Flying the Goldwing Ultralight

allen griggs · March 15, 2007 18:03

Some years back I bought a kit for the Goldwing ultralight.
This was a fiberglass/composite aircraft. It was a well made kit.
The wings were made of styrofoam. You set up one of the styrofoam wings, which were fifteen feet long, on two saw horses. Then you covered the wing with fiberglass.
This little airplane had a small wing in front called a canard wing. This canard wing provided a great deal of stability, and prevented the aircraft from stalling.
The weak point of this aircraft was the engine. The engine was a two stroke snowmobile engine of 430cc. Alas it was single ignition. A good aircraft engine has dual ignition, so that if one ignition system fails, the backup will make the engine run without a hitch. There was a five gallon red plastic gas tank, like you would have for a motorboat.
This was a very high performance aircraft, for an ultralight. Top speed was 80 mph.
I must say, that on my first flight, I was 1,500 feet above the ground, I was thinking, "Did I mix that resin right on that left wing? I know I was hung over that day. Did I mix two parts of the dark resin with one part of the light resin, or did I mix one part of the dark resin with two parts of the light?"
Evidently I had mixed the resin right, for the airframe was very strong.
I had a lot of fun flying my Goldwing in central Georgia. I loved to fly along the Oconee River. One day, two wood ducks got spooked up by my noisy little airplane, and they got up above the trees, just in front of me. I liked to fly without instruments, including airspeed indicator, but I would say that these ducks were doing about 45 mph. I nosed the little white airplane up to within 15 feet of the tail feathers of these two ducks. I mean, these ducks were sweating. They kept looking back at me, as if to say, "What the hell is this?"
After a minute or two, I realized that I was really stressing these ducks. If one panicked, and just did a back flip, it would come back, and either hit me in the face, or hit my propeller, with very bad results. So, I backed off, and let these ducks fly back down into the trees.
My airstrip was a cow pasture that was 1,500 feet long. One day, I went down to fly my Goldwing. I had thought that my tank was full, and had brought no gas. When I looked at the tank, I saw that I had only about 1 1/2 gallons. I thought I would try for an altitude mark. Rather than go into town and buy five more gallons of gas, I merely went up to my house, 1/2 mile away, and got my altimiter.
I hooked up the altimiter, and took off. I flew in lazy circles, and set the plane for maximum rate of climb. In a little while, I was up at 6,200 feet. Then, I heard the engine sputter and quit. I tell you, that is way up in a little airplane, you could see for dozens of miles. I could see the big smokestacks of the coal fired plant near Macon, at least 30 miles away. The air was very thin and cold.
It was very quiet, except for a little whistling noise the airplane made with the engine off. Since I had climbed in circles, I was just above my little cow pasture airstrip, about a mile and a quarter above the ground. I just set the plane for maximum glide, and slowly returned to earth. I turned in big, lazy circles just the way I had climbed up.
The only problem with doing a flight like this is that there is no room for error on a dead stick landing. You have to make the first pass at the airstrip just right, otherwise the sky gods will smite you.
Well, I landed with no problems. I had my stopwatch set, it took me 13 minutes and 30 seconds to descend from 6,200 feet.
I had some great adventures in my little airplane for about a year. Then, one night in a thunderstorm, a tornado struck, flipped my little airplane upside down and broke the wings.
I went down the next day with five gallons of gas and gave the Goldwing the Viking funeral.
Before the fire, I removed the motor. In a few months, I sold it to a guy who wanted to make an airboat.

Flying the Goldwing Ultralight

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