What happened to the Maule?

[phonic_monkey 0]

I'll also give that a go tomorrow.

[DreadMetis 5]

Can it be that it has something to do with the auto-mixture On/ Off ? I'll give it a try tomorrow !

 

I did many clandestine flights, one heavy freight and one sanitary flight, all with automixture on, and most of them using checklists / auto-checklists. I'll try using only manual stuff with a heavy load (still in kgs when it should announce lbs though...).

[LAdamson 240]

Full Power doesn`t mean full speed!!!!

It`s like shifting gears in a car: 1st gear lots of power but not that much speed, 6th gear lots of speed but not that much power.

 

Actually, is does mean full speed. To make the aircraft fly the fastest possible, the throttle (MP) will be full forward, and the prop (blue knob) will be full forward or pulled back just slightly.........as in 2650 rpm instead of 2700 rpm readline. What's different from a car at this point, is that the prop is still close to 2700 rpm, as it is for takeoff..........but now the blades are at a courser pitch, than they were for takeoff. It's the prop governor setting the blade angle, while the pilot just sets preferred RPMs. As to full power, as altitude is gained, available power percentages go down, unless there is turbo/supercharging (which keeps them up to higher altitudes).

 

Some (real) RV6 stuff. Some RV's do have aileron trim. Nice for fuel and passenger balance, but stick loads are still light, without it. Most 6's just have a bent tab (Cessna type) for rudder......which is set for cruise speed. With the 6, a fair amount of right rudder is required for takeoff & initial climb. With airspeed picking up quickly, it doesn't take a lot of rudder thoughout the climb.

 

L.Adamson

[LAdamson 240]

EDIT

Wow part 2: at 8000 feet, RPM at 100% and trimmed to climb 500 ft a minute, speed dropped to below 60 knots and almost into a stall. Simply bringing back RPM back to 70% brought speed up to (after a while) 100 knots... at 10.000 feet and climbing 500 ft/pm! What a difference.

 

Yes, that's not right. For the fastest climb, rpm would again be full forward, along with full throttle. If I'm in cruise, and want to do some fast climbing, I'll slightly pull on the stick, to load the engine, while pushing the prop lever full forward. Then I'll push the throttle full forward, if it wasn't already (which it usually isn't) This is for an RV, but would apply to the Maule.

 

L.Adamson

[Sigma54 0]

Ok, I will check the weather. And it's nice that the load has a greater impact. I am doing a hospital job now, 17 kts headwind and at 5000 feet I can get a speed between 100 and 120 knots, providing I change the mixture.

 

Another thing: those nose and bank trims... I had to apply rudder all the freakin' time, so I decided to assign keys to those two new trim options. The bank trim doesn't seem to do anything at all, but the nose trim does: it banks the plane... However, apart from the bank indicator there is no trimindicator anywhere (not that I can see) so I don't know how much I am trimming and I also don't see an option to center the trim...? How am I supposed to know when the trim is centered again? Or do I, from now on, also constantly have to set the right nose trim...? I am a bit confused here.

 

I was having the same problem before the update when I was overloaded due to fuel. Of course, it's more difficult to lose cargo or passengers than to lose fuel! A few days ago, I added a request for more incremental rudder trim to the bug/wishlist.

 

I'm not an expert at all so I may be wrong but it does make some sense to me that the 'max power' and 'max speed' rpm settings would have to be different at different altitudes. Given the change in air density, it would seem that at higher altitude, having a lower rpm might be better otherwise the propeller would be mostly pushing empty space and, in order to make up for this, the propeller would require a greater angle of attack, even at low speed, to make up for this.

 

Kind of goes with of keeping a 100 to 1 ratio between RPM to MP that RoboRay mentions... as you increase in altitude while maintaining the same throttle setting, MP goes down and, based on that rule, RPM should come down as well.

[Azone 39]

Maybe you or someone else could test this? Take off with 4 passengers, climb at a constant (as possible) 500 fpm rate at full RPM, then bring RPM back to 70% and trim back to a 500 fpm rate: what's the difference in speed?

 

BTW I don't quite like it that the planes are changed with every upgrade. And I also think it's odd we aren't told so... The release notes say NOTHING about planes being updated or changed but they clearly are...

 

I noticed the same thing this morning. I had a 900 pound clandestine flight that was dragging along at 110 knots. I ran through the cruise on the checklist which changed the RPMs and bang I was up to 140 at the same alttitude.

 

They definitely changed some characteristics on the Maule.

[Lethalgoat 0]

Does this mean my saitek issues are more than just me improperly trimming...

