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RV6 Open Canopy...

Plumbmaster

Active Member
I would like to start a brief discussion on canopies opening in flight inadvertently and the results thereof. I understand that tilt up canopies (especially the ones that open sideways) can open I flight and blow off, but what about sliders on the RV6, RV7 and RV9?.
Secondly, is it even physically possible to open the canopy n the 6 or 7 in case one needs to exit the aircraft in flight. Why would one need to exit the aircraft? the reasons should be obvious; structural failure due to aerobatics, fire, angry wife etc...
I'm about to embark on basic aerobatics and would like to hear from others experiences with the slider canopy.
 
Owners of -6, -7, and -12 tip-ups have had canopies open in flight (usually due to forgetting to latch on departure) and they can be flown normally apart from the canopy sitting partly open (6" or so if I recall) and the glareshield blocking some forward view. They are unlikely to depart without some "other" confounding factor... Canopy jettison pins pulled, for example, or maybe excessive gyroscopic forces?

The sliders are reported to be almost impossible to open more than a few inches in flight, the aerodynamic loads want to close them. A number of people have modified the forward rollers to attach to quick-release pins that could be pulled if jettisoning the canopy in flight was desired. In that case, one would pull the pins first (while the latch is holding the canopy shut), then release the latch and try to slide back. The aerodynamic forces should lift the front of the canopy off, and tear the slider block off the rear track.

All in theory, of course. I don't recall any reports of *intentional* canopy jettisoning where the pilot continued to the ground safely.
 
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Owners of -6, -7, and -12 tip-ups have had canopies open in flight (usually due to forgetting to latch on departure) and have flown normally apart from the canopy sitting partly open (6" or so if I recall) and the glareshield blocking some forward view.

There have been at least 9 RV crashes and 4 RV fatalities associated with canopies opening in flight.... so it should be a worthwhile discussion.
Not caused by, necessarily... but associated with. (Same as most other aircraft with doors or canopies)
 
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Tip-Up canopys

Owners of -6, -7, and -12 tip-ups have had canopies open in flight (usually due to forgetting to latch on departure) and have flown normally apart from the canopy sitting partly open (6" or so if I recall) and the glareshield blocking some forward view. They are unlikely to depart without some "other" confounding factor...

So how many out there have truely "Experimented" opening their canopies in flight? Do those of you that fly tip-ups know that the canopy can be substituted for the elevator in the case of elevator control failure? It turns out that the canopy is a lifting surface. Opening it causes the nose to fall, which can be overcome with trim alone. Once trimmed, opening the canopy further will cause the nose to fall further. Closing it will cause the nose to rise (all at the same power level). Flaps MUST be left in the UP position or the canopy looses control. I have successfully tested landing the aircraft under these conditions (on a long runway) using ONLY canopy positional input and hands off the elevator.

I can say from experience that an unplanned open tip-up canopy should not result in a loss of control unless the pilot stopped flying the aircraft.
 
My experience: Two times I have had my primary latch open on my tip-up -7 due to me not getting it completely latched before takeoff. both times my secondary latch on the "roll bar" was closed so it only raised an inch or so until that caught it.

The first time I had my wife with me and we were able to get it shut when I slowed almost to stall and she pulled and I latched. it takes a pretty good pull to get it back down. The second time I was solo and didn't have enough hands to pull down, latch and keep straight so I just had to land. I didn't notice any adverse handling at all.
 
This topic has been discussed in depth many times over the years. The archives contain all these threads....the search engine is your friend. :)

Bottom line, the tip-up canopies (RV-3 and -4 excepted) will ride open about 6" and can be closed if the plane is slower than cruise speed. The sliders are very difficult to open much past 6".
 
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There has been at least 9 RV crashes and 4 RV fatalities associated with canopies opening in flight.... so it should be a worthwhile discussion.

I think a better summary would be "There have been X number of crashes due to pilots not continuing to fly their RV after a canopy has opened".

Open canopies don't create an unflyable RV.
 
I think a better summary would be "There have been X number of crashes due to pilots not continuing to fly their RV after a canopy has opened".

Open canopies don't create an unflyable RV.

I'm probably not qualified to respond since I'm in the fact finding phase and haven't even flown an RV.

