I came across an old videotaped interview with Curtis Pitts, recorded about 2003 when he was in declining health so pretty hard to understand it all. Here are transcriptions of some of the more memorable quotes:
Regarding testing the new symmetrical airfoil on N8L:
"The first symmetrical wing we built was directly out of the book. It had a sharp leading edge and it had a sneaky stall, just happened with no warning. I was out one day,(flying N8L). I got into a spin with the damn thing, so I recovered, started to pull up, and I was in a damn spin again. I reversed it, being ham fisted, and got spinnin’ outside, and I didn’t realize that for a bit... by the time I got things sorted out and quit ham handin’ the damn thing and was able to straighten it out, I got pretty low. When I came around the bottom on recovery I could have counted the blades of grass on the ground. It was close. Flew back to the airport, those damn wings came off right there."
Regarding redesigns of his airplanes by other people:
"You know, one of the things people don’t understand, is you put a pound of weight on this little airplane, it equals 20 pounds of weight on a Stearman. They all want to improve the airplane but every damn one of ‘em makes it heavier."
Regarding the strength of the S-1S upper wing:
"You know the weakest place on that S-1S is the front spar, right at the edge of the center section. That’s why we put that little doubler on it. If it wasn’t for that one place, that airplane would be a good bit stronger than it is. Our stress analysis showed that’s where it would break, but it would take about 10 and a half G’s to break it there." "Did you read that little blurb I put in that magazine about progressive failures? It was in the IAC magazine (Sport Aerobatics). If you exceed the elastic limit on a material, you weaken it. Just a little bit. Next time it’s not as strong as it was, so at that same load rate you’re gonna weaken it a little more, and this goes on until it gets so damn weak you’re gonna break it (well below the ultimate load rating). It just accumulates. I tried to explain that in the magazine and I doubt that ten people read it."
Good stuff...
Regarding testing the new symmetrical airfoil on N8L:
"The first symmetrical wing we built was directly out of the book. It had a sharp leading edge and it had a sneaky stall, just happened with no warning. I was out one day,(flying N8L). I got into a spin with the damn thing, so I recovered, started to pull up, and I was in a damn spin again. I reversed it, being ham fisted, and got spinnin’ outside, and I didn’t realize that for a bit... by the time I got things sorted out and quit ham handin’ the damn thing and was able to straighten it out, I got pretty low. When I came around the bottom on recovery I could have counted the blades of grass on the ground. It was close. Flew back to the airport, those damn wings came off right there."
Regarding redesigns of his airplanes by other people:
"You know, one of the things people don’t understand, is you put a pound of weight on this little airplane, it equals 20 pounds of weight on a Stearman. They all want to improve the airplane but every damn one of ‘em makes it heavier."
Regarding the strength of the S-1S upper wing:
"You know the weakest place on that S-1S is the front spar, right at the edge of the center section. That’s why we put that little doubler on it. If it wasn’t for that one place, that airplane would be a good bit stronger than it is. Our stress analysis showed that’s where it would break, but it would take about 10 and a half G’s to break it there." "Did you read that little blurb I put in that magazine about progressive failures? It was in the IAC magazine (Sport Aerobatics). If you exceed the elastic limit on a material, you weaken it. Just a little bit. Next time it’s not as strong as it was, so at that same load rate you’re gonna weaken it a little more, and this goes on until it gets so damn weak you’re gonna break it (well below the ultimate load rating). It just accumulates. I tried to explain that in the magazine and I doubt that ten people read it."
Good stuff...
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