I finally finished fixing (actually replacing the nose gear) on my Tiger 60. While I had it apart, I replaced the engine mount (Sullivan soft mount with those rubber shock pads that bolt to the firewall... the plate was slightly bent and I had a new one so I put that on and will straighten out the bent one and make that a spare) and put in a DX7 receiver. I also replaced the battery with a 6 volt. Ummm.. I think that's just about all I did to it.

Then I went out yesterday afternoon and re-maidened ;-) it.

Whatever you do, if you ever replace a receiver with a different brand like I did, remember that trims are never going to be the same. That's a function of the transmitter. This is not a harbinger of hard times, just a reminder. It was tricky at first yesterday, but successful. And on top of that.. that stupid wind.. more on that later.

That Super Tigre 75 started right up after laying around for almost a year. Good engine. No leaks. I checked the mixture after letting it run for about a minute to warm up and get the kinks out, and it did not need any adjustment. I walked over to the cross runway doing a range check and all was fine. I had more range than that, but that was much greater than the 100 feet recommended by Spektrum and it still took input.

Time to fly.

At takeoff, it would not lift off like it used to. It used to lift off on it's own. I had to pull quite a bit of elevator then immediately push over on the left aileron to get it to fly straight, then hold those stick positions while I climbed out and leveled out to adjust trim. It took all of the up elevator trim I had then I backed off about two or three clicks. That didn't leave much. Then it needed a good 8 to 10 clicks of right to get it to fly straight. Ah the fun we have when they are severely out of trim like that. I flew several orbits then I landed it to put in 30% expo. Wphew. And, while I was at it, I took out some elevator and aileron authority. Lowered the end points to 80%.

I had been using the RD6000 Airtronics with that plane before and don't recall it being that sensitive. Now that I think about it, I believe it's the difference in latency between the two radio systems.

On top of that was the wind. It wasn't really that bad at ground level but oh how things change once you get above the tree line. So, I flew one flight, landed, put in the exponential then immediately put it back up. Much much better. That plane does definitely fly different from my Venus II !!!

The prop on that engine was an old and chipped 13-8. I only had a 13-6 and a 13-10 as clean spares, so I put the 13-10 on. Not bad, but not ideal, for sure. I flew straight then pushed the throttle to full then pulled to do a stall turn. As I transitioned to vertical, the nose immediately yawed to the left. That took a good bit of right rudder to correct, but by that time I was out of air speed. That prop is not for that engine even with the tuned pipe (yeah, I know Ron, it's not tuned yet. Maybe one day we can tune that thing correctly). So, when I came around after the stall, the wind took over and it was all over the sky. So, I added throttle and flew out of that and back to the flying zone. Glad I didn't dead stick at that point. I did fly inverted several times to make sure all was ok before playing around, though.

Like I said, that ain't no Venus II !! And the Venus needs some work, right Ron? ha.. But, it was a good two flights, always enjoyable.

Landings were interesting with that wind. The plane did not want to come down.. sailed at about 20 feet for it seemd a long while until I started to nurse the elevator to bleed off air speed. Then it came down smoothly as that Tiger 60 always does. Makes a bad landing look good..ha.. not that it was bad or anything, but you know what I mean.

So, after two partial flights, I landed it and jeezzzz that damned nose gear turned 90ΒΊ again. Damn.. I replaced it because it was slightly bent and because I needed to put new linkage on the stupid thing and I guess I forgot to slot it for the set screw.

Rather than straightening it out again, I decided to defuel (what was left in the tank was about a thimble full..ha.. good timing on that one.. didn't want to dead-stick in that wind), clean it up, and head on home. There were to many things to readjust to play at the field, and besides, it was getting late and I needed to get home to have dinner before 6 PM. (doctor's orders.. eat dinner before 6 pm).

So, I will do all of the trim adjustments to get the TX trim back to 0 with all corrections in then, get a new prop, then the old Tiger 60 will be back to full potential. I love that plane!!!

Now if I could get that Tiger 120 weight situation in check...