Interesting observations rainedav, as just a casual observer of the pattern event for most of the last three decades (I flew a little pattern at the club level during the mid-seventies) I couldn't tell you if that's a better approach either. My guess though we be that if you had two different engines, and each produced two horsepower, the engine with the larger displacement will be "working" less and will generally last longer before something wears out or breaks. An extreme example might be the modern funny-car motors which are only good for one, quarter-mile zip down the track before a complete overhaul. I've only seen a couple two-meter planes at the field, I was amazed to learn they're only going through the maneuvers at about half throttle. The overall impression was that these machines were very refined, very specialized.

Neat stuff but not for me. To start a maneuver you need to be screaming out of a split S!



Bill Ervin (President, Cedar Yopantz Aircraft Co.)