Congratulations Mike.

Here it is in Mikes own words.
Some of these pictures are quite old so lots may be changed.

Paul Lamar

All weekend winds were 45 - 90 crosswinds @ 10 - 15 so no chance to fly. Was
working on my glider in the hangar and happened to notice at 3:00 that the
wind had calmed. Drag the airplane out, quick preflight, quick brief of my
crew and the tower folks and away we go.

Verified at 40 knots that the ASI was working this time and proceeded with
the takeoff. Pitch trim good, healthy dose of left rudder and we're off.

Once off the ground everything is good. Just joined the pattern and continued
to climb directly over the airport. My home airport is surrounded, Mexico
border 2 miles south, Class B 2 miles north, ocean to the west, and a 3500
peak to the east so up is the only way to go.

Climbed to 5,000 and level off. Coolant temps are good (my mechanical
coolant temp gauge isnt working at all but the engine monitor says 185).
Oil temp by the monitor on the output of the cooler is 190, mechanical
gauge with sensor in the oil pan indicates 210 so I back off the power
and it comes down to about 190. OAT was in the mid - 70s (sorry to rub
it in for the guys that are freezing elsewhere in the country).

Orbitted the airport for about 20 minutes. Still dont trust the ASI.
There's a 20 KT discrepancy between it and the GPS in all directions.
Pulled speed back to just nibble at the stall and the ASI is reading 30 KTS.

Holding lots of left rudder in straight and level also - I see a trim
tab in my future. No surprise since I didnt put any offset in the
engine mount. Should make it easy to upgrade to a 2.85 ratio later.

Funny how you get so used to setting power by sound. I dont know where
to set power. Especially for the descent and landing which is exacerbated
by lack of a trustworthy ASI. So while loitering above the airport I set
4500 RPM and see about 135 KTS on the GPS for ground speed. Seems lower
than I thought it would be but I need to do LOTS more flying before
making any judgements.

Controls seem lighter than my old RV-6A. It's very nimble. For some
reason the rudder seems more powerful than the 6A even though they are
exactly the same. Pulled off a decent landing. Little bit of a skip
but I'll blame the rough runway surface. Wandered a bit left of the
centerline due to the left rudder I was carrying.

Thought I had the EC2 pretty well programmed but found once in flight
that it needs more tweaking - no surprise. Found a few throttle settings
that were running a little lean/rich and had to tweak the mixture some.
On short final pulled the throttle back almost to the stop and got the
surging that I thought I'd finally cured on the ground - bump the mixture
a little and its gone. On roll out with the throttle at idle the engine
starts to run rough - richen it up a little and its good. At this point
for the next few flights I'll just leave the programming and focus on
flying. The programming is close enough for now.

Lots of things I should have noted but didnt. Sensory overload. I have
a little list of things to fix before I go again. My ground crew reported
that the airplane appeared to climb well ( I was focused on speed/attitude
and didnt think to look at the VSI - which probably didnt work anyway). They
also noted that they lost sight of the all metal airplane, but never failed
to find it by the sound. :-)  On a positive note, once away from the ground,
the cockpit got much quieter. And they pointed out that it was also
considerably less noisy than the former George Graham E-Racer that used
to be based here.

More than enough for now. Sorry for the length - figure I'll be on
a high for a few days.

Mike Wills
RV-4 N144MW

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Paul,

Following is the report on my second flight. There was a months lapse I as
totally redid my static system and added Ed Anderson's EFISM to better tune the EC2.

Not noted here from my third flight. Max speed seen at full throttle
and 8,000' was 155 KTS. Speed was still ramping up but it was tough to
maintain straight and level in my very confined area directly over the
airport. Best rate of climb I've seen is about 1500 fpm but I still dont
really know what Vx and Vy are for the airplane. This was with 3/4 tanks.
At 1027 pounds empty my RV-4 is 110 pounds heavier than Vans says it should
be and almost 100 pounds heavier than Tracy's. I know where some of the extra
is (2 batteries, extra radiator, etc...) but I cant account for the full 100 pound
difference. This has been one of the bigger disappointments.

Mike

Spent the last month addressing issues uncovered during my first flight. Today was
the day for flight number 2. OAT was in the low 50s. Temps during climbout up
to 6,000 were good. Leveled out and stayed at full throttle for a couple of minutes
just to see what happens. Saw indicated airspeed in the mid 150KTS range. RPM was
5500. Both were still creeping up when I throttled back. Looks like I may be slightly
over-propped. Temps still fine.

 Throttled back to 5000 RPM and just flew racetracks over the airport for an hour.
My flight test area is very restrictive. I've got a huge piece of the desert to the
east but have to cross a 3500' mountain and 30 - 40 miles of rugged terrain to get
there. Not until I have a few more hours on it in flight and have 100% confidence.
I have the Mexican border 2 miles south, Class B 2 miles north and the Pacific Ocean
5 miles west. So racetracks over the airport are going to be the norm for a few hours.

 So, 5,000', 5,000 RPM, roughly 20 - 21" MAP, and indicating 140 KTS. Temps 170 on
the coolant and 168 on the oil. I've already met my goal for this airplane on the
second flight - this airplane is a little faster than my old RV-6A was at equal
power settings. The -6A had a 160 HP Lyc in it.

 Looks like the revised static system has solved my airspeed indication problems.
Stall speeds are in line with the Vans book numbers and airspeed correlates pretty
well with the GPS groundspeed. Still need more left trim tab.

 The engine ran great. Anyone trying to tune up Tracy's EC2 without either having
an EM2/3 or Ed Anderson's EFISM, you're wasting your time. I spent the better part
of a year tweaking the MAP table and thought I had it pretty well done. On my first
flight I spent a fair amount of time fiddling with mixtures and had a couple of
rough running spots. I installed Ed's EFISM and spent 2 days tweaking. In the process
I got the engine running smoother than it ever has and now have it idling nicely
at 1350 RPM. Thats 300 RPM lower than I was ever able to get it previously. In my
opinion you really HAVE to have some sort of indication of what is loaded in the
MAP table to effectively tune it.

 The only hiccup was when I came in to land. Tower asked for me to extend my downwind
for traffic so I added a little power to hold altitude. And ended up setting the
power right at the injector staging point, which still seems to run a little lean.
Nothing like having the engine cough just as the runway is receding over your left
shoulder. Took me a couple of seconds to realize what was going on and then added
a little power and that cleared it up.

 Then managed to bounce the landing. How many landings can I log on one approach?
Oh well, I guess I'm a little tailwheel rusty. And without the cowl cheeks the view
over the nose is very different so I havent quite got the pitch attitude figured out yet.

 Other impressions. The airplane is loud, but not painfully so. At least not from
the pilot's seat. The handling and control power still seem quite a bit better
than my RV-6A (which was great). Not really clear why but most of my flying in
the -6A I had someone in the right seat so maybe the weight? Other than the rudder,
the airplane flies perfectly straight.

 All things considered I'm real happy. This flight was considerably less stressful
than the first and I actually was able to enjoy it. I honestly dont remember a
lot of the first flight. Also, I took my glider data logger with me on this
flight. I havent downloaded it yet, but when I do I'll know more about speeds,
climb rate, etc.

 Dont know how you guys feel about these flight reports. Give me some feedback
if you want more as my testing progresses. I know that I like reading about
other's flight experiences as it motivated me to keep going. After 13 years
of building I'll tell you, its worth it. Now I wish I'd pressed harder to
get it done sooner.

 Next flight will have to wait until I get gear leg stiffeners added.
Classic RV - pretty bad shimmy on the roll out after landing. 38.5 hours to go!

Mike Wills
RV-4 N144MW