[NSRCA-discussion] Happy New Year

[Jon Lowe]

Unfortunately, I'm old enough to remember the "brake of the week" to 
successfully complete the taxi back to hanger maneuver.  There were 
actually drum brakes with phenolic brake shoes available that worked 
about as well as you'd expect on a nose wheel soaked by oil from fuel.  
Later came partially self actuating springs wrapped around a drum 
turned by the nose wheel, pulled on by a piece of monofilament fishing 
line actuated by the elevator servo on down elevator.  By the time I 
first flew pattern, that "maneuver" was thankfully gone.

Speaking of old manuevers, at one time a power dive was in the pattern 
sequence.  Yep, a straight down dive under full power, sort of the 
opposite of the vertical line on center in the current sportsman 
routine.  More than a few airplanes met their maker with elevator 
flutter ripping off the tail.

Now remember, I was born very young, so all of this happened when I was 
about -10 years old, and Ron was already about 50!


Jon Lowe


-----Original Message-----
From: Ron Van Putte <vanputte at cox.net>
To: General pattern discussion <nsrca-discussion at lists.nsrca.org>
Sent: Wed, 7 Jan 2009 6:21 pm
Subject: Re: [NSRCA-discussion] Happy New Year









Yeah, and the landing and taxi back to the box were scored too.  That 
was right after dirt was invented, but before the round wheel was 
invented. 
 

Ron VP 
 
=0
A