Tell us about your last flight

[ClintonB]

A Great looking trio of planes.

too wet this weekend to do anything here.

beautiful days whilst at work, Murphy doing his thing.

 

[Blueadventures]

Fitted in a quick fly yesterday, weather was excellent but had to meet someone to trial fit their aircraft into the hangar so needed to be back at 8am.  back by 8.10 as too good of weather to waste.  Also flew over the previous airfield I was at that unfortunately will not exist in two weeks time.  Cheers

 

Marian airfield 

 

Edited February 7, 2021 by Blueadventures

[ClintonB]

Nice and green up your way.

 

What’s happening to your air field?

 

[Blueadventures]

16 minutes ago, ClintonB said:

Nice and green up your way.

 

What’s happening to your air field?

 

The two owners are fencing to the extremity of thier land.  You can see the right half of the airstrip is not mowed and the line between the unmoved and mowed section is having a fence placed. Don’t like the aircraft as disturbs thier horses was mentioned a few years back.  Not good but out of the locals hands.

[Blueadventures]

21 minutes ago, ClintonB said:

Nice and green up your way.

 

What’s happening to your air field?

 

Cyclone season rains.

[Old Koreelah]

This one wasn’t me, but an interesting flight. This Herc flew low over our strip this morning and did a low level turn around the valley.
His flight plan looks like a drunk’s night out:

 

 

 

[NT5224]

At last. After three frustrating weeks grounded by a tropical low that had the clouds streaming across my airstrip there was a literal 10 minute break in the clouds. I just  happened to be preparing to slash the airstrip so I dragged the bird out of the hangar and got in a few respectable circuits before the clouds began creeping back over.

 

My wife drove over when she heard me throttle the Lycoming...And snapped my last circuit.

 

Here's landing and takeoff

 

Alan

 

[Old Koreelah]

Alan I’m a tree-hugger from way back, but I think you should take the dozer to those big high buggers at the end of your strip.

[Thruster88]

Just now, Old Koreelah said:

Alan I’m a tree-hugger from way back, but I think you should take the dozer to those big high buggers at the end of your strip.

That's not a line of trees, he is totally surrounded by them. A good place to have lycoming power🤔

[NT5224]

18 minutes ago, Old Koreelah said:

Alan I’m a tree-hugger from way back, but I think you should take the dozer to those big high buggers at the end of your strip.

Koreelah, I agree but as Thruster said my whole property is thick woodlands. I've already cut  about 15 of the highest trees at each end with a chainsaw (intentionally leaving the stumps in).  Just beyond those trees the land rises in a steep escarpment. Its like flying on or off an aircraft carrier. Lots of fun. I'll clear the trees back to the escarpment, but the strip is plenty long, even with them there.

 

Alan

[Blueadventures]

Todays flight caught up with a mates Skyranger completing its 25hours.  All done so he will be submitting the paperwork and can soon do some trips around.

 

 

• Spoiler

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Spoiler

Spoiler

 

 

 

[Old Koreelah]

Just had a look at the BOM chart and OzRunways. Tried to see a correlation between the weather and lots of aircraft (on OzR) currently in the air over SE Qld.

 

Then the penny dropped. That would be people heading home from the Clifton Fly-In, which I missed again this year.

[ClintonB]

Not been the best weather lately around here. Friday and Saturday looking ok at moment. Might have to bug out and go to airport with a cobweb broom.

[waraton]

Just got home from a river trip along the the darling river in NSW from Menindee to Wentworth then along the Murray to Renmark and Loxton. South West NSW is still dry as bone which is hard to imagine given the drenching other areas have had. Few pics of some river towns along the way. Weather was about as good as it gets.

Poonacarie in NSW, the Darling river is pretty shallow between here and Wentworth.

 

Renmark in South Australia.

 

Loxton, just down river from Renmark and Berri.

[Old Koreelah]

4 hours ago, waraton said:

Just got home from a river trip along the the darling river in NSW from Menindee to Wentworth then along the Murray to Renmark and Loxton. South West NSW is still dry as bone which is hard to imagine given the drenching other areas have had. Few pics of some river towns along the way. Weather was about as good as it gets...

 

All this long green grass, soggy ground and low cloud puts a dampener on flying.

Good seasons are great for farmers and lots of others, but droughts are better for pilots. 

[Old Koreelah]

Yesterday I flew for an hour to test a few modifications.

All went well and the view was awesome.

 

Pic 1: A peep over the Liverpool Range looking down the Hunter. Note the buildings right up near the stop of the range; what a great spot to live!

 

Pic 2: Even after a week of sunny days the farmland is still sodden; not a good place to land.

 

 

 

 

[spacesailor]

I put two litres in my HBird, and gave the motor a twentyfive minute workout.

Would be wonderful to actually Fly it.

Need to find, how to polish the exhaust pipes back to Chrome. 

spacesailor

[kgwilson]

Here on the North East Coast of we have had rain and more rain since mid December. Another trough has been moving through yesterday and today with plenty of rain. There was a rare fine day on the 3rd of March so I flew out to Yamba and down the Coast & looked at all the flood damage etc around Corindi only to find everything looked normal from the air and on to Sapphire beach then back to South Grafton. The following day it rained again and we have only had the odd day of no rain since.

