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david(at)mcgirt.net
Guest

Posted: Tue Oct 30, 2007 12:34 pm Post subject: yak 50

For what it is worth, there has been a great deal of good discussions about tail wheels, and how that works in the existing systems and training.  It is worth noting , many of the “old” military standards have been forgotten by most former and current pilots, as they never fly anything but a nose dragger.. Thus, these habits and opinions are hard to break.  That being said, the FAST documents continue to grow and address the mass population that we are ( Tail draggers, nose draggers, Jet’s , etc.. )  I know my world was enlightened the first time my tail came down, and the world around me I could see became really small...  

 

   FAST is meant to be a baseline we can all have to work from , most of you are far superior pilots, and would never need this baseline ( all you fighter pilots.. Hehe ), but for the rest of us mortals that do not strap a G suit on in the morning, it is a great reference for safety, and should be used as a PART of your safe flying – use your brain for the other PART.. 

 

 If you have not read the manual in a while, and I am pretty damn sure that is 90% of us..  Read it, there is a lot of hard work and lessons learned in there now.

 

 Just my .02 , I am glad the two guys that bumped walked away safely, and we are able to have a good discussion and learn from this.  We fly for fun, and like to come home alive, FAST is a means to that end.. Not the only way..

 

 David McGirt

 Yak 52 TW

 

 

 

 

 On 10/30/07 3:59 PM, "viperdoc" <viperdoc(at)mindspring.com> wrote:

 

  	  Quote: 	
		  Agree Blitz.

 Doc

  

 

 From: owner-yak-list-server(at)matronics.com [mailto:owner-yak-list-server(at)matronics.com] ([email]owner-yak-list-server(at)matronics.com][/email]) On Behalf Of ByronMFox(at)aol.com

 Sent: Tuesday, October 30, 2007 2:40 PM

 To: yak-list(at)matronics.com

 Subject: Re: Re: yak 50

  

 I've been reading through the new FAST formation manual that is now available for download on the RPA's web site. It is very comprehensive and an excellent guide to safe formation flying. Drew Blahnick and the RPA's FAST check pilots have done a superb job of drawing together decades of hard won knowledge gained by Navy and Air Force flight training.   ...Blitz

 

 

 *********************** 

  

  

 http://www.matronics.com/Navigator?Yak-List

 http://forums.matronics.com

  

 

 

 ail Forum -

 ">http://www.matronics.com/Navigator?Yak-List

 ; - NEW MATRONICS WEB FORUMS -

 matronics.com

 

 

 	


         [quote][b]

djester(at)gjtbs.com
Guest

Posted: Tue Oct 30, 2007 12:58 pm Post subject: yak 50

Walt your points are well taken.  I think the key here is that you flew

twenty years of 4 plane T-6 AIRSHOWS with hundreds of formation

landings.  Most formation pilots do not have that type of experience.

In many instances, formation pilots are lucky if they fly formation a

few times per year.  The axiom better safe than sorry should apply.  I

won't fly in formation with someone that I am unsure of.  I damn sure am

not going to land in section with someone who hasn't trained extensively

to do so and with whom I am not familiar.  I used to do section landing

with two plus tail draggers, but no more.  This year during the warbird

show at Oshkosh I was almost a victim of an inexperienced pilot who lost

directional control on rollout and cut another landing airplane off.

The pilot who was cutoff firewalled his ship and staggered into the air

over my airplane.  If that had been a section landing both planes would

have been toast.  God knows what would have happened to the pilots.  We

fly for fun here and I want to bring me and my airplane back to the

hanger each night in one piece.            



 



dave jester



________________________________



From: owner-yak-list-server(at)matronics.com

[mailto:owner-yak-list-server(at)matronics.com] On Behalf Of Walter Lannon

Sent: Tuesday, October 30, 2007 12:26 PM

To: yak-list(at)matronics.com

Subject: Re: yak 50



 



Geez!! good thing I did not know that.



 



We managed twenty years of 4 plane Harvard (T6) airshow formation work

with hundreds of formation landings, two plane mostly but many times 4

(in finger) if runway width was adequate.



If crosswind conditions dictated we used an alternating (left/right)

stream landing with about 2 sec. separation over the button.



