No subject

From: flynby_80918
Sent: Saturday, August 14, 2004 8:41 PM
Subject: [RV10] Hello-New uilder

"I wanted to introduce my self. My name is Dan Lloyd, I have been building a

7A, and after Oshkosh , my wife and I decided to sell the 7 kit and start a
10. I will be ordering the Emp on Wed. I look forward to to meeting and
working with you all over the life of this project!!
If I can ever be of some help let me know. We are in NW PA, so if you are
ever in the area feel free to contact us.
Dan Lloyd"

And shortly thereafter he posted his Bio:
"Bio: 34, IT Manager for Werner Ladder, PP-SEL, Instrument Student, 150
Hours TT, Cherokee Driver, till 10 is done. Based in Hermitage, PA. It is on

the Ohio Border, 1 hour North of PITT. Have 2 Kids, 11 and 6, not adding any

more, (they do not make a larger kit plane!) Finishing Emp/Cone, have wings
ready to start. I agree with Tim, seems like a lot of geeks are into plane
building, maybe we like the many hours of alone time in the garage? "

As time progressed, he was also very happy to get from me my original RV-10
wooden model, after I finally got one painted with my own paint scheme. He
loved having this thing around.
http://wwwmyrv10.com/N104CD/misc/RV200507010122.html

Down the road a ways, when we had the big axle extension group buy, you may
remember Dan offered his help for some of the overseas people:
"Tim for everyone in Europe and further East I will help with the packaging
and sending. Just send me the list of people and I will make sure it gets
out to them. I think there was one from Germany , and I do not know how many
others, but I can help.
Dan
N289DT "

You get the picture....Dan was a guy who was known by lots of people, very
nice to most everyone, and was a good participant in the RV-10 family.

When good people do bad things...

Much of my info is from other people who Dan discussed some things with more

often than myself. I have always tended to express the opinion that care
and safety be used, and to "do it right" to him, to encourage him to not do
things that could cause him problems. That caused him to have a tendency to
avoid telling me things he thought would just bring him a lecture. That's
understandable, but I think he really just didn't feel that some things were

as risky as they may have been. I always pointed out to him though that
even though he's heard lots of people have good luck with Subaru engines in
planes, that his particular installation was a first, and he needed to be
extra cautious with everything related to his engine. Luckily he did tell a
few other people his stories though, and I was able to observe from a bit of

a distance.

Dan's first flight occurred 7/12/2007, and per an email from him to an email

list, lasted 40 minutes, and said they had "just a few small issues to fix
tomorrow"
On 7/13/2007 in the early a.m. he emailed the group this:
"39 hours and 20 minutes to go, and if I follow the plan I will make it with

a little to spare, but God controls the weather.....I think we will make the

40 hours and flying on Thursday evening and park at Eggenfellners booth.
Dan
N289DT Now Flying.. "

On the 13th, he had added on another hour and a half or so from what I had
heard from others. By that point they had experienced some high oil temps,
and I heard talk that they were thinking of flying the aircraft down to Jan
Eggenfellners shop to work on it before Airventure. Remeber that Dan had a
completely new iteration of experimental Subaru, with a completely new prop,

and that caused him to have a 40 hour flyoff requirement, so it was a bit
shocking to hear that he was contemplating flying to Florida right away.
The fact that he spent a vast majority of his time in N289DT with another
person on board wasn't surprising, as he indeed probably did need Jan
Eggenfellner aboard on many of those flights to help work through the issues

on the engine.

On 7/14/2007 I heard that they indeed had left for Florida , and that they
planned to be back at KOSH by Thursday for the show. The Thursday date did
end up slipping, due to delays in getting things working, but they did make
it to Florida .

