Bad day

[R-2800-59]

Dear community,

after having a cursed gig in the evening, the band was all over the place and my lips were too weak from the action on the past days to bring me through the music properly, I decided to jump into my newly acquired P-51 to have some fun at last .

Well... after a risky takeoff with a dangerous sidewind gusting and pushing me off to the right I actually was able to fly some loops and rolls where the cloud cover left some space, felt like moving around in a giant arena, really nice.
I did a slow pass on my airfield with flaps fully deployed to show off a little with the new paint job. After it disappeared under my left wing I adjusted the engine for climb and retracted the flaps - well, there it struck me.
Doing so the plane banked violently to the right, I looked on the right aileron instinctively what seemed doing ok. Unknowing what was about to happen I stopped the retraction of the flaps. That one saved me. When I looked to the left aileron it too worked as it should - but the left flap didn't move a bit.
I then checked the hydraulics gauge that was in the green. So there was something wrong with the flap linkage, every attempt to raise it resulted in the same banking because it just didn't move - no way to safely continue the flight, so I turned around and brought her down. Fortunately the left flap was stuck in the full down position so I could land without overshooting on my short home strip, although I had some fears the left flap could snap up and make the plane uncontrollable.

My mechanic had a look on it and found out that the linkage was completely broken. He asked me about the flap speed limits of whom I am aware and always eager to obey. This day it really was just a bad part on the plane.

Well, on those days you just should stay on your couch, neither touching your instrument nor your airplane.

[Lewis - A2A]

hehe, least in the sim you can reset and start over

cheers,
Lewis