Flight Test

Back in 1986, I was learning to fly on Austers with the maverick Kestrel Flying Club at Cranfield, and between flights often chatted with an unassuming middle-aged chap called Peter Hing. As I recollect, Peter was doing a taildragger conversion. When he found out that I was a fellow PFA member and building a Bowers Flybaby, he was happy to talk of his RV-3 project, which like the Flybaby had yet to gain PFA type acceptance at that time. No Van’s aircraft were flying in the UK back then, and in fact, in this country the Van’s name was pretty much unknown except to readers of the EAA magazine Sport Aviation

Peter’s project had first been registered in 1979, and between circuit bashing sessions in the Auster, he would tell me of his progress week by week and looked forward to the day when he’d get to fly his hotrod creation. He knew that my interest was genuine because I’d bought an early set of RV-4 drawings myself, having been much impressed by RV designer Richard VanGrunsven (‘Van’) writing inspiringly in a 1979 Sport Aviation about the tandem two-seat RV-3 development.

This was long before the days of ‘matched hole’ pre-punched kits, when RVs were basically plans-built aircraft where one could also buy a materials pack with the more difficult metal parts partially made, along with fibreglass wingtips, cowling, wheel spats and the clear bubble canopy. In those pre-internet days, rather than spending evenings surfing websites with a credit card, one scratched around for instruments, wheels, engine and prop from aircraft breakers or stripped out some luckless write-off on one’s home patch – an autumn gale often bringing a welcome windfall to the PFA homebuilder.

Despite being a single-seater, Peter’s RV-3 would inevitably take longer to finish than today’s refined RV kits. As it turned out, the gestation period for the project was a great deal longer than Peter expected, for it was another 18 years and two owners later before the project took flight. By that time it was owned by Cambridgebased Ian Glenn who had taken over the project in 2000 after finishing an RV-4, G-BVUN in 1995. There’s a letter on file at LAA HQ from the time of Ian’s purchase of the stillborn RV-3 project where, by now in the post of PFA Chief Engineer, I confirmed to Ian that the RV-3 was now a PFA accepted type, Dan Calabritto’s G-BVDC having been the first to fly. I also pointed out that the early RV-3 design had wing structural strength issues, and that to be able to be cleared for aerobatics the project would need one of the Van’s wing upgrades to be embodied – either some pretty major reinforcements or a whole new wing. Ian chose to order a new RV-3B wing kit from Van’s in 2002, bringing the aircraft up to the latest spec and enjoying the huge step-forward in Van’s kit standards since 1979.

Above The RV-3B’s low aspect ratio, parallel-chord wing and generous tail moment arm are well displayed here, both important factors in its forgiving flight characteristics.

Inset The letter that started it all – Peter Hing’s handwritten order for the first RV kit to come to the UK – hundreds have followed.

The background to the wing redesign is interesting. After a structural failure of a number of early RV-3 wings in flight, the FAA banned aerobatics in the type. At one time it was theorized that an optional adhesive bonding of the spar cap strip bars, for ease of construction purposes, stiffened the spar cap against compression buckling. However, further static testing found this theory inconclusive. The testing did eventually find the spar web stiffness to be inadequate, and possible that of the spar cap strips as well. A spar stiffness strengthening modification was designed for existing RV-3s and a production spar re-design included a thicker and stronger spar web and thicker spar cap strip bars. This was designated the RV-3B configuration. Later a further redesign replaced the spar cap strip build up with a single piece step-milled bar similar to that first used on the RV-8, and later RV models.

Following Van’s philosophy of keeping the aircraft simple, light and, as far as possible, low cost; after substituting the new wings Ian equipped his RV (now registered as an RV-3B) with a second-hand Lycoming 0-235 engine and fixed pitch Pacesetter wood prop. With its modern-day registration, G-CCTG, belying the project’s 1979 start-date, the aircraft first flew from local PFA’er Derek Burden’s airstrip, near Bourne, in the closing months of 2004. Since then, it has accumulated more than 650 hours of sport flying and moved through a three more owners before being snapped up, sight unseen, by our Van’s enthusiast LAA magazine editor, Ed Hicks, in spring 2020.