He did email the email list on 7/13, and stated "You have it right a
certified combo will be 25 hours and an uncertified combo is 40 hours --Dan"

That indicates that he did indeed know the rules about flyoff time as it
applies to his engine and prop and airframe.
On the trip to Florida , I had heard that they experienced the same high oil
temps, and had pretty slow cruise speeds that were down in the sub-140kt
range. They also had experienced some strange vibrations that they were
unsure of the origin of, and wanted to investigate those when they made it
to Florida .

On I believe 7/14 or perhaps 7/15, (for sure by 7/15) Dan emailed or called
me, I can't remember which, to ask how to disable "bitching betty". He had
complained that his alarms were annoying him, and wanted to know how to
silence it all. I told him that once he had finished calibrating his EFIS
and alarm setpoints during his test flights, they would
be in the green most of the time, that he'd not be bothered so much. Alarms
only go off when you're out of the specified green range, so I told him it
was up to him to set proper ranges and make sure his sensors were setup and
calibrated properly so the readings were right. But once you did all that,
you should not receive many false alarms. I realized by talking to him that
he had never calibrated ANY of his avionics, so headings were off (I had
heard by 30 to 70 degrees), engine items were alarming all the time and he
had issues with chosing to display propeller RPM or engine RPM (due to the
reduction unit), he had no pitot test, and nothing had been debugged much at

all. I had heard that on his flight to Florida , he had an INOP transponder
part of the time, that neither of his 2 EFIS systems were working right
(because they were never set up), and that they navigated to Florida above
an undercast with just a handheld 396/496 type GPS, which was basically
their only operational navigation instrumentation. They had decided just to
plug their headsets in using some alternative method to avoid having to
listen to alarms, and had to swap plugs to make radio calls. His Autopilot
was also non-operational on this trip. It really started to worry me that
he and Jan Eggenfellner were showing such lack of pilot judgement in
participating in such a trip. If you look at all the popular engine
companies like Aerosport, Barret, and all the other good ones, how many of
those companies do you know that would endorse taking off on such a trip
after such a short flying experience...even though the engines they install
and run they have extensive track records with?

It was apparent to me that he was trying to snow the rest of the community
into believing he was indeed doing his diligent flyoff time, because he then

made a post to the email list saying how he was so very tired every day
because they had been flying taking turns, sun-up to sundown trying to get
the 40 hours flown off. He was trying to conjure up the image to the public
when in fact he had not planned to fly off the 40 hours at all before going
to OSH . During the time they were in Florida , it sounded from reports I
heard that they spend most of their time doing things like swapping out the
gear drive unit (one or more tiems) and attempting cooling improvements to
get the engine to OSH , and that they actually were flying very little.

Sent: Tuesday, July 17, 2007 3:56 PM
To: rv10-list at ... <mailto:rv10-list%40matronics.com>
Subject: RE: RV10-List: Surreal experience realized today...
--> RV10-List message posted by: "Lloyd, Daniel R."
I have been asked by many people for pictures and I apologize I forgot to
post them. I have been having so much fun flying, and falling into bed
exhausted every night that I left the camera at the hanger. Jesse and John I

promise I will post the pics tonight for all to see...as long as no one
makes fun of the paint or lack there of!!!
Dan
N289DT RV10E Flying

Prior to 7/19 I heard a very disturbing comment that I can't verify that he
also skipped doing a proper Weight and Balance on his plane, and that he had

simply used MY weight and balance numbers and modified them to be roughly
what he believed his plane would be. This I though was so entirely
ridiculous, especially after telling us how much lighter his Subaru
installation and prop would be, that I had to call in on it. So, on 7/19 I
made a public post, trying to urge him to tell people how his W&B had turned

out with his Subaru. I had heard that on his flight to Florida , they
realized in flight that his C.G. was too far aft, based on some flying
qualities. He planned now to move the battery forward eventually,
which was something he did within the day or two before his death. His
flight that he died on may have actually happend on the first flight after
moving the battery forward, because on the phone he told me he was moving
the battery and planned to weigh it and fly it. This is not to indicate it
as a cause in the crash, but it does both point to something he knew needed
to be done, and a mechanical task performed just prior to the crash.

