Flight Testing the Stall

On a beautiful morning at 10:30 I was able to get out for a test flight to find the stall characteristics of my rebuilt Q2.  We took off on runway 26 in calm air and headed north for about 30 miles.  My friend Jeff alongside in his Citabria acted as a safety pilot in case of issues.  I felt much comfort having him along to watch over me.  As we headed north and out of the control space of Calgary, I began a series of forced stalls at various power settings.  The plane is behaving as it did when I purchased it, stall speeds were a constant 68-70 mph.  The characteristics were also as expected where the forward wing would just mush downward then pick up a few mph, rise and repeat over and over.  Very little wing drop would occur and it could be controlled with rudder and some aileron.  This is just as the canards are supposed to behave and this one is no exception.  My purpose was to find out exactly when the canard was loosing lift and control.  This test would show where my absolute minimums on landing in the flare should be.  I am very pleased with my results.  Our return trip southbound allowed for some more stall tests with a following wind and confirmed previous numbers.  I probably completed over 20 stall tests on this day, a very good day.  Total flight time was 1 hour in the air and all temperature and pressures stayed nicely within limits.  I have a radio static noise problem still occurring and found a small leak from one valve cover which will need a new gasket.  Short flights with accompanying aircraft will be recorded as I spread my wings further from home base.

Flight Test after Rear Wing re-Alignment

Yahoo...Yahoo...10:00 am I had all things checked and rechecked on the Quickie Q2 with all paperwork in order.  It was time to test fly my plane once again after resetting the angle on the back wing.  The flight of one circuit using the 5000 ft runway at Springbank Airport (elevation 3960 ft) went fantastic and I could not be happier with the results of my modification.  It flew hands off the stick with only slight adjustment to the pitch trim.  The moment arm of the T-tail being so far back offers super adjustment to pitch in takeoff and landing profiles as well as cruise.  It should prove to be very effective at adjusting for different weight loading options.  Next step is to do a one hour flight over the airport and check pressures, temps, rpm and stall speed characteristics.  Following flights will be circuits to practice landings and experiment with heavier loading.