> ******************** > Jason comments that "Running out of aileron in crosswinds was a new experience for me."
> I've never had that happen to me. If my memory is faulty and I indeed did have a crosswind strong enough to overpower my ailerons, it's possible I kicked in enough rudder to help the ailerons do their job. If this has ever happened to me, it was a situation that lasted for only an instant. If asked, I would say the KR's ailerons are effective enough to counter anything they might run into. > Jeff Scott lands with strong, often extreme crosswinds on a daily basis . . . so perhaps he would comment on whether winds ever overpower his ailerons. > *************** Since my name came up; sure, I'll comment. I have routinely operated my KR with crosswind components up to 15 knots for the last 20 years. At 7200' MSL, if you correct for the density altitude of typically 8 - 10,000', that trues the crosswind up to around 18 knots as my self imposed limit for sea level conditions, not including the gust factor. Generally speaking, if the crosswind factor is much in excess of 15 kts, or the gust factor is in excess of 25 kts, I'll go find a different airport. I haven't ever run out of aileron or rudder in my current configuration under those conditions, but this is really a matter of every KR handles differently because builders all modify the plane in varying degrees to suit themselves. I flew my KR 500 hours before I enlarged the horizontal stab, elevator, and rudder, and added large drag producing flaps. Prior to those modifications, my self imposed base crosswind limit was 10 kts. That meant that I missed out on a lot of flying days at my home airport, and periodically had to land at a different airport. After making those mods, I fly in pretty much the same conditions as most any other plane. As Mike alluded in his post, the plane is very vulnerable during that time you are transitioning from flying to rolling. Adding drag producing devices to help avoid floating, adding additional rudder to help to square up the plane in crosswinds, and adding a significantly larger horizontal stab and elevator to reduce PIO tendencies made my plane much easier to land and allowed me to increase my crosswind limits by 50%. IMHO, that's a significant increase. In very gusty winds, I simply add enough power to continue floating down the runway and land between the gusts. That's why drag producing devices are a necessity in those circumstances. I mentioned landing between the gusts at the Gathering a couple of weeks ago. I think the other pilots thought I was pulling their collective legs. My home airport is also a one way in and one way out airport, so landing with rear quartering crosswinds is also a common practice. A 15G25 wind that is coming across from about 30 - 60 degrees behind the wing is probably the most challenging as you lose rudder and elevator effectiveness at a point when you are still rolling fast enough that flight controls are really needed and the wind is trying to weather-vane you around backwards. As the winds get farther behind towards a tailwind, you spend a lot less energy fighting the crosswind, but will be landing really fast and will lose elevator and rudder effectiveness at a pretty high speed, so gusts from the rear will want to push the plane onto it's nose, which can make braking kind of exciting under those circumstances. FWIW, Los Alamos (KLAM) is now my "former" home airport. My KR and SuperCub have been relocated to their new home, I've sold my hangars, and will be moving shortly. -Jeff Scott Los Alamos, NM _______________________________________________ Search the KRnet Archives at https://www.mail-archive.com/krnet@list.krnet.org/. Please see LIST RULES and KRnet info at http://www.krnet.org/info.html. see http://list.krnet.org/mailman/listinfo/krnet_list.krnet.org to change options. To UNsubscribe from KRnet, send a message to krnet-le...@list.krnet.org