 

We have been struggling to keep up with the mowing and have limited it to the runways and main taxiways plus access paths from hangars to the main sealed taxiway. I have about 250 metres from the hangar to the sealed taxiway which I mow and there is a natural watercourse that runs across it and it filled up when the Clarence river began to flood. South Grafton aerodrome is only 20 feet AMSL and the lowest part of South Grafton. The locals say that if South Grafton was a bathtub the aerodrome would be the plug hole.

 

With the floodgates closing on the 22nd of March when the river level reached 3 metres, local runoff began to fill the flat lands. By Wednesday 24th of March there was a huge lake that enveloped half of the runway and some of the parking and apron areas. The flood level rose to 6.6 metres on Wednesday night before beginning to slowly recede but with the floodgates still closed the aerodrome got even more flooded. Luckily it was not enough to get in to hangars.

 

YSGR Flooded. Hangars 2/3 way down below strut. 1/2 sealed runway under water.                                Half of 26 under water. Note the (real) Jabiru in the centre

 

The floodgates opened on Friday night the 26th of March. By Saturday afternoon all the water was gone but the aerodrome was saturated. On Monday the 29th we began to mow essential areas. It was good flying weather but I could not get the plane to the taxiway.

 

Wednesday 31st of March. The sealed runway was good and I'd mowed most of the grass runway on the Monday. The weather was, well not that flash but at least it wasn't raining. The cloud base was low at around 2000 feet and fairly dark grey stratocumulus and there was a 90 degree Southerly crosswind of about 10-15 knots with a few higher gusts. It looked like it would improve so I decided to give it a go. Backtracking 08 was interesting. With my castoring nose wheel I was wandering about a fair bit. This should have been a warning.

 

I kept the aircraft on the ground till I had over 55 knots on the ASI, popped off the ground and immediately weather cocked into wind. Gained height quickly and all was OK except it wasn't. I was getting thrown all over the place. I got up to about 1500 and decided to head down river. There was water everywhere. The turbulence got worse so I turned around & flew back over town to the West then straight along the runway at just under 2000.

 

The cloud to the South East was now black and I could see rain showers heading towards me. That was it. I throttled back and began to lose height on a wide 180 to downwind for 08. The turbulence was awful but I just let her go making sure I had good airspeed & descent rate. I didn't lower the flaps until I was on a long final. The windsock was straight out 90 deg to the runway & I thought I may have to abort except the rain was close so decided to have a go with plenty of power.

 

I was crabbing at about 50 degrees off to the South with a fair bit of aileron to keep my heading and dropped full flap at around 70 knots. I lined up on 08 Grass North, kicked the rudder round & made a pretty solid landing. Then she just wanted to weathercock & I skidded a fair way before getting her straight and slow. Back on the seal and I could not taxi straight at all. The first shower hit and the wind was at least 20 knots probably 25-30 in gusts and the windsock was swinging wildly. Once on the taxiway I had the wind to my back & with the flaps still at 30 degrees I turned off for the 250 metre trek to my hangar with the wind now buffeting me from the right & the rain pelting down. In the end I got back without further issues, swung round and shut down.

 

That was my last flight. Without a doubt the worst flight ever since I built my Sierra.

Edited April 6, 2021 by kgwilson

[facthunter]

When you aren't doing it for a living, the choice to fly is yours. Not much fun when it turns to $#!t is it? IF it was a STOL type you would have been in real strife. Anyhow nothing bent and you learned something. I think these weather "events" are going to be more common. Nev

[spacesailor]

AND

Very interesting to read about that That quick trip.

spacesailor

[Blueadventures]

Last Saturday had nice cool Autumn air and light wind providing great flying conditions to the West of Mackay.

 

https://youtu.be/AQLmR1Q

W69k

Edited April 16, 2021 by Blueadventures

[Old Koreelah]

Yesterday I flew over to a mate’s strip to help him with his radio.

After all the recent cooling modifications, my little plane is purring along perfectly. CHTs on cruise are all even and around 135C, even though the ram air ducts now enclose the whole length of the cylinders.

 

The oil cooler now exhausts separately under the cowl and even though I closed the outlet to 35X140mm, the oil only got to 70C, so I’ll have to tape some of the inlet for winter. 

 

We were getting ready for today’s planned flight west to the Warrumbungle Wings and Things Community Field Day.

 

Bluddy rain.

 

Jason and his team have worked so hard for this event only to have a rainband dampen the whole area. I’ve just spent weeks renovating my wooden prop, so a little rain is a big turn-off for me.

Maybe it will have passed by lunchtime...

[Thruster88]

Dave and I changed our plan for Coonabarbran today due weather and had a local in the RV out to lake cowl gold mine instead. Dave then had his first solo in a traditional ultralight,  I enjoyed seeing the thruster fly. 

[facthunter]

You need a mower in there. Nev

[Wirraway]

Today I went solo for the first time in my own aircraft. 

601 XLB.
After a couple of years flying a Jab 170, spent time adjusting to the differences. 
It does fly nicely, though.  🙂