longez360

Took me 16 years on-an-off to build mine... Add another 18 months for downdraft mods. Never give up hope! It's SO worth it.

Drew, I have a panel Comm and an Icom that I take on cross countries. I have two winglet antennas. The second antenna RG-400 coax is up in the left leg well which I can connect if I don't get range. I had planned to add a B&C recpeptacle and carry an extension.

I agree with Chrissi 100%. Get it from the experienced developers, and follow their process. Flip side of the coin: Three times I have been really glad I had a Lycoming. First time was when I sat in the aircraft for the first engine start and realised really I couldn't see a thing going on back there, 2nd was when I crossed the rocky mountains and 3rd was when I was out over desert Australia hundreds of miles from anyone, or anything. A rotary is smooth, higher power, small package low weight and would seem perfect for the application, but in my opinion service history is everything.

A rag with eucalyptus oil works great. Moves all sticky residues. Flush with water afterward.

Need to nail down a location, and produce a flyer with registration details, camping details etc.. If I interstate or a long drive away I would be hesitant to give any positivity without them. Maybe something in airsport for free? Other aircraft types should come along if they desire. My vote is Mangalore, with Seymour 10 minutes drive and good facilities including a hangar, shower blocks and kiosk. Weather is typically good as well north of the dividing range. BP fuel and oil available. Runways in good order. Best airfield in Vic in my opinion, and known to most. I also vote for a fly market for parts, some forums, a BBQ brunch sat and sun and seymour pub dinner for those that book sat night. Sunday could be a spot landing contest, a kilo trial race, and rides. General flying throughout.

Sounds like a sump leak. No need to flip your aircraft. I'd drain the fuel, rub back the entry point, observe weep, repair with resin and a tight glass weave. Always peel ply a tank repair. I fly a 9.2:1 parallel valve IO-360 powered Long EZ. I'd choose a parallel valve 360 over a 320 in a heartbeat. Excess power is safety in my opinion. My aeroplane is significatnly faster than Jackpot winning 10:1 320 LEZ's now with a top end of 215 knots on a standard day @ sea level. Early 360 Long EZ's did not have good prop matches nor were they necessarily refined airframes. As for fuel burn, I flight plan 180 knots at 10gph. An O-360A1A is 265lbs dry, and a O-320D3G is 255lbs dry...

Unless something comes up, I'm in and so is VH-WEZ. My backseater should be in as well. We don't plan on staying more than an afternoon however. Like I mentioned Bruce, I believe it's worthwhile mailing some letters and shooting some emails around to flyers and builders all 'round the country. The Cairns and Perth contingents are bigtime travellers and have been for 20+ years - people like John Atkinson, John Sabadina, Lindsay Danes, Bill Keehner etc Great people who deserve an invite more than anyone. New owners are a biggie - they need to be invited as much as anybody - vital info available. I'd even let the NZ'ers know it's on! I'm serious! from Rutan Vari-Eze to vari-ation, these are travelling machines and so are the people who build and fly them. Builders are certainly a massive focus. A swap meet is a good plan. 'If you build it they will come'. - Wayne

Cowling pictures attached. apologies for the delay. Upper cowl airworthy. Off-the-shelf Berkut Lower cowl shows where the scoop was removed. Needs to be glassed back in place. Off-the-shelf Berkut Spinner pictured with matching 8" flowguide also available. Airworthy. Excuse the dust.

Berkut lower and Long EZ firewall Berkut upper as pictured on http://www.ez.org/feature/F0411-1/F0411-1.htm are US$1000 + freight.

I have an off-the shelf Berkut lower that I have removed in my change to downdraft cooling. It is available, but probably expensive to ship from Australia. It has one armpit scoop removed, but can certainly be put back as I have it on hand. I have a mold for a Downadraft version of the Berkut lower (no armpit scoops, centreline scoop only and reduced outlet). I have a mold for a modified Berkut upper which fits a standard Long EZ firewall, and a carbon cowl from that mold. I have a mold for a full downdraft upper for the Long EZ. They match the standard Berkut lower. The standard Berkut cowl (lower) and modified upper do not have standard Berkut exhaust outlets - I removed them and used an internal exhaust system. I can sell you the Berkut lower, and as I own the molds of the downdraft lower and 2 uppers (all non-Berkut), can mold one for you if the price is right. Like I say, freight is probably the killer.

