The Marske Pioneer IID
|
The Marske Pioneer IID
|
|
windows media (xp) video clip of the launching of the Pioneer IId november 2002.
|
On our computer using explorer we do not get good results for the videos. when using netscape we get very good results... but they do take a long time to download. Mpeg Video of thePioneer on tow July 2003 Windows Media File of Pioneer in flight Pioneeer In slow flight (07/30/03) no airspeed registering Stall and Spin entry attempt: 03/28/04 in windows Media. 446 kb Takes a long time to load at low bandwidth but reasonable quality Our story follows:
March 31, 2005. The Marion workshop location is now closed and the new location in Port Burwell Canada is being set up so news may be a little slow for the next few months.
However Mike and Mat have been very busy with the trailer... and yesit has been a success! We delivered the Pioneer to the airport a few days ago adn everything worked. We had miscalculated on the height of the assembly wheels... but that can easily be fixed.
March 08,2005. Well Mat and Mike have it on the trailer.... Mike did a lot of work machining the adjustable wheels.
Feb 27, 2005. Good progress this week on the Pioneer wing holder. Mike and I have completed the holder and pretty much got the removeable setup done for the ease of plutting the wing on.
Feb 13, 2005. So just as we are finishing up the mass balance... and I must say it feels real good Mike comes up with this idea of a new trailer and a wing dolly that also serves as a holder for putting the wing on. Well we tried the idea out with a piece of foam... dang thing works!..... so on to another project.
Jan 30, 2005, Yes we have been busy in the shop... the Pioneer now has mass balanced ailerons and what a difference it makes to the feel! I was so impressed I did the mass balance on the Elevator!
January 19, 2005. OK second time around. I now have 2.5" down and 4" up aileron.
Jan 12, 2005. Mat spent a lot of time working on installing the mass balance but once finished he discovered that we should really try having more down elevator... he only had 1.5" and there really should be at least 2" so he dutifully took it off and started again. We are looking for 2.5 inches down and at least 4" up measured at the root side of the aileron.
Dec 23, 2004. Mike and Mat removed the Pioneer IId from the summer hangar in mid november. We have a number of fixes to perform this winter. The first thing on the list is the mass balance for the ailerons. Other concerns are the nose wheel replacement with a retractable skid and the control system. As always ideas are welcome.
Nov 11, 2004. Just lots of test flights... and what started as measuring the performance has turned into how to define the handling characteristics of the Pioneer and how one goes about changing them. The Trip strip on the tips seems to really soften the stall. To get more details join our Yahoo group.
Oct 29, 2004 lots of test flying and learning. Getting some good results and every flight is recorded on video. Yesterdays flight was remarkable in that on a previous flight I was getting wing tip stalls at 35 mph indicated because we had cleaned up the root fairing so well. So to stop the wing tip stalls I added a trip strip at 30 percent chord.... and now can go to 27 mph with lttle tendency to drop a win. so I will fly again holding the stall longer then on a subsequent flight remove the strips and see if it will stall the wing tips. I have a lot of materials to review in the coming winter months. I will make all of the videos available. I have often been told that you can't box the wake of the tow plane with a flying wing.... well I have it on tape now.... and yes it does look funny being towed in low tow position out to one side with the outside bridle across the fuselage with the inside rope slack!Yes that is on tape too! Oct 13, 2004. A lot of flying this week and last... every flight was video taped. The results show that the L/D is maximum is about 35.6 and we have not discovered the lowest sink rate. I have been flying at 46 mph calibrated, which is quite comfortable in a thermal but on the test runs when trying to find a stall speed I found I could hold 43 mph ( cl of about .9) quite successfully with a much better sink rate and I could even see 30 mph indicated ( problably 39 CAS) on the airspeed.... so more of that area to explore! I will publish all of the videos at a future date. -mat
