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Old 11-21-2005 | 03:44 PM
  #9  
msiminoff
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Joined: Oct 2005
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From: Palo Alto, CA
Default RE: SIG Rascal 40 (forty) with flaps ?

Yes.. I have a report, unfortunately it's not a pretty one;
This past Saturday was a magnificent day at the flying field. Quiet, 70 degrees, zero wind. It was the 11th flight for the Rascal and my third flight of the morning. I was really having fun practicing knife edges and spins, the Rascal was flying like a champ! As I was making a fairly low pass from left to right when an older gent' flying his T-34 at at least twice the speed I was flying. flew up my tailfeathers and slammed into me from behind. It was a devastating midair that resulted in both planes fluttering to the ground in a heap of balsa. Sadly, my Rascal is not repairable... major damage to the fuselage and both wing halfs.

Our flying club has a no-fault rule with regard to mid-airs, which is fine with me (after all it's just an airplane), but the old ******* didn't have the common courtesy to apologize... and he was obviously the one who caused the crash. That part has me pretty upset.

Anyway, the Rascal Forty was a FANTASTIC plane and a pleasure to fly, and somedy I will get another one... but it's time for a change so I stopped by my local hobbby shop on the way home from the field and picked up a new plane... a Hangar 9 Funtana 40 ARF.

As far as the flaps/airbrake on the Rascal, here's what I did:
I set up a three position switch on my radio with both flaps (mid position) and airbrakes (third position). With the flaps down the Rascal could fly along at a snail's-pace. I could easily land at speeds slower than a walk. Once on the ground I flipped the switch to the third position (ailerons up, elevator up) to keep it planted on the runway. This was especially helpful at faster landing speeds. This is the setup I used:

Flaps:
Right Aileron +70% (down)
Left Aileron +60% (down)
Elevator +14 (up)
(right and left aileron were different to get the plane to trim correctly with flaps down)

Airbrake:
Elevator +90% (up)
Flaps -80% (up)

Happy flying
-Mark