----[Please read http://ercoupers.com/disclaimer.htm before following any advice in this forum.]----
At 01:34 PM 9/28/2004, William R. Bayne wrote: >The factory got 127-129 m.p.h. with new planes in 1945 thru spring of 1946. To paraphrase Mark Twain, 'there are lies, damned lies, and factory flight test results.' Prior to the FAA's stepping in during the mid-70's, virtually every light aircraft manufacturer routinely inflated their cruise and max speeds from 10 to 20 percent. Whether they did so just by changing the numbers on the paper or whether they pressured test pilots to come up with better results isn't clear. But the fact is they did it. Most of the numbers you see in the classic aircraft books are laughable. 127-129 in 415Cs from the factory is laughable. We have examples of the Ercoupe today which are as good as factory-new, little, if at all, heavier. They aren't that fast. They tend to be 105-110 MPH airplanes. Not to cast aspersions on Mr. Weick, but perhaps the reason he was so quiet about it was that he was part of a system of deliberate 'marketing over truth.' When companies like Maule and Mooney started overstating numbers to the point where people were going to get killed running out of gas or rate-of-climb, it became clear that the POH's had to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Well, sort of. In a new-style POH, I usually knock 5-10 knots off their figure for flight planning purposes. Greg ========================================================================== ==== To leave this forum go to: http://ercoupers.com/lists.htm Search the archives on http://escribe.com/aviation/coupers-tech/
<<attachment: winmail.dat>>