Oct 1, 2004. Did some more flying yesterday..... again it was not perfect weather but I am using the opportunity to sharpen my skills and equipment. The video and logging worked perfectly. I towed to 5000 agl and did a airspeed calibration at 80 mph. It showed I was really going 83.6 mph, 50 mph was really 56 mph and 40 was really 46.47 and my sink rate for a 500 ft descent was 226 seconds or 131 ft per minute sink rate but I did encounter some extra sink at one point in this test. Again the day was not perfect. At 2000 ft agl I was able to soar in light thermals and this was a great chance to really try a number of things. One of the obvious was that the ship is much better in a thermal turning to the right due to the slight left turn it is absolutely stable and I can fly hands off, to the right, using only the rudder. Following the yaw string is everything.... but that can be straightened by either aileron or rudder: however as Bill Daniels has mentioned use of the rudder first definitely makes for a faster roll reversals..... To my surprise I recorded a 35:1 glide ratio at 56 mph... but I will average them all out when I have all my data. To anyone sponsoring a flight I will send you the complete video tape of the flight and do any of the tests you would like to see done on the Pioneer. As you can see from the photos below you can read all of the instruments quite well. -mat
Sept 20, 2004. Mat finally has been able to fly the Pioneer after a month of vacation and time spend crewing for Mike in the recently held contest. Pilot Report: Sunday was very turbulent and a real challenge but I was amazed at how well the Pioneer handled. I have been concentrating on the slow roll reversal rates and this had clouded the very enjoyable handling I had found in thermal flying. Yes the Pioneer does move around more but it told me just where the lift was. Its a difficult thing to explain... where is that Pioneer V two -place?... donations please! I made a complete video of the flight from 6000 ft msl so that one can see exactly how long it takes to loose 500 ft at various speeds. Yes totally successful! I did this as a try out... yes I made a few mistakes...but the video recordede all the instruments and my commentary on the temperature at various altitudes as I read them out. The microphone got turned off accidently and went undiscovered for two thousand feet on tow... I recovered... I got good results at 80, 70, 60 and 50 mph. Not really official results since I did not do an airspeed calibration... and there was turbulence at 3000 ft but this is really good stuff and exciting to see the results! I will publish these results once I get many tests compiled.... and yes donations are accepted.... and I will send you a video of the flights as well! -mat Photo below is Mat on tow taken from the video!
Sept 15, 2004. Mike Couts entered the local Clubs Cross country contest and placed 6th out of 17 entries. It was very tough the first day and Mike did not get the required distance, He was just a cou-ple of miles short... poor planning on our part. The second day was a good soraing day and Mike performed admirably by completing about 50 miles. He did though have a very low save over Bucyrus at about 700 ft and managed to make it back to Marion.
Sept, 11-12 Marion, Ohio I have to say that the P2D performed much better in the contest than it's pilot. A couple of errors on my part cost Team Marske a lot of points. Day one saw 17 gliders on the grid, weak lift, blue skies, and low thermal heights. I did manage to take a start, and was rewarded for my courage at the start gate with the job of pulling off a save from 800 agl. This at least told me that today I could recover from a low alt. Just as was nearing my chosen turnpoint, I saw another glider landout at that airport. That's a real confidence builder !! I was getting a little low and knew that if I didn't hook up soon, I'd be joining him. As I watched him push his glider off the runway, what a surprise it was to find lift nearly directly over his head. Maybe luck was with me. Maybe his landing kicked the thermal loose. Who knows? He is a good XC pilot and it felt great for once to be "handed the other end of the stick" instead of my hat. I managed to make it back and take a finish only to find out that I had mis-estimated my minimum task distance and came up about 4 mi. short. I do own a calculator, next time I'll use it. I scored some points but not as many as possible. I felt a little better after learning that only 4 out of 17 made a full task that day. Still, I am sure I could have made it if I had picked a bit more distant turnpoint. I did learn a lot that afternoon, mostly that I was capable of doing XC on a weak day. If it was not a contest, I'm not sure I would have even bothered to fly on such a poor day, yet alone go XC. Sunday, day 2, I later was to find out, had much better conditions to the south and west. You guessed it, I had gone east and north. Actually I was keeping up a pretty good speed until just after my second turnpoint. Good CU's got to be few and far between. I let myself get below the good lift band. Try as hard as I could, I just could not find a thermal that would get me back up into the stronger lift. I had to slow way down and tippie-toe all the way to my next turnpoint. Luckily I had picked an airport. The Marske Pioneer 2D performed very well. When I could hold my intended line in traffic, I could climb with anyone. Saturday had many relights. I felt so good that I could just stay up, when others couldn't that it gave me the confidence to go out on task. Not bad for a 30 year old homebuilt design with fabric covered wood wings. I've flown a fair number of sailplanes. The P2D is still my favorite. Mat and Jim worked hard to crew and support me in the contest. It was great to be able to focus on flying and know that they had handled all the details of getting the sailplane and equipment ready and on the grid. Thanks very much. -Mike Couts
