Hey everybody, I wanted to take a few
minutes to introduce you to my airplane
that I've had for about six months or so.
This is what we call Lil Ru.
This is a Jabaroo J230, a 2008 model.
And she's just an absolute blast to fly.
We've really been enjoying her.
I'm doing some lessons for students,
doing some transition training, even
doing its technologically advanced
airplane, so I'm even doing TAA training
for commercial candidates
who need to get more hours.
So yeah, she's a fun airplane, really a
blast to fly, and I'm going to introduce
you a little to her
today and also take you for a
(Music)
All right, I'm going to be
doing a little voiceover here.
So, kind of like a director's commentary.
So I'll pipe in from time to time when I
want to give some after-the-fact
commentary on what
you're seeing or hearing.
And so hopefully you enjoy that, gives
you a little more insight.
(Music)
By the way, that's one of my favorite
parts of this video when I act surprised
when there was no passengers.
I didn't mean to do that, but when I was
watching it later, that was pretty funny.
heat is off.
Propeller is clear.
Master's coming on.
Boost pump on for five seconds.
Clear.
Start second car.
Instruments coming on right away.
And we do have oil pressure.
That's good.
Cortex heat is across.
Good.
Lights will turn the naps on.
Leave the strobes on.
Lift the landing light off.
Weather received in flight instruments.
So go ahead and turn the transponder on.
Get my headset.
Wind 090 at 5, temperature 32 viewpoint
minus 2, altimeter 2, niner 8 niner,
visual approaching use landing in
departing, runway 4 left and 4 right,
notice check if you notice your UAS
activity, crane's in minimums.
south of runway center line 124.6, north
of runway center line 119.7, advise on
initial contact, you
have information Charlie.
Alright, I went ahead and got the ATIS.
I'm ground 994, leave my just to make
sure there's not any major closures or
anything, but I'm just taxiing over
to the fuel pumps so I don't really need
to talk to anybody not
ready to go yet ( Radio )
So just listening to ground if they have
to get in touch with me.
( Radio ) That's never
happened before, you never know.
( Radio )
Why is 5 kilo Sierra parked
in front of the fuel island?
( Radio ) That is strange.
So,
So I was talking
there about 5 kilo Sierra.
Later on in this video 6 kilo
Sierra will play a big role.
Both of those airplanes are part of a
club that I am a member
of but I also teach at.
And so I've flown those airplanes before.
That'll come into play later on.
But the reason I was surprised it was at
the pump is because we have a deal with
the FBO and they
always fill it by the truck.
And so it turns out that I don't think it
was actually parked there to get fuel.
It just happened to be there.
Anyway, it's going to come back up.
go ahead and set that.
Instruments are gonna come off.
(Music)
All right, I'm going to talk about
something here that you
might notice during the video.
You might notice some flashing on the
warning light above the PFD there.
That happens quite a bit when I'm doing
things like touch and goes or landings.
I get terrain warnings and different
types of warnings like that all the time
on there, and they have to be
acknowledged or it'll continue to flash.
I'm going to work on fixing some of those
so it doesn't happen as much.
You'll also notice sometimes during the
flight possibly that the light stays on.
Well, there was a mistake in some of the
limits that I had to figure out.
It was happening for a couple of days and
there were no actual
problems going on at the time,
but one of the limits had gotten messed
up and so it was latched on all the time.
The day after this, I fixed it.
I talked to GRT.
And they gave me some things to try and I
was actually able to fix it.
So that went away.
But if you're wondering why that's on,
sometimes that's why.
If you're wondering why
it's flashing, that's normal.
off.
There we go.
Lights as required.
We're good there.
Transponder is set to altitude.
We'll get that on.
Radios are set.
Got 119.7 on the other side.
All right, take off brief.
We're going to be
taking off on four, right?
It looks like there's almost no wind.
Any wind there is looks
like it's down the runway.
We should be off the
ground by Bravo taxiway easily.
If we're not, something's wrong.
We're going to abort the take off.
If we're on the take off roll and
something anomalous happens,
we're going to cut the power.
