"Some time ago, I can’t remember exactly when, I was at my local airfield and watched an air race and the final spectacular dive to low level for the finish line. But what also struck me was the social side; everyone was chatting and talking about the previous night as well as the racing. I had medically retired from the RAF some years before I saw this race and my wife and I had often discussed missing the social side of the Air Force so I thought one day ... one day.
Wind forward several years and after completing the build of my Vans RV-8 I started to tick off the list with a memorable Air to Air photo shoot with FLYER’s editor, visiting friends and family, ferrying the co-funder to Primark in various cites, touring, formation flying, including an unforgettable photo shoot with the RV8tors and Vulcan XH558 and sport aerobatics. At the beginning of 2014 it was time for the air racing tick. My first setback was that for budgeting and weight reasons I went for a Catto fixed pitch prop optimised for touring and aerobatics and discovered that it would overspeed the engine at race configuration -Wide Open Throttle (WOT) - even with the wheel pants off.
Fortuitously my original prop had a minor issue with the Nickel Leading Edge (NLE) and as the first UK customer with a NLE Catto agreed to replace it free of charge so I asked the prop pitch to be optimised for WOT at 2700 RPM. Due to the move of Catto’s factory the prop was delayed and also due to weather at my home base I had missed the first three races of the season. Testing showed the new prop was still a tad fast but with the wheel pants off the RPM settled at 2690. Ready to race? Not quite!"
This is the opening part of an article that I have written for FLYER magazine and I will publish it later when permission is given. Needless to say I had a great time and am in danger of becoming addicted! The photo was taken by Geoff Alan (Flickr) and the octagon and turning point images are from data se
