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Old 11-01-2004 | 03:25 PM
  #17  
vypr
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From: Woodlands, TX
Default RE: How do you maiden your plane???

I do my own madiens, mostly because there is no one at my field that I trust more than myself. I see a lot of newer pilots that prefer to get someone to fly their planes first to take care of things if anything goes wrong, I have done this for a number of people.

As for my own way of doing maidens for my own planes: I prefer to do what I call a "shock test".

I take a plane up and trim it out. If anything seems amiss I land as best as possible and check it out. If everything works smoothly, I keep flying and start a progressive series of aerobatics randing from loops and rolls to test CG and setup to snaps and tumbling to shake the airframe really well.

All of this usually lasts for just a minute or two before I land again. I then take the hatch/wing off and check everything over. All servo screws, pushrods, etc. Usually I find at least one thing that needs to be tightened up after being shaken loose.

I repeat this for a few flights gradually lengthning them and fixing things as they occur until I trust the airframe for full duty.