And we're going to slow
down and get off the runway.
If we are off the ground, but there's
runway remaining, we're
going to do the same thing.
Chop the power.
We're going to put it back down on the
remaining runway and heavy braking.
If we're in the air and something
happens, we're going to keep it straight
ahead within 30 degrees.
And we're going to find some places as
safe as possible to land.
If we have electrical power, we're going
to put the flaps down more.
They'll already be at 10 degrees.
If we're in the air and there's no runway
remaining, but we are 800 feet AGL.
That's 2200 feet.
MSL.
The airport is available to us.
Falcon Ground, LightSport 648 Juliet is
complete with a run up.
LightSport 648 Juliet,
continue taxiing, monitor tower.
Continue taxiing over to tower 4H Juliet.
We're sending a note.
We're looking for traffic, not by street.
Officer 2080 Fakken Tower University,
Blue Dep pursuit, power out, OK, you're
going to touch the existing
Well, if you hadn't noticed, taking off
from KFFZ, that's Fackenfield in Mesa,
Arizona, it is a very,
very busy GA airport.
There's a lot of training going on there,
but also a lot of based aircraft.
So you'll notice during this flight that
the radio's pretty much constant.
There's always people in the pattern.
There's always things happening.
Anyway, you'll see here,
it's busier than most airports.
Takeoff doors are closed,
flaps are set ten degrees.
Seatbelts are
secured, landing light is on.
( Pause )
( Pause ) ( Pause )
Alright, final is clear.
( Pause )
Alright, power is coming up.
No more braking.
Airspeed is alive.
Engine instruments are in the green.
Okay, we'll fly the nose.
( Pause ) Just continuing that heading
for now for IFR citation and balance.
No need to return to the green.
( Pause ) Alright, flaps are coming up.
( Pause ) ( Pause )
( Pause ) ( Pause ) ( Pause )
Juliet runway 4R, cleared to land.
Cleared to land 4R, 1-6-2.
Music
( Radio )
All right, I thought it'd be a good
opportunity to talk a little bit about
Lil Ru, tell you a little more about her.
She's a 2008 J230 from Jabaroo.
It's got an updated Gen 4 Jabaroo 3,300
six-cylinder engine in it and an engine
instrumentation system from GRT or Grand
Rapids Technologies.
The PFD and the MFD are also from GRT as
well as the autopilot.
It's all part of an integrated Pretty
easy to use but as with most more
advanced instruments you have to spend
some time to get to know
them to get proficient.
Here's the other
thing about this airplane.
It's not that easy to land and take off
compared to more traditional trainers.
I've noticed this as I've done TA
training for a handful of commercial
certificate candidates and I've noticed
how they've struggled at first with the
rudder with how light it is and probably
other parts of the design.
The left turning axis on takeoff are
pretty pronounced compared to your
average Cessna or Piper.
You got to be Johnny on the spot with the
rudder and it's a strong push on the
right to keep that nose
straight when you're taking off.
But it's not just on takeoff either.
The adverse yaw is much greater than on
an Archer or even a 172 in just normal
turns when you're flying the airplane.
Besides the risk of ground looping, it
kind of feels a bit like
flying a tailwheel aircraft.
You have to really be on the rudder.
Likewise for landings it can feel a
little squirrely on touchdown and roll
out compared to common trainers.
Not as planted if you will.
You really have to dance on the rudders
to keep the nose straight at those speeds
just after touchdown.
You really get rewarded in this airplane
for keeping the nose off the
ground as long as possible.
So riding that wheelie on
landing really helps out.
The slower you are when the nose wheel
touches the ground, the
more off you're going to be.
So today since I don't get to do that
many landings anymore since I'm either
with students who do the landings or I'm
going somewhere with my wife or someone
else and I only get one
landing at our destination.
So I thought I'd go up and
just stay in the pattern a bit.
It was really fun just to relax and get
some reps in like that.
Like most skills in aviation it's a bit
perishable and I want to make sure I'm
keeping my proficiency up.
