I did this to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the RAF, which is this year, and also to remember 'The Few' and the somewhat 'Forgotten Fewer' those pilots who were from outside the UK and took part in the Battle of Britain. Roughly 1 in 5 were from outside the UK with New Zealand fielding the second biggest contingent in that group.
Some details about the flight: Distance flown - 365 nautical miles, flight time - 3 hrs 10 minutes, various altitudes flown to avoid airspace, several months planning and practising parts of the route.
Unlike the Dreamliner over the USA last year I did not have the help of an autopilot to fly the route for me, the Spitfire shape is mainly curves which are much harder to fly than straight lines. Also it was surprisingly turbulent for a Winter's day which made it all the more challenging.
The story is already being shared far and wide by the RAF press office and it's proving popular on Social media too.
Hi Andy
ReplyDeletewe have a ULPower engine in an escapade G-LEEK and we have had the same problem with a failed TPS but i think the problem is not the sensor but the way ULPower have used it in their throttle body I found this out by accident when I checked ours out and found that it only made contact when the centre rotary bit was pushed in this was on a new one supplied by ULPower when they supplied them bare without the throttle body. I think there should be a spring pushing the centre in against the spindle I got around this on ours by dismantling the sensor and bending the brushes slightly so that it made contact with the track inside without the need for it to be pushed in, this is why they have had so many failures with these as they normally never fail.
Hi John,
ReplyDeleteMany thanks for sharing the knowledge. Someone else has told me they think that UL modify the sensor a bit so that may not be helping things either.
Regards
Andy