June 30, 2004. Mats Cross country report: Another good flight of 130 miles on Wed June 30, 2004. The day looked rather poor but I decided to fly anyway and at least do some photos of a stalled wing. Once in the air the thought came that why don't I try for a cross country. I started north west with only 4000 agl and the thought of my first leg being 23 miles away made me a little anxious. I made Upper Sandusky and progress was better than I expected so I pushed on to Finlay... another 22 miles away. I made that goal but Findaly is a sink hole for me. I just could not get above 4000 agl... but knowing that Mike would have great difficulty doing a retrieve from Findlay.... 100 miles round trip.. I pushed on back to Upper Sandusky arriving there with only 1500 ft agl. Luckily I hooked up with a good thermal that brought me back to 4500 agl and I headed for Marion. The distance between thermals was about 8-10 miles but things looked up around Marion so I continued through to Morrow county south of Marion by about 12 miles. Morrow was easy so I headed north to Bucyrus about 17 miless away. The lift started to deteriorate but I made Bucyrus and did a final glide to Marion 12 miles away. Total flight was 130 miles.
This flight was well done, but if only I had remembered the pee bags!!!..... BUT I did land it well! I was having trouble landing it with the new main and nose wheel. The height difference has had me touching down before I flared. Landing at speeds over 50 mph on the main wheel causes the glider to rotate and touch the nose wheel which pops the glider back in the air.... and can result in a banged nose gear!
I must say the more I fly the Pioneer the more capable I find it. I still feel it should do faster turn reversals so I plan to do some additions to the ailerons in the near future. This is one very remarkable glider and deserves more study. The Pioneer III which has a superior airfoil and fuselage, better aielrons and large spoilers should bring a remarkable advancement in performance. Please consider donating financially to the Pioneer III to get it finished. -mat June 30, 2004
June 26, 2004. Now this is getting exciting.Mat and Mike have a friendly competition going on. Mike Couts went about 85 miles in a cross country last weekend so Mat decided to add a few miles to it and flew, Marion- Findaly-Bucyrus-Marion and back home to Marion for a round trip of 110.3 miles Mat's Flight Report: The trip to Findlay was most difficult as I was bucking a 14 mph head wind. It was discouraging to stop for a thermal and find myself two miles further behind but a thousand feet higher. There was the odd cloud street which made the upwind journey more enjoyable. When I finally got ot Findaly I just could not find lift and struggled for a time at about 2200 agl. I eventually found light lift and decided to punch on to Upper Sandusky where a retrieve was more likely at about 25 miles from home. With the tailwind I made good progress reaching ground speeds of over 80 mph and happened to connect up with cloud streets and good thermals. When I arrived back at Marion I suddenly realized that my flight might be a little short so just to make sure I topped Mikes flight, I added Bucyrus and back which put me up to 110.3 miles The Pioneer is by far the most enjoyable glider I have flown to date. The low speed climb and the excellent high speed flight characteristics make this one exceptional sailplane. But what do we do with this? As Dave said before he left " This design of sailplane while currently rare, will, in next 50 years be the most common configuration of a sailplane". The Pioneer IId is not getting a 40:1 glide ratio but the fact this glider designed in the 1970's shows so much promise using a very old airfoil ( same as a 1-26) and basically a wood glider points to a brilliant performance by the Pioneer III and its derivatives. But we are a very small company without the resources to make all of this happen alone. To establish a foothold in the sailplane history I feel that Marske Flying Wings should cease production of kits and planes and devote our time to research and the development of the single place Pioneer III, The two place Pioneer V and the high performance Saiplane the Pioneer IV. We will need a lot of financial support for this venture. Please voice your concerns and consider supporting our efforts by donating time or money to a project of your choice. -mat