However, I think that the above statement holds true no matter what you're flying. I've been a CFI for a long time now. With primary students, when they are getting close to solo, I'll pick a time on either the upwind or final when they have a relatively high workload, reach across the airplane (c-172) and pop the pilot side window open.

WITHOUT FAIL, every student I've ever done this to will immediately focus on closing the window even if we're only a couple of hundred feet in the air, and even if we've talked about "fly the airplane first" less than an hour before in the preflight brief. Any thought of holding Vy in the climb, or keeping a stabilized approach on final is immediately abandoned due to their new #1 priority of closing a window that could be open all the way up to Vne with no problems at all.

When I do a BFR we'll discuss this and I suggest that we go through the same exercise, as well as opening the door in flight. I've worked with more than one relatively high time Cessna pilot that had no idea it's possible to open the window in flight, not to mention that there's a process for closing a door in flight.

If they had a door or window pop open before we talked about it and went through the process, I have zero confidence that they would have performed perform any better that the 15 hour pre-solo student.
 
My slider wouldn?t budge

Not one inch. One of my first flights didn?t latch all the way so I slowed to 70 kts or so, tried to pull it back and slam it shut but no way. Was real loud and windy but no other bad things happened.
 
So how many out there have truely "Experimented" opening their canopies in flight? Do those of you that fly tip-ups know that the canopy can be substituted for the elevator in the case of elevator control failure? It turns out that the canopy is a lifting surface. Opening it causes the nose to fall, which can be overcome with trim alone. Once trimmed, opening the canopy further will cause the nose to fall further. Closing it will cause the nose to rise (all at the same power level). Flaps MUST be left in the UP position or the canopy looses control. I have successfully tested landing the aircraft under these conditions (on a long runway) using ONLY canopy positional input and hands off the elevator.

I can say from experience that an unplanned open tip-up canopy should not result in a loss of control unless the pilot stopped flying the aircraft.
Not a planned "experiment" today, had my RV Tilt-up canopy pop open during flight today.

Spent the day washing/waxing the plane. At the end of the day it was so nice decided to go out for a flight. After 10+ hours was a little tired.

Cranked up, talked with ground, received taxi instructions and soon was in the air.

Headed out North, towards a friend's home on a remote lake. Descending from 2000ft to 1500 to get my airspeed up for a zoom climb, right at 200mph (mph on ASI) started to pull up. Before that happened, the roll bar latch holding the canopy down let go, that's right forgot to latch the side latch.

Big popping noise followed by medium wind noise in the cockpit. With headphones could still here the Kenai Tower talking with a Cessna.

Main thing was it wanted to do a nose tuck, almost full elevator before it stopped, was adding trim at the same time as pulling, what made the big difference was reaching up and pulling the canopy down, immediate elevator control. Just a couple of inches made a big difference.

Just like you mention, do believe you could control pitch with the canopy.

Once in a climb and slowing down was finally able to pull it down enough to rotate and close the roll bar latch again. Reduced airspeed back to Kenai.

Not my best day for reading/following my checklist....Skipped right past the line to check/verify the pilot side latch.

A wake up call for sure.

As far as controlling the plane, it was not responding like it normally does when moving the controls. A little was not working well, more force and about 2/3 nose up elevator leveled it, more initiated a climb. After level flight established reached up and grabbed the D handle and pulled down a couple of inches. Was riding about 6" open and took some force to pull down, at first I did try to close, but it would not, actually think it came down crooked, might have been able to close if I could have watched the rails to verify lined up right. So, just held and flew normally until the airspeed went below 140 mph: at that time was able to close the roll bar latch.

Best regards,
Mike Bauer
 
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There have been at least 9 RV crashes and 4 RV fatalities associated with canopies opening in flight.... so it should be a worthwhile discussion.
Not caused by, necessarily... but associated with. (Same as most other aircraft with doors or canopies)

During my 40 hour test period I intentionally tookoff with the tip-up canopy unlatched.

My RV-9 did not pitch down or do anything unusual.

The test card I wrote had me climb to 2000 AGL, slow to 70 knots, and perform a control check but not a stall. The airplane handled normally with no tail buffeting noted.