Maybe I got a little too relaxed though
as you'll see later in the flight so yeah
a little foreshadowing for you.
( Radio )
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There you heard me coach
myself more right rudder there.
That goes back to what I was talking
about a few minutes ago about, you know,
needing an extra rudder in this airplane.
So sometimes, uh, when I'm a little out
of practice, I got to coach
myself up a little bit too.
( Radio ) ( Radio ) ( Radio ) ( Radio )
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( Radio ) ( Radio )
Alright, how about some numbers?
That might be interesting for you, so
I'll throw some out here.
While the engine is very conventional by
today's standards, it does
have a bit of a wide RPM range.
I say conventional because it's a
horizontally opposed, air-cooled, direct
drive, carbureted aircraft engine.
Pretty standard stuff.
But there are some things that are a
little different, and we
can talk about that now.
First, it's got an
altitude compensating carburetor.
There is no mixture
control that the pilot can use.
The carburetor changes the mixture on its
own as appropriate for
whatever density altitude we're in.
Interesting concept, but yeah, no control
of the mixture by the pilot, which is a
little strange when you
first start flying it.
To shut the engine down, for example, you
turn it off like a car.
With the key.
It's something that's a little
different for most airplanes.
( Radio )
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It's also a pretty small engine, about
200 cubic inches of displacement.
But it's a six cylinder
engine, about 120 horsepower.
The result of that six cylinders, at
least from my perspective, is that the
engine is very smooth,
very little vibration.
With the lightweight carbon fiber prop
this airplane has, it just
starts and stops like a car.
It fires up basically
instantly every time.
You can barely hear or feel it when it
happens, relatively speaking, of course.
It's pretty cool.
Anyway, I'll let you watch this landing
and then I'll pick this back up after.
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I saw an opportunity for a short approach
so I asked for it and got it.
I don't, I haven't really gotten a chance
to do a ton of those in this airplane but
I like to feel what the glide feels like
and kind of really get to start to feel
how the energy is going to need to be
managed on something like that so when I
see this opportunity I had to take it.
There you go.
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I should note this
airplane's pretty slippery.
It's got a 12 to one glide ratio.
So it's actually not
that easy to get down.
So it's good for me to practice these
power off 180s and things like that.
So I can get a feel for it.
It's quite a bit more
floaty, quite a bit more glidy.
If that's a word, then the
trainers that I'm in a lot.
( Pause ) ( Pause ) ( Radio ) ( Radio )
( Pause ) ( Pause ) ( Pause ) ( Pause )
Lie drive Arm assistant Access
Alright, I gotta mention it.
I mean, I don't get to practice these a
lot, but I did put that right on the
thousand footers which was my target.
So, hey, you win some sometimes.
Mark Copekell for the three light shirt out. Light shirt out.
Left close traffic approach.
Left close traffic behind that warrior
that's about my 9 o'clock for you Julia.
Thank you.
( Radio ) ( Radio ) ( Radio )
Also, something that's a little different, like I said earlier, is the RPM range. Some of the numbers feel a little bit
normal, like it likes to
idle and taxi about 1,000 RPM.
That's pretty normal.
But pulling the throttle all the way out,
all the way to idle, doesn't really
reduce it much from that 1,000, maybe
down to about 900 or so.
Some of the other RPMs
you use seem kind of normal.
For example, I usually fly
the pattern at about 2,100 RPM.
The difference is, when I'm flying at
2,100 RPM in the pattern, that's usually
at about 80 knots, not the 90 or so you
would see in a conventional trainer.
Let's talk about cruise.
This is where things are a bit different.
The standard cruise range
is from 2,750 to 2,850 RPM.
She'll cruise at about 110 knots
indicated or more at the higher end of
that range, usually somewhere about 120,
maybe even a little more
true airspeed, maybe 125.
She'll do that sipping
about 5.2 gallons an hour.
There's an information screen on the MFD
engine page that, among other things,
shows the current mileage and
the average mileage as well.
Often, she reports that we're getting
about 23, 24, or even 25
nautical miles per gallon.
