First RV IFR

[4kilo]

With several days off this week, and the phase 1 completed, I flew my 8 from the DFW area to Hilton Head. Monday was a beautiful day all the way from DFW to the island, but I filed IFR anyway just to get experience in the system with my new toy. At 11000 feet, I got ground speeds as high as 220 knots with the tailwind, but it was very cold.

I spent the rest of Monday and all day Tuesday with my parents (I haven't seen them in a while), and even gave each of them a ride (my first passengers).

Wednesday was a perfect day to try IMC; perfect weather in HH, with forecast marginal VFR in the DFW area and some IFR inroute. Coming back at 6000 kept me out of both winds and ice.

Now for the learning experience. With a slider canopy, in cold weather the aft edge of the canopy skirt tends to lift up slightly, creating a fairly severe draft in the cockpit. I have tended to consider this an anoyance to be fixed sometime later - after all, I can just wear warm clothes, right? Well, in light rain the area around that gap collects water, and then the blast of cold air blowing into the cockpit creates quite a shower. It's not a lot of water, but the air blast creates a fine spray that coats everything in the cockpit. Before I fly IFR again I will find a way to seal that gap!

Once I got clear of the rain, the rest of the flight was quite pleasant, and I shot an uneventful GPS approach into the home field (GPM). The RV makes a reasonable IFR platform, but I would not like flying it IMC without at least a wing leveler for an autopilot. My long range fuel tanks have already paid for themselves since I topped off the tanks in GPM at 3.57 per gallon, and only had to buy 30 gallons in Hilton Head (at 5.50 per gallon) to get back to GPM with IFR reserves. That is a 1714 nautical mile round trip, with two rides given in HH!

Keep pounding those rivets, it's worth it!

Pat

[captain_john]

Pat,

That sounds like a cool trip!

Rudi gave me a good idea for weatherstripping the canopy. He is using some door jamb seal from Lowe's. It looks like a good product and I will likely use it too.

Check it out.

CJ

[RobDob]

I wish we could fly home-builts at night & IMC in the UK!!!! Day VFR only here!!! Hopefully one day they'll change things............................! Have you got any pictures of your '8 Pat? I'm progressing slowly through a quick build! How ironic!

[dons]

Pat,

That's great that your phase one is over and you were able to make that trip. My first real cross country after getting my license was to go visit my parents (in a C-172 though).

I'm building an IFR capable RV as well and have read your website about those tanks many times with great interest. You did a very good job of documenting your thought process behind the design, something I haven't read anywhere else when it comes to extra fuel.

With a desire to fly IFR to remote areas of Canada, I have always had a desire for extra fuel capacity, not so much for staying in the air longer as a normal procedure, but rather having sufficient legal AND practical reserve beyond a typical flight of 3 hours in a less than populated area.

I hope Vans didn't totally give you the cold shoulder on the tanks, but I sorta understand why they don't want to endorse many changes at all. Rules and regs here are slightly different, so I am still investigating what I can do and not set off too many alarm bells. Every single rivet is potentially inspected here (on both sides), and inspectors are very RV aware.

Anyway, sounds like you had a great first experience (except for the cold mist shower) in a long range flight with your new machine, congrats!