I then deployed the flaps and slowed to 60 knots and was able to close and fully latch the canopy without undo effort.
 
Canopy opening is a non issue

Thanks for starting this thread. Those that have and those that will applies here. Anyone crashing a plane caused by the canopy opening or failed to latch didnt perform the basics: maintain aircraft control, analyze the situation, take the appropriate action.

I have purposely taken off with the canopy unlatched to be prepared for the time when it does accidentally. Nothing happened. By nothing I mean, the canopy stayed shut due to the aerodynamic forces at work. at 100 kts (and a safe altitude) I couldn't latch it. I slowed slowly trying it at each 5 kt interval until it did close. Around 75 was the number that got it closed with little effort.

I will note that the remainder of the flight could be louder and more windy. Let me explain. When the canopy does get shut while flying the sides of the canopy are bulged out and the trailing edge of the canopy doesn't sit correctly. I did my first check of this in colder weather and it was cold in the airplane even with the heat on.

After landing, the canopy, once opened would shut fine and there was no permanent damage to the canopy. I think the best thing to do is to land and latch it then proceed with your trip IF the canopy is bulging and letting in air (which feels good in the summer time). If your canopy doesnt bulge after latching it, press on!

I have never had the canopy move further aft when it was unlatched. Each plane is different but mine stayed right where I left it but latching it was impossible until at a slower speed. The most mine opened was about 1-2 inches thus the need to slow to close it.

Tailwinds
 
My Wife?s Story

It’s a lot bigger deal on a tilt-up than a slider. My wife was flying a Young Eagle in our RV-6 when the canopy opened at cruise speed. She’s fairly sure she latched it before takeoff, but says she might not have gotten both latches set. When the canopy popped open, she was at about 1000’ AGL and about to enter the traffic pattern. The airplane lunged for the ground and her headset went overboard, trailing alongside the cockpit on it’s cord. It took a lot of elevator and a hard pull to keep the nose up. She needed three hands for a while as she tried to keep the airplane from diving into the ground, pull the headset back in and pull the canopy down, in that order. Unable to get the headset back and unable to get the canopy down far enough to latch, she took the headset off the Young Eagle and put it on her own head, (one handed!) only to find that the push to talk switch worked the wrong mic. It was a busy time since she could not let go of the canopy because the airplane pitched down hard when it wasn’t held down which made power adjustments tricky. She landed OK, but it was right hairy. Not sure if she extended flaps. The Young Eagle said she had a great time, skipped away happily with her certificate and my poor wife got herself back together. She has not flown another Young Eagle. She did a write-up of the incident and I’ll try to find it and post it here.
I read an accident report where witnesses watched an RV-6 take off, then something small flew off and the airplane dove into a house, killing both aboard. The object turned out to be a headset., which was pretty compelling evidence that the canopy opened.
Vans released a Service Bulletin about this subject and much has been written about canopies opening in flight. Incidents seem to vary from minor annoyances all the way to fatal accidents. Your mileage WILL vary. Bottom line, ‘canopy down and latched’ is on our checklist twice.
 
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I am close to finishing a 14A. The 14 does not have the secondary latching point on the roll bar and instead uses a micro switch that will annunciate visually on the EFIS and also in your headphones If the latch is not engaged when you hit an airspeed that you select......I think 40 knots is the recommendation. This system has its own possible failure modes. Just curious what others view as the +/- of this approach vs a secondary latch.
 
I am close to finishing a 14A. The 14 does not have the secondary latching point on the roll bar and instead uses a micro switch that will annunciate visually on the EFIS and also in your headphones If the latch is not engaged when you hit an airspeed that you select......I think 40 knots is the recommendation. This system has its own possible failure modes. Just curious what others view as the +/- of this approach vs a secondary latch.
I haven't seen the geometry of the -14 canopy, but if it's similar to the -6 and -7 geometry it probably wouldn't be that hard to add an overhead latch that uses a similar mechanism.
 
She needed three hands for a while as she tried to keep the airplane from diving into the ground, pull the headset back in and pull the canopy down, in that order. Unable to get the headset back and unable to get the canopy down far enough to latch, she took the headset off the Young Eagle and put it on her own head, (one handed!) only to find that the push to talk switch worked the wrong mic. It was a busy time since she could not let go of the canopy because the airplane pitched down hard when it wasn’t held down which made power adjustments tricky.

