Skyhawk Down!

mscard88

mscard88

Touchdown! Greaser!
Joined
Oct 1, 2015
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Alabama
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Mark
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KEET Shelby County AL
One of the flight school's 172s had a prop strike yesterday, porpoised and hit on the nose wheel. Engine will be sent out and be gone for a couple of months. Bummer as activity is picking up with nicer weather. Must have hit pretty hard on the nose wheel. :(

ps No, I didn't fly yesterday, in case you're wondering ('Dog & Ryanb)
 
Off topic on 2nd post but is that an Enforcer in your profile pic? I saw one of those a few years ago at Edwards AFB while driving to park for an airshow. I only saw the square prop tip and immediately knew it was something different. Just sitting in a fenced area with some other assorted parts.
 
overdrive148 said:
Off topic on 2nd post but is that an Enforcer in your profile pic? I saw one of those a few years ago at Edwards AFB while driving to park for an airshow. I only saw the square prop tip and immediately knew it was something different. Just sitting in a fenced area with some other assorted parts.
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Yep. When I was stationed at Eglin AFB two of them flew there for two months dropping weapons out on the range, proving test. Fighter pattern was around 300 knots and they fit right in with the F15s and other fighters at Eglin. Stopped by and got permission to take pics of them, cool airplane.

The one at Edwards is a static display I think, right? May be another at the AF Museum too I think.
 
mscard88 said:
Yep. When I was stationed at Eglin AFB two of them flew there for two months dropping weapons out on the range, proving test. Fighter pattern was around 300 knots and they fit right in with the F15s and other fighters at Eglin. Stopped by and got permission to take pics of them, cool airplane.

The one at Edwards is a static display I think, right? May be another at the AF Museum too I think.
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At the time it was just in a random yard on the edge of the base. I didn't know where the museum was. Neat aircraft!
 
mscard88 said:
One of the flight school's 172s had a prop strike yesterday, porpoised and hit on the nose wheel. Engine will be sent out and be gone for a couple of months. Bummer as activity is picking up with nicer weather. Must have hit pretty hard on the nose wheel. :(

ps No, I didn't fly yesterday, in case you're wondering ('Dog & Ryanb)
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Wouldn’t have happened in a taildragger. ;)
 
mscard88 said:
One of the flight school's 172s had a prop strike yesterday, porpoised and hit on the nose wheel. Engine will be sent out and be gone for a couple of months. Bummer as activity is picking up with nicer weather. Must have hit pretty hard on the nose wheel. :(

ps No, I didn't fly yesterday, in case you're wondering ('Dog & Ryanb)
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Better check the lower firewall for wrinkles... :tongue2:
There was a school 172 in the shop here a week or two ago that experienced the exact same thing.
 
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GRG55 said:
Better check the lower firewall for wrinkles... :tongue2:
There was a school 172 in the shop here a week or two ago that experienced the exact same thing.
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Yep that was the first question I asked the boss. Said he hopes not.
 
Lachlan said:
You can’t damage the nose gear on a taildradder. ;)
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Depends on how you define "gear." There's some pretty expensive rotating gear out on the nose of most taildraggers, and they are indeed sometimes damaged in poor landings, as in "too nose low" like a nosewheel porpoise . . . .
 
Hank S said:
Depends on how you define "gear." There's some pretty expensive rotating gear out on the nose of most taildraggers, and they are indeed sometimes damaged in poor landings, as in "too nose low" like a nosewheel porpoise . . . .
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The propstrike is merely the precursor to the main event of the vertical stab burying itself in the dirt.
 
GRG55 said:
The propstrike is merely the precursor to the main event of the vertical stab burying itself in the dirt.
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But sometimes they flop back down on the wheels. Then ags3in, sometimes they get enough sideways with the prop digging in that a main wheel will break off. Saw that just the other day, watching Flying Leathernecks.
 
Friend of mine with a grass strip on his farm told me a story about being in the right seat of a Cessna 170 piloted by one of his neighbors, who really messed up the takeoff from his strip. Went through the fence, bent both gear legs going through the ditch, ended up on the county road, nose down, tail up, still at full throttle and did several pirouettes on the prop. Plane fell on its back after they chopped the throttle. They both crawled out, left the plane where it was and hiked back to his house for a beer, and the tractor. Plane is back in the air now.
 
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