During the days down at Eggenfellners in Florida , I had heard that they were

also disappointed in the speed that the aircraft flew on the way down. They
had expected much more with that engine and 4-bladed prop. But, when it
arrived at OSH they had removed 2 blades from the 4-bladed propeller and
flew it up that way. The engine was also planned to be a turbocharged
engine, but that turbo hadn't been completed yet so they flew it for all of
the preliminary flights, and for many weeks after, without the turbo.
Another interesting happening that was largely un-discussed is that on the
trip to OSH from Florida , they had a failure of a bracket that caused them
high oil temps suddenly, grounding them in Kentucky until they could get
some parts to fabricate a new bracket at a local store.

At OSH he was making claims that he had something like 48 hours on the
airplane, and he and Jan Eggenfellner displayed the airplane and engine and
tried to attract buyers for the engine package. There was no discussion of
working through issues, but only stories of smoothness and success, as it
was important to keep the positive image up. They had removed the cowling
during the show for the whole time because they had quickly put together
many cowling mods to try to increase cooling and were left with lots of
unfinished fiberglass edges, and other things that would make it look awful.

I had heard, but not seen myself, that there were stringers of epoxy covered

fiberglass cloth that were poking out from various places that were sharp
and un-filed down, so the cowling was hid away.

After OSH , with the problems they had experienced, they wanted to work on it

some more so instead of heading to Pennsylvania , they flew it back to
Florida for the work. It stayed down there until sometime in about
mid-October, but I don't know the exact date. Around 10/10 they posted some
performance numbers, but by 10/25 the airplane was back home with Dan. A
video was put out of him departing Florida . During the second time in
Florida , they did cowling development work, to try to fix all the remaining
cooling problems and clean up the cosmetics, and install a cowl flap. I
heard that they got the temperatures much better with the redesigned cowl
and cowl flap. What struck me as strange though was they hadn't yet
installed the turbocharger, and I thought it was strange that they would do
all that cowling development work prior to getting a turbo installed that
would definitely affect the cooling requirements. Towards the very end of
the stay in Florida , the turbo was finally ready, so they installed that.
They took it for a speed test to 14,000' and compared numbers with the ones
that had been gathered by Ray and myself on Lycoming equipped RV-10's. But,
in the process of getting their numbers, they had actually destroyed the
turbocharger, so they had to do another turbo swap. Incidently, I've heard
that aircraft turbos are built substantially heavier to handle the high duty

cycle involved in aircraft power generation, whereas automotive turbos have
a lower duty cycle....but I'm not sure what the type of turbo used on this
install was. Of course, the information about the turbo being destroyed was
not presented along with the numbers, because that again would result in
more 2nd guessing by would-be interested parties. But, in not much time
after that, however (within a week or two), Dan was down to pick up his
plane, and they had a new turbo on it. It was posted on eggenfellners
website and still is as of this writing.
http://www.eggenfellneraircraft.com/News.htm

Interestingly, when they did their speed tests, they took photos of their
Chelton's as proof, and on the website you can see photos of the Cheltons
that clearly show that they never did calibrate the AHRS or set up the unit.

It is still set to display info from a strikefinder, which he did not have,
the heading is off by 30 degrees or so (I had heard they had mis-alignment
up to 70 degrees), and when you compare the skid ball with the Dynon, they
do not match at all. When installing avionics of this nature, there is a
lot of setup and calibration that needs to be done in the airframe before
flight, and that has to be taken on by the builder. In his case, almost
nothing was ever done to calibrate any of the systems. At the time, I had
also questioned the accuracy of the numbers they presented, because if
nothing is calibrated, how can you guarantee that your speed numbers are
accurate?
You will notice in the photos that the ENGINE and AUX SENSOR alarm flags are

also going off. I understand that they flew the plane up the busy East
coast and right over New York City like this to bring it home, stopping in
Boston on the way back too. He flew it home with a friend of his, so once
again he had a co-pilot onboard during his flights. This perhaps actually
extended the amount of time that the RV-10 actually survived, because there
were apparently some very workload-intensive things in his airplane, the
least of which was inaccurate instrumentation.

