hrs. and used 40 flap all the time. I miss it I should not have sold it a great and very capable aircraft. Yes it takes a little to get the picture right but not that hard. Have had a ride in a RV12 but not as pilot. I would describe the RV as a bit more gentlemen like, a bit slower but not much, both are good fun.
  12. Without knowing all the facts it is not wise to speculate on the cause. Having said that, a new aircraft can have any number of problems from the start and take time to get all the bugs out. My first new bird CTSW was perfect from the start with no faults at all, however my second new bird CTLSt I had a number of problems resulting in several forced landings in the first 25hrs. fortunately with no damage but stressful just the same.
  13. Hi Tom the rules in AUS are the same as in USA, for LSA you need a manufacturer approval for any change no matter how small. Having said that you are lucky to have F D USA who can do it as a manufacturer, but in AUS we have to go to back to Europe. A bit of a disadvantage with LSA compared to an engineering order for a change to a normal certified aircraft.
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