While in Homedale last weekend, I eyeballed the Raven. I ALWAYS keep up on what is new and available, just for my own future reference and for telling others, stealing others ideas etc. Anyway, it is a very stout looking aircraft, with a really good looking wing, and the gear looked just right. No extention needed, it is already there, (it sits nice and tall, the center of the spinner above my head) any Super Cub pilot would be right at home in it, as would one like me, coming up from something a bit smaller like the S-7. A nice compromise and easily under the LSA requirements, which is the big thing of course these days.

Taildragnfun happened by just when we were going flying, so he got in the pictures also, everybody but me! Come to think of it, I have NO pics of my bird airborne.......Anyway, while we did no off airport landings so I can't really say how it performs there, it sure appeared to cruise nice, and the 6 banger Jabiru sounded great, very airplane like with a nice deep tone. All in all a nice mix of new thinking combined with tried and true. I'll keep my bird as I'm too lazy to build (again) just now. I really like the gear, the Rans spring rod gear works amazingly well, but I have always like the A-frame Cub type, whether die springs or bungees, and the big aft baggage door and the clean floor (all controls covered) was also nice, I have to watch where I put things in flight. Thanks for the looksee John!

Thanks for the nice write-up. I'm glad we were able to take a flight with you and Steve and get some photos. We'll be at the Ontario Air Faire on the 11th and also at what we hope will become an annual fly-in at Smith Prairie 2U0 on the 25th and 26th. I'll be posting more about that in the events/fly-ins section here shortly. We'd love to have you stop by again.

courierguy,
Glad to have you stop by and kick her tires.
Maybe some of us can get together here and fly over to your neck of the woods
and have you show us some of your back country stips or flat spots HA!
Both , your s-7 and the highlander looked really awsome off my wing tips sorry I
didn,t have my camera . but if I make it to east Idaho I wont forget to bring it
I,d like to stop and see how Joel is coming on his s-7 too.

That would be great, Joel is about 15 minutes from my place, and there is a good little fly-in breakfast spot, (Rockford) about 10 minutes from Joel's, with a lot of gravel bars in between! I'm going to try and make the Smith Praire fly in also.

Good deal, the Prairie Store owners are really looking forward to this and will be providing a bbq dinner on saturday for a nonimal price. they've got rooms for rent as well as camping on the strip and we have a nice fire pit for a bonfire.

viewtopic.php?f=8&t=6069

courierguy,
Sounds like a plan , nothing like a batch of gravel bars to work up an appitite for breakfast ! ha !
Ya Prairie would be a
great ( anyone could fly into this strip ) fly in spot and lots of room,camping,ect.. to have some
friendly S.T.O.L compitition or ?

Hey, you guardian guys - how about making a set of your gear that will fit the S7?? Wed need to weld a fitting for the rear arm, but....

got lost there for a minute.. the thread was moved. John might be able to do something for ya

emflys wrote:Hey, you guardian guys - how about making a set of your gear that will fit the S7?? Wed need to weld a fitting for the rear arm, but....

Emflys
I like the A-frame gear, but damn I have not been able to break or bend the original spring rod gear yet, and it does soak up loads fore and aft in addition to up and down, unlike the A-frame. The parts count is lots lower also. So, at least for me, I wouldn't think the airframe modifications needed to handle the new gear load paths would be worth the trouble on an existing S-7. For sure the A-frame must be a bit draggier, more stuff hanging out in breeze/prop blast. Building new it'd be a different story, but so far the rod gear is surprising me with it's toughness.

Yeah, you are probably right Tom. Joel said the same thing when I looked at the Outlaw gear in his shop. And there is a HD version of the gear (with extensions) avail. (Weav has a set, Joa H. made some, i have pics) which also has extensions for better clearance. The tops and bottoms are milled flat to reduce the fore and aft movement some. It also has a more scalloped circumference right where the gear exits the socket to reduce that area as a stress riser.

I have the doublers on the socket and just checked them at my annual. While I couldn't seem to rotate the gear at all, the bolt hole has visible signs of rotational stress. That's the part I would like to "fix" on the S-7.

OK, sorry for the detour on this thread. Tom and I will take this off-line.

Back to the Raven - we need to all set some dates, maybe at the BCP fly in, to get Joel, Steve, the Raven, Tom, and other LSA-types together for some video!

emflys,
yes I have been approched by several guys wanting to do that,the biggest gain is that you would lighten
the plane by 20 lbs ( one of those s-7 gear legs are almost as heavy as both of the raven,s gear )
and the raven,s are heavy wall , the same as pa-18 .
I would make an insert with fittings for the cabane ''V'' and front leg that would slip into the gear socket with a retro fit fitting for the rear.Yes it is
draggy but when landing in the really rough stuff nothing will hold up to the punishment like a super cub gear , ask Joel about the s-7 with 33'' bush wheels
But it depends on how you want to use your plane , like Tom said why fix what is,nt broke .
When is that flyin ? and where ? Yes we need to get all of the LSA,s together .

Well, we hopefully we'll get a good showing in Prairie. got a few commits so far.. looks like it's going to be popular.

When is this Smith Prairie fly-in supposed to happen?
Steve

the 25th and 26th of September. I made a post on it in the Events/Fly-ins topic. Think you might make it?

Sounds fun but I can't make it then. Going to be flying up to Yakima to watch a big dirt sprint car race that weekend. I think several people are going to Alvord then too. I wish I could could fit 'em all in but I haven't quite figured out how to do that yet.
Steve

ravenflyer33 wrote:emflys,
yes I have been approched by several guys wanting to do that,the biggest gain is that you would lighten
the plane by 20 lbs ( one of those s-7 gear legs are almost as heavy as both of the raven,s gear )
and the raven,s are heavy wall , the same as pa-18 .
I would make an insert with fittings for the cabane ''V'' and front leg that would slip into the gear socket with a retro fit fitting for the rear.Yes it is
draggy but when landing in the really rough stuff nothing will hold up to the punishment like a super cub gear , ask Joel about the s-7 with 33'' bush wheels
But it depends on how you want to use your plane , like Tom said why fix what is,nt broke .
When is that flyin ? and where ? Yes we need to get all of the LSA,s together .

You got me thinking.....and if I do need a gear re-build in the future ( ), we'll talk some more. I DO like the Cub type gear, wish I had it, since I don't I've decided to like the low drag of the faired spring rod, and it's backward (?) shock absorbtion, not to mention it came with the kit and was paid for, and was quick and easy to install. I think the best thing I did was go for the Airstreaks, as they do most of the work on landing. The weight issue is something I didn't think about, no kidding, lighter?? I'll keep working on trying to wear out or bust what I have in the meantime. This kind of stuff is why I flew over to look at the Raven, it is always good to get new ideas and different viewpoints on how to do whatever, the more info the better. Being experimental gives us the freedom to mix and match however we want! That includes of course taking ideas off of the certified designs.