Possible Bird Strike on LongEZ

[Nathan Gifford]

Interesting read about a possible bird strike that took out most of the right winglet, damaged the right aileron, and left about a foot of his propellor. Sounds like he did a great.err good landing (great means you can fly the plane the next day. However, due to the bird hitting his bird, it will be a little while be it flies again!).

 

Take a look at ez.org Bird Strike and think about what you would do.

[Spodman]

I'm not convinced it was a bird strike, in fact I'd say it wasn't. If a bird hit the winglet it could cause that damage, but I don't see why it would be transmitted to the ailerons & prop.

 

"...felt as if I was in a paint mixer..." and the spread of the damage is more consistent with aileron flutter, but even then I wouldn't have thought that would put enough stuff through the prop to bust it.

 

I assume he had changed channels on his radio before and didn't dive through VNE

[Marc Zeitlin]

I'm not convinced it was a bird strike, in fact I'd say it wasn't. If a bird hit the winglet it could cause that damage, but I don't see why it would be transmitted to the ailerons & prop.

It's fairly obvious from looking at the pictures that SOMETHING took out the prop, and then one blade of the prop left the engine at about the 5-6 oclock position, just barely hit the trailing edge of the aileron, and continued on to take off the winglet above the rudder.

 

The other prop blade went somewhere else, and didn't hit any part of the plane. While there is certainly some question about what made the propeller break (and it's been discussed to death on the canard-aviators list), there's no question about the facts above. The damage traveled from the center outward, not from the outside inward.

[Blackhawk D]

Marc,

 

I asked this on the other forum and got no response; I'll try again and directly elicit your opinion/knowledge.

 

Understanding that there are a lot of variables (speed at impact, weight of bird, angle of impact, low probability, etc) do you believe that the canard is capable of surviving a bird strike intact? Given let's say cruise speed and a duck for example.

 

I'm curious and don't really know. I've seen some damage done by bird strikes and wonder if the canard is strong enough not to break apart or break loose from the airframe if struck by your average Daffy at an airspeed over 100kts.

 

Maybe it's a given that it is no problem, but I haven't seen anyone relate an experience with a canard strike nor do I pretend to know how to calculate the forces involved in such an impact.

 

Anyway, thanks for your help.

[Marc Zeitlin]

....do you believe that the canard is capable of surviving a bird strike intact? Given let's say cruise speed and a duck for example.....

I believe the answer is yes, and I believe this because at least one canard has had a bird impact and survived. IIRC, I saw some pictures of the canard, in which the L.E. was crushed back toward the spar approximately 3". The impact zone was about 6" - 8" wide.

 

I think that the most probable outcome from a strike the size of a bird will be to do this (or somewhat more) damage to the canard, which would then have to be repaired/replaced, and the canard mount points inspected, but I think it's extremely unlikely that the spar/shear web would be compromised.

 

But that's only my $0.02, and we've got one datapoint, at most.

[Blackhawk D]

Thanks Marc.

[Nathan Gifford]

I think with your average size duck or maybe even a goose you'd be OK. Hitting a Condor might be a different story...