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Old Koreelah

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Everything posted by Old Koreelah

  1. Old Koreelah
    That might be the worst spot, Nev. I take off ever a paddock where black cattle are regularly hand-fed. Their hooves have made the surface rough and if I got down safely they’re all likely to crowd around my plane for a rub while I’m away getting the carrier…
  2. Old Koreelah
    The slab could cost as much as the rest of the hangar! Regarding joint lines in concrete slabs: good idea to make sure they’re in the right place, because some pilots use them as aiming points when taxiing into the hangar. After smashing a club-mate’s wingtip strobe, I painted white guidelines on the floor and extending outside onto the apron, to make it easy to line up wide aeroplanes. Our neighbour has built a new hangar to accommodate three Air Tractors; it’s wide, but not deep, so no aircraft has to be moved to get another one out (which is the problem with our club’s building). We added bi-fold doors. They might be cheaper, but are a menace in any sort of breeze.
  3. Old Koreelah
    My Lithium turns the engine painfully slowly, then gradually speeds up as it warms. Gentle on the flywheel bolts. Restarting when warm is not. Almost instantly fires, no doubt putting enormous loads on those bolts. Mine has dowels, so I’m less stressed, but should soon check bolt tension.
  4. Old Koreelah
    First of all, I moved as much fixed equipment like toolkit, spare parts, etc. forward as far as possible. Because of my aircraft’s design, it wasn’t a monumental job and was an opportunity to install new mounting bolts and brackets. Afterwards I did lots of testing and CoG stays well within the original designer’s range.
  5. Old Koreelah
    A lead battery is a major component of your W&B. After I replaced my 4kg Decca with a 1.6kg lithium, I had to move the wing aft 18mm.
  6. Old Koreelah
    Thanks Glen. If a 50/50 mix of water/metho spray contacted those materials, what would you anticipate to be the worst outcome? Nev metho (ethanol) is widely available. If I went to the trouble of obtaining some methanol, is it likely to do less damage to sealants and hoses? For my experimental phase, I plan on mounting a small garden spray bottle in the cockpit, pressurized before takeoff. The CHTs might tell me to give the bottle a few pumps during climbing. I can set the release valve to be open only during WOT. That should give at least a few minutes of running to clear out any water/metho residue before engine shut-down. From my reading an approx 50/50 water/alcohol mix might suffice and be fairly safe in the event I prang the plurry thing. Next time I light the Rayburn, I can experiment with a small clear measuring cup; we know the combustibility of 100% metho (woof water), so I’m interested to know how much water it takes to remove the “woof”.
  7. Old Koreelah
    Just as I’ve refined my water/metho injection design ready for installation, it occurs to me that metho is ETHANOL, the plurry stuff we try so hard to keep out of the engine! If I spray metho into my Jabiru carb only on wide open throttle, what rubber is downstream to be damaged?
  8. Old Koreelah
    My PowerMate regulator seems to do the job, letting 14v get to the LiFePO4 battery. Its resting voltage is 13.2v, which it holds for weeks.
  9. Old Koreelah
    Good point! An often-overlooked dimension to landing control. I had mobs of problems with idle revs until a LAME showed me how to adjust the idle screw. 800 rpm is now a reliable idle speed, but some have reported it as low as 350 rpm on Jab engines with EFI. I had major problems stopping my early single-disk Ducati until I replaced the standard master cylinder (which I assume had been designed for a dual-disk setup) with a smaller-diameter one off a Honda 500. Bicycle shops might be a good source of very light-weight hi-tech hydraulic brakes.
  10. Old Koreelah
    Flighty would you please explain how the Govt gains from this.
  11. Old Koreelah
    Back to the Sierra: years ago I dropped in to Garry’s Taree factory for some industrial espionage- I was looking for design ideas for my wing flaps. Garry is the sort of energetic, Can-Do bloke this country is running short of. He insisted I go for a fly. His son took me up in a Sierra and impressed me with its stability and speed.
  12. Old Koreelah
    They’ve grown soft in their old age; no more tents, so accomodation is the issue.
  13. Old Koreelah
    Another dimension: Air tractors are usually idle for months during droughts and a water-bombing contract could save the company from financial collapse. If Australia wants a credible fire- fighting force, we should give these Airtractor operators some priority.
  14. Old Koreelah
    Wow! It’s older than me and still flying! Can’t help comparing that with America’s car industry, which managed to convince people to buy a new one every year or two. Imagine the roads filled with well-maintained Plymouths and De Sotos. Like Cuba.
  15. Old Koreelah
    My old bike mates are planning a trip down the Darling. I presume there a lots of airstrips with pubs, but fear the place will be swamped with caravans.
  16. Old Koreelah
    I flew a few circuits yesterday, then like, Kevin, did the mowing. We will be charged landing fees after this month, so I’m getting in all the STOL circuits I can! As with Sth Grafton, our club maintains the airport terminal grounds.. We have two ancient mowers, a Husky and a RAM zero turn which get the job done in a couple if hours. Best season we’ve seen, so need to mow weekly. I alternate between mower and wizzer, which keeps the edges neat. Biggest problem is hammering given to my bad back by the deep ruts left when huge harvesting machinery uses our grounds.
  17. Old Koreelah
    Octave’s analogy is the best I’ve seen; so good I shared it with friends. Perhaps Flighty could explain why he finds it funny.
  18. Old Koreelah
    An early round engine: https://youtu.be/0I-xLhLquMA?list=RDCMUCOC84qwgDHkUPwfeLKL40tQ
  19. Old Koreelah
    I’ve read that the Allies were quite impressed with the build quality of the Zero, or at least those made early in the war. Saburo Sakai was skilled at leaning his radial engine for economy and claims he once flew for over 12hrs. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saburō_Sakai#/media/File:Saburo_Sakai_Zero.jpg I have a part-built 75% replica in my shed, based on the one in Canberra. (Wikipedia claims it was Sakai’s plane, but John White, in charge of restoring it, never mentioned that to me.)
  20. Old Koreelah
    Thanks Nev. Its a big old 9-cylinder unit on a 301. Uneven popping at idle, some pops while speeding up. After some work behind the engine, they have it running better, fewer pops.
  21. Old Koreelah
    Nev I’m just watching a round engine being ground-run and at idle its popping every second or so. Any ideas?
  22. Old Koreelah
    I’m tired of hearing that’s cliche; the empty spaces barely matter to this, and so many other arguments. The populated part of Australia to about the same size as Japan. What matters to this discussion is urban density.
  23. Old Koreelah
    Thankfully that that is still true of Australian politics, but for how long? Too much American madness is being imported. Our society is being riven by misinformation, much of it coming from the US. Scomo and his backers are obviously closely following the Republican playbook to secure future control of this country; the Murdoch empire is spreading its tentacles to ensure that. The recent spreading of free Fox “News” to rural Queensland media is clearly aimed at ensuring those electorates remain firmly under the control of the LNP.
  24. Old Koreelah
  25. Old Koreelah
    Flighty we are sitting on the edge of our seats, waiting to read what you think they should be doing...
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