Lancair Columbia
Flight Crew Instrument; Flight Crew Multiengine; Flight Crew Flight Instructor
Flight Crew Last 90 Days 50; Flight Crew Total 2500; Flight Crew Type 6
Aircraft Equipment Problem Critical
Flight Crew Inflight Shutdown; Flight Crew Returned To Departure Airport; General Maintenance Action; General Declared Emergency
Aircraft; Procedure
Took the owner of the aircraft on his first flight since a new engine was mounted. The engine had 5 hours on it at the beginning of the incident. Run-up was normal. Departed and noticed a slightly low fuel burn on climb out at 35 GPH; should be 40 GPH. We leveled off at 2;000 FT about 3 miles southwest of the field. When I reduced the throttle to lower manifold pressure; nothing happened. I pulled it back farther and still no change. At that time I elected to turn back towards the field and land. On CTAF there were 3 other aircraft in the pattern and one on a long final; I said that we had an emergency and needed the pattern clear. The other aircraft acknowledged and cleared the pattern. We were indicating 190 KTS at 2;000 FT. Once we were abeam the numbers I pulled the mixture to idle cut-off to start slowing the airplane. To bleed off speed and altitude we made right 360 and then turned base. On final I added 1 notch of flaps and made a normal landing. We coasted off the runway and got a tow back to the ramp. In the maintenance shop we discovered that the throttle linkage had separated from the throttle control attachment point.
Lancair 400 pilot experiences a throttle linkage failure during climbout resulting in a high power setting that cannot be reduced. The reporter returns to a point above the departure airport where the mixture is pulled to cut off and a gliding approach is accomplished successfully.