Joining the fraternity

Pilawt

Pilawt

Member
Joined
Oct 18, 2022
Messages
23
Location
Goodyear AZ
My Cherokee Six has been sold and I just signed a purchase contract on a 1977 7ECA. I'm stoked to get back into tailwheel, stick & rudder flying!

In 55 years and 4500 hours of flying, my only tailwheel experience so far has been 300 hours in the CubCrafters Sport Cub I owned several years ago (well, not counting four hours FO time in a DC-3). I'm flying with a CFI now to dust off my rusty skills and get back into it. I'm looking forward to participating here. Photos to come! :D
 
Welcome and congrats! Be sure to post some pics of your 7 when you get it.

I think I recognize your user name from PoA, no?
 
Pilawt said:
My Cherokee Six has been sold and I just signed a purchase contract on a 1977 7ECA. I'm stoked to get back into tailwheel, stick & rudder flying!

In 55 years and 4500 hours of flying, my only tailwheel experience so far has been 300 hours in the CubCrafters Sport Cub I owned several years ago (well, not counting four hours FO time in a DC-3). I'm flying with a CFI now to dust off my rusty skills and get back into it. I'm looking forward to participating here. Photos to come! :D
Click to expand...

Welcome and glad you found us! Hope the training goes well and we'll be looking forward to some beautiful pics of the desert southwest from above. :)
 
The CFI has purged my system of the tri-gear toxins that built up over the last ten years, and he says I'm good to go. I can feel this 7ECA talking to me now and I think the airplane and I are building a fine relationship.

The entry-exit routine is still a work-in-progress. I'm 6'3" and not as limber as I used to be, and this airplane has a non-adjustable front seat. The entry procedure goes something like this:

1. Right foot on step.
2. Grab left-side upper frame and pull myself up.
3. Kneel with left knee on seat and pull right leg in.
4. Pull myself up as far as possible toward the skylight with both hands on upper frame.
5. Bump head on spar center section.
6. Pull left leg in and wiggle down into the seat.

Once in, I have barely enough legroom, with knees grazing the bottom of the panel. Another inch or three would be very welcome.

The exit procedure is not as refined. The best technique seems to be to wait for someone to come along to turn the airplane upside down and shake me out. 😁

Kidding aside, I absolutely love this airplane. 😀





 
I would never tell you to move the seat an inch back. Highly illegal. I have seen it done with a couple 1/8" x 1/2" steel bars, each with four strategically drilled holes. Probably took that criminal about 45 minutes.
 
Congrats!

Key to entry is remembering you have a lot of headroom once in. The top edge of the door opening makes you think the roof is lower than it is. So get your head and shoulders inside, then extend your right leg and pull to get your hips and legs up and swivel your left leg in.

Try touching the top of your head to the greenhouse plexi. You will be surprised at how far up it is.
 
There are a couple ways. Roy Redmon showed me a bulletproof way, but for my six foot octogenarian frame, I put right foot on step, left foot on left rudder pedal, right foot on right pedal, pull my butt in, and done. Really easy if I do it once a week.

Yesterday I did a solo hand start of the Cub - usually a non-event. Turned out to be more of a struggle than I remember - legs no longer bend the way they did in my seventies. But I can still swing into the Cub front seat more easily than many 30-year-olds.

You would laugh if you saw me crawl into the back seat of an Amphib Cub or Husky. What a struggle!
 
Yes. I grab the blade a little further in, but yeah. Then it is up on the door frame and into the backseat. Used to be a fluid motion.
 
Bob Turner said:
There are a couple ways. Roy Redmon showed me a bulletproof way, but for my six foot octogenarian frame, I put right foot on step, left foot on left rudder pedal, right foot on right pedal, pull my butt in, and done. Really easy if I do it once a week.
Click to expand...

That's my method at 6'4"
 
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