Heh. That would be an interesting choice for a trainer -a Beech 18
for quite an eccentric individual!
btw thanks for your tips on flying the Beech 18! How
I land it (on wheels and pavement) is to keep the tail
up as long as possible, then gently lower the tail at the
slowest possible groundspeed - you're really just taxiing
by then.
What I didn't expect - but is obvious in retrospect -
was the yaw for the right ditch, when the tail came
down. But of course, those big metal props create
gyrosopic precession ... lowering the tail is equivalent
to pushing on the bottom of both prop discs when
viewed from behind, and with the clockwise rotation
of the R-985 (again, viewed from behind) the gyroscopic
90 degree lag is equivalent to pushing on the left side
of the prop discs (again, from behind) which creates
the yaw to the right.
Obviously, you can reduce the effect if you lower
the tail slowly, with minimal RPM.
It's the exact opposite of what happens on takeoff,
when you raise the tail - you need to feed in the left
engine, to oppose the yaw to the left.
Interesting aircraft!
I do aerobatics with exactly the same engine and HUGE
metal prop on the 450hp Stearman. You wouldn't believe
how much forward stick it needs, during a hammerhead!
For obvious reasons, maneuvers involving high rates
of yaw and pitch change are NOT a good idea with
the 450hp Stearman - no snap rolls, no tailslides, no
torque rolls, etc. I was told of a fellow who didn't
observe such precautions, and when the crankshaft
finally (but not unexpectedly) broke, the props blades
came down into the cockpit - I presume he was yawing
left at the time - and decapitated him, which I guess is
one way of the machinery telling you that it's pissed at
you overstressing it.