The rarest RV

Come 2022 and with Van’s Aircraft celebrating its 50th anniversary, the RV-3 remains the rarest of the Van’s types here, with only four examples flying in the UK. Outnumbered even by the new kid on the block, the RV-14/14A. Perhaps this accounts for the fact that the single-seater has never had much exposure in our magazine. The -3 looks absolutely the epitome of a sportplane, shouting out that it wants to be flown – and the five-point harness is a give-away that it’s an allattitude performer. So having known the original builder all those years ago, it was particularly welcome to be invited by Ed to fly ‘TG’ for a Light Aviation review, from its base at Garston Farm Airstrip.

Ed’s aeroplane gives away the fact of having been a very early RV-3 that’s been upgraded to an RV-3B by the presence, on each fuselage side, of small doubler plates riveted on around the retro-fitted new wing main spar carry-through. The -3B wings incorporate wing fuel tanks in their inboard leading edges, like the later two-seater RVs, while the original -3 carried all the fuel in a single tank above the pilot’s knees. There are no signs of a fuselage tank ever having been fitted to Ed’s machine, so most likely Peter Hing’s original build never got to that stage.

Ed’s aeroplane enjoys some very neat custom features. The rear guide rod for the sliding section of the bubble canopy works with a sliding plate on the top of the fuselage, which allows the canopy to open a few inches further back than the standard design, providing freer access when entering the cockpit.

In the cockpit

Another custom feature stems from a requirement from PFA HQ that it would need a canopy latch releasable from outside the cockpit – the early plans just showed internal over-centre catches. Ian Glenn designed a very neat rotary latch with a coiled torsion spring and both internal and external handles, which by clever design would neither tend to work itself loose and release in flight, nor jam on the ground in a crash. It would also compensate for any wear and preserve a nice rattle-free closure of the canopy. As I had signed this feature off all those years before, it was particularly pleasing to see it for myself in the flesh and recall how like all good bits of design, it is so very simple and effective.

The canopy and windscreen on Ed’s machine are beautifully clear, distortion-free mouldings whose condition belies the fact that they were made by Van’s back in 1980 when it was producing kits on a limited scale. I expected to see the odd ripple or two. But no, they are perfect. The windscreen has a relatively slim arch-like frame on Ed’s machine, so it’s not for grabbing hold of on entry or exit, as Ed was at pains to point out. Nevertheless, it was not too difficult to climb in from the wing root walkway and slip down into the cockpit.

The seating arrangements are unpretentious, being a simple shaped cushion resting on the sheet aluminium seat base, and a similar custom cushion fitted into the angled seat back which, hinged along its bottom edge, also provides access to the substantial enclosed baggage space behind. Once seated, the cockpit feels comfortably wide – snug – but not at all cramped. There’s a very welcome stowage slot for maps, iPad or whatnot on the starboard side, while to port there’s the substantial mechanical flap lever, push-pull throttle knob and a pitch trim lever all quite closely grouped together. The rudder pedals are spaced quite wide apart, so one flies feeling a bit bow-legged, but you soon get used to it. I remembered noticing exactly the same thing, and other similarities made it something of a ‘déjà vu’ experience from when I flew a Harmon Rocket a few years ago, the six-cylinder derivative of the tandem-seat RV-4.

Also familiar from other RVs were the very direct control runs on Ed’s machine, its pushrod-controlled aileron and elevator control systems having negligible free-play or friction. If only all sportplanes were like this! While on the ground, the unbalanced elevators fall under their own weight and it takes a surprisingly large pull force on the stick to level them. In the air, the forces balance out, but Ed pointed out that when landing, you mustn’t hold the stick with too light a touch because otherwise, if you bounce the tailwheel down, the inertia of the elevator tends to make the stick jerk forward in the pilot’s hand, and the resulting flapping of the elevator will likely lead to an exaggerated bouncing arrival.

The prototype RV-3 was equipped with a converted Lycoming 0-290G engine, a popular choice among

What makes the Van’s RV range so special?

