Tuesday, November 6, 2012

Saturday, November 3, 2012 Beautiful Day at the Airport

I haven’t updated this log since August, mainly because there isn’t much to tell. I’ve been to the airport a couple of times still fighting the throttle cable problem, but in fairness, there’s been some lag in my enthusiasm about the JW lately. I guess I would call it a love-hate relationship. I keep saying that I should sell it, but no one would want buy it if they couldn’t see it demo’d?!? Richard and I have talked about the cable problem several times and he was convinced that we could make the old cable work, but after trying everything we could think of, it seemed like that cable was not allowing free movement of the throttle; either it would impede the opening up of the carburetor to full power, or oppose the return back to idle. Finally I made the decision to scrap that cable and replace it. After some research on the web, I was pointed to a company in Santa Ana, CA named MotionPros who make all kinds of cables. Since my cable was apparently custom fitted, the only recourse would be to have MotionPros duplicate the cable with the proper ends and housing. I pulled the cable off, packed it up with instructions to reproduce it increasing the length. The cost came to $35 plus shipping; spendy, but necessary. It took them awhile, but finally I received the new cable by UPS. Initially I wanted to have Bob come with me to install the new cable, but his priorities were skewed…he goes hunting every year and I couldn’t make him understand my problem was more important than his hunting with his hunting friends. So I asked Richard to meet me there and help me get that cable installed. Although I did not divulge to anyone my intentions, if the cable solved the throttle and acceleration problem with the engine, it was my plan to fly the bird. I went out to the airport about 10AM and began to tinker with the JW. I put the charger on the battery, tightened all the nuts and bolts, got the wing inflated (not easy, but got it done), and waited for Richard to arrive, which he did as planned at 2PM. For November (albeit early November), the weather was beautiful. Cool, about 40 degrees, but no wind. The conditions would have been very flyable, although it would have been too cold to be aloft for very long. My plan was to do only a couple of T&G’s just to build confidence that I could handle the JW. Richard is very thorough (a euphemism for SLOW) and he did more than just install the cable. The battery charger didn’t seem to charge the battery very well, but we got the engine running using the pull rope. It was the first time we’ve done that, and it worked OK, although I can’t imagine using that method to start the engine during actual flight. We spent probably an hour just running the engine, tuning the idling and checking out the new cable effectiveness, and testing the lower hand throttle with the control-bar throttle control. Everything worked better than ever before. I was exhilarated! One thing I’ve found about the Kawasaki two-cycle engine is that it is a little hard-starting, but once it runs and warms up, it starts like a champ every time. My method of operation in the future will be to get the JW started standing and facing the engine so I can get to the choke contol and primer pump, etc., but to then shut it down and then get the helmet on, strap myself in, and then start it seated in the seat. So after we had run the engine and Richard tuned the idle speed and mixture, I put the helmet on and got into the seat and did some taxiing around the area. I had learned from my previous disastrous experience to keep the speed under 20MPH, since lift-off is somewhere around 25MPH. It was a foreign feeling, and very uncomfortable. I attributed that to rust, but whatever, I didn’t have a “feel” for the aircraft, and after doing the taxiing for a half-hour or so, I decided today would not be the day for a test flight. It was getting late, the wind was picking up a little, it was turning cold, and I was tired. But now at least, I know that at any time I can go out there. start It up, and taxi as much as I need to get the “feel” of it on the ground before I try another take-off run. Another goal is to try to find a hanger so I can leave the JW set up rather than having to inflate the wing every time. It sure would be great to be able to go out there, open the hanger, taxi out and fly!