June 24, 2004 On tuesday this week Dave Welles, from Elmira, New York set out to find roll rates, Spiral stability and figure out roll to Yaw ratios. The weather on that day was quite overcast but he managed to stay aloft for over three hours. The unfortunate part was that due to changes in the cockpit Dave was not able to wear a parachute. Mat had flow over 7 hours in it already and Mike about 4 hours. Dave's report will follow in the next few days.Of note was Dave's surprise at the unusally good spiral stability. On Wednesday we wanted to film the tufted root section and wings of the Pioneer at various speeds. Since Dave could not wear a parachute Mat was elected as test pilot with Mike Couts on the video and Dave Welles Piloting the Grob 103. We where most interested in the tufting at the lower speeds and at stall. Mat had previously experimented with attempted full stick back attempt stalls and had first become aware of the tips now being able to stall which was different from last year due to the new fuselage/ wing filet. In last years testing Dave had discovered that the root section started to stall first. This past winter Jim Marske had proposed a new fuselage/ wing section filet which was grafted on from the PIII fusleage mold. Mat had also put a fence on the root end of the elevator. Mat also designed and built a new front hinging canopy which aided in the tests. As Dave acknowledged after his first flight "This is a new aircraft"! The aircraft tufting showed that every tuft along the fuselage, fin and rudder was straight up to the stall attempt. At this point a few showed a flow up the fin. The wing now stalls starting at the tip and progresses slowly inboard. The surprising thing was that the stall produces yaw and not much roll. Mats Flight report:
In the first few attempts at a full stall I could not get the wing to break. Arriving at the stall with more speed made one wing start to break. It was interesing to see the progression which started at the tip and spread to the root. The most surprising thing to me was that this stalling of the wing produced a yawing movement with little loss of lift so it did not drop a wing. Recovery was very easy and at no point did I encounter anything that gave me concern.The moving CG was in its most aft position. We could have even moved the CG more aft with added weight placed in the rear fuselage but then the trim would not allow for neutral elevator at speeds of 75 mph. At any rate this is the best range for cross country soaring, but with a further aft CG the wing may not have been able to stalled at all. The biggest problem I had was keeping below the following Grob 103 with Mike Couts at the video camera and Dave Wells at the controls. A lot of my commands where "Spoilers please mat" to keep the Pioneer from climbing out, since the Grob continually sank below the Pioneer when following behind. Filming the stalls was even more difficult since the Pioneer climbed appreciably when entering an attempt stall. We did a number of stalls straight ahead and a couple in turning flight. The Pioneer gave me complete confidence with easy recovery and I would say it is one of the safest gliders to pilot when in or around a stalled condition. Recovery is initiated by pushing the control stick forward and opposite rudder. One never feels out of control. In thermals the Pioneer easily outclimbed the Grob and many times I had to leave the thermal and re-enter a couple of hundred feet below only to find myself again on top a few minutes later. Flying at less that 40 mph has its advantages. I also easily outclimbed a 1-34 which happened to join us. At the end of our filmings session we did a run to about 85-90 mph where the Grob and Pioneer seemed to be about equal in the glide. Not bad for a Pioneer wing loading of 3. 7 lbs per sq ft compared to the Grob at over 7 lbs per sq ft. This Pioneer is by far my most favored glider I have flown and I feel the safest especially in the slow speed area approaching and executing attempt stalls. The only area we would like to see improved is the roll reversal rate which is relatively low at 7 seconds, 45 degrees to 45 degrees. Dave has proposed a section of the tip extension being added to the ailerons that lift only and have no down position. Jim thinks that the Yaw Damper that Mat developed for the Monarch would work as well...... so onward now to finding a way to improve the roll rate. -mat June 22, 2004 The Pioneer is back in action. On June 19, 2004 the rain finally stopped long enough for Mat to do a test flight. On June 20 Mike did his first real cross country of 85 miles in the Pioneer. Mat used the Grob 102 to chase Mike around the course and finally intercepted him on the return from Bucyrus. What a sight that was seeing the Pioneer whiz by at 80 mph. Mat then pursued him starting at about 200 ft above and ending about 300 ft below about 8 miles later at Marion airport. On June 21 Dave Welles arrived in Marion to begin flight testing the Pioneer. We will publish data as we get it.