At one point within 2 or 3 weeks of his crash, he had called me to tell me
he was having problems with power vs. RPM control. I was surprised and
wondered why, with a constant speed prop. I had never dealt with electric
propellers before, so it puzzled me why he would be having problems. He
said it was because they had not yet finished designing the prop control
unit, so he had to manually make power adjustments, which would change the
engine and prop RPM greatly, but then with the prop now changing RPM
drastically (affecting pitch too) he would have to manually move a prop
pitch lever to bring the RPM to it's desired setting. So every power
increase or reduction required a corresponding adjustment of the propeller.
With this and all the other instrument issues, it was really a busy plane to

fly, and I can see why you'd want a co-pilot along on most flights. It to
me seemed very strange that Jan Eggenfellner would have him fly home and
consider the engine "delivered" without such equipment operational. Dan did
not have that many hours of total time (under 200, and other than the
transition training, all lower performance) and flying a slick, fast plane
is a handful. Combine that with not having calibrated any avionics, hearing
alarms going off all the time, and the prop control issues, and this plane
was much more complex to deal with than most planes would be. I know it's
"Experimental" aviation, so sure, we can play with new things, but Dan
wasn't the engine designer...he was just the guy stuck with flying such a
complex plane.

Also along the way in the past couple weeks he had emailed to indicate that
he thought his Chelton wasn't displaying correctly. He said he had
indicated 2300 G's (G-forces) when flying with his wife, and he emailed a
photo.

"This should make you laugh, I bet your RV10 can't pull 2300G's"

Well, of course an incorrectly calibrated system won't read properly, and
since I knew he still hadn't calibrated things, it didn't surprise me, but
as it turned out, he was reading "2300G" which means 2300' AGL GPS Based, as

2300G's. He had never really read through any operation manuals for his
avionics. He had in the past, complained that on his trip to florida his
Autopilot didn't work, and criticized one avionics dealer for not telling
him that he had to hook up pitot and static lines to his
Autopilot...something that is a definite
normal part of the autopilot installation per the manual. It was very clear
that he hadn't spent much time checking out his installation, or reading any

manuals to ensure they were correct.

On 10/25, he emailed me this:

"Eww I am an idiot!! I had no clue because yesterday I was at 6000ft and it
did the same thing, listing 2330 g's with the same reading, and then tumbled

to the right. I am scarred of it and that is why I have not been using it.
It is difficult for me to process everything it is telling me. I can
understand some of it, but then it starts putting up all this other stuff
and it is just easier for me to look out the window for now. But I do need
to learn it so I can feel comfortable before I ask an instructor to fly with

me. I called stein and he said it is because I have not calibrated it, for
that matter this is the first couple of times I have turned it on for
anything. So yes I need to read the manuals and build many hours using it
before I get in the clouds. I need allot of help to learn all of this stuff
because I am not having a clue on how to do it. Definitely a case of money
versus intelligence. But I have to learn it to use it. Does that mean I can
come up and get some lessons? Or do you know anyone who will teach behind
it? I have been using the Dynon and G496 because they are easy. Everything
else is still uncalibrated, including the AP etc. I am definitely behind
the power curve on this and need help! And they say that is the first step
to recovery, realizing that there is an issue and asking for help! -Dan"

That scared the CRAP out of me. Period. I mean, it's one thing to know all
of the stuff you just got done reading, but clearly, here was a guy who was
not up to speed on the airplane, the avionics, and some other comments he'd
been heard to make even made me wonder if he didn't just need a general
pilot refresher.

Trying to keep him open to listening, I replied back and tried to come
across as not lecturing too much, knowing that he'd tune me out if I did...

