Performance figures

[Murray Parr]

Hello all,

I am happy to report my phase one flight testing is almost complete (just the takeoff and landing distances and also endurance testing left). I am a bit inclined to do the takeoff and landing tests at another airport after I sign off on the phase 1 completion. The airport I am at for testing has a slope and also the grass runway has been out of service due to soft wet surface and mostly has been unusable these last few months.

Here are a few performance numbers from doing the saw tooth climb and descent tests. The average density altitude was 8500 feet at the midpoint of 1000 ft climbs and descents (5000AGL).

VX 58 KTS
VY 73 KTS (732 FPM average at this speed and altitude).
VBG 67 KTS (-710 FPM altitude loss at this speed and altitude. Haven't worked out the glide ratio yet so if anybody wants to do the math, feel free:-)
Minimum sink 54 KTS (-601 FPM average altitude loss at this speed and altitude).
VSo 34 KTS
VS1 40KTS
Full throttle level flight was 128KTS IAS at the same altitude and the Rotax 912 ULS (100hp) was spinning at 5500 RPM with the E-Prop almost adjusted to ideal (I am going to add another 100 RPM to it and see how it goes).

At 90 KTS the rate of climb only drops to 640 FPM so I will most likely use this as my cruise climb speed.

How do these numbers compare to others?

I had a hard time deciphering the best glide because the tangent line on the graph is almost parallel between 55 and 70 KTS but seems to be closest at 58 KTS, I am sure slightly different test results could have a big effect on this however I was fairly fussy with keeping speeds constant and also compared my timed results with Data from flight data viewer program and it was all fairly consistent.

Edit: Take off weight was 473Kg or 1043 Lbs.
I calculated glide ratio to be. 9.27:1

[WaiexB22]

Thanks for publishing these figures. At VX and Vy what are your approximate rates of climb?

[Murray Parr]

Thanks for publishing these figures. At VX and Vy what are your approximate rates of climb?

Vx was 660 fpm at 8500 DA
Vy was 732 at the same DA