I haven't done the math exactly, but that
translates to likely over 30 statute
miles per gallon or
somewhere around that.
It's pretty funny that in cruise, my
airplane gets better gas mileage than, I
don't know, like a Corolla.
It does it at about twice the typical
speed and in straight
lines to your destination.
I don't know.
I love the efficiency
we get in this thing.
looking good.
I'm gonna start to walk that power out.
Alright, power's all the way down.
Just gonna let it float
to the thousand footers.
(Silence) Alright, that's good.
Keep that nose light.
All right, we are not
gonna let it go to the left.
Fly that nose.
Full power.
(Radio Chatter) (Radio Chatter)
Obviously, if you've watched the video
part of this flight, not just listen to
the audio, you'll also notice that it has
a control stick and not a yoke.
So for those only listening, it's a
shared center stick where it comes up in
kind of a why, so there's a grip for each
pilot on the same control stick.
It's pretty easy to fly
and works out pretty well.
Because the stick is between the two
pilots, there has to be a throttle
control for the outside hands, and sure
enough, there is a dual throttle control,
one on the far left of the panel and one
on the far right of the
panel, so either pilot can use it.
One more thing that might be a little
different is that the push to talk for
either pilot is just above their
respective throttle control on the panel.
It actually is pretty easy to use since
your hand is usually resting right there,
closer on the throttle, because there is
an arm rest on each door that leads your
arm straight to the
throttle and the push to talk.
Likewise, there's an arm rest in the
center for the stick hand.
Seriously, it's a very comfortable
airplane to fly as your hands are just
sort of naturally resting
in all the right places.
( Radio ) ( Radio ) ( Radio ) ( Radio )
is your
warrior 9 or 5 4 will you be landing out
warrior 3 9 or 9 or 5 4 talking to her
alright (Silence) nailed it, 75 knots
start slowing it down here 70 at least
there we are (Silence) (Silence)
(Silence) (Silence)
(Silence) (Silence) (Silence)
alright, alright alright, we are keeping
behind the lights for
it, for left, clear to the left, you have
to get to the earphone
box (Silence) (Silence)
(Silence) alright, the lights are coming
up, and we are going to fly the nose
(Silence) (Silence) (Silence) lights for
4-8 Juliet, fly straight out fly straight
out, 4-8 Juliet (Silence)
(Silence) (Silence) lights 4-6 4-8
Juliet, follow Cessna,
your left and downwind
alright, we will follow that traffic on
downwind to insight 4-8 Juliet
lights 4-4-8 Juliet, thank you traffic
over the confluence, we will follow you
for additional traffic, after you are
right, we will be turning northbound
outside of you as well, we will be
looking 4-8 Juliet extend downwind
There was six kilo Sierra.
Pay attention to them.
( Radio ) ( Radio )
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So let me know what else you might want
to know about Lil Ru and I'll try to
include more
information in future videos.
Oh well it might be obvious but I'll tell
you anyway why we call it a Lil Ru.
First she's small so that part's pretty
obvious but the Ru part comes of course
from her manufacturer Jabberoo.
Ru happens to also be a family name in my
family so it fits even better.
( Radio ) ( Radio ) ( Radio )
( Radio )
Alright, back to the 6 kilo Sierra.
Notice I'm kind of following them around
in the pattern a little bit here.
They're ahead of me.
Anyway, it'll come back up in a minute.
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( Pause ) That was nice.
Right on the money.
Right on the thousand footers.
( Radio )
Negative contact.
48 Juliet, we'll be looking.
I should have mentioned this earlier, but
one of the reasons I was out here trying
to kind of do spot landings, I was trying
to make sure I was landing most of the
time beyond the beginning of the thousand
footers, is because I'm probably going to
be flying my airplane
to Oshkosh this year.
Yeah, it's going to be awesome.
But because I've only had it for six
months and I don't get to land it all
that often I talked about earlier, I
wanted to start getting real familiar
about managing the energy like I said
before, so that I can get proficient at
spot landings, making sure I can hit my
spots because that's an important skill
when you're flying into Oshkosh.