I wrote:
"You know, what might work better for you until you calibrate it, is to get
yourself some some nice sticky paper or 5x6 post-it notes and write these
letters on it. "INOP". Then just paste it over your screens. ;)

But seriously, you really need to just first sit down and read the manuals.
Chelton has user manuals on your site, and I have them posted on the EFIS
forum. Then, there's Keith's book that you said you bought....that will
give you the more detailed stuff for later. And of course, the install
guide. That one you'll need if you ever want to see things working well
enough to trust for navigation. It's all in the manuals to start. If this
thing were calibrated and working, you wouldn't have that feeling that
looking out the window is better for you, because it would actually work
well.

<Note that I'm not saying you shouldn't look out the window, but you want
instruments that work properly to make it easy to fly the plane>

As far as training goes, Josh the old D2A guy does EFIS training and he'd be

the absolute best option. He's a hired gun who can come out and give
training that will set you on the fast track quickly. Beyond that, it's
really not worth learning until the stuff is set up properly. When you come
up this way, I can take you out for a flight and show you some things too,
but really, once it's set up, you'll get the basics very quickly from flying

and the manuals. All the things that a trainer would really be valuable for
are the things like flight-planning and approaches, and things like
that....but that's way beyond what you should be doing with the system until

you're A) comfortable, and B) have all the stuff working right. You'll find
later that it's really a very easy system to use, much more so than a 430 or

480.

Also, if you have an airline pilot friend, they'd be a good victim to bring
along, because they know the symbolism on the glass pretty well, even though

this system has more than theirs for features.

Don't worry, I only bill $800/hr for my EFIS instruction... and I do it in
my own airplane since there's an EFIS on both sides. ;)
Tim "

He followed upwith another reply:

"I just got off the phone with XXX, and he said it is like trying to drink
from a fire hose, and I tend to agree. I need to get my hands around flying
the airplane and getting everything calibrated. Then I can sit down and read

the complete manuals. I have read the first 4 chapters of the Chelton
manuals but that is just basic symbology and the tapes, and those I do
understand. IF you take all of my owners manuals and stack them up they are
over 3 feet high!
I am lucky the dynon and 496 are already familiar because I can use them to
navigate and get myself out of trouble if absolutely necessary. Remember I
have only flown a Cherokee140 for 200 hours, so I am learning how to fly
high perf stuff too, I feel more comfortable, but still learning the Egg
stuff/ and the variable pitch prop is also more stuff to learn. I am getting

there and in a couple of hundred more hours I will maybe be ready to start
IFR training again. I have passed the written, and have 10 hours towards it,

but with the new plane I can already tell it will be time to start over.
Right now I am working on how to slow down and make sure I have enough pitch

on the prop for a go around, once that is done, I will move up the ladder a
rung and work on additional stuff. Calibration, troubleshooting other
electronics etc is also going on at the same time. XXXX and you both say I
have to just laugh at myself and the various issues I am having because
everyone has something or another happen. But it just seems like lately I am

way out of my comfort zone and clawing my way back in.

THX for the guidance and glad I could make you laugh this afternoon. "

I had one more follow-up for him:

"No prob. You're right, there's a lot of stuff there to learn even without
the avionics. Now you see why I say the -10 isn't something I'd recommend
to a basic beginning student pilot. It's not a hard plane to fly or land,
but there's more to the -10 than a cherokee, and it would be nice to get the

time in a $50K cherokee so if you smack it up you don't waste all your cash.

The -10 is high performance, slippery, and there's a LOT going on with the
C/S prop and engine stuff. Then, throw in high tech avionics and it's just
too much to use as a trainer, as you can see it's a handful with a couple
hundred hours.

I would encourage you to calibrate a.s.a.p. because you really will be
hindered in improving skills and having the experience go well until that's
done. Things like Bitchin' betty are there for a reason, and just flying
without them will not add to the safety. It would be better to HAVE the
warnings when they happen, but have them happen appropriately. None of it
is that hard to set up, but it all takes time.

