metalman

Well done, I hope if I ever have to do the same I'll do as well

Being a "young 46yo" I have yet to experience a lot of the stuff that age will bring, but I think being humble enough to know when to hang up the headset would be the hard part, I've got a mate who gave it away recently, he says he was worrying about mistakes and errors and enjoying the flying less, so the plane gets sold and that's that. The good thing , he was out at the field on Sunday and did a lap with one of the other guys in the same type as his last plane, a great thing to see him still getting airborne and not having the worry of staying ahead of the plane. I guess it's a hard desicion to give up something that's been a huge passion for many years but at some point that step will need to be taken,

I've found living and flying around Melbourne and the Yarra valley turbulence is an every flight affair( occasional calm day aside) I've found that trying to fight the aircraft can make it worse, I tend to let the air do it's thing , and only catch it when the plane rolls past about 10 degrees( maybe a bit more , going through some of the passes here is VERY lumpy), especially if I'm alone, PAX get a bit more care, the biggest thing is having confidence in the airframe, slow it down into the green on the ASI and if its really bad well into the green, and trust the aircraft, you trusted it to leave the ground now trust it to keep you aloft, the forces in a steep turn are higher than most turbulence ,fearing that the aircraft won't handle the bumps is often the biggest thing that we worry about, so pull the straps tighter and look for some smooth air ,maybe higher, and as I think of it the QLD outback is probably the bumpiest place I've flown, 9-10000 in the middle of the day can still loosen your fillings.

Well, me Blighty bound friend,,,,you certainly know how to get a thread going,,,I like most of us would like to see alot of things done differently here but it seems we have an infestation of politicians that are mainly interested in getting re-elected,,,which I guess is the same in most western countries,,enough of that!!! The accident reporting here is crap, and in light of countries like NZ that seem to have got that bit a little more right than us it only makes it appear more ridiculous! As for the funds ,,well ,we spend billions of bucks on stupid stuff here, the average person (especially those of us in business) just cannot believe some of the garbage our elected ones chuck money at ,so really that lack of funds would more correctly be misused funds . I really can't see an answer to some of the issues ,even CASA is completely immune to government pressure, maybe the ATSB out of the goodness of their hearts would have a little look at some of our stacks,,maybe! The bottom line for us is to build a culture of safety at our airfields, I sat next to a guy last night who had around 16000 hours, for me to "have a word with him about his flying" would be pretty damn hard( not that he was doing anything wrong ,just an illustration ) and for him to even consider my input would be humbling beyond belief, BUT ,we have to be responsible for our peers as it effects us all, it costs nothing to ask a mate if he's had a look at the WX radar as he's heading for the apron, it is good airmanship to stand back quietly while another pilot is pre-flighting(you may learn something, or get to teach something) it cost nothing to ask another pilot to pre flight your plane occasionally, might be amazed at what they find, the point is some accidents can't be avoided but a lot could be , in fact three stacks that resulted in pilots I knew in the last year could have been avoided if someone had said something ,but instead we got funerals. thats my input like it ,lump it or use the ignore button

Yuk, the bugger was leaking plenty of claret, bloody hard lesson

Can't see why not, one of my instructors went from 0 hours to PPL in around a fortnight, flew as much as they could and I guess got a good run of weather, not sure what he did for the exams , that was the story anyway

Baiting???,,,,,,your very good,,,,a master one might say,,,,,a master baiter! ;-)

What we need is a collection of old Ferris wheels , just toss one on the aircraft wreckage WHA-LA instant headlines, in depth investigation and aircraft manufacturers ducking for cover ,,,,,,,maybe we can vote on it, but only a first past the gate election, gotta keep it simple for us colonials ;-)

My condolences to the pilots family, it would be a painful time and I wish you all the support you need at this time As for building his own plane I hope we never see this right taken away , sadly it hasn't worked out well in this instance but in this over regulated country there is very little we can do without the government holding our hand ( or tieing them up), good bad or ugly we have the right to experiment with flying machines and its a good thing, aviation would be in the dark ages without the experimenters, for all who want more regation, really, think about what your asking for!

It's a sad day when we'd for go our rights rather than " jeopardise " any perceived leniency , I know I'd do as I'm told rather than have the bastard5 start tallying up "penalty points", I've heard some good and bad stories so I guess it's a lottery!

The 180 cessnas tried castoring wheels for easier crosswind landing,,,,,never tried one but I have heard they're VERY exciting,,, Back to the nose wheels, was watching a mate taxi an RV7a a tad to quickly on a less than nice hard surface,,,it was actually really awful seeing the nose leg shudder back and forwards ,I asked him if he had any feedback through the airframe that the noseleg was moving pretty violently ,nope couldn't feel a thing, this guy is a taildragger pilot so stick was back but he now taxis a bit slower in it,

Yeh Maj SSSHHHHH, if everyone starts flying taildraggers I'll have to book ahead for the Eurofox!

Hoping to go, a few of the fellas from Coldstream are talking about it as well, would like to head up to longreach after then back via the coast( victor one) the war museum in Canberra ,a place in Woolongong , then back to YCEM

Google is our friend!

I might be wrong but the CH200 is a certified buggy, you may check out the process of getting a local one made, also heard H- aircraft spares at morrabbin are closing , I know he does windscreens and canopies , might be worth a try

Maybe a rewrite of the manual to get rid of some of the crap requirements , most probs have come from us not adhering to our own rules, the old saying ( which I may have wrong) "hoisted by our own pittard"

Geez Maj, you must have balls of steel,,, 60knots in a RV6 on final, I've only flown them that slow when I wanted to stall the bugger, it happens around 50 , but its a good stall with plenty of warning. I've got a mate who owns a warrior ( yeh I know but he's a good bloke otherwise) did a lap in an RV 7 , over controlled it to buggery but fell in love with it at the same time.

Well, here we are with quite a few post and it still is as clear as mud,,,,so this lack of AIRMANSHIP that I supposedly suffer from is a bit wide spread. I know what I carry on a flight ,documents as required, very ambiguous I'd say, but back to my post I posed the question of when this current CASA movement will move from "education" to fines and tears,,,,,I don't know how this is a display of poor airmanship on my part but maybe I'm just not real good at this flying stuff,,,,so I thank you for your help, I'll be consulting with an instructor ASAP with focus on my aviation related questions

Mmmm, staying ahead of the aeroplane never really hit home till I flew a mates red hot RV7, the fastest thing I'd been in was a 180hp 172, I arrived in the circuit doing about 170kias managed to very sloppily loose most of the speed somewhere on base ,,,and then float down the 2000 m runway using quite a lot of it ,,,,,my mate,a pretty good instructor and very good glider pilot, asked what I thought about the performance( mine, not the RV?),,,," geez mate I was still about ten miles out when the RVwas on final"! I've since spent a