Renkou1
Senior Member
- Joined
- May 18, 2010
- Messages
- 2,743
- Reaction score
- 307
O.K. after almost a month of bad weather in the northwest I finally got to go get my 'new' 1939 J3.
Due to this being my first J3 flight in 30 years I was somewhat apprehensive. Things I'd read in this site and C. Clues had made me more so. This ac can be discribed as 'rough'.
This aircraft has an eight gallon wing tank on the left side. Had read about problems with transfer to the nose tank. The first problem was fuel transfer to the ground. Fitting coming out of the tank was LEAKING. Turned out the flared tubing end had disintegrated. This is a very stiff connection of very stiff tubing between the wing but and Fuselage. Flight and strut removal for checking A.D.s exercises this area. Most other aircraft have hoses in this area to allow for 'wing motion...etc; Fuel transfer during flight was perfect and required. When main tank was less than half full with the wing tank still full I had to hold forward stick as I'd run out of trim. AC will get reweighed and the actual trim travel checked. Rigging?
For those other Cub Forum folks that disagreed with my thoughts that double puck brakes -- like found on aircraft up thru 4000# gross wt were too much for the J3. Well yes they do not do too much braking on this J3. The original master cylinders do not send as high of pressure to the wheel cylinders as a toe brake or other folks master cylinders would. Only just strong enough to hold position for run-up in this cub. I'm still looking for a lighter single puck wheel cylinder system that will work on the Cleveland wheels that are on the aircraft.
Made my first cub landing in 30+ years in high winds after passing thru roll wave west of Hood River airport.
Had been seeing 111 mph on the hiking/ camping gps the last few miles. The curator for the WAAAM Museum came over and looked the aircraft over. He couldn't see any obvious reasons for the aircraft to have gained 128# since new either. The Museum has a bunch of airworth J2's, J3's, L 4's in the museum. Turns out Steve Wolf did the spare splice on the left front spar. No more worries about strength on that splice.
Had the most fun flight since joining the mile high club. Great to have a J3 again!
Now if I could just find a C-85.
R
Due to this being my first J3 flight in 30 years I was somewhat apprehensive. Things I'd read in this site and C. Clues had made me more so. This ac can be discribed as 'rough'.
This aircraft has an eight gallon wing tank on the left side. Had read about problems with transfer to the nose tank. The first problem was fuel transfer to the ground. Fitting coming out of the tank was LEAKING. Turned out the flared tubing end had disintegrated. This is a very stiff connection of very stiff tubing between the wing but and Fuselage. Flight and strut removal for checking A.D.s exercises this area. Most other aircraft have hoses in this area to allow for 'wing motion...etc; Fuel transfer during flight was perfect and required. When main tank was less than half full with the wing tank still full I had to hold forward stick as I'd run out of trim. AC will get reweighed and the actual trim travel checked. Rigging?
For those other Cub Forum folks that disagreed with my thoughts that double puck brakes -- like found on aircraft up thru 4000# gross wt were too much for the J3. Well yes they do not do too much braking on this J3. The original master cylinders do not send as high of pressure to the wheel cylinders as a toe brake or other folks master cylinders would. Only just strong enough to hold position for run-up in this cub. I'm still looking for a lighter single puck wheel cylinder system that will work on the Cleveland wheels that are on the aircraft.
Made my first cub landing in 30+ years in high winds after passing thru roll wave west of Hood River airport.
Had been seeing 111 mph on the hiking/ camping gps the last few miles. The curator for the WAAAM Museum came over and looked the aircraft over. He couldn't see any obvious reasons for the aircraft to have gained 128# since new either. The Museum has a bunch of airworth J2's, J3's, L 4's in the museum. Turns out Steve Wolf did the spare splice on the left front spar. No more worries about strength on that splice.
Had the most fun flight since joining the mile high club. Great to have a J3 again!
Now if I could just find a C-85.
R
