Page 23 - Volume 16 Number 12

Pilots NeededAuthor’s special thanks to:Ab (Mule) and Wendy Fuoss, convention hostsEarle Olson, Duke Flyers Association PresidentJim Gorman, long-time Duke owner and publisher of the Duke Flyers NewsletterJerry Burnham and Gary Bongard, carbide tipped liftersNick Dean, Boundary Layer Research (vortex generators for many aircraft types)George McCrillis, Oil-a-matic engine pre-oilersBob Hoffman, Duke guru/historian and recurrent training instructorthe environment since 1979.Dukeflyers.org, the DFA websiteVolunteer Pilots NeededQuarterVolunteePagers flying for the environment since 1979.Phone: 307-332-3242 www.lighthawk.orgrA fine example of a Royal Turbine Duke conversion to PT6A engines.it. I flight plan 64 gph in the climb and, at 65 percent, about 44 gph in cruise. This setting will get you an honest 210 KTAS. The myth that the Duke is a ground lover is only partially true. While my personal minimum for a gross weight takeoff at sea level is about 3,400 feet of runway, many owners, and the Duke training guru Bob Hoffman, will show you that 2,500 can be acceptable.Aerodynamically VoluptuousThe average Duke owner, I would hypothesize, is substantially wealthy, on the high end of the Twin & Turbine readership food chain: oil barons, engineers, inventors and manufacturers of popular devices and machines – carbide lifters and the zero-turn-radius lawn mower, for example. For some, the Duke is their second or third “other woman”, after the companies they built from scratch, their jet, and their boat. And, of course, some have turned their Duke into a real fire-breather by installing Pratt turbines. With that kind of company owning Dukes, perhaps I’m not just a dim-witted, chest-thumping airline pilot after all. The Duke is aerodynamically voluptuous and I’m simply in love with a wonderful, but moody, challenging and occasiona•lly expensive partner – and sometimes impoverished because of it. Hmm, maybe my Duke is a woman after all. T&T242•wAwcwou.lpilgehofthelaewctrki.coalrgremlins were put to rest withan alternator conversion, lightweight starters and thechange to a lead acid battery instead of the originalorizontalNiCad. Vortex generators should be mandatory on all twins and you will find them on most Dukes. Their effect on performance allows not only a gross weight increase, but single engine flight to near stall speed. The two 380-hp turbo Lycomings like fuel, and lots ofQuarterDECEMBER 2012TWIN & TURBINE • 21