Peter
looking at that track, feel free to post some pics of Eastbourne. I spent a very happy time there in my youth learning English. 
Recently I have seen significant activity above the 7000ft threshold but almost all of it at weekends and almost all of it in the Alps. A typical one is an RV, near Locarno, right now. Most of them are HB-reg.
Some interesting results from FR24 over the past 10 months or so…
Loads and loads of RVs.
Totally zero Lancairs (except several of the IV / IV-P and the two Evolutions – probably a total of 5-8 airframes).
I realise the European RV population is a lot bigger than the Lancair population but still this doesn’t make any sense, especially with the different performance profiles. It’s a good Q why… the obvious one is that FR24 sees only Mode S targets so if you don’t have Mode S, or take care to not use it… but why would you do that?
The ICAO type classification on FR24 does work because one 320 popped up almost a year ago. The certified ones do also, regularly.
Peter, I don’t think it’s any different anywhere, RVs fly a lot in relation to most other kinds of planes. It’s the combination of performance/utility and relatively low cost/hassle of operation.
Peter wrote:
The ICAO type classification on FR24 does work
How can that work on homebuilt, when homebuilts have no ICAO classification?
Peter wrote:
I realise the European RV population is a lot bigger than the Lancair population but still this doesn’t make any sense, especially with the different performance profiles
An RV does everything a Lancair does. In addition it does short field, soft field, aerobatic, and is generally a much more usable aircraft. An RV doesn’t have the super critical highly loaded laminar foil that the Lancair has. An RV has a lightly loaded low AR Hershey bar wing. I think of it as a Lancair, and similar aircraft (The Cirrus also), has sailplane aerodynamics tweaked to allow fast and efficient cruising at high wing loading. An RV and Sonexes are more like lightly loaded “lifting body” (low AR) aircraft in comparison, tweaked for low speed (lifting body wise). The result is an RV will cruise almost as efficient (short wing span), but will also do all kinds of other things due to low wing loading. In addition the stall characteristics are nice, due to the hershey bar shape.
Attended a seminar at Osh. It was a young researcher from Saint Lois Universality who did a theoretical study trying to “improve” the foil of the RV-8 without changing the wing shape, span, cord thickness and pitching moments using Xfoil and some adaptive optimizing software that worked with it. Later he used the foil in X-plane to simulate any improvements. In theory he could improve performance (cruise performance) by 5% by just tweaking the foil without affecting other things too much, or anything at all. In practice, who knows, 2% ? But the funny thing was what he said at the end. Vans did not chose a wing shape and foil for the RV, he simply built a fuselage around what he considered to be the best foil and wing shape for the performance he wanted.
PS In case some engineer objects to the use of Xfoil for real sized airplanes. Everybody knows that, and no one cares Fascinating how several of the later designs have actually been engineered using Xfoil and X-plane. True grass root engineering – and it works.
How can that work on homebuilt, when homebuilts have no ICAO classification?
EVOT, LNC4, LNCE, LNP4 and LNT4, for example.
An RV does everything a Lancair does
That may be, or may not, but it doesn’t represent an “existential” POV
Peter wrote:
EVOT, LNC4, LNCE, LNP4 and LNT4, for example.
Are you sure this actually is ICAO ? In the old days (pre EASA) we had “ICAO” names on common homebuilts (RV and a few others). Today there are no type specifications for any homebuilt. The “type” is determined by the name of the builder and the name of the aircraft. I have to find out these things before “programming” my transponder, but how can ICAO be “valid” for something that is not ICAO. What about all the different microlights?
Peter wrote:
That may be, or may not, but it doesn’t represent an “existential” POV
It represents the truth A truth universally known by everyone except Lancair owners
Here ya go…
Obviously this does rely on the Mode S transponder being correctly configured.
I’m not sure I understand how mode S works. How does FR24 gets the position when the aircraft only transmit alt? There must exist some database that FR24 use, but what kind of database?
