From a jet jocky, that rings true

Posted By: Carl, Horizon Cat/Picnic Cat, Central Texas
Date: 6/25/08 11:43a.m.

Report: outside forum guidelines

In Response To: Prop walk (Dick Herman, Muddy Duck)

Well, here I sit, listening to music on hold. Perhaps I can share some wisdom while the sun crosses the zenith. A long, long time ago, back when those nice Wright boys still had a bicycle shop, there were fan-things on the noses of planes. You might even argue the Wright brothers' contraption had fans on the nose. They sort of had the tail feathers up front, so maybe back where the motors were that might have been considered a dislocated nose. My aeronautical knowlege, much like anything with 'nautical' in it, has gaps. Anywho, those fan-things were called props. They should have been called fans, though, because when they stop everybody on board starts sweating real bad. It's also noteworthy those dashing young men in their flying machines could navigate just fine with timekeeping limited to the hour hands on their wind-up watches. Of course, when your VNE would just be a fast taxi in a 'real' plane you're generally carrying a noticeable angle of attack. Pilots came to find out, somewhere along the way, that angle of attack also made for an inconsistent angle of attack for the prop blades throughout the prop wheel. They called it P-Factor after some guy discovered it, shouting, 'Eureka!'. No, wait, that's the guy that figured out there were both right and wrong triangles. This was the guy who stalled his bird on departure, full throttle, nose to the sky, and a demonstrably impossible angle of attack. As his plane rolled over on its back he cried, 'Persnickety pea-pickin' plane!' Those jolly fellows in the tower always love creative alliteration on unicom, so the P-Factor name stuck. So did the pilot, where to this day there's a nice little memorial flower patch. Petunias, out of respect. P-Factor is also why they started putting a second rudder pedal on airplanes, over to the right side, and the same p-factor effect is used on inboard-powered boats to scrape barnacles off pilings. Some pilings. The moss grows on the north side of the trees, and the barnacles get scraped off the port pilings in slips. Makes for an easy way to remember that port is left. 'Port' has four letters, so does any relevant expletive in 'Oh $%&' But it's 'prop' walk, not 'compressor' walk. Nothing to worry about in these modern times.