Aeronca Champion - Best airplane to teach how to land?

[Lowflynjack]

For those of you who are interested in learning to fly a tailwheel plane, or to just become better at flying in general, check out this guy. http://tailwheelersjournal.com/ He's got some great info and thinks outside of the normal general aviation training box. He may offend some of you if you're whuffos... you'll understand after reading some of his great articles!

 

[FloridaPilot]

I want to learn how to do this well:

 

[Timbeck2]

What's a whuffo?

 

[pmanton]

whuffo do you use this for? whuffo you doing that?

 

[champ driver]

I think tailwheel teaches you to use the rudder more and highlights the importance of staying on the centerline and straight. Nosewheel planes tend to forgive bad habits. I think the Champ is a good trainer. I think the Luscombe is trickier to land, so if you learn in one you'll be able to fly most of the small tailwheel planes. I spent 300 hours in a Decathlon, then jumped in a Luscombe and was amazed at how much more responsive it was, especially on rudder.

Now the other part of a Champ, or similar low-powered tailwheel plane, is that it will teach you that horsepower won't save you if you don't have it. It teaches you when you're headed toward trees and looking like you're not going to clear them, you need to keep the nose down and build speed. In my Luscombe crash, I had a Cirrus pilot in the next seat who decided to pull back on the stick to "help" me over the trees. He used up any energy I had. He admitted it, and said he panicked.

I believe the average Champ is around 700lbs with 1200 gross, so with 10 gallons of fuel, you and a 200lb guy would be legal, but you won't feel like you're strapped to a rocket!

The empty weight of the Champ as advertised from the factory was 740, that's with a bare bones plane. How they got a number that low, I don't know, and that's with just a 13 gal fuselage tank, metal side panels, no electric and small tailwheel. Lots of Champs have padded side panels, carpet, a wing tank, a large Scott 3200 tailwheel and other things that all add up to an average much closer to 820-900 empty weight, gross is 1220 for a 7AC. Now something like a 7EC has a higher empty weight and gross with it's 90 hp, electrical and wing tanks.
My Champ was weighed before restoration and I came up with 805 with certified scales. I have a stock bare bones Champ, no extras.

 

[kyleb]

The empty weight of the Champ as advertised from the factory was 740, that's with a bare bones plane. How they got a number that low, I don't know, and that's with just a 13 gal fuselage tank, metal side panels, no electric and small tailwheel.

Agree. I have a Champ project spread around the hangar, and take a look at all of the Champs and their prop cards at airshows. I've never seen a Champ with a listed weight of under 775#, and I'd bet the number on the prop card is optimistic for most of 'em.