When Van’s Aircraft first appeared in 1972, homebuilts were generally either slow and basic ‘retro’ designs, aerobatic biplanes, or highperformance types that tended to land pretty hot, designed to outpace and outdistance certified light aircraft, majoring on high efficiency. The popular metal Thorpe T18 and Mustang II were generally of quite high-wingloading – and particularly those with small wheels – unsuited to operating off a short grass strip. What Van put together in the RV series, starting with the single-seat RV-3, was the combination of an airframe with close attention to drag reduction, yet with a modest wing loading to give reasonably low take-off and landing speeds, effective flaps (ditto) and a fixed gear with proper sized wheels to cope with a cow-pasture airfield. Fortunately for us Brits, Van’s flying activities were based around a farm strip that was home to his family Taylorcraft when he decided he wanted something with the famous phrase ‘total performance’. This strip, which was not unlike so many airstrips in the UK, was a defining influence in his development of the RV range. Famously, the stepping stone from Taylorcraft to RV-3 was a second-hand Stitts Playboy which Van transformed in performance by substituting a new pair of cantilever wings and a bunch of other aerodynamic clean-ups.

For simplicity in construction and benign flight characteristics, all Van’s aircraft are mainly of conventional riveted sheet aluminium construction and have parallel chord wings with a pilot-friendly, non-critical aerofoil section. An RV won’t fall out of the sky if you should encounter heavy rain in flight, as some types with laminar flow sections can, nor will they be much affected by a splattering of cow-pat on take off. All have beautifully friction- and backlash-free flying controls, responsive control surfaces and nicely tuned control harmony contributing to a very pleasant overall ‘feel’. Their cockpits can accommodate 21st century-sized people, and unlike many types, they have ample payload for crew, baggage and fuel. Whether nosewheel or tailwheel equipped, the main gear of most RVs are of slim cantilever spring type where the bending of the metal undercarriage leg itself provides the suspension effect, and dragreduction is similarly achieved through the proper design of intersection fairings, cowlings and canopies for maximum performance.

The fact that more than 11,000 RVs have been finished and flown is testament to a formula that’s remained popular with builders – and made them the world-leader in kitplane production.

homebuilders in the USA, particularly because this was a ground power unit version which could be purchased cheaply on the military surplus markets and converted relatively easily for aircraft use. Nowadays the engines of choice for the RV-3 variants are either the 0-235 or the more powerful 0-320, offering from 108 to 160hp. While originally envisioned with a fixed-pitch wood prop, one UK example G-HILI has an MT composite bladed constant-speed prop for ultimate performance. Ed’s RV-3B has a 115hp Lycoming 0-235-C2A that originated in a Robin DR315, and a fixed-pitch Lodge two-blade wood prop of 66.5 inch diameter and a rather impressive 67 inch pitch – indicative of the expected high-speed cruise performance.

Getting started

After giving five primes on the throttle lever, starting the 0-235 was straightforward on the key, and with its familiar red split rocker switches for battery and alternator, and a simple push-pull throttle and mixture control, ‘classic Cessna 152’. There’s a push-pull carb heat knob and, well separated to avoid confusing the two, a push-pull mixture control. Ed recommended leaning a half-inch or so on the mixture knob during taxi and in flight, except when at full power, to minimise the risk of the plug fouling for which these 0-235s are somewhat renowned. With the engine warming at around 1,100rpm, and avoiding inadvertently riding the toe brakes, I taxied out to the hold point, getting used to the look of the horizon cutting the cowl ahead in the three-point attitude and enjoying the aura of the spartan, traditional Van’s cockpit – so obviously designed for honest sport flying rather than ‘leather-clad swish’. My forward view over the nose was unrestricted, despite the fact that I had about two inches of headroom beneath the canopy. The picture looking past those curvy cheek cowls through the flickering prop blades was adrenalin-pumping superb. My only dislike was the instrumentation. While the array of 2 ¼in round instruments had looked alluringly dinky beforehand, once in the action seat the ASI and altimeter were clearly going to be too small to be of much practical value. A Dynon D100 mounted centrally on the panel provides a digital-numeric display of airspeed and height, and while perfectly functional, felt rather out of keeping.

Checks completed, and lined up on Garston Farm’s 09 Runway, I had more than 750 metres of grass ahead. A 90° crosswind blew from the left, but scarcely enough in strength to waft the windsock from its rest position. Ed had briefed that there was little tendency to swing on take-off, but nevertheless, I opened the throttle progressively over the course of a three or four seconds so we could move off in a ‘gentlemanly’ fashion on this first go…

The controls soon came alive as we accelerated and, true to form, there was next or no swing as the tail came up. With the action unfolding rapidly outside, it was beyond me to drag my focus to the panel, only a handspan in front of my nose, to check either the minuscule mechanical ASI or the numbers on the Dynon, so lift-off was by feel alone. Perhaps forgetting for a moment that I had scarcely nine feet of wing stuck out either side of me, and a coarse pitch prop turning at only a little over 2,200rpm – well short of the engine’s rated 2,800 – I rotated initially a little early and had to wait a further moment or two before we could unstick and be up and away.

