jsbougher

It is funny how you can completely miss something that to which you've become accustomed. This is a good, and valid, catch. While I love my center stick, I guess I'd REALLY love to have left/right sticks. While making ingress / egress more of an issue, and giving up the great comfort of having you arm comfortably resting on the keel rest, I'd live with it for the convenience of being able to left hand the stick. That said, I would never consider the center stick to be an issue of any real merit (my experience being considered appropriately). Jeff PS - Most of this is moot, since there are only a couple of things in life better than flying your own canard - side stick, yolk ;^), left/right stick or center stick. I didn't even build mine and I feel this way. I'm truly envious of those of you who committed the time and resources to build your own - I can't imaging what the experience must be like for you.

Another comment on controls. 1) The Velocity check out plane has a nice set up that I'll likely duplicate at some point. They have duplicate throttle/prop push/pull on the far right side of cabin. Takes no room, easy to cable and gives sufficient control from right hand side. On the stick, they have a small bracket mounted on the standard stick just below the hand grip. This has a duplicate "handle" at an angle on the co-pilot side. The co-pilot handle looks like a bicycle grip (no PTT, etc) and reminds me of the right hand side of the Zenith Y grip. 2) The Velocity (even the SE) is very stable, and roll is easily controlled with rudder pedals only. You can easily enter a turn or hold a turn with rudders only. You can fly for many minutes without touching a control if you have her trimmed up correctly. As long as your trim isn't out of whack, you can easily take notes and make any needed corrections with the rudders to control roll (which can be affected by unbalanced fuel). Also, with AP controls on the stick, jotting a clearance is nothing more than a button push. That said, I've not done anything more than IFR training, so YMMV. All in all, I love the center stick. It is easily modified to allow dual control, makes handling a breeze, and problem with right handers (like me) taking notes has simply been a non-issue.

I could be wrong, but I'm pretty certain this won't work on a pusher. I believe it uses a pre-loaded vane system on the nose to detect airspeed and set pitch accordingly.

I just joined the group. If you are still interested in the answer, here goes. I have a 2003 fixed gear SE. I have a wife and 2 kids - 11 and 14. We used our Velocity for semi-regular transportation from NE OH to central IN. This is a 6 hr, 320 mile drive for us. The Velocity replaced a 172 which had a 3 hr flight time and more limited load carrying. With the Velocity (no wheel pants), we had about an 1:45 trip. I would regularly take both kids, the dog and a weekends worth of "stuff" back and forth. In my plane, I can rock the rear seats forward and re-pin in place to allow about another 2" in the rear. We'd move one seat forward and pack as follows: * behind rear seat rocked forward to provide extra space - 2 full duffel bags + small back pack on top * behind rear seat in regular location - 2 half filled and flattened duffel bags. * behind rear seats but between the seats - 1 duffel bag wedged vertically * right strake - canvas airplane cover * left strake - flight bag & wife's purse * rear feet area - misc kids stuff in backpacks With all this and 3 hrs of fuel, we were at gross. It was easy to load and unload, but made for a very full plane with our 15 lb dog thrown into the mix. Note that my kids are both physically pretty small (~75-85 lbs each), so if you have linebackers in the gene pool you may not have such good results. I love the plane, the flight characteristics, the versatility, the load capability and the safety of a canard. I firmly believe that you can't go wrong with a Velocity. Any more questions, please ask. Jeff