Neal,
Good recollection.
While the bullet story is popular, that wasn't really the cause of the accident. It may have, however, been a factor. "Mr. Awesome" was the R-3350 PRT Yak-11 mod'd by Joe Kasparoff and his talented crew, including Matt Jackson.
I've spoken to Skip about flying it, and while the qualities were poor, it was a fast SOB. I hear the T-33 tail made it a really good racer and a much better flier.
When Neil flew it, the racer had a boil-off cooling system for the oil. Before takeoff, the oil was already too hot (the bullet in the way?). He thought he had to get airborne to get some oil cooling. It doesn't work that way... The system does not use air at all for cooling. The cooler sits in a bath of water/alcohol and boils it overboard as it heats and turns the fluid to steam.)
Anyway, he took off hot, it got hotter, and he came back for an emergency landing as the engine was failing. That Yak had a two-handle gear system. If I recall correctly, he got the gear handle down before he got the door handle down. So, at that point, the gear was messed up and out of sequence.
Here's the kicker... THEN tower told him to go around.
He began to... The engine had juuuuuuust enough life left to impart a burst of power and energy into the aircraft. Too hot to land and too sick to fly. He crashed it and tore it up.
Lots of mistakes were made. The benefit to this is it has become one of the emergencies always briefed at Reno's PRS, at least for the unlimited guys.
Know your systems. Don't let anybody else fly your airplane via radio.
My memory is also subject to the ravages of time and such. Please feel free to add or correct as necessary!
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