[LHookins 3,109]

I just did a few flights in the Maule. First one just pilot and full fuel, aircraft acted normal. Second was a short care flight hop, 2 passengers, max takeoff weight (about 50% fuel). Third was a long flight with 3 passengers and 50% fuel, so about 200 pounds overloaded. Both these flights showed the same performance I was getting before the last update.

 

Generally I'll set the throttle at 17 inches Hg, prop at 2300, mixture at 8 gal/hr. This puts me right at 125-128 knots, top of the green arc.

 

So far I can't tell any difference. Next flight will be way overloaded to see if I can find any changes.

 

Hook

[dburne 2]

So far I can't tell any difference. Next flight will be way overloaded to see if I can find any changes.

 

I just flew an app 860 lb Cargo job , and again I don't know that I am seeing any difference either. I set my prop rpm down to about 2300 as well, and my mixture around 46% whatever that comes out to be, which is what I normally set them to. I still attained about my same cruising speed as I normally would get, around 144 knots.

[Guest]

Generally I'll set the throttle at 17 inches Hg, prop at 2300, mixture at 8 gal/hr. This puts me right at 125-128 knots, top of the green arc.

17 inches....? Isn't that very low...? I am used to keeping MP somewhere around RPM... And 8 gal/hr: I suppose you mean 18?

[RoboRay 126]

The Maule sips fuel if you throttle back and really lean it out. I don't think I ever got it that low in a cruise, though. I was sucking down about 11gph when I flew down to Johnston Atoll at 15,000'. I could have reduced that by throttling back.

 

 

But I normally cruise with MP at 22'ish and RPM 2250'ish. That gives me a speed around 145'ish knots. I typically fly at just 3500' or 4500' depending on which way I'm going, unless I need to clear terrain, so I don't need to lean much. I'll climb higher for longer (+100nm) flights.

[HiFlyer 9,371]

I is getting so confuzzled........... :Monkey:

[Brett_Henderson 5]

EDIT

Wow part 2: at 8000 feet, RPM at 100% and trimmed to climb 500 ft a minute, speed dropped to below 60 knots and almost into a stall. Simply bringing back RPM back to 70% brought speed up to (after a while) 100 knots... at 10.000 feet and climbing 500 ft/pm! What a difference.

 

 

Just a snapshot observation.... If you takeoff full-rich, climb to 8000msl without leaning, you'll be flying at a grossly ineficient air/fuel ratio. "Bringing back" RPM will reduce thrust even further..

 

However, at 8000msl and running way rich, an aprox 30% reduction in mixture WILL yield significantly more power (nearer to optimal air/fuel ratio). Your scenario suggests you've confused mixture with prop-control ?

 

To keep us all on the same page... let's refer to RPM settings, as RPMs as seen on the tachometer.. and refer to throttle-settings as MP as seen on the MP gauge.

 

Mixture settings suffer from the eternal MS bug, in that fuel-flow is not accurtely represented (until on the lean side of optimal) on the fuel-flow gauge, and the EGT gauge (best reference for discussing mixture settings), is slow to respond.. which is actually realistic.

 

SO, as we discuss performance scenarios, we'll assume that the pilot has leaned for a fuel-flow peak, at any given altitude (or, auto-mixture is set.. ugh).

 

Also.. climbing targets in light singles (especially at altitude), should be an airspeed (somewhere between; Vx(best-angle), and Vy(best-rate).. not a vertical speed (i.e.. 500fpm). Maintaining a vertical-speed during a climb WILL land you near stall-speed..

 

And finally... totally divorce yourself from the idea that the prop-control(blue), sets a prop blade angle..ala the dread 'gear-shift' analogy. Constant-speed prop function is a discussion unto itself, best left to its own thread.. For scenarios in this thread, all we need to know is that the prop-control sets a constant RPM (constant speed **wink**)..

[Guest]

Thanks for the observation.

 

- I wasn't confusing mixture with prop-control. I am no expert in all this, but I do know the difference.

 

- Also, in order to test this, I did set mixture to auto (because I find it impossible in Flight to set the mixture the way I want to: normally however I do manually control it, but not exact: I just pull back the mixture somewhere to the middle at a certain altitude...).

 

- The next time I will post RPM in numbers and not percentages: good one.

 

- And the tip about climbing at airspeed instead of maintaining a certain vertical-speed is noted: lesson learned!

 

I am amazed at how much I don't know yet, really...

[HiFlyer 9,371]

Some (combining a few common rants) "Stupid game for Xbox children" huh?

 

Its a safe bet that many of the new fliers buzzing and swooping happily around Hilo are taking into account very little, if any of this, nor do they have to. On the other hand, those inclined to do so can find a lot to play with.

 

I think in that regard, if not for their communication or marketing skills, Flight and Microsoft deserve recognition for honoring their stated intent of striving for an experience with diverse appeal.