Miles Messenger down

I understand from the owner that an agreement has been reached with an organisation in France to repair the thing. Hurrah!

THere is a lot of expertise in France, as anybody who has had the fortune to visit the Robin factory will testify.

Lets hope that we see OE back in the air soon ( my guess is 3 years min..)

HP

Wonderful news if true which I hope it is. I don’t care how long they take as long as they do a proper job of her, not a bodge.

Here they are.

Sad sight that.

Thanks for posting those photos! It’s a sad sight, but with some luck she’ll be back in the air one day.

That last photo is pretty explanatory by the way!

You’re welcome. I didn’t like the sight too. I’m not a pilot, but I like planes (and flying) and to visit airshows regularly. It’s a strange thing if a beautiful plane like this Miles ends up almost in your backyard… It crashed about a kilometer from my house.
If she’ll fly again, I hope that we can enjoy a low pass over this area one day.

Thanks for posting those photos! It’s a sad sight, but with some luck she’ll be back in the air one day.

That last photo is pretty explanatory by the way!

I reckon that somebody of average ability and with zero tailwheel experience would be ready for solo in the Magister – in ideal weather conditions and with good instruction – within ‘several’ hours only.

Unlike a Maule with its high power:weight airframe! I reckon I could fly the blinkin’ Lizzie when I’m done (soon) :p

If I ever got the opportunity to fly Maggie solo, I think I’d wet myself with glee. Wouldn’t be a good thing to do with all that wood around 😮 😮 😮 😀

Hi Arm Waver

Nice to read that my machines are being appreciated.

Flying these old aircraft is no black art ( I wish I could say the same about the heli I am learning to fly….) but it does require a lot more care.

I reckon that somebody of average ability and with zero tailwheel experience would be ready for solo in the Magister – in ideal weather conditions and with good instruction – within ‘several’ hours only.

A lot of the Shuttleworth pilots – invariably ex-military test pilots – have very few tailwheel hours.

If you think about it, in WW2 kids soloed these things in 10 hours or got chopped. Mind you, there were lots of accidents….

We are running regular features on ‘flying the Shuttleworth machines – a pilots perspective’ – in ‘Propswing’, the SVAS Newsletter.

These features will include privately owned aircraft. I believe the article on my Magister is due to be printed shortly.

Join the SVAS!

Check out wwww.shuttleworth.org for details.

Half-price admissions on display days, free, I think, on other non-flying days.

All the best

HP

JanJ
Thanks for posting the pictures and welcome…

and

Hairyplane
Thanks for the update and the insight into real life implications of owning such aircraft and sharing yours with as many people as you can.

Update on Messie Down..

I understand from the owner that an agreement has been reached with an organisation in France to repair the thing. Hurrah!

THere is a lot of expertise in France, as anybody who has had the fortune to visit the Robin factory will testify.

Lets hope that we see OE back in the air soon ( my guess is 3 years min..)

HP

Insurance – It would be wrong to apply standard automotive criteria to aircraft. Hull values are agreed and premiums calculated accordingly.
No insurer is going to accept the risk at, say £100k and then when you stack it say, ‘it was only worth £50k’ so thats what we’ll pay out.

Flying qualities – I have around 40 hours on Messengers and have flown 3 of them (including ‘OE). Consider the military design criteria (for that is who it was designed for): STOL operation from unprepapared strips.

To achieve this, the thing has a great big thick wing with significant undercamber, huge barn-door flaps and a wide track U/C well forward of the CofG ie to stop it nosing over in soft ground.

The Messie achieves it all in spectacular fashion and outperforms the Storch in every respect ie it will fly faster, further and lift more people.

Operate it out of wind and you need to be on the case.

Why?

In the landing configuration, wing and flaps blank out the vertical surfaces to a significant degree. In the rollout, there is very little rudder effect due to the slow speed (an incredible 27 mph stall is achieved engine off and less if you rely on the engine!) . Only the dinkly little central fin – fitted later in the programme to improve the directional stability – is in the propwash. (Miles did experiment with a very tall single fin and rudder but structural problems in such a light plywood design produced more problems than it solved.)

So, you need differential brakes to control the rollout. Trouble is, the Bendix brakes fitted are not that efficient.

Also, for reasons that would take too long to explain, a wide-track undercarriage, also well forward of the Cof G, compound together to render the thing highly prone to ground-loop.