I flew 70-100 hours before I did anything other than normal stuff for the
most part. Just take your time.
Tim "

See, I almost feel like a father when I read that....You've got this kid
that you know is doing stupid things, and he's not going to listen to a
lecture, but during that one chance when he finally comes and asks for help,

you try not to be an ass and come down on him, but give him all the
encouraging advice you can. You can tell he was in over his head in both
airplane and avionics, because he hadn't taken the time to really learn
either, and almost 100% of his flying time up to this point was with someone

else in the plane to help keep an eye on things. Unfortunately, it leaves
me feeling guilty that I never just strangled him into getting some good
sense and judgement. His statement about his comfort zone is very scary
indeed.

On 11/1/2007, the day before his crash, Dan emailed me to ask what landing
speeds I use at full gross, and I replied to him. Here are some excerpts
along with a follow-up comment from him:

"What speeds do you carry on base and final when at max load? I am taking
the family on our first trip and I am being paranoid but this is the first
time I have taken more than 1 passenger. So just doing due diligence."

For what it's worth, I wrote:

"I fly pretty much every landing the same even with or without passengers.
80-85kts around base (keep it below 87kts once the flaps are out) Then once
you get on final it's either 75Kts on a bumpy, windy day, or a strict 70kts
and no slower if it's relatively smooth out. Just don't let it get below 70
until the runway is right under you, and you're in the flare."

And he replied again:

"Good that has been what I have been flying, but I float awhile and was
thinking I was carrying to much speed because Mike had us carry 70 mph on
final, and since I switched to knots I was thinking that was my issue, but
until I get allot more comfortable I will bleed the speed over the runway,
instead of slowing on the approach, much safer in my mind! Going to the
airport to redo W&B after I moved the batteries forward, then I get to fly
this afternoon and tomorrow to get ready to take the family to Boston on
Saturday! THX for being there for questions, it is always good to have a
friend that can double check my thoughts."

That was the last communication I had with Dan before I learned of his crash

just over 12 hours later. I had heard prior to this that Dan had really had
a hard time on landing the plane, having to go-around sometimes multiple
times before a successful landing. Since he had 10 hours of transition
training, albeit a few months earlier, I figure it HAD to be because of his
extra workload with the propeller controls, and his low-time status, because

it absolutely isn't a hard plane to land. Given the fact that he probably
didn't even have 5 hours in his airplane as a sole-occupant though, it is
easy to see how he actually was able to put on some hours without incident
before this.

All of the above comes from either conversations I've had with him, or other

people had with him and passed on. Much of it is second hand, but to me,
all of it indicates a pilot and engine builder who spent all their time
rushing to complete an install to display at OSH , and they would be willing
to break just about any rule to accomplish that. Then, throughout the
process, there was a pilot who was in way over his head with a very much
more complex mess of an airplane than anyone else had flown.
It's extremely sad and hard for me to say, but I saw it as a completely
expected conclusion that some day he would end up in a smoking hole in the
ground, and in fact the night before, when we heard he was taking his family

to Boston , at home we said that we needed to pray for his family if he was
going to take them for a flight. Why would someone who just very recently
described his flying the -10 as "scary", be now racing to share the
experience with his family before he truly felt comfortable? It truly
distrubs me that I could see the end coming so clearly from back as far as a

week or two before OSH . As I talked to him and learned more and more of the
above info, and many more things that I can't even remember at this time, it

was readily apparent that no matter how nice, friendly, and capable Dan was
as a member of the RV-10 building community, he had a serious lack of
caution about flying his Eggenfellner Subaru, and very poor judgement about
his piloting in general. He was my worst fear for our RV-10 world...someone
who would not only bring insurance issues, and a negative image of homebuilt

aircraft, but someone who would kill himself doing it.