J-3 Cub - first PIC flight with my son

iWantWings

iWantWings

Pre-takeoff checklist
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wingsIwant
It had been about 2 weeks since the endoresement and also my last flight in the Cub, so on a day when the winds were no longer gusting, I scheduled a flight with my son.

Here is video of the flight
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ofdwgjtdus8

We got a bit of feeling of what "ownership" is like; the plane is hangared and because there was no one working in it, i
my son and I got to open the hangar and all . . . ;)

(Yeah there were things I didn't do right - but it ended well and had the best of times with my son ;) )
 
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That was so cool to watch.

Thank you!
 
Very nice video, with a cute kid, and you shared a nice flight together.

That tailwheel looks like a Scott 3200, which is a nice well made tailwheel. On the last landing with the shimmy, sometimes if you slightly unload the tailwheel, that may stop the shimmy, do that by reducing some back stick pressure.

Now, the question on my mind and everyone else's, where did he park that booger after the flight?
 
Great video. The look on your sons face during the flight is priceless.
Great memory for him, and you.:thumbsup:
 
As I also like to take kids up in my Cub, I can especially enjoy watching your flight. My only caution to you would be to secure that window. It would be a distraction for me and might lead to a premature failure of the window hinge. Enjoy the Cub and be safe out there.
 
What a great testament to the pure joy of flying.

Sometimes I think we get caught up in gadgets and minutea, and it's just so cool to get back to basics.

Thanks for putting that together.
 
Dennis McKim said:
You, sir, are a hero. Kudos to you, and thank you very much for sharing those few moments with us.
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Thank you very much for very kind words. I really can't take credit for anything out of the ordinary. I suppose this is a 10 minute snapshot of simple aviation and a young boy enjoying time with his dad. My hope is that one day he will he will learn to appreciate "things", understand he is fortunate and not take anything for granted.

But I digress - this is an aviation forum ;) Thank you again.
 
Bereikua said:
That was so cool to watch.

Thank you!
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texasag93 said:
Good Stuff!
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register@teamandras.com said:
So awesome. Tip of the hat to you!
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Mike5250 said:
Great video!!!
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I'm glad you guys enjoyed it; in general people don't have the span of watching something that's more than 2 or 3 minutes long, so I tried hard to chop 45 minutes of video to 5 minutes. But I just couldn't do it and ended up with a lengthy one. Thanks again.
 
champ driver said:
Very nice video, with a cute kid, and you shared a nice flight together.

That tailwheel looks like a Scott 3200, which is a nice well made tailwheel. On the last landing with the shimmy, sometimes if you slightly unload the tailwheel, that may stop the shimmy, do that by reducing some back stick pressure.

Now, the question on my mind and everyone else's, where did he park that booger after the flight?
Click to expand...

Great info and advice, thank you.

In the nearly 14 hours or so that it took me to get the tailwheel endorsement, I had never come across this vibration - which now I am certain it was the tailwheel shimmy. As it was happening (can't really see it in the edited video), I sort of instinctively did what you said and eased up on the tailwheel pressure bringing the stick to a neutral position. Nonetheless the vibration continued and I was trying to be ready for the plane to dart left or right, not being sure what was going on.

But it stopped.

(Just a few days ago the tailwheel tire was flat and it was changed, not sure if that was a factor)

Ah... about the boogers... LOL ... I'll let the next renter find out the answer (yuck - the problems with renting).

Thanks again for the good advice.
 
96gs917 said:
Great video. The look on your sons face during the flight is priceless.
Great memory for him, and you.:thumbsup:
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Glad you liked it! Funny that you mention the look on my son's face. That is exactly what I had in mind of capturing, his reaction to a first flight where he is in an semi-open cockpit.

But I didn't quite frame the view out of the gopro right (there's no "preview" of the framing on this gopro i have), i captured way more than I wanted in the frame. Had I had 2 gopros, I would have had one recording from opposite side and see his reaction as he was looking out the side.

Great memories ;)
 
Rick Rademacher said:
As I also like to take kids up in my Cub, I can especially enjoy watching your flight. My only caution to you would be to secure that window. It would be a distraction for me and might lead to a premature failure of the window hinge. Enjoy the Cub and be safe out there.
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I like your signature photo - wish I could make it bigger ; )

If you were to ever get a CFI rating (you might already have, I don't know) you could experiment on your kids and in the Cub. Do your kids ever want to take the stick and fly the plane themselves?

