Spinning! I used to enjoy spinning, so much so that I would use it as a technique to lose height. My last ever, before I went on to rotary, was in a Chipmunk.
Honington, 1964. Our Valiants were being towed away to be scrapped and to keep us in flying practice whilst they sorted out somewhere to send the aircrew the Squadron was issued with a Chipmunk and I was O/C. There was a surprising reticence to take up this facility by the other pilots so I, virtually, had it to myself.
This was an opputunity to get our ground crew airborne as there had been no chance on the Valiant unless you were the aircraft's crew chief. So I was now running a Squadron AEF. I would take one up for about twenty minutes, they would change over in the back and off we would go again. I would let them have the feel of the controls and if they felt like it show them some aeros, progressivly, staring with an airleron roll to loops etc.
I had this one in the back who was as bright as a sparrow. Loads of enthusiasm. Roll, loops, stall turns, every one a winner. I then demonstrated a spin.
Close the throttle, control stick back and on the stall full left rudder. Give it three tuens to develop and then recover. Full right rudder and the stick forward precisely on the Direction Indicator on the instrument panel.
Nothing happened. It kept spinning.
It was now getting quite serious because we were about 3,500 ft and the altimeter was in overdrive. I applied full Pro-spin control to ensure it was in an upright spin as a guard against the unlikely fact that it had gone inverted. Then I again applied full anti-spin.
Three turns later it grudgingly came out. We levelled at 1,200 ft.
My passanger was still full of beans and he was saddened when I told him his time was up (I didn't tell him how close to fact that statement was) and we landed back at Honington.
It was time for a refuel so I shut it down, climbed onto the wing to assist my passengert. He was struggling to get out of the cockpit; not surpisingly because he must have weighed about twenty stones. I hadn't seen him being loaded on as it was a running change and I was negotiating something with ATC at the time.
We were almost certainly at or beyond the aft CofG limit which it why the aircraft behaved the way it did. In my defence we were not informed of any limit on rear passenger weight when I was checked out.
My next spin was in a Puma, but thats another story.