So that's one of the
reasons I was out as well.
( Radio )
left base, turning four
left, good touch and go.
Good touch and go, four left, following
that traffic inside 48 Juliet.
( Radio )
Alright, well she might be small, but
again, if you've watched the video, you
do get a glimpse at one point of the
baggage compartment.
I would bet it's likely the biggest
baggage compartment in
all of light sport world.
My understanding is that the same
airframe is used for a four-seat model
that's available in other countries, like
maybe Australia where it's made.
So in this light sport two-seat model,
the area behind the seats
is absolutely cavernous.
And it has a man-sized
baggage door to boot.
It's one of the things I
really love about the airplane.
It's really easy to get stuff in and out,
and anything light enough to take with
you is more than likely going to fit.
It's seriously huge back there.
So she might be little, but she's got a
big heart, as they say.
As long as by heart,
you mean storage area.
(Inaudible) If you need to climb for
train, that is approved.
Continue straight out.
(Inaudible) (Inaudible)
Alright, spot is made.
(Inaudible) (Inaudible) (Inaudible)
Flight 464H Julia, flight straight out,
gosh, virtual is departed citation.
Flight straight out, 4H Julia.
Yeah, that's in sight, 4H Julia.
Can't see the wake though.
(Inaudible) Turn left
crosswind, follow Archer
I know, I'm a smart aleck.
I thought at least I'd get a little
chuckle, but she just moved on.
Light 48, Juliet, if you need to climb
for train, set us up for
it to continue straight out.
We'll continue straight out, 4A, Juliet.
Warrior 0, Papa Fox, traffic left base to
2, Moaf line, Archer.
He's on the aisles traffic.
We have him on site,
7-0, Papa Fox, short.
6881, extend downwind.
Oxford 6881, extend downwind.
Extending downwind, Oxford 6881.
Flight 4, 4A, Juliet, traffic ahead and
to your left, 1 mile
over climb and roof dam.
Traffic is in sight, 48 Juliet.
Flight 4, 4A, Juliet,
follow, set, snap your left.
We'll follow that, 7-0, 48 Juliet.
Warrior 0, Papa Fox, short, follow,
Archer, 2, Moaf line, running
4L, good, that's angle number
That's not what I'm following, by the
way, that's 6 kilo Sierra.
(Inaudible)
two fourteen running four left continuing
traffic holding position.
Four left, two
All right.
I was just feeling good.
I was having a good day and getting
pretty relaxed and what you're going to
see or hear upcoming is me picking up
somebody else's call
and it's six kilo Sierra.
So as I said before,
I'm pretty comfortable.
I was just sitting there kind of doing my
thing following six kilo Sierra.
She called them up and I
sat there for a second.
Nobody answered and then I answered for
them and then I got everybody confused.
Here you go.
full stop.
Request in full stop please,
we're your one eight seven.
Touching six two Juliet, number three,
correction number two, follow Warrior one
mile final, running four
left, six, touch and go.
Four eight Juliet, clear, touch and go
four left, I thought we
were following a Cessna.
Six two Juliet, correction,
follow Cessna three mile final.
Alright, we're following that Cessna
three mile final, four
eight Juliet, number three.
Alright.
Tower, this is nine two six, Kia was
here, did you make a call for us?
Two six two Juliet, affirmative number
two, follow Warrior half mile final,
running four left, quick touch and go.
Number two, behind the Warrior, four
left, clear, touch
and go, six two Juliet.
Identify three, extend downwind.
Okay, so yeah, kind of crazy.
So she correctly told
Sixquila Sierra to follow an archer.
And when I so confidently answered
that I was supposed to be following a
Cessna, then she's probably going, oh
yeah, did I get that wrong?
So she corrected herself.
And then a few moments later, Sixquila
Sierra jumped on and
said, did you call me earlier?
And so it was at that point when they
said that I went, wait a
minute, what just happened?
But my little blunder
there got everybody confused.
So, you know, don't say I didn't do
anything to keep it interesting that day.
empty one on the go, you have to do.
