My Lancair IVP after 55 hours of total flight time is having an engine overhaul (it was a “new engine” to start with from Performance Engines – I’ll tell that story later) and I expect to get the engine back from Barrett in Tulsa in January or early February.  It will take a while to get the engine back on – all the other upgrades and fixes completed, taxi tests etc etc and so I expect to be ready to get airborne again in the spring or early summer.

I have about 60 hours of personal IVP time – 50 of them in my airplane.  I am hangared at 0S9, Port Townsend International Airport in Washington State. 

The advice I’m looking for centers around the fact that our runway is 3,000 feet long, certainly more than adequate for this airplane but not by a lot.  The first flight after reinstallation will be a test flight with several different concerns. 

1.       Although I have much confidence in my decision to have Barrett overhaul the engine, it’s still a break in flight and carries more risk than normal for that first takeoff.

2.       Because I am still a low time LIV driver and I will have had almost 6 months of rust developing in my IVP skills, that will be a factor

3.       Because the airport environment is not conducive to emergency landing after takeoff (trees and salt water at both ends) engine problems during this takeoff would be problematic.

Port Angeles is about 6 or 7 minutes away in the IVP and has a nice long and wide runway, so the plan is to head directly there and perform engine break in over head that airport followed by several landings there prior to returning to home field.  There is another runway at Sequim midway between that is 4,000 ft long -  it’s narrow but could be a satisfactory emergency strip if necessary.

Is there advice other than hiring another test pilot and/or buying time in someone else’s IVP that I should be planning for to lower risks in this upcoming event?  Any other concerns I should be thinking about I haven’t mentioned?

Regards,

John Barrett, CEO

Leading Edge Composites

PO Box 428

Port Hadlock, WA 98339

www.carbinge.com