Control Rigging, XM Weather, ForeFlight 8 Upgrades
Years ago, I was flying a friends P-51 Mustang and was flying low-level at roughly 400 knots (at the time there was no speed restriction below 10,000 feet) when the rudder flutter began. I flew vertical and reduced to idle power to slow the airplane down, where the flutter stopped at about 170 knots. The violence of the flutter was unbelievable and destroyed nearly every instrument in the cockpit, leaving gauge needles lying at the bottom of their instruments. We tiptoed back to the airport in Van Nuys, California, for an immediate and uneventful landing because the airframe had a vibration that made me nervous.
In his article about aircraft flight controls rigging (October 2016 issue of Aviation Consumer), Kim Santerre may not have emphasized strongly enough the danger of improper control cable tensions as it relates to aircraft damage. I once experienced rudder flutter that should have cost me the airplane, but somehow did not.
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