Just a reminder to all, communication it down the list on things to do in an emergency situation. Fly the plane, worry about the headset latter. Glad all ended ok.

How far does the canopy stay open on tip-ups if open in flight? Must be quite a bit if headsets can get through.
 
Just a reminder to all, communication it down the list on things to do in an emergency situation. Fly the plane, worry about the headset latter. Glad all ended ok.

How far does the canopy stay open on tip-ups if open in flight? Must be quite a bit if headsets can get through.

I have taken off twice with the tipper canopy unlatched (early in my 6A experience). Both times I got to around 120 MPH in climb before noticing. The canopy lifted about 1" from the closed position with no tendency to lift more. Both times, I had to slow down to about 90 MPH or less in order to be able to latch it closed. Never got near cruise speed, so can't say what would happen then.

I can't recall if the safety latch was closed, but unlikely that it was, as I routinely close the main latch followed by the safety latch.

Larry
 
I am close to finishing a 14A. The 14 does not have the secondary latching point on the roll bar and instead uses a micro switch that will annunciate visually on the EFIS and also in your headphones If the latch is not engaged when you hit an airspeed that you select......I think 40 knots is the recommendation. This system has its own possible failure modes. Just curious what others view as the +/- of this approach vs a secondary latch.

My open canopy alarm comes on with rpm, as well as airspeed. If I forget to latch before run-up, it warns me. :cool:
 
Owners of -6, -7, and -12 tip-ups have had canopies open in flight (usually due to forgetting to latch on departure) and they can be flown normally apart from the canopy sitting partly open (6" or so if I recall) and the glareshield blocking some forward view. They are unlikely to depart without some "other" confounding factor... Canopy jettison pins pulled, for example, or maybe excessive gyroscopic forces?

The sliders are reported to be almost impossible to open more than a few inches in flight, the aerodynamic loads want to close them. A number of people have modified the forward rollers to attach to quick-release pins that could be pulled if jettisoning the canopy in flight was desired. In that case, one would pull the pins first (while the latch is holding the canopy shut), then release the latch and try to slide back. The aerodynamic forces should lift the front of the canopy off, and tear the slider block off the rear track.

All in theory, of course. I don't recall any reports of *intentional* canopy jettisoning where the pilot continued to the ground safely.

A friend of mine had a sliding canopy detach inflight. It slammed into the tail structure, doing a fair amount of damage. Luckily, the plane was still flyable, and he made to an airport for repairs...and a change of underwear.
 
Tilt Up Opening Near VNE

After my experience with the canopy opening on my RV-6, and the nose dive it wanted to do, been thinking about my reactions.

The one thing that I'm convinced is: 1st thing after recognizing what is happening, grab the D-handle and pull it down from the 6" it is open.

The elevator starts working like normal.

I muscled the elevator all the way back to my stomach before is started working to level the plane at near VNE.
I waited until the nose dive was cancelled before reaching for the d-handle to pull the canopy down to about 2" open at the top.

With the elevator full back and the sudden lowering of the canopy, a very steep climb initiated pulling 3.8G's.

I know that if I had grabbed the D-handle, the control issue of stopping the nose dive, using the elevator, would not have been needed.

Thought process says to fly the airplane with the controls.

We all know how responsive the controls are. What got my attention is how the normal control movements didn't work. This caused a delay in the recovery.

Elevator not responding to the stick pull, the feeling of the elevator just flopping around with no pressure on it will set off a whole new set of alarms, right when you don't need them.

This caused another time delay in taking the correct corrective action: Close the canopy!

Granted all of these time delays didn't last but micro-seconds, still work load during an emergency needs to be kept to a minimum.

Best regards,
Mike Bauer
 
Dianne's Canopy Adventure

Ah, here it is... I promised to look for my wife's essay on her canopy open incident. This happened in March of 2014. Sorry, I'd garbled some of the details in my earlier post.


Inadvertent canopy unlatch in flight in RV-6.
Recent report of a pilot being flung from his tilt-up canopy Experimental Zodiac compels me to share my recent experience with a tilt-up canopy unlatch in-flight in my RV-6.

