Feeling the familiar rush, he caught himself. "You're behind the airplane, damn it. Get your head out!"
The sound of his own voice calmed him. The engine was still howling at full revs. Chagrined, he reduced throttle and looked around as the wind roared past the paneless window. He was already high above the trees and still climbing. The controls worked fine, though the ailerons were a bit slow, a little mushy. He made a mental note to tighten the cables and looked at the altimeter, watching it move quickly past 500 feet. That looked about right. The VVI wasn't working properly, though, as it showed first no climb, then a dive, then an impossible 4000 feet per minute rate of climb. Oh, wonderful, he thought sarcastically. Watching the altimeter, he did a quick calculation. About 500 feet per minute.
"Not bad," he said, tapping the dial. He looked at the airspeed and knew he had another problem. It, too, was operating erratically, showing only 25 knots of airspeed, then 40. He glanced at the string, his poor man's attitude indicator and angle of attack gauge. It was streaming straight back toward him, the last inch or so twitching a bit above the cowling surface. He crosschecked the angle of attack with the reference marks he had drawn on the windscreen.
"It's okay, Jesse. Settle down," he told himself. "You're about four or five degrees nose high. You gotta be doing about sixty knots." He thought about the airspeed indicator. Installation error, probably. The pitot tube must be cocked a little.
He leveled the small high-wing monoplane at 2000 feet-give or take, he reminded himself-and noticed an increase in speed. The airspeed indicator gradually caught up and showed a steady 85 knots. The string was now straight and flat against the cowling. Throttling back further, he relaxed a bit and took stock of where he was. Looking down past the strut to his left, he saw nothing but the expected forest, since his takeoff had taken him away from Grantville toward the Thuringenwald. He banked slightly to the right, holding top rudder to stay on course, and looked past the right seat. More trees.
Fine, he needed privacy, anyway. Checking the compass and the clock, he was surprised to see he had been airborne only five minutes. Keeping his course, he flew on for several minutes, experimenting with the controls. Aside from the sloppy ailerons, the craft handled just fine. He began to enjoy the clear morning as he tried a few basic flight maneuvers.
"Damn, I'm good!" He grinned ironically as he finished off with a rather timid cloverleaf. The sun glinted off the angled, glossy skin of the fuselage and cowling as he leveled off.
Jesse squinted at the glare off the shiny cowling. Shoulda painted it flat black or something. Well, you can't think of everything. I got most of it right, anyway.
He took a few minutes to admire his own handiwork. There was very little vibration, a testament to the care with which the engine had been braced on its welded steel cradle. That assembly had been likewise well joined to the four angled, light steel tubes that served as the base of the fuselage, converging at the tail and to which the castering tailwheel, salvaged from a garbage Dumpster, had been affixed. More steel tubing overhead anchored the main spar, to which the wings were joined. Vertical pieces bracketed the cockpit space, further braced with half-inch plywood, secured with screws. The cockpit floor was a single cut sheet of three-quarter-inch plywood, perhaps more than needed, but solid and giving a firm base for the seats.
Jesse glanced behind him at the thin wooden strips that formed the remaining longerons for the fuselage, looking for gaps or vibrations where the semi-rigid skin had been secured. He could see none, though he'd thought he should have used more wood screws.
Tight, he thought. Well, we'll see when it rains. Maybe I can liberate a tube of bathroom caulk or something.
He ran his fingers over the rough interior side of the door, made of the same material as the fuselage and cowling sections.
Best use of pink kitchen Formica anyone ever came up with, he thought smugly. Especially when you're short of lacquer.
He had found a room almost half full of sheets of the stuff at his father's place, undoubtedly acquired at some ridiculously low price when it had gone out of style. Heavier than prepared cloth, the Formica, while too inflexible for the wings, served to stiffen the fuselage construction admirably. Jesse had always preferred a stout design and he suspected the smooth surface would cut down on drag.
With a glance at the cloth-covered wing, traditionally braced from the spar above to below the door, he turned his attention back to flying.
The last part of his flight profile was the most critical, especially with a balky airspeed indicator. Before attempting a landing, he wanted to know how the aircraft felt as it approached stall speed. He deliberately went into his instructor mode, talking himself through the procedure.
"Okay, Jesse," he told himself, "take it slow and easy. Straight and level at three thousand feet-no, better make it five thousand." He whistled as the aircraft climbed and leveled at the higher altitude. "Okay now, slowly pull off some throttle. Try to keep it level as it slows. Pull off some more. A little more."
Working off the altimeter, he followed his own instructions, hands more sure now, feeling the aircraft slow and raising the nose as it did so. The controls became less effective and it became harder to keep the nose up. His experience made him confident he could sense the stall approaching. He made a quick note of the power setting and angle of attack. The aircraft felt steady.
The string blew out at an increasing angle from the cowling and then fluttered wildly. As the aircraft slid past fifteen degrees nose high and slowed even further, it suddenly fell off in a stall, snapping over to the left, plunging toward the ground, departing controlled flight as it whirled into a tight, nose-down spiral. Despite his earlier confidence, he was completely surprised. Negative G forced his body up against the straps and his head struck the low cockpit ceiling, stunning him.
"Jesus! Shit!" he yelled, disoriented and scared, as he looked out the windscreen at the blurring trees. He churned the stick with no result. His heart raced. The instruments were crazy.
No they're not, Jesse, he thought. You're in a spin. He shook his head and checked again. The bubble in the turn and slip was in the far right of the curved tube and the altimeter was unwinding past 2600 feet.
"Okay, okay," he panted, as his training took over. His hands went through the recovery procedure learned thirty years earlier and a world away, his mind seeing the boldface words from the manual. CONTROLS NEUTRAL. STICK ABRUPTLY FULL AFT AND HOLD. He pulled the stick into his stomach. DETERMINE DIRECTION OF SPIN. Left. FULL RUDDER AGAINST THE SPIN UNTIL ROTATION STOPS. He stomped right rudder and the world slowed. STICK FULL FORWARD TO BREAK THE STALL. He slammed the stick forward and the nose pitched over even more. He felt the controls start to bite. RECOVER FROM THE ENSUING DIVE. The engine roared as he firewalled the throttle and eased back on the stick.
Flying again.
He wiped the sweat from his eyes as his breathing slowed back to normal. He noted the altitude. 1200 feet. The tree-covered hills were no more than 700 or 800 feet below, and ahead of him he could see Grantville looming up, with the unmistakable outline of the power plant beyond it.