 



In all cases these were, of course, wheel landings. Somehow in our

ignorance we managed not to scratch anything - amazing!



 



Walt 



	---

david(at)mcgirt.net
Guest

Posted: Tue Oct 30, 2007 1:00 pm Post subject: yak 50

 Walt, be nice  you know Harvard¹s are notoriously easy to land, have

plenty of rudder, and have a clear view ahead when you put the tail down...

We are talking about real tail wheel airplanes here..



( OK PEOPLE  I am joking...  I fly a tailwheel, thus I felt the need.. Hehe

)



To Walts  and other points  When I fly with my regular crew  we are all

tail wheels, we can land any way we BRIEF.. And we continue to do so safely

djester(at)gjtbs.com
Guest

Posted: Tue Oct 30, 2007 1:18 pm Post subject: yak 50

Well said David...the key is the level of training and competence of

your "group."  I hope that when my TD gets here in April 08 I have a

regular set of people to train with many times each year.  I too fly a

tail dragger and am fast lead qualified through JLFC.  Not many

birdoggers around here to fly with.  I did a three ship for memorial

day.  I did not know one of the pilots.  He landed as a single ship.

The gent I regularly fly with and I landed as an element.  Of course

there is a greater margin for safety when you land about as fast as my

grandma crosses the street.     



 



Post script:  I did not know Texans were easy to land, the ones I have

flown must have been crooked or something.       



 



dave jester



________________________________



From: owner-yak-list-server(at)matronics.com

[mailto:owner-yak-list-server(at)matronics.com] On Behalf Of David McGirt

Sent: Tuesday, October 30, 2007 3:59 PM

To: yak-list(at)matronics.com

Subject: Re: yak 50



 



 Walt, be nice - you know Harvard's are notoriously easy to land, have

plenty of rudder, and have a clear view ahead when you put the tail

down...  We are talking about real tail wheel airplanes here..   



( OK PEOPLE - I am joking...  I fly a tailwheel, thus I felt the need..

Hehe )



To Walts - and other points - When I fly with my regular crew - we are

all tail wheels, we can land any way we BRIEF.. And we continue to do so

safely.  As a standard goes, I think the FAST way, is a great standard

for when a group of people come together , fly together, and fly safe.

Many do not understand the details of the differences, and that common

FAST standard attempts to remove that knowledge requirement, but making

the evolution match the most dissimilar aircraft ( being a tail wheel in

this case..)



Walt - you should get a TW, it is like a T6, but with training wheels on

the ground.. 



David

On 10/30/07 1:25 PM, "Walter Lannon" <wlannon(at)persona.ca> wrote:



Geez!! good thing I did not know that.

 

We managed twenty years of 4 plane Harvard (T6) airshow formation work

with hundreds of formation landings, two plane mostly but many times 4

(in finger) if runway width was adequate.

If crosswind conditions dictated we used an alternating (left/right)

stream landing with about 2 sec. separation over the button.



In all cases these were, of course, wheel landings. Somehow in our

ignorance we managed not to scratch anything - amazing!



Walt 

---

hkgibby(at)yahoo.com
Guest

Posted: Tue Oct 30, 2007 1:23 pm Post subject: yak 50

I'll second that!!!



Hank Gibson

"Hoot"

CJ/Jax, Fl

Sent via BlackBerry from T-Mobile



--

mark.bitterlich(at)navy.m
Guest

Posted: Tue Oct 30, 2007 3:04 pm Post subject: yak 50

Dave, many people in this world live for doing things that others would

consider to be less than safe.  The list is endless, and I am not going

to insult you by listing examples.  



Any time anyone has an accident doing one of the many things that we are

not listing here, it then becomes very easy for someone to say the very

exact same thing that you did.  I.E. "That doesn't seem safe to me, why

were they doing that?"



There probably are a lot of better answers to this than mine, but I'll

give it a shot:  Because they enjoy doing it very much, what they were

doing was above board and legal, AND they trained very hard to do it as

safely as they could, but in the process something went wrong and there

was an accident. 