I was giving rides at Santa Paula Airport and was with my third young future pilot. This was to be her first ride and she was excited. I got my 9-year old passenger strapped in and then strapped myself in. Ran the check list, started up, rolled to run-up area and ran that check list including verifying canopy latched and locked (did I miss the locked?!) We climbed out and I turned the stick over to my passenger and talked about the wonders of flight. It was slightly bumpy but not too bad. (Did I bump the canopy lock?) We got to 2500’ and I leveled off for a quick scenic when suddenly with an explosive force, the canopy popped, the plane nosed over, I was off the seat and tight up in my harness; my checklist, sectional and headset departed the plane. A look at the airspeed and altitude showed a rapidly increasing airspeed and decreasing altitude – what the.. I pulled off the power but couldn’t pull out of the dive.

My first thought was “midair” and I looked around and up and saw the canopy up. I reached high up for the handle on the canopy and pulled with all my strength. I felt the nose relax a bit and was able to get level. I looked at my passenger and was greeted with a big smile as if this were the best ride ever. I explained what happened and that although not a big deal, it was too noisy now for us to continue the flight so we were going back to the airport.

I slowed the plane down hoping I could get safely slowed enough and then muster the strength to latch the canopy but found out that was not going to happen. I even used both hands at one point, trying to hold the stick with my knees but when I let go of the stick, the nose pitched down and when I was able to pull the canopy down with two hands, the stick needed attention so that was getting me nowhere. Ok, so now I am holding the canopy handle down with all the strength I have with my right hand, holding the stick with the left and needing to add power. I juggled with that for a little bit and then thought I better make a radio call and let everyone know I am coming back and need the pattern cleared. My Bose headset is slapping against the outside of the plane so I again get the stick squeezed between my knees so I can pull the head set back in by the cord. Pulled it in and saw it was broken and the earpieces were dangling on their wires.

Ok. I look over at my smiling passenger and announce that I am going to take her headset so I can call on the radio and warned that it was going to be loud when I did that. Now I am holding the canopy with my right hand and my arm is about to give out so I need to switch for a moment. I think about how to do this – and with the agility of an epileptic elephant, I let go of the stick with my left hand and the nose pitches down, I stretch up to reach the latch with my left hand and let go with the right and grab for the stick and get it all back together and fly like that for a few minutes till my right arm is ready to go back to the job of holding the canopy down and then go through the gyrations to switch hands.

Ok, got that settled, now how to get the headset off the passenger and on my head. Passenger is too little to help so I have to do this myself. I look over and say what I am about to do and I again squeeze the stick with my knees trying to hold it there and I grab the headset off her head and she immediately puts hands to ears because it is loud and windy and I jam it on my head and get back on the stick. Cool. Now I calmly press the button on my stick to make the call and realize that’s not going to work because the button for this headset in on the stick over there in the passenger seat. Great. I really need to make this call because it is real busy at the airport today. I lift my feet off the rudders and lift my legs up so that I am grabbing more of the stick and while holding the canopy with my right hand I reach over with my left, press the button and make the call.

I enter the pattern and am able to fly a normal pattern while holding the canopy with my right hand and working the stick and throttle with my left. I lower the flaps downwind abeam and slow further and try letting go of the canopy. It still rises up but not too much and is not causing the nose to pitch down. It is controllable and I relax just a little bit. I come in for a normal landing as if nothing were amiss. I asked my passenger if she enjoyed the exciting ride and with a big smile she told me yes. She must have expected a wild ride. That little girl is going to very surprised the next time she flies and all is calm and straight and level.

I was a bit worn out physically from the experience but not terribly frightened by it..until I read about the Zodiac pilot. I know that if my passenger and I were not strapped in, we would have been thrown out – the canopy popping open and immediate pitch down was that violent. The airplane was not controllable and if I had been unable to pull the canopy down, we would have made a big dent in the ground.

The lesson here for me is to make sure the canopy is latched before take-off and check again after getting bumped around and check again just to make sure. Also thinking about converting to a sliding canopy!

Dianne Williams
RV-6

[paragraph breaks inserted for easier reading; S.Buchanan]
 
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