Posted for "Mark Steitle" <msteitle@gmail.com>:

I can hardly believe that it is my turn to post first flight news. For
those of you still building, don't dismay... its is worth it for those who
persist.

Yes, I flew my 3- rotor Mazda rotary powered Lancair ES today and she flies
beautifully! My first flight took place Sunday, 8/25/07, at 9:30 a.m. I
was close to doing it the previous day, but the winds were directly across
the runway at 10-15, and there was lots of traffic in the pattern, so I
waited. This morning was much better, except for the fog, which burned off
about 9:00 revealing a beautiful August morning. I guess I just got tired
of doing fast taxis. She flew like I was hoping she would, actually better
than I had hoped. I only did one lap around the pattern, but the only thing
I had to adjust was elevator trim. I landed with 20* flaps and did the best
landing of my life (I'm going to love this airplane). It was very difficult
not to go for another lap, but I wanted to get the cowl off and look things
over real well. Three sets of eyes didn't find anything amiss.

The engine has plenty of power for sure. I was especially impressed by the
smoothness of the rotary engine. It was a little loud, but that is
partially due to not having a door seal, and the ANR headsets took care of
most of that.

I'll know more about how well my cooling system is working after a few more
flights. It appears that oil cooling may need a little tweaking, but then
it was 90* at 9:30 a.m. H2O seemed to be within limits, from what I could
tell from my brief flight.

Thanks to all who contribute to this forum. I couldn't have done it without
your help.

Head still in the clouds and looking forward to the next flight.

Mark S.
Lancair ES/20B
N208TX

P.S. I surprised the photographer and ended up without any pictures...
sorry.
 
[A big congratulations to you, Mark... I've been following your progress closely both here and on the other list, and I just knew that you were going to have an extremely favorable first flight report.  Please send some photos, especially cowl off... I'm anxious to see the end reult of all that FWF work.  Thanks much for sharing the experience with us and please continue with your reports as you expand the envelope.  Great job!   <marv>   ]