• Become a Subscribing Member today!

    J3-Cub.com is the largest community of J3-Cub pilots, owners and enthusiasts. With over 1000 active members, we have fostered a vibrant community and extensive knowledge base.

    Access to the J3-Cub.com community is by subscription only. Membership is only $49.99/year or $6.99/month to gain access to this community and extensive unmatched library of knowledge.

    Why become a Subscribing Member?

    • J3-Cub.com hosts a library of over 13 years of technical discussions, J3 data, tutorials, plane builds, guides, technical manuals and more.
    • J3-Cub.com also hosts an extensive library of J3-Cub photos.
    • You will also receive two J3-Cub decals!

    Become a Subscribing Member and access J3-Cub.com in full!

    Subscribe Now

Take off RPM with a wood prop?

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

Idleclamp

Member
Joined
Mar 16, 2016
Messages
11
Reaction score
0
Hi All,

I realize there has been much discussion on metal versus wood props, and after reading through several threads, I didn’t find the answer I’m looking for, so...

The club I belong to recently purchased an L-4 with a stroked (Don Swords) C-85 motor and a wood Sensenich 72/44 prop. When I went to pick it up I could only get approximately 2100rpm on take off, and only slightly higher during the return to the airport. Even with a slight descent the max rpm I could get was about 2200rpm. The previous owner said that’s what he was getting out of it, and it was normal. I seem to recall the other Cubs I’ve flown would produce closer to 2400+rpm on take off, but they had metal props, and I unfortunately don’t know that the length/pitch were. Can anyone tell me if that is a normal rpm for take off on a 40 degree Fahrenheit day at 500’ msl? Could the prop be the reason the rpm is low, or more likely the gauge?

Eric
 

Latest posts

Back
Top