Frank and all,
According to Fred's book and a bunch of magazine articles from the
early Ercoupe days, in 1946 ERCO offered a $500 reward (a bunch of money
in those days, enough to buy a new car) if they could demonstrate that
they could spin an Ercoupe. Many pilots tried, flight instructors,
ex-military, etc., but no one could do it. The CAA certified the
Ercoupe as "... incapable of spinning." I've flown my Ercoupe over 2000
hours, and have given rides to over 1500 people, and almost always let
the passenger fly for a while. Some have tried to spin it, but no one
has even come close. In my opinion, if any of you can even come close
to spinning your airplane is out of rig. I've seen some Ercoupes that
were rigged so when the left aileron went up the right rudder deflected
outboard, exactly backwards of what is supposed to happen. Those were
airplanes that had passed annual, even.
Syd
fnelson913 wrote:
Jim,
Did you cut the throttle because you were worried about approaching
Vne (144 mph)? I always thought the idea for spin recovery is to get
the inside (stalled) wing flying again. If you are not in a fully
developed spin, exceeding Vne should not be a problem. I would
almost think that you would want as much throttle as possible.
As I remember the discussion with my instructor, I think he said
that he could get the Coupe to enter a spin. But he could not get it
to stay in the spin. The Ercoupe would immediately fly itself out of
a spin condition regardless of what the pilot was doing.
I have not heard of anyone on this forum who has been in an Ercoupe
that completed even half a rotation of a spin. Are we worried about
a spin entry the will develop into a real spin? Has anyone been able
to spin an Ercoupe for even one full rotation?
Frank Nelson
N51DV - 415C
TOA
--- In [email protected]
<mailto:ercoupe-tech%40yahoogroups.com>, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
>
> Just so the record is complete my airplane is a 415C without
rudder pedals and with?standard 13 degrees of up elevator. I was
carefully maintaining wings level when the left wing dropped and all
of a sudden I was looking at the ground. I immediatly cut the
throttle and turned the yoke full right which resulted in?prompt
recovery but didn't help the stained underwear.
>
> Jim Graham
>