Climbing at 80kt, and manoeuvring carefully clear of Garston Farm’s noise sensitive area (the visitor’s brief on their website states with commendable directness that any offender would be summarily banned from the airfield), I quickly noticed that the ailerons on the RV-3B, while beautifully powerful, have firmed-up more than I expected for an RV, even at this airspeed. This perhaps partly accounted for my fractionally premature estimation of the take-off speed being reached, for the subliminal signals from the feel and responsiveness of stick and rudder are surely one’s strongest cues about an aircraft’s readiness to fly off – that’s my excuse anyway!

Gathering my wits as we head for the local area, she is climbing strongly even in a throttled back cruise climb. Opened up fully, we get 2,500rpm at full throttle and at 80kt she climbs at 1,500 fpm, not bad with those stubby wings and 115hp!

The RV-3B certainly loves to climb, and you have to lower the nose – what seems like a very long way – to find

Above The RV-3B begs to be flown.

Left The Lycoming 0-235 engine revealed, including a propshaft extension that makes possible a more streamlined cowling appearance.

Below The sliding canopy is of a generous size, there’s none of that claustrophobic feeling of having your head in a goldfish bowl. Being able to taxi with it open (or fly like that, at modest speeds) is a plus in the late summer heat.

Below The lovely lines of an RV-3B – all the more remarkable given that most of the airframe is made from single curvature aluminium. What better example of ‘if it looks right….’ the attitude for level flight, whereupon she will accelerate like the clappers.

Up and away, a quick run through the usual stability and handling test points revealed textbook characteristics and on this fleeting acquaintance, nil non-compliances with CS-VLA or FAR 23 design code requirements.

Directionally, either feet-on or feet-off the RV-3 swung quickly back to straight-ahead after pushing either rudder pedal and releasing it again, yet with only the merest hint of an overshoot (‘fish-tail’) – so the sizing of the fin and rudder combination and the rudder’s self-centring characteristics are spot on. Similarly, with the longitudinal static stability, as in each configuration it took an unmissable and increasing stick force in the appropriate direction to hold the speed displaced either above or below the trim speed, and releasing the stick force resulted in the aeroplane seeking to restore the trim speed with a well damped phugoid. Unlike some of the later Van’s models, the RV-3B showed marked positive lateral stability too, both flaps up and flaps down, both in the response to sustained rudder inputs, which reveals the adequacy of the dihedral effect alone, and on stick release in a steady heading sideslip, which brings into the mix the aileron self-centring characteristics. The elevator trimmer was powerful enough to trim the aircraft out from flaps up fast cruise to approach speed with full flap and power for a shallow descent, yet wasn’t over-sensitive or notchy, nor showed any tendency to creep back.

Manufacturers of certified aircraft spend huge amounts of time and money developing their prototypes to achieve results like this, and I couldn’t help but wonder whether Van had spent a lot of effort tuning the prototype to handle so well, or had he just been incredibly lucky to get it so right straight off the drawing board? Not being an aeronautical engineer, how much (if any?) aerodynamic stability and control calculation had he done when sizing the tailplane, fin, fuselage length, dihedral etc?

Levelled off to check the cruise performance, I get 137kt at 2,400rpm, which Ed says results in a fuel burn of around 19 litres per hour, and a maximum of 155kt at the engine’s red line of 2,800 – this was with not quite full throttle. Vne is 182 kt. Compared to the sort of craft I usually fly, one covers a lot of ground quickly at these speeds! I discovered that 2,300 was a comfortable power setting, as cruising at more than 130kt tended to make the ride less comfortable on this moderately thermic day. At the other end of the scale, I found the speed at which I could maintain height with minimum power setting was 80kt at a mere 1,700rpm.