I for one am very sorry there was an accident at all, but am extremely

happy that no one was hurt, and as an American will support them

wholeheartedly when they hop into another aircraft and try to do it

again tomorrow.  The ability to take certain risks in life is in my mind

what makes life worth living.  



Of course everyone is entitled to his or her own opinion, and that is

also what makes this country great. 



Respectfully, 



Mark Bitterlich

 

   



--

dsavarese(at)elmore.rr.co
Guest

Posted: Tue Oct 30, 2007 3:25 pm Post subject: yak 50

Also well said Mark.

Dennis

---

mark.bitterlich(at)navy.m
Guest

Posted: Tue Oct 30, 2007 3:47 pm Post subject: yak 50

Dave, if you don't feel comfortable doing ANYTHING, you shouldn't do it.

I feel comfortable section landing my YAK-50 with any number of other

aircraft.  I have done it, I continue to do it, and will do it tomorrow

and the next day, as long as I know the person who is lead.  I am much

more worried flying a section to landing as lead than I am as wingman by

the way.  



Of course I have my own limitations.  They deal with wind speed and

direction over the deck, the performance capabilities of the airplane I

am flying with, the experience and knowledge of the other guy, how many

times we have done it together, etc., etc.  



Sometimes I say yes, sometimes I say no.  I am sure that the two guys

who touched each other are now wishing they would have said no.  I am

also quite sure they will learn from it and be safer pilots in the

future.  



I hear you loud and clear when you say that you are not passing

judgment, my only question would be... If you WERE passing judgment,

what would be different in what you have already said?  



Respectfully, 



Mark Bitterlich

--

djester(at)gjtbs.com
Guest

Posted: Tue Oct 30, 2007 4:11 pm Post subject: yak 50

Mark:  I guess what I am inartfully saying is that I do not know the circumstances surrounding the accident.  Nothing is certain in our flying and accidents do occur.  What you are comfortable and competent in should control.  Although there are people that I trust and do section land with in my birddog, I can count those people on one hand.  I agree that I would have to know my flight lead very well before I would do it.  There is a risk in that as well,  but I love formation flying and I will continue to do so.  I apoligize if anyone took my comments as questioning the skill and competence of the pilots at issue. 

 

 ---

mark.bitterlich(at)navy.m
Guest

Posted: Tue Oct 30, 2007 4:27 pm Post subject: yak 50

Dave, I didn't think you were, but I also think that some could have interpreted it that way, thus my comments.  



By the way, I think a Birddog in it's own way can be harder to land than a YAK-50.  Yes, it has better vis., but it also has this rather strange habit of skating around on those gear legs that some of it's bigger cousins, such as the 180 series does not!  I'd feel more skittish formation landing your airplane than a 50... Seriously.  



I almost purchased one of those aircraft by the way... A version called the "Mountaineer".  Had a 260HP motor in it, from the factory!  Hold on to that L-19, it's a real prize. 



Mark Bitterlich

 



--

mark.bitterlich(at)navy.m
Guest

Posted: Tue Oct 30, 2007 5:00 pm Post subject: yak 50

Trust one who has been there and done that and has the tea-shirt.  There

is no winning this line of conversation.  Everyone has their own

opinions about it, everyone is very sure they are right and the other

person is wrong and it really opens the biggest can of worms that can be

imagined on Planet Earth.  



After months of debate, here is what I learned to be the case ... For me

anyway: 



1.  FAST has the authority to set any rule they want to in order to

receive their certifications. 

2.  Not one single person in the world must pay any attention to these

rules, unless they want to participate in an event that requires said

FAST certification and thus desire to go get that certification

themselves.  People can fly formation over 99.9999% of the Earth's

surface without any FAST card what-so-ever, and in many cases do so more

safely than FAST card holders themselves.  Witness the most recent

YAK-50 collision.  

3.  The FAA could care less about formation, who, what, where, or why..

Until somebody goes killing a lot of people all at once, or even comes

CLOSE to killing a lot of people all at once, at which time the hammer

will fall, no matter who wrote the last FAST manual.

4.  FAST was created by guys out there flying their airplanes in

formation for fun, and decided to try to do so as safely as possible and

thus created their own little "Clique Certification Program".  They did

this so well that now a lot of people demand that a pilot have this

non-regulatory-certification in order to do certain things at certain

places.  