About the window: I told the A&P about it and confirmed it will be fixed. The window was detaching from the "latch" quite frequently, so I stopped paying attention to it after a while; i just hope I didn't make it worse.

Thank you for the advice and enjoy flights with your kids.
 
FastEddieB said:
What a great testament to the pure joy of flying.

Sometimes I think we get caught up in gadgets and minutea, and it's just so cool to get back to basics.

Thanks for putting that together.
Click to expand...

I am happy you liked it. For me anything related to flying is still a novelty that has not warn off; and my son enjoys doing just about anything with me, so it's a win-win situation (my other kids enjoy doing things with me as well, but a little "differently").

It's also rewarding to see other people's reaction to flying GA, when they like it. A day after the flight with the Cub and my son, I took a coleague from work and his 4 year old son for a short sight-seeing flight in a C172 (my son in the video tagged along as well). They had never been in a small GA airplane and the country they are from does have much general aviation.

My colegue's respnose really caught me by surprise. He said that was probably the best experience he has had in his life. Wow, I didn't expect that. I also recorded a video from the cockpit for him to have it as a memory for when he returns to his home country.

I suppose that's an example of what you had just written - how the basics of aviation are by themselves one of a kind.
 
Rick Rademacher said:
As I also like to take kids up in my Cub, I can especially enjoy watching your flight. My only caution to you would be to secure that window. It would be a distraction for me and might lead to a premature failure of the window hinge. Enjoy the Cub and be safe out there.
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Maybe you can help me with this question, or someone else can.

I feel a little uneasy, or would much prefer if I could find a way for my son to wear not just a lap belt, but also a shoulder harness type of contraption.

The shoulder harness in the rear seat I tried in all sorts of way to fit it to him, with or without booster seat, but to no avail.

If this was my plane, mounting a shoulder harness that would fit his small frame would be the first thing I'd do - but for the time being I'll look at "rental solution". I guess my options are limited to finding a way to fit the existing shoulder straps in the rear seat.

I suppose I find some comfort in the relatively low vertical and horizontal components of the total momentum at which the J-3 can be flown, just above the angle of attack before stall. So that's of some help.

So i've got some homework to do.
 
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Low tire pressure could definitely cause tailwheel shimmy.

But so could a half dozen other things.

It usually begins with a slight sideways drift as the tailwheel touches down.

That looks like a Scott 3200, a substantial piece of hardware for a Cub. It's what my Citabrias had. I spent many a greasy hour with them disassembled on the bench to try to cut down shimmy. There's one particular centering spring that's prone to fracture - #18 below:

scott3200.jpg


You can catch it on preflight if the tailwheel "locks in" in one direction but not the other.

I found the chances of shimmying became worse if the tailwheel springs were fatigued. Ideally the pivot should be parallel to the ground. If that starts to angle up at the rear from weak springs, shimmy will be more likely.

Between good technique and proper maintenance I think you can cut down on tailwheel shimmy - but probably never eliminate it entirely.
 
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Thanks for the video and thanks to Eddie for the tailwheel info. My 140 has a 3200. You can't hang around here for very long without learning something.
 
FastEddieB said:
Low tire pressure could definitely cause tailwheel shimmy.

But so could a half dozen other things.

It usually begins with a slight sideways drift as the tailwheel touches down.

That looks like a Scott 3200, a substantial piece of hardware for a Cub. It's what my Citabrias had. I spent many a greasy hour with them disassembled on the bench to try to cut down shimmy. There's one particular centering spring that's prone to fracture - #18 below:

scott3200.jpg


You can catch it on preflight if the tailwheel "locks in" in one direction but not the other.

I found the chances of shimmying became worse if the tailwheel springs were fatigued. Ideally the pivot should be parallel to the ground. If that starts to angle up at the rear from weak springs, shimmy will be more likely.

Between good technique and proper maintenance I think you can cut down on tailwheel shimmy - but probably never eliminate it entirely.
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Thank you FastEddie - that helps me understand some things. Now that i know the tailwheel type i'll try to find the same diagram you posted but big enough to print. I admit I really dont understand how the tail wheel gets into a "mode" where it locks into the last position it was deflected into, or just how it works in general. Looks pretty complicated - this is no dummy wheel. Thank you again
 
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