I flew from Venice to Milan. Normally I have fuel on unlimited. I decided to fly with limited fuel for this trip. I flew the X Cub bush plane because it has a better view than most of the other single prop planes and being able to land anywhere is fun.
Half way through the trip the engine cuts out! I was able to land in a farm field safely. I checked the fuel gauges, the right wing was empty and the left wing was full. I looked for the fuel tank switch for 5 full minutes before I finally found it. I switched to the left fuel tank and was barely able to make it to Milan!
haha, it was quite an adventure!
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I always wondered why we cant pump fuel from both wing at the same time. It seems to me that having one full and the other empty would create a big inbalance.
Anyway, glad you made it !
Yeah, you must manually switch tanks in a lot of the lighter planes every 10-20 minutes or so because they don’t crossfeed. Most of their POHs say to not get more than 5 gallons out of balance, so this is a habit you need to develop. Set some sort of timer for like 10 minutes and switch tanks every time it dings, then restart the timer. Pretty soon, you’ll train your brain to do it at about the right time instinctually.
It depends on the plumbing. The more plumbing and more pumps, the more weight. For planes trying to be as light as possible to fit under the MTOW restricctions of US (and most of the rest of the world) LSA (or the local equivalent), not to mention the even harsher Euro (NOT US) “ultralight” regulation, that weight is usually not worth it if you want to make an airplane with enough utility to sell in profitable quantities.