There's those who've dropped them on their tales, and those who will! I haven't yet, but... Good move I reckon.

All, I've seen some emails floating around on rudders that are cut to the top of the winglet (no fixed portion), and changes to rudder chord. Some personal thoughts that might be relevant: a. If you cut your rudder to the top of the winglet, you will not be able to see an in-trail position from the cockpit. My rudders were 1/4" to 3/8" out at the tops on the ground due to a rudder cable re-route in the hell hole during the downdraft mod. I assumed aerodynamic loads would provide enough pressure to close them on the first test flight and didn't bother to fix it prior (not much was needed when hand force was applied). Wrong. Glad I have fixed tips. b. If you move your entire rudder hinge line forward by a fixed amount (I've seen references to 0.5" and 1" to account for no lower winglets or winglet changes), you may not have a straight rudder hinge line and they will bind. Think geometrically. You probably need to stick to the same airfoil chord percentage and account for twist, although it's nice that it's on a relatively flat side of the airfoil for us. Easy way: Use a straight edge, and lie it on edge onto the winglet surface. Check b4 cutting (I knife trimmed out my ailerons and rudders after I did this)... This is another good reason to ensure you don't have hotwire lag at the aileron or rudder hinge line. I'd do Ronneberg style oversize airfoil tremplates and sand the cores back in a heartbeat - besides, you'll get much nicer and straighter cores and have less micro, less sanding and less time & $$ to outlay to get your machine in the air. Rudder chord hence hinge line position, and rudder area without lower winglets are all easily planned for and defined concurrently. Don't ruin your day. Rework when building sucks. good times,

HI there, Installed the B&C starter. Without changing anything else the prop roared around. Problem solved. Nothing wrong with the Skytec, it's just higher torque at higher current and struggles with the setup. Have flown one flight since. All CHTs 390F, Oil topped out at 180F. OAT was 73F. I need to get slightly better airflow through the NACA inlets for cylinders. They are dedicated 5" x 1.5455" inlets through dedicated diffusers and dual plenums. I'll increase flow with some tiny 1/4" VGs. I need to add some piccolo tubes in and under the plenums and get some solid pressure data with and without VGs. Topped out at 190KIAS at 4000ft with the Hertzler Mk IV cozy prop. This reflected the first flight. I've refinished the Lightspeed Berkut prop and have had it painted. I need to balance it and check top end. It used to give me 206KTAS, but I expect to get approx 215KTAS now. The new Hetzler prop probably isn't far off either with more pitch which should be a match for the lightspeed top end and have much better takeoff performance. I removed cowls and all is well. The plenums seal against the crankcase cylinder flanges which I thought might me a problem. None observed. Tg not an issue without load. I see no difference in MAP from the previous config. The old Berkut centreline inlet spilled a lot of air. I am staggered the new little 5" wide centerlne flush inlet diffused once for induction with spilled air diffused a second time for oil is working so well to provide induction and oil air. I'll take measurements in time, but I'm getting textbook performance in line with calculations. I think I can do even better. The throttle oil outlet works well in controlling airflow, and has a direct affect on MAP when closing. Re-routing of the rudder cable conduits has put my rudders about 1/4" to 3/8" actuated at the tops. I can see them still delfected against the fixed upper winglet portion when I'm flying. Have to fix that. For anyone who is cutting your rudders full length, like I've always said, good luck seeing an in trail position from the cockpit! Not a good idea. I'm done with mods for a while! My recommendation to all building is just get it finished and go fly! Having my plane out of the air was awful. Now that it is going, I haven't had much time to fly, but it's there when I want to and that is COOL. Cheers

Count me in. Got a couple of minor issues to fix but I'm airworthy. Any chance we could do Mangalore? It's in very good shape nowadays.

