Carbon Cub UL Reaches 37,609 Feet in Record-Breaking Climb

News Discussion
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Originally published at: Carbon Cub UL Reaches 37,609 Feet in Record-Breaking Climb

CubCrafters’ Carbon Cub UL sets new altitude record over California coast.

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Wow! That is really amazing. Look forward to learning more: did they add some kind of anti-ice to the fuel? Did they decrease the pressure in the tires to prevent failure at altitude? When I first read about this I thought we were being punked and then saw the video. Congrats to the team on this remarkable flight!

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Hey! So the atmosphere’s pressure at sea level is 14.7psi on a standard day. It’s approximately 3psi at 37,000ft. (Rough numbers) so they would increase 11psi (not accounting for temperature decrease) and even if in space, the PSI in the tires would increase 14.7psi, which usually is well within the limits of a tires capability. The space shuttle never had issues that I’m aware of. Any physics majors can correct me if I’m wrong but this is what I remember from class.

Edit:spelling

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This is a forum for pilots yet there’s not a single technical detail - not even one - about what was required to get this plane with this motor to these remarkable altitudes. Lots of questions, very few answers. Just for fun, I issued the following prompt to my favorite AI Agent and (within 5 seconds) got a fascinating list of turbocharger and prop optimizations on, parasitic drag accommodations, gotchas, etc: “What determines the service ceiling of a normally aspirated Piper Cup airplane and what three things would be most important for significantly increasing the service ceiling, even for demonstration purposes?”

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Even AvWeb fails to provide factual information for just general information headlines it seems.

Edit: when i say factual, i meant like technical specifications and pilot jargon, like you mentioned

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I am surprised that for all this effort, cost, modifications, etc, there was NO NAA or FAI participation. I suppose that this was really classified as a ‘test-flight’… perhaps in preparation for a formal record flight? Or Not. Informal ‘records’ are always ‘interesting data points’… not to take-away from the mindboggling accomplishment ‘as is’. **
Also…
I am very curious how they attained the exterior camera angle/images… which appear widely detached from the airframe but remarkably stable.

**My Dad flew/attained official world records Class C1b, so I am partial to the FORMAL process.

PS: I graduated from CPSU SLO’77…

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Thanks! Appreciate the explanation!

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This must have been great fun. Congratulations.

Now you just have to climb about 40,000 more to beat the altitude record for a glider. https://youtu.be/_hk7JcKMrkk?si=Iy7dpbxPyJbHKe_z

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This is an insane feat! -51F at that altitude-- I can’t help but wonder how he stayed warm enough and what effect the extreme cold had on materials throughout the airframe. I’m hoping someone might’ve caught some amusing ATC audio. I’m sure a few 121 flights were questioning their choice in coffee after having a Cub called as traffic in the FL’s.

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Great story! But I could not stop laughing after seeing how appropriate the professors last name was: “Project lead and Cal Poly professor Paulo Iscold.”

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