On October 30, 2003 after almost 3 years and 1900 hours of building time, I flew my RV-8 QB for the first time.  Now I know what the RV grin is all about.    My crew and I launched around 12 noon into a beautiful clear Carolina Blue Sky from the Stanly County Airport in Albemarle NC .  N123SG otherwise known as Cappy’s Toy, flew like a dream.  

The flight however was not without some unexpected excitement.  After a near perfect  takeoff and climb to 3,000’ my EIS system went totally dead and all engine instruments were gone.  

Not knowing anything about how she would fly during approach, I was committed to some seat of the pants flying.  I continued climb to 5,500’ making turns over the airport and started my slow flight work.  Again Cappy’s Toy flew like a dream.  75 MPH clean, 70 MPH ½ flap and 65 MPH full flap, not even a suggestion of stall.  Next I started descent and again tested her at all thee configurations.  I decided on ½ flaps for landing with a final approach speed of 80 MPH.

The landing went quite well with no control problems, but during the landing roll the engine quit.  Thanks to a great ground crew we pushed her clear in a very short time and back to the hanger.  We determined the EIS problem was probably caused by over voltage of the alternator which caused it to make an auto shutdown.  The engine quit because the idle mixture screw was missing.  It must have been set to far back and worked its way out.  When the engine slowed to idle after landing the mixture was way to rich and the engine flooded .  

A loaner EIS from Grand Rapids and the mixture idle screw should both be here this morning.  After some tweaking of the voltage regulator and mixture adjustments, I hope to fly again this afternoon.  Can’t wait for another awesome ride.

Cappy's Toy