June 11, 2004. Mat got another two flights in the Pioneer.... both with short cross countries. On june 5, 2004 Mat flew the Pioneer for 3 hours and did some comparisons with the Grob 103. The Pioneer seemed to outclimb the Grob 103 but was about dead even on the run between 65 and 75 mph. The wing loading for the Grob was about 7 lbs/sq ft and the Pioneer about 4 lbs.... so that is really pretty good for such a light wingloading. Again on Tuesday June 8 Mat did another 3 hour flight in rather rough conditions. The moving weight is second nature now and greatly aids in trimming the glider to what ever speed you want. Mat also did tuft the right wing and with the current weight all the way back attempted a couple of stalls. The tufting did indicate a stall beginning at the tip but it still did not drop a tip. Last yeart we had a stall starting at the root and this year we have made a large radius filet at the wing root and fuselage junction and put in an elevator fence at the root end to help the low speed performance. More research is planned for the coming weeks. On a sad note Mat had a rather turbulent landing and once through the turbulence relaxed just before his flare.... he then found himself 10 feet in the air and then nosed in the glider damaging the front nose wheel area. The Glider is back in the shop getting repaired and will be flyable as soon as the rain stops. Dave Wells had wanted to fly the Pioneer in the Sports class nationals but with the damaged nose area it was felt that we should take our time repairing the damage and spend the time test flying and doing research on the craft.
June 3, 2004. Finally the rain and wind stopped and we got our first flight in the updated Pioneer IId. We did four autotows and then Mat decided to do the first aerotow. Mat has been the designer for the new canopy and moving weight system so he volunteered to do the first flight. The tow went to 4000 msl with no difficulties. Mat did play with the moving weight and found that a slightly nose heavy indication on the moving weight was best on tow. Upon release there was a few moments of acclamation then it all came back and that glider really flew well. The moving weight simply acts as a trim for airspeed. WE have 10 pounds than moves about 90 inches. For me with the weight in the aft position and elevator neutral it trims out at about 42 mph. With the weight fully forward it trims out at about 72 mph. I had thought that the weight was adequate but the figures above indicate that we probably need a weight of 15 pounds so as to acheive an up elevator at 90 mph. The climb rate seems to be greatly increased but at speed there seems to be a small rumble in the tail section but we have not sanded the wings nor waxed them. Next flight we will tuft the wings. The new canopy is very quiet and what a pleasure at having this forward hinged canopy.... and it certainly proved very useful on launch when we only closed it just before takeoff allowing some cool air in the cockpit.
Past history of the Pioneer rebuild
RETURN TO: MARSKE FLYINGS WINGS HOMEPAGE Designer: |
This Site was created by John Furterer. If you have any problems with this site
or just questions please let us know. Contents of this site may
not be reproduced without permission from Matt Redsell.
