Holy Shit

[Colonel]

Spent the morning doing accounting.

Spent the afternoon getting checked
out in the L29 Viper jet conversion
(Rolls Royce Viper 601 w/3700 lbs
thrust, removed from Hawker 125)
with Mike Mangold.

[img]http://wingshots.foxalpha.com/2009/RENO/IMG_4801s.jpg[/img]

You might remember him from this:



The L29 Viper is ridiculous.  So light
and nimble, with virtually no spoolup
time.  You can crank it around the
pattern like a Pitts!

400 knots down the runway, pull +7G's
to vertical, roll through 10,000 feet and
gently pull inverted back down again.

What a wonderfully ridiculous airplane!

Mike guaranteed that we could go from
parked at the end of the runway to 15,000
in 90 seconds.

Everyone should fly one!

I doubt we'll fly it at any airshows in Canada
because TC doesn't like that kind of thing -
you know, when me, my family and friends
fly airplanes.

[Colonel]

The stock L29:

[img][/img]

It has 1800 lbs of thrust, and the RR Viper
conversion gives it twice that (!) 

It flies as you would expect of any stripped
aircraft with twice it's original power.  Insanely.

It doesn't so much take off, as levitate.
Rotate?  Who needs to rotate?  Just
get the gear up.

Funny note ... Mike is as much of a fan
of checklists as I am  ;D

I know I'm a [b]BAD PERSON[/b] but he's a
USAF Academy grad, F4 pilot with the little
checkered patch (FWS) and Red Bull championships
and a four-bar for AA, so maybe his opinion
matters.

[Fendermandan]

Talking about levitating on the take off.

Check this out