Rutan Varieze Dogfight

[@U20E27]

The only plane that got my WWII vet grand pop back in the air after flying in the war. 1981 one flew over his house, he nearly blew up the old Buick racing out to the airport to find it! Found the plane and owner as he taxied in. Ended up snagging a back seat flight right then. A week later he had talked to Burt Rutan on the phone and had a kit on order. The kit then was a set of paper plans and a list of materials. He had not flown since 1946 the day he parked his C46 for the last time and went to work designing and building commercial buildings. 3 yr build I was there nearly every weekend sanding setting up templates or holding parts as he shot sight lines with a builders sight. We few that plane all over the west and back to Illinois. Lots of stick time from the back seat and front seat when I was working on my license at 16-17yrs old. Gramps was 109% by the book. But his WWII flying would bubble to the surface once in a while and geezeus I was seeing fuzz a few times😆. We got into a game of tag with a hangar neighbor in his P51D over town once. Nothing too crazy but 190-200+ knots ripping around chasing each other over town apparently was noticed by my mom😆. I got home and my dad says hey, just warning you mom’s pissed! Then he asked me what it was like ha!! Gramps and I were grounded by mom and grandma for a week. Only other time the gloves came off we were contacted by a static air show via radio announcer was listening in on the radio for interesting planes in the area and asking if they would do a fly by. Christ I nearly needed a new pair of shorts! After checking for traffic none, we did a roll into a dive and literally dropped in on the runway with the old Lycoming pegged... you sit in the back seat of the eze when it’s pegged flat out your just hoping the damn engine stays in one piece 😆. We dropped in on the runway about 6ft off the pavement still pegged flat out! Then hard vertical to about 3000ft. Announcer came on the radio right as we were pulling out. All he said was “yeah I think 1/2 our audience missed that you might need to make another pass😆😆😆” We didn’t headed on with our flight.

[@plaiskool64]

Ahah!!! Nice!!!

[@electricaviationchannelvid7863]

What a story! Vow...those were the golden years...in car design,aircraft design,moon-landing...the great free spirit...with guys who were tough as a nail...

[@carlosa.avalle528]

Gotta hand it to you, this is the craziest video of a Rutan canard type I've seen. You've got some "cojones" ! :D

[@blh-rr9fu]

Crazy how fast those things are with the same engine that's in a C150

[@plaiskool64]

Drag is key!

[@77goofyguy]

I gotta try this, looks almost as much fun as canyon flying. You know that you can tighten those turns up a lot, the main spar G limit is 14G on the Vari but you will start to brown out at about 6-7Gs when you yank your bank.

[@douggraham5812]

The Varieze, LongEZ, Cozy and other derivatives are designed for the Normal category. The designers do not recommend aerobatics. Limit load in positive G is 3.8. Ultimate loads vary widely between individual examples due to build quality, resins and cloths used, age, and environmental factors.

[@stevefranseen1905]

Ya, probably the most intense canard flying I've seen.

[@stuge2589]

Plaiskool, what have you done!!! Oh my god!

[@plaiskool64]

Yeah on the way home i challenged my buddy by saying "Turn away?!" he immediatly did! the following calls were "turning in", "visual", "FIGHT's ON"! :)

[@electricaviationchannelvid7863]

@@plaiskool64 So it started after merge an-almost-looping-scissors ( oblique looping) then rolling scissors then flat scissors then using the valley to get below soft deck then you reversed not sure why since you were already winning in a 2 circle (rate) fight...

[@letmeflyendeltaplane1057]

Ah Ah Looks like a place I used to fly in ! 😁 Great video anyway !

[@michaelfortunato3117]

it looked dangerous, but it looked fun

[@dualinput601]

Nice flying. I wonder, if you fly it straight up vertical and then let fall, will it recover by itself? Is there any situation where it would be impossible to recover from?

[@plaiskool64]

Hi Seb, if i go strictly nose up, aircraft will tailslide a bit then fallback nose down first, either side, maybe tumble around pirtch a bit but it will quickly, like 2/3sec fly again. Varieze design are hard to put in spin. I guess in some very extrem marginal balance circumstances is it possible.... Per Varieze Manual spin are not approuved.

[@airboss212]

@@plaiskool64 no stall which stays stable as i hear all this tales of stalls and non escape of it, of course of pilots who never stalled the plane actually

[@HousetoHull]

I got sick about half way through...who won?! And I think you guys are having too much fun, must have been a law broken here...

[@thumper248]

My Vari rolls well to the left but not so much to the right. How does it loop. Speeds and tendency’s ext?

[@plaiskool64]

Go check on insta and fb : patrouille reva. You will se how it handles

[@U20E27]

Due to the duel vertical fins getting the plane perfectly squared during the build is really important to the flight characteristics. We used a builders sight to shoot straight angles during the build. Today I would use laser finders👍. Not only the square factor on the verticals but also the winglets and fences! These planes are super sensitive to small differences. Ours we could induce a 3 degree bank just getting the pilot and passenger to lean the little we could to one side during level flight. So you can imagine what a vertical surface would do if it was even just slightly off square.

[@airboss212]

what engine do u have in the VE ? o 200 ?

[@plaiskool64]

Yes

[@valtahan]

ca à qd meme bien evolué DCS

[@plaiskool64]

De biens beaux graphs...!

[@rutanaircraftflyingexperie6303]

Not much dogfighting going on in this video.. where’s the rolling scissors? :)

[@plaiskool64]

Didn't want to convert in down rolling scissors at 2:50 i wanted to try staying high other wise it would have been a rolling scissors transition. And i wanted to try 2 circle stuff at the begining of fight

[@electricaviationchannelvid7863]

@@plaiskool64 What fighter did you fly before?

[@plaiskool64]

@@electricaviationchannelvid7863 Rafale

[@electricaviationchannelvid7863]

So it started after merge a couple 2 circle passes then an-almost-looping-scissors ( oblique looping) then rolling scissors then flat scissors then using the valley to get below soft deck then you reversed not sure why since you were already winning in a 2 circle (rate) fight... 2 times you eased off G and cut back power to avoid bubble/collision...

[@electricaviationchannelvid7863]

At around 2:30 that is a rolling scissors...

[@thumper248]

Bad ass

[@robcarter167]

Can’t wait for the “dumb ways to die” version.

[@plaiskool64]

Yeah we had too much stress going straight line....that was too much émotions for us, so we went dynamic bfm a bit to get something a bit more boring to relax.