Took care of a few things while the plane is waiting for a new carb. The old spark plugs are old. So they’ve been replaced with champion rel37b plugs. I probably should have just converted the mag to auto plugs, hindsight is a bitch.

also replaced the rubber fuel lines and sealed the npt fittings correctly. They had Teflon tape and it has me suspicious of how the plane was running.

One nice thing is I found that there is a one way valve that bypasses the mechanical fuel pump. So if it fails I have plenty of gravity feed from the header tank.. now just need the carb back... it’s done and being sent out on Monday.

Pulled the carb off. It’s a zenith Stromberg 150 CD3. Did it once Saturday to adjust the mixure. Took several hours. Not much of a change occurred in how it ran.

So I pulled it off again, only took 35 minutes the second time. Really helped knowing what I’m doing. Opened it up, and had a look, it at least needs a new metering needle. So I’m sending it off for a complete rebuild and cleaning. I don’t think it ever was rebuilt. If for nothing else it should look better.

First issue... when I bring the throttle up past 2500rpm and reduce it quickly the engine quits. It drops to 500rpm tries to recover for a moment then dies. If I do it slower it’s fine. Idle is a bit rough and if I push throttle in quickly it stumbles between 2200-2500 rpm, then recovers and keeps moving. I. Thinking mixture issue either air is leaking into manifold and making it lean, or mixture is set just a bit too lean.

Well folks, just did my first flight in dragonfly N41GK. The landing wasn’t fantastic, but it wasn’t horrible either. Just need to nail the speeds a bit better.

Ceiling was only about 2500 today. So only took it up to about 2000. Did practice approaches, shallow turns, Steep turns, got accustomed to the pitch sensitivity which took the most time.

First approach I went around, had a bit too much speed. Second approach felt better, so went ahead and landed. It’s certainly going to take a few to get the feel of it. I came in stable but just a bit too fast so it was a bit of a dance to keep it straight. Used about 2500 feet of runway.

The flight itself was actually nice, smooth. The control harmony between pitch and roll was a bit weird. Just had to think about moving the stick forward or backward and it moved. Roll was fine. Once I learned to fly it with two fingers like I do every other airplane it started coming together. That doesn’t mean I wasn’t stressed though. There were more than a few times I thought I wanted to be on the ground even though everything was going right. Eventually it was time to land once I felt comfortable. Like I said above that happened on the second try, and I knew I landed.... Now, when I got back to the hangar and shut down I just sat there for a few minutes. Happy I flew it, but happier it was safe and so was I. Then I climbed out and sat on the ground for a bit. I had no idea how nervous I was. Just wish I had a picture...

Sun N Fun may have been cancelled, but for me this was even better.

Well been taking my time. After last week it is time to fly if the plane convinces me so. Every time I go to the airport to fly, my default answer is I’m Not going to fly today, the airplane, the conditions, and my mental state must convince me it’s tine to fly.

so I am almost there. Hoping Sunday works out. Tomorrow I’m going to check the calibration of the airspeed indicator after making a manometer.

if anyone wonders how they fit. I’m 6 feet tall and about 180 pounds. See below.