wayne_blackler@yahoo.com.au

I have an O-360 on my Long EZ and I'm happy with it. I had it built by Aero Sport Power in Kamloops, BC Canada. It would be worth pricing the 360 and 540 with them. I have never had better customer service than from ASP. Bought my engine in 1999, had it delivered to Melbourne Australia. In 2002 I went to Seattle for 3.5 years and took my 60% complete LEZ. I bought 9.2:1 pistons for it. They put the new pistons in, repainted the engine, gave it a once over and delivered it back to me in Seattle for no charge. When I built up my new downdraft cooling system they sent me an old 360 pot to Australia to use as a mold. No charge. I've gotten various bits and peices as I changed my Long EZ systems, nil charge... Never ends. My buddy Rob is building an RV-8 and just bought an O-375 from them... Yes, an O-375. If building a CozyIV I would install a 540, providing I had the extra time to make the changes. Being out of the air is NO fun. There is one thing for certain, I would contact Bart and Sue at ASP for the engine, without hesitation.

First downdraft flight was a success. I cruise climbed to 3000ft DA and set 2300RPM and watched #1, #2, & #3 CHTs drop slowly into the 360s. #4 stayed at 390 and oil = 180F. At 2500RPM, CHTs #1, #2, #3 stabilized around 350-370F, #4 was 405F (needs assessment), oil topped out at 185F. Oil never went above 190F even in climb which was a HUGE surprise. OAT was 75F or so. It's going faster. I'll get solid data this weekend. All this with a pumped up O-360 and the same size inlets as Bill James O-235 (5" x 1.5").........

The starter has been on the aircraft since first flight. It has always struggled. I read James Redmon's upgrade to the B&C on www.berkut13.com and have bitten the bullet. The B&C arrives on Friday. B&C caught wind of my problems with the skytec and actually sent me a starter to try when I was living in Seattle. I should have swapped it then, but I didn't want to rip into my new baffling. With the baffling now gone, it's bye bye skytec. Good customer service goes a long way - eg Aero Sport Power Kamloops BC has the finest customer service I have dealt with BTW. Just superb. I think if I have a problem with oil cooling, it may be the way I'm diffusing the air, so I have a backup plan. If that doesn't work, I'll try to get more air into the inlet with VGs. If that doesn't work, I'll go to a 13row, or a second cooler off the back of one of the plenums. I nearly added coolers behind each plenum and treated the plenum design like I had 6 cylinders. I would have throttled the oil cooler outlets on both cooler undersides to make the system work. That may happen next. I also may take plenum air from between the cylinders each side and use that to aid air extraction out the back of the cooler, or to introduce more air mass into the coolers oblique diffuser. It's all about mass flow and pressure drop.

In my old updraft configuration, the 9 row gave me about 215F max on a high ambient temp day. That updraft system was REALLY leaky! :-) I know the RV-8 guys using the angle valve 360 are having lots of troubles with oil cooling, but the parallel valve 360 guys are having less trouble. I didn't get the test flight done last weekend due to a dead skytec starter.

Spot on Kent. You will save money and time. I did. Additionally, you wont be concerned about the 100 bucks you saved on materials having unintentionally sourced the wrong material, paritcularly in that brief moment after an inflight structural failure. PLEASE ensure you use the materials and substitute materials rutan specifies/approves. Do it for your families and the innocent people we fly over.

... and I never get tired of looking at your workmanship. Superb.

Cheers Lynn. Thanks for the motivation to get this mod done. I decided to feed my induction and oil cooler in a self contained system. I only have the one SW 10599R 9 row. I may need a second unit like yourself. I went with a oblique diffuser to the cooler and mounted it longitudinally. I found this in Aerodynamics of Propulsion by Kuchemann and Weber. The oil outlet is throttled with a butterfly valve on a push-pull line back to the throttle quadrant.

Thanks mate. I appreciate that. Will be good to see you back in the air in short order as well. Are you building another beautiful ERacer?

All going well, I'll be doing my first post downdraft modification test flight tomorrow. That should give me an indication on whether the system is going to operate satisfactorily, albeit at lower ambient temps. I'd like to get confidence time on the system (and engine/airframe) prior to a trip like Cowra, but it's also a great trip to gather test data. I tend to avoid airshows a bit these days as well, but do like to catch up with other builders/flyers. We'll see... Cheers

Thanks for the kind words on my LEZ. Here are some more shots for those that are interested. I'll try and find a couple of shots from the front. cheers