Nav for friend pickup

[Guest 3rd dimension]

A mate and her two kids went to Moree for a holiday and they decided to take the train from Canberra [ this trip took 14 hours ].

 

I was talking to her while she was there and she mentioned that she was not looking forward to the trip back. So being Mr nice guy I said that I would fly up and bring them back to YSCB and that would take about 2.5 hours.

 

So I booked a Piper Arrow and away I went.

 

The trip up was fantastic, with some broken cloud around YBTH, this was a narrow band of cloud that was in the area forecast and a quick check of the BOM site showed it as well, so I went above it [ 8500ft ]- nice smooth air. The cloud cleared about 30 miles north of YBTH.

 

Had a bit of a headwind so I was only getting about 115kt grounspeed - the trip to YMOR took me about 02:50 hrs.

 

Standard entry into Moree with a C172 doing circuits and a few ag planes around.

 

I rang the guy about some fuel and he said he would be about 20 mins.

 

My friend, kids and a few other people arrived so there was time for a few pictures and load the plane.

 

Refueled, pax in, taxi call, waited for an ag plane to land and clear runway and we were off.

 

I was coming home at 5500 ft, tailwind, 150kts groundspeed and the ride was fairly smooth until we went under the cloud bank around YBTH. I was under the cloud base as I was going to land at YBTH to give the kids a break and throw a splash of fuel into the tanks.

 

Standard entry in YBTH onto rwy 36 with a couple of other planes doing circuits. Landed, backtracked and taxied to the bowser.

 

Reloaded everyone, started up gave the taxi call - quick mag check on the run - all was OK so lined up on to 36 for a left downwind departure.

 

Takeoff was all normal until I turned crosswind. It was at that point that the engine developed an huge miss. Quick turn to downwind gave a call to say I was doing a low and close approach to reland on 36. Lost about 200 ft agl on downwind, so I was about 500ft agl now.

 

Thank you to all the people in the circuit to help me out and they cleared the circuit for me.

 

Base turn at the runway threshold and relanded. Had a lot of runway to use and I did not want to get too far away from it in case things went pearshaped. I cancelled my SARTIME to YSCB and said I was in Bathurst.

 

There was a LAME there who said he would look at it. After a couple of hours he said that the gap on the plugs was too big, causing them to breakdown. We did another takeoff run and it felt as though it was running ok.

 

Reloaded pax and off to YSCB. I requested flight following once airborne just in case something was going to happen. The rest of the flight was uneventful. Except my nerves thinking that every little noise was something with the plane.

 

Straight-in approach onto rwy 17 [ thank you]

 

A few more hours in the log book, and an experience gained. The plane has not played up since.

 

Straight and level flying. And be safe

 

 

[ahlocks]

I reckon you had it made. An excuse for a flight and helping a friend out as well -doesn't get much better.

 

Shame about the glitch. But hey, betcha felt alive after it sorted out so well!

 

Cheers!