QUICKIE NEWSLETTER 13 page 2
- Details
- Category: QAC Newsletters
- Published: Wednesday, 29 November 2006 14:11
- Written by Quickie Aircraft Corporation
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| CAFE 250 Continued The 3 Quickies entered were privately owned:
history. N80QT was damaged in an early flight incident and repairs were not finished until one week prior to the race. In that one week period, 40 hours of flying was accomplished on the aircraft by Martin Fisher, Gary Keep, and Jim Thompson. It was then ferried to Santa Rosa for the race. N88QB has over 675 hours of flying time by over 24 pilots,on the engine and airframe. It won an award for outstanding workmanship at the recent Merced, CA flyin. N80QK, which you have read about before, sported a different cowling and a new spinner installation for the race. It has accumulated over 150 hours of flying time. Many designers discounted the Quickie in the race, and went gunning for the Q2. As the results indicate, not one of the other 45 racers managed to get by the Quickie for a shot at the Q2. Gene Sheehan was the ace Q2 pilot for the race, and Peter Lert, Senior Editor Air Progress Magazine, went along as navigator, radio man, and chief ballast. Although the sizable victory speaks for the efficiency of the Q2 itself, the race was not run at the theoretically optimum speeds and profile, which resulted in a FEF about 25% lower than the theoretical maximum, and about 10-12% lower than the practical maximum. Information learned from this race will be used to increase the FEF factor with a goal of 140,000+ for next year’s race. By careful optimization of the flight profiles. the Quickies can probably improve 15% on this year’s performance. In summary, the race results of the CAFE 250 demonstrate the impressive and decisive margin of superiority of the Q2 and the Quickie over all other homebuilt and factory production aircraft. While some aircraft may go further, and others may’ go faster, or carry more people, no other aircraft has a better combination of speed, economy and |
payload. The Quickie or Q2 builder can be justifiably proud to own the
most fuel efficient aircraft in the world, Next year, we hope to see many more Quickies and Q2’s participate. The event was relaxed, fun, and gave everyone the opportunity to rub shoulders with pilots from all over. PREPARATION OF THE WINNING Q2 We think many of you would like to know how N8IQA was prepared for the CAFE 250 race. N81QA was constructed from the standard components and construction plans available to the public. The surface finish is very smooth and wave free, and consumed two weeks of effort to achieve. N8IQA was built over a three month period in our shop, which enabled us to show sisitors an aircraft under construction. Many would return at two week intervals in order to measure the progress of the speedy construction. For the race, we concentrated on the following plan:
The final propeller selected was a 56 x 51 propeller similar in design to the standard Q2 propeller. It achieves greater efficiency at the race cruising speed. while sacrificing some horsepower during takeoff and climb, and at high speed. |
Airframe rigging changes included determining the correct
c.g. location for maximum performance, and modifying the aileron rigging
for a small
benefit. These changes resulted in a more demanding aircraft to fly, particularly
at high speed and on landing. Approximately 2.8 hours of flight testing was accomplished specifically preparing for the race. Fuel flow instrumentation was reinstalled in the aircraft to assist in this phase. At 8,000 feet, 1040 lb. gross weight. and 158 m.p.h. TAS, N8IQA’s fuel flow is 3.09 gallons per hour, which equates to 52.7 mpg. A power setting of 70% at 8,000 feet results in a TAS of 172 m.p.h. Measurements taken of rate-of-climb at gross weight bettered the advertised figures by about 10%. We estimate that the airframe and propeller changes for the race made an incremental 3-5% improvement in the Q2’s CAFE 250 performance. Therefore, extrapolation of the data for N8IQA to the standard homebuilder configuration can he accomplished. The major findings at 1000 lb gross weight are:
Why is N8IQA superior to the advertised performance? All published performance data was based on flight testing the Q2 prototype N8490P. The production homebuilt Q2’s are cleaned up in many areas. Also, N8IQA is an above average Q2, (if we may he allowed to say so). and all advertising is based on an “average” Q2. A new exhaust system utilizing the advanced A/R technology is being shipped as a standard feature of the Q2 kit. It was tested on N8IQA, but was not available for the prototype N8490P at the time that aircraft was being flight tested. This A/R exhaust system has made a substantial improvement in fuel consumption for the Revmaster 2l00-DQ engine on the dyno. Flight testing confirms the lower fuel consumption. As a result, customers are receiving a better aircraft at no additional cost. |
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Using a simple bar graph approach, here are some comparisons of FEF and
fuel economy between several different models: |
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