12/14/2007

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The weather has been lousy for the last week. Ceilings have been low enough to be IFR or winds have been above my personal (and still conservative) limits.

I have had suspicions that the weight and balance of N188LC wasn't right. It showed the CG to be at about 81.5". 78" seems more typical for an RV-8 configured like mine. A couple of days ago I leveled the plane and put a bathroom scale under the tail wheel. It showed 61 lbs. The official weight and balance document shows 91 lbs.

I took the plane back to the place that initially weighed N188LC. They very kindly agreed to re-weigh it at no charge. The result was that the nose is now 30 lbs heavier than the tail. I can't think of anything to account for this other than some kind of error happened during the first weighing.

In any event, this is good news. It is now a lot easier to load the plane to maximum gross weight without exceeding the CG limits. The timing is good as well since I am about to start testing with weight in the back. I have purchased several 50 lbs playground sand bags. I will build up to it slowly but eventually I want to fly the plane at gross weight at the CG limits.

I put a sliver of aluminum tape where #1 cylinder's fins are close to the baffling. I did this to bring #1 CHT in line with the others. Now, it the weather would just cooperate, I will test fly it.

A couple of nights ago I adjusted the landing and taxi lights so that the taxi light pointed down as low as possible and the landing light pointed up so that it lit up the runway when the plane had the tail off the ground. I then did a taxi test in the pitch dark. The first thing that became readily apparent was that I do not have enough interior lighting. I had to count switches (which I have memorized) to turn the various appliances on. Also, while taxiing the landing light was useless. I could not see unlighted taxiways on the left side. I had to stop, open the canopy and strain my eyeballs.

I talked to another RV8tor and his advice was that both lights pointing down low works well not only for taxiing but us sufficient for landing. I followed this advice and lowered the landing light. I also ordered more LED lighting for the interior.

This is about as far as I will take lighting until after phase 1. My flight limitations are for day VFR only while in phase 1.