Corkey's Plane Talk

OK, OK, OK, I got your Emails, phone calls and Facebook messages. No one was more disappointed than I that the Fury and I didn’t make OSH. I did call Bob Hoover, Burt Rutan, Tom P. and sponsors, explaining our situation and was comforted in their understanding. I’m not a politician so I won’t blame it on someone or anything. We are a great team at LoPresti. Our team had a few problems we were unable to overcome in repainting the Fury. As we got into the prep, we realized how much paint was on the Fury. I believe we all heard Peggy and Roy LoPresti saying “DO IT RIGHT” so we stripped it to the metal. The major problem was finding the right stripper as there were several coats of different color paint and the bottom coat seemed to be an epoxy of some sort. Bet you we took off more than 80 LBS. of paint. Yep, it will now be red where it was yellow and yellow where it was red. The paint is a special Sherwin-Williams paint which, in sunlight, is supposed to appear as if it is electrified, making your eyes spin, your socks go up and down, give you Fury fever and kiss your girlfriend. Yes I know, I have already gotten many questions as to why the change, that the Fury really stood out in yellow, it was different etc. Well the truth is, other than the Boss’s words, I don’t know why we changed it but it’s red like a Ferrari and I love Ferraris hahahahaha.

We have a number of events and air shows coming up starting the end of September. The AOPA Summit in Hartford where we’ll once again participate in the Legends dinner and do several interviews on AOPA Live. Air shows include the CAF show in Midland, TX, the Sertoma show (oh, the great food) in Lafayette, LA, the November First Saturday show at our facility in Sebastian, FL, plus several others.

ALL AIRPLANES HAVE AN UNRECOVERABLE SPIN MODE

It is with a sad and heavy heart that I go into this next subject. I lost another friend this past weekend. Bryan Jensen at an air show in KA. Bryan was an excellent pilot, full of energy and passion for life. While we don’t know exactly what happened, from what was described to me it sounds spin related. So with that, and the thoughts of conversions with Art Scholl, Randy Gagne, Dean Ortner, Bulldog, Bob Herendeen and visions of a P-51, T6, Pitts S2, Decathlon, J3 Cub and a few others spinning in, I lay this comment on you.

ALL AIRPLANES HAVE AN UNRECOVERABLE SPIN MODE

That statement was told to me by several NASA, foreign spin experts and Bob Hoover. Now I know I will get many comments pro and con, on this subject, I REALLY DON’T CARE, for I have been there. I have witnessed and participated in unrecoverable spin modes. I don’t mean for this to sound cold or harsh but to bring some to reality and hopefully save someone’s ass. It makes my stomach tight after an accident to hear “He must have passed out, you can’t spin a Cub in” or “Oh he was such a great pilot, he couldn’t have spun in, he must have had a heart attack!” Yeah, he had a heart attack just before he hit the ground. Leave yourself a way out.

Mid 1970’s Newton, KA. As I sat on the phone with Bob Hoover chewing my ass out for doing spin testing, I relived the day’s events. We were doing spin testing on the GAW 2 airfoil for NASA who had several other foreign agencies involved. Seth Anderson of NASA was a great guy and laid out the program. The story is too long to go into here, so I will give you the short version. Bobby and I were testing, trading off every other day, our turn in the barrel. On the day before Bobby bailed, I found some traits I didn’t like. When I finally got theBD5J to break into a spin it was like a P-51 Mustang, i.e. it snapped inverted, then the nose came upright flat for approximately half a turn then snapped again. I rolled into it, dumped the nose when it was pointed down and recovered. Because of the size of the BD5J they didn’t want us using a spin chute because they felt it would not give the info needed due to the size and location of the spin chute. Now I must admit, it took unbelievable and unknown inputs to even get the GAW wing to break into a stall. It would pitch nose up and down violently about 8 KTS. above stall speed. It was actually asking you, “DO YOU REALLY WANT TO DO THIS?” Test pilot Les Bervin added that if it does spin and you can’t recover, throw the gear out and add full power. These will pitch the nose down.

A good friend, Pierre Beaux, test pilot on the Concord, was with me in my V35 Bonanza as we followed Bobby out to the test site. At approximately 14,500 FT. he started the test. What a sight. After being through it the day before I couldn’t believe how much it bucked up and down. It finally broke on Bob and around he went, yep like I had experienced. After several turns he initiated recovery only to see it go flat and accelerate spinning like a top. Pierre and I were nose down, flaps and gear out telling Bob his altitude and to get out. The only other words spoken by myself or Pierre was I said “Shit” and he said “SHEEEET.” Bob stood up in the cockpit, leaned over the nose pushing on it trying to get it down. That didn’t work so he was going to step on the wing to lean further forward. The second he stepped onto the wing and out of the center of gravity he was thrown out of the spin as if by ejection seat. The 5J stayed flat as it spun to the ground landing flat in a farm pond. By radio I directed our crew to Bob’s location and stayed on station till they arrived to help Bob.

I took Bob Hoover’s words to heart as he had passed so much useful information to me over the years. I listened as he explained that each turn the airplane steps further out, that eventually the centrifugal forces are more than the aerodynamics can handle and you’re locked in. That during true testing, never been done before, you should always have a way out other than just a chute. Yes it all made sense to me.

During the filming of “Top Gun” Art talked to me about the inverted spin sequence, Clay Lacy and I recommended he hang the camera under his helo and peddle push it for the shot. Art use to argue with me all the time that he could get out of any spin, as did my friend Randy Gagne and several others. All I could do was tell of my experiences. I have talked to several air show performers who asked me to critique their shows. I’ve cautioned them about multiple snap-rolls on the down line, that they won’t always recover as they plan or wish. I have lost several to this. A snap-roll is equal to the third turn of a spin which is the factor used to determine a developed spin, three turns.

I no longer do spins, but I believe all pilots should be exposed to them given the proper instructor, altitude and equipment. So, if it makes me seem less macho, so be it. I love life and seem to get into enough exciting situations without creating them. I joke about a yellow streak up my back, that it gets so big sometimes that I could make it into raincoat. That yellow streak is made up of others’ and my experiences. It keeps me alive.

Get a yellow streak up your back!

Check 6,
“Corkey”