Having said all of that, flown carefully and operated into wind wherever possible – ideally on grass, the Messie is an absolute hoot of a thing to fly. Even in light winds it can stop in just a few yards. On take off, even with passengers and a lot of fuel, the take off is incredibly short too.

The Messie is a rare beast because its made of plywood and people are frightened of ownership.

However, for the money, if you can find one, it has no equal in my book.

HP

That’s better, I needed to read an operator’s point of view of the characteristics. Not as bad as it’s sometimes made out to be then. Mind you the report I read was writtten by someone with all of half an hour on type, not really conducive to an objective report.

Pictures from G-AJOE in Kats

Yes please, post them here.

Moggy

Welcome 🙂

Here they are.

I’m living in Kats an took some pics when they loaded the plane on a truck. Some people where busy removing the left wing. If anybody is interested in these pictures, I’m very willing to mail them.

Yes please, post them here.

Moggy

Welcome 🙂

Bristol – I havn’t tried to buy one recently because I hav’nt been a)unfortunate enough to damage one and b) paid out on the insurance if I had.
So it’s a academic.

Cannot quite understand your ideas . There is more than one Messenger airworthy in the U.K. Therefore it is feasible to buy another from an owner. There is also a former
RAF MK.4 for sale in Europe as a kit of parts .

tried buying one lately?

Just find out, the crash was last Friday (May 20) and the machine came down near Kats in the south west of Holland. That’s all, I am looking for a pic. BW Roger

I’ve found this forum just because I was looking for information about the crashed Miles near my house. I’m living in Kats an took some pics when they loaded the plane on a truck. Some people where busy removing the left wing. If anybody is interested in these pictures, I’m very willing to mail them.

Insurance/ Messenger flying qualities

Insurance – It would be wrong to apply standard automotive criteria to aircraft. Hull values are agreed and premiums calculated accordingly.
No insurer is going to accept the risk at, say £100k and then when you stack it say, ‘it was only worth £50k’ so thats what we’ll pay out.

Flying qualities – I have around 40 hours on Messengers and have flown 3 of them (including ‘OE). Consider the military design criteria (for that is who it was designed for): STOL operation from unprepapared strips.

To achieve this, the thing has a great big thick wing with significant undercamber, huge barn-door flaps and a wide track U/C well forward of the CofG ie to stop it nosing over in soft ground.

The Messie achieves it all in spectacular fashion and outperforms the Storch in every respect ie it will fly faster, further and lift more people.

Operate it out of wind and you need to be on the case.

Why?

In the landing configuration, wing and flaps blank out the vertical surfaces to a significant degree. In the rollout, there is very little rudder effect due to the slow speed (an incredible 27 mph stall is achieved engine off and less if you rely on the engine!) . Only the dinkly little central fin – fitted later in the programme to improve the directional stability – is in the propwash. (Miles did experiment with a very tall single fin and rudder but structural problems in such a light plywood design produced more problems than it solved.)

So, you need differential brakes to control the rollout. Trouble is, the Bendix brakes fitted are not that efficient.

Also, for reasons that would take too long to explain, a wide-track undercarriage, also well forward of the Cof G, compound together to render the thing highly prone to ground-loop.

Having said all of that, flown carefully and operated into wind wherever possible – ideally on grass, the Messie is an absolute hoot of a thing to fly. Even in light winds it can stop in just a few yards. On take off, even with passengers and a lot of fuel, the take off is incredibly short too.

The Messie is a rare beast because its made of plywood and people are frightened of ownership.

However, for the money, if you can find one, it has no equal in my book.

HP

Welll, a nice crash pic is always welcome for the saturday edition

I still need to check Saturday’s ‘Telegraaf’, I figure it might still be in there 😉

Now all we can do is hope that somebody will want to put his/her money into getting G-AJOE flying again.

Damn shame – I do like Messengers. Dunno why!

I am the same. Having read a flight test on them I don’t know why I like them as they apparently have some strange flying characteristics like having poor yaw control despite the triple fins – and yet there is just something about them that I find attractive.

There is also one hiding away in Australia, awaiting a rebuild..

So I make that about 5 max. They’re hardly tripping you up ,are they?
Do you really think you can buy a replacement cheaply?

There was one advertised in Pilot within the last 24 months for surprisingly low money, under £20K as I recall.

As is the way of these things, somebody claimed to know somebody who knews some dark reason why it was seemingly so cheap. You never really find out the complete picture until you are the owner.