Tower five fifty two, contact tower one
two four point six, please.
Twenty
And by the way, I really didn't know for
sure what had happened until later on
when I went back to the recording and
kind of figured it out.
But I knew something was up when Sixgila
Sierra called back in, but I really
didn't even know at the time
that I had made that mistake.
It's pretty funny.
Cross five fifty two, contact tower one
two four point six, please.
Warrior zero, Papa five, start additional
traffic, opposite base, Archer, Lance,
Peral, runway, reduce, speed, please.
Seven zero, Papa five, start.
Venture west one zero
two, extend downwind.
Venture west one zero
two, extending downwind.
Warrior eight five
eight, extend downwind.
Extending downwind, Warrior five eight.
Calcutta, Oxford sixty eight eighty one,
hold short, four left at Echo one,
request short delay.
Sixty eighty one, five until standby.
Flight 48 Juliet, fly straight out.
Fly straight out, 48 Juliet.
( Inaudible )
( Inaudible ) ( Inaudible ) ( Inaudible )
( Inaudible ) ( Inaudible ) 48 Juliet.
44 Juliet, roger, follow the system.
We'll follow that system.
48 Juliet.
2953, flight straight out.
53, not 53.
Falcon Tower 648, Juliet, can we make
this one a full stop?
Terminate police parking south side.
Well, as you just heard, I'd be making
this one my last one, full stop.
But listen carefully because the
controller is going to have a hard time
finding a Venture West airplane.
I think it's 108
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Tower, MD1, Echo ramp, request a cactus
to departure to the north.
MD1, cactus to departure, approved
traffic three miles north of the field,
aimbound on the Gecko
2 arrival helicopter.
MD1 will be searching.
Flight 440, Juliet, traffic opposite
Baseline's trail running.
Four ahead, Juliet.
So anyway, she got so distracted that she
almost didn't give me a clearance.
She did give it to me
at the very last minute.
I was ready to ask for it or go around,
but she did finally give it to me.
And then she also, as is the normal
practice, didn't tell me to turn right
and hold short of the parallel runway
because I had to get across over there to
park and didn't have me go over to the
other controller and everything.
I ended up doing it and you'll hear that
the other controller kind of cleaned it
up by making sure that I
was going to hold short.
Central West 108, Falcon Tower.
Central West 108, if you hear the
transmission, I dent.
Tower, MD1 has the Gecko helicopter,
traffic inside, no factor.
MD1, Falcon Tower, Roger.
Roger, 953, I told
you to extend downwind.
Turn back into the downwind and extend.
Extend downwind, not by three.
Turn right, turn right immediately.
Turn right, turn right
immediately, read back.
Where is it at?
0 Papa Fox, start, extend downwind.
Okay, extending
downwind, 7-0 Papa Fox, start.
Central West 102, thank you for the
extension, turn left crosswind.
Left crosswind, Central West 102.
Central West 108, Falcon Tower.
Archer and Air 5-3, turn base.
Turn base, 953.
Central West 101, running 4 left, good to
land, number 2, follow
Cessna 1, mile final.
Clear to land, number 2, 4 left, 101.
Clear to land, 4 left,
clear to land, 4A Juliet.
4858, follow Archer left crosswind.
Calling that traffic, 4858.
Central West 108, Falcon Tower.
Anyway, you can see where distractions
can be critical on the ATC side as well
as on the pilot side.
Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this.
we would like to make a 4
stop for the landing, 953.
Archer, 953, running 4 left, good to
land, number 3, follow Cessna 1, mile final.
Alright, I'm going to put this one down a
little shorter. 4
left, clear to land, 953.
Falcon Tower, Scatty 2 right now, for red
level, 4 stop, foot 12.
Archer 953, cancel landing, clearance
change, 2848, contact Tower 1 to
(Music)
ready to go for the next time.
So hopefully you enjoyed that time flying
with her for the
first time on the podcast.
Going forward, you'll probably see more
of her because as I do more cockpit
series episodes, some of them