Slowing further still, remarkably considering its short wingspan the RV-3B not only was still flying at an indicated 60kt, flapless – clawing along with its nose high – it was still very responsive in roll at this speed and most extraordinarily, without much adverse yaw even when ‘feet off’ the rudder pedals. This is a great safety feature because it’s an unwanted yaw developing in a slowspeed turn which is the main trigger for fatal low-level spins. Slowing to the stall required a significant pull on the stick, a slight buffet from 53kt and a positive but by no means alarming nose drop at a mere 50kt. Selecting full flap required a fair pull on the substantial flap lever, dropping the nose attitude and creating a significant nose-down trim effect – but one that was easily neutralised using the trim lever just alongside. In full flap configuration the stall came at just 46kt, with a similar fightback on the stick, refusal to drop a wing and aileron authority right up to the break.

Aerobatics

Aerobatics in the RV range need particular care because they can pick up speed so quickly when going downhill, meaning that if a manoeuvre goes wrong and the pilot fluffs the recovery, they can easily go through Vne or be overstressed, or both. Having written safety briefs about this to numerous RV owners over the years, before swapping earth and sky in the RV-3B I spoke sternly to myself of the importance of planning each manoeuvre’s energy management and avoiding the forbidden parts of the flight envelope. After a few chandelles to limber up and enjoy the ‘all attitude’ willingness of the RV-3B, I tried a ballistic roll either way with a 110kt entry speed – taking four seconds to get around, using a comfortable singlehanded stick force that was well short of full deflection. With my SkyDemon-bearing tablet only loosely thrust into the stowage slot alongside me, I was reluctant to go more axial for fear of it falling out. The chandelles had already shown me that a loop entered at 135kt was likely to rise almost 700 feet to float over the top, and let me rehearse the pitch rate and pull that would be needed in the first and last quarters of a loop. The loops that followed were far from round, I’m sure – that could come later, but they were safe, and hit my speed target of 50kt over the top and no more than 100kt at the vertical dive point, from which point I had to keep pulling ‘g’ to keep the speed from rising too far. I really missed the sweep of a needle on a nice clear three inch analogue ASI at this point!

Time to land

Time flies when you’re having fun, but even so, I was amazed to find that I had already been airborne for 45 minutes – time to head back and to reflect, and to write up my hasty notes. Giving the noise sensitive areas a wide berth, I set up for a full-flap long final onto 27, which would both avoid the dogleg approach called for into 09 and give me the benefit of a slight upslope after touchdown – though with more than 700 metres to play with I should have more than twice what I need. The speed stability and effective trim made it very straightforward to stabilise at the briefed 65kt approach speed. Slowing to the ‘last look’ speed of 60 I found myself sinking below the profile on short final and needing a hefty burst of power to compensate – clearly a case of the ‘back of the drag curve’, which I should have anticipated with that stubby wing. Once over the threshold it was easy to hold off and set her down gently on three points, thanks to the beautifully direct elevator control run and powerful elevator – rounding out at 55-60 she was 10 or more knots above the stall speed, but settled without fuss immediately I throttled back. Ed had warned me that if I came in at 70 I’d float and float. I taxi back to a waiting Ed, shut down and slide the canopy back, whereupon he snaps my own wide ‘RV grin’.

Relaxing over a cup of tea afterwards, admiring the RV-3B sitting in the sun alongside, I’m short of points to criticise. The aeroplane has behaved exactly as briefed – its performance, agility and willingness, allied with its gentle behaviour made it a huge amount of fun, but I’ve clearly only scratched the surface of what it has to offer. Yes, if it were mine I’d definitely want to fit a big round ASI and altimeter, throw out the prehistoric-seeming GPS and run SkyDemon on an iPad – but other than that, there’s simply NOTHING not to like! ■

VAN'S AIRCRAFT RV-3B SPECIFICATIONS

General characteristics

Length 19ft

Wingspan 19ft 11in

Wing area 90sq/ft

Empty weight 737lb

MTOW 1,100lb (1,050lb for aerobatics)

Useful load 363lb

Wing Loading 12lb/sq/ft

Power loading 9.5lb/hp

Fuel capacity 113litres

Engine Lycoming O-235C2A 115hp

Performance

Vne 182kt

Cruise speed @ 2,400rpm 137kt

Stall speed 46kt

Rate of Climb 1,500ft min

Take off ground roll 150m

Landing roll 200m

Range 685 nm (with 30+ min reserve)

G limits +6G/-3G