Low level HACman test

Today I flew to the Alvord to test fuel burn close to the ground with the system. It is a given that leaning your engine at altitude makes quite a difference. I was interested to see if it did the same where I like to fly, close to the ground. First I marked the front tank's fuel level, so that I could be at least close to correct. I started and warmed up the plane using the back tank, and when it was ready to go, I switched to the front tank, climbing to 500 feet to activate the GPS timing system, then only maintaining enough altitude to clear the hills between me and the Alvord. I did not change the throttle position once I established about 5360 RPM's until I set up for a landing here at the house. I did dial in the EGT to 1350 degrees and changed the setting to match the MSL as needed. Keep in mind that the higher you go, the richer the fuel mixture, so on occasion a change was required.

The flight covered one hour and 24 minutes from warm up to landing. I burned a total of three gallons of fuel from both tanks. I burned 2.3 gallons on the timed front tank flight, and 7 tenths of a gallon on warm up and the extra 24 minutes.

The OAT was 70 degrees, winds mostly calm, approximately 5 MPH wind out of the SW. Average speed of 62 MPH. The CHT's were well within limits at around 306 degrees. A great day for flying, and I am very happy with the results.

Of course there was the obligatory picture of the Steen's Mt. This time showing how much water is still on the normally dry lake bed. It however is a lake bed and therefore holds water quite well. You can see where the water is receding each day. Being very shallow it disappears quite fast due to evaporation. With a humidity of 14 % you can almost watch it move.

The wild (Feral) horses are quite scattered with so much water available all over the desert landscape. Little groups of three or more are scattered all over.
The first video shows some wild horses that happened to be on my flight path. The second shows the HACman in operation. At the beginning of the video my EGT's are shown with the HACman turned off. As the dial is adjusted, the EGT's come up. Since there is a bit of a delay, it exceeded what I was intending, so I tuned it back to my goal.

The third video is of the water level in the lake. Apparently the high water has put a ?damper? on the normal activity of the lake. There were only two vehicles in the area yesterday. Normally Gliders at this time of the year spend a week here using the thermals and upslope wind.



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