5.  It is also true that sometimes certain folks who control the FAST

program go a little bit too far in certain aspects, and in fact set

rules and requirements that have little to do with safety and instead

have lots to do with "image".  However, after all they are human too,

and heck... most pilots in this world just LOVE to "look good" anyway!



The above about covers 100,000 words and about 6 months worth of some

very serious arguments, which yours truly was very guilty of by the way.

Mark Bitterlich

    





--

viperdoc(at)mindspring.co
Guest

Posted: Tue Oct 30, 2007 8:10 pm Post subject: yak 50

Forget this nonsense! It was written in hast without much thought. BS! 

Sometimes engaging ones fingers before engaging brain in hast will other multiple tasks are pulling on you at the same time leads to inserting ones head in the dark orifice. It to such nonsense!

Ignore it! Intellagent thought left the room on this one! It is a time distance issue not a drag lift issue! Duh! At least I was correct about the 50 being a floater but not for the reason I gave in this drivel.

Doc



--

drc(at)wscare.com
Guest

Posted: Tue Oct 30, 2007 8:48 pm Post subject: yak 50

I agree with Mark,

I have been flying formation this summer in the 52TW and with some  

liason planes in my Wilga.  I would much rather wheel land with lots  

of reserve power to get out of the way in the yak.  The L birds have  

such limited vis with the high wing and they do tend to float, be  

landed 3 point, and are slow to spool up and get out of the way if  

things don't go well.



I am not advocating element landing though.  I did it with Sergei  

this summer and even with him on the wing it wasn't "fun"  it was  

more of a pucker factor than I like.  Then 2 days later the P51  

incident happened at OSH and I REALLY re-thought my actions.



There are some excellent point / counterpoint discussion on this  

topic though.  The new FAST manual and the ground course is  

excellent.  Thanks to the work the RPA put into it.  And people are  

so right that training and experience together go a long way to make  

a dangerous situation into a managealbe risk.  I work in medicine and  

that is the whole idea behind the training and experience we get.  I  

would not expect some military pilots to be able to cut people open,  

only cut the structures we want to cut and get the patient safely  

back together.  I won't try to pretend I can fly and perform at their  

level either.



Herb



On Oct 30, 2007, at 7:26 PM, Bitterlich, Mark G CIV Det Cherry Point,  

MALS-14 64E wrote:



[quote] 

 Point, MALS-14 64E" <mark.bitterlich(at)navy.mil>



 Dave, I didn't think you were, but I also think that some could  

 have interpreted it that way, thus my comments.



 By the way, I think a Birddog in it's own way can be harder to land  

 than a YAK-50.  Yes, it has better vis., but it also has this  

 rather strange habit of skating around on those gear legs that some  

 of it's bigger cousins, such as the 180 series does not!  I'd feel  

 more skittish formation landing your airplane than a 50... Seriously.



 I almost purchased one of those aircraft by the way... A version  

 called the "Mountaineer".  Had a 260HP motor in it, from the  

 factory!  Hold on to that L-19, it's a real prize.



 Mark Bitterlich

 --

bwade154(at)yahoo.com
Guest

Posted: Wed Oct 31, 2007 4:58 am Post subject: yak 50

Do any of the pilot-owners of the injured ships monitor this list? if so and the airplane that got its tail chewed off is a 52 and would like some parts I have a Yak 52 fuselage and tail 1982 vintage I believe.

 Bill Wade

 bwade154(at)yahoo.com (bwade154(at)yahoo.com)

 Broadalbin NY

  

  

  

  

  

 



 

 ---

djester(at)gjtbs.com
Guest

Posted: Wed Oct 31, 2007 5:00 am Post subject: yak 50

Well said Mark and point taken.  I am also pleased that no one was hurt.  I too shall contiune to fly formation and hope that I am lucky enough to avoid an accident.  It is what makes life worth living.  I sweat more in forty minutes of formation flying then in much more time working out.

 

 ---

dsavarese(at)elmore.rr.co
Guest

Posted: Wed Oct 31, 2007 5:32 am Post subject: yak 50

Both were Yak 50's.

Dennis



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