I short while ago I did a posting about my friend’s property in Kent where there’s a chance I might be able to keep MYRO. I put up some pics and gave some dimensions of the ‘runways’ that would be available and my microlighting pal Tony said that he thought they’d be a bit short. I said probably not for an AX3 but bearing in mind Tony is current and I’m not, I think he may be right.
In the last couple of evenings I’ve knocked up a scenery for Microsoft Flight Simulator X (don’t laugh 🙂 ) based on my friend’s property and in which I’ve tried to place trees and bushes as far as possible in their correct places and of about the right heights. Just so you can see how close it is, here are a few comparison pics and I’m sure I won’t need to say which ones are real and which are not 😐
I won’t bother showing the reciprocals and I hope you’ll agree that the scenery is not too far out. The aircraft in the sim, by the way, is a Quad City Challenger that I’ve given flight characteristics to that are very similar to those of an AX3. What I’ve found is that in the sim, it is possible to take off without too many problems. However, landing is much more tricky and speed control on the approach has to be VERY accurate. I haven’t been able to model the up-slope that would help you to slow-down once landed in an easterly direction but stopping does not seem to be a problem in the sim. But what I have found is that whereas the ‘runways’ look totally adequate at ground level, on landing approach they are much foreshortended and from the air they do look very short indeed!
This is something I’ll have to think about. My friend himself said that he thought the space might be a bit small and mentioned that he has another area of land nearby that could possibly be more suitable. I think I may need to find out more 😉
English
Nederlands
Français
Deutsch
Italiano
Latviešu valoda
Português
Español
And you’re right too Tony. It’s not a total disaster though. There is a gap which is shown in the first two pics that you can land through coming from the north/north-east and although you’re landing on a short runway there’s a run-on area that I’ve not shown very well and also a mound that you can run up that the property is built on the top of actually. You can just see the start of it in some of the pics – it’s not too steep. Also, there’s a clear approach with no trees (they died and were removed) from the west onto a longer runway with a slight upslope. So if you always used those for landing it would just depend on what the cross-wind was really. The best thing would just be to give it a try – but I’ve got to get MYRO flying and permitted first! Obviously what I’d like to do is for my friend to say ‘Go ahead and give it a go’ so I can trailer the wings there and finish the assembly there without being under any pressure. If I get permission to do it at the strip where the wings are currently, as I’ve been told there’s no room for MYRO there I’d be under a lot of pressure to get the job done and get MYRO moved away.
Roger, Please don’t let me put you off! It is just the lack of clear approaches that would worry me. What would happen on a hot summers day with no lift and a lot of thermals? If it was me I would cut down the trees 30′ either side of the runway centre lines and leave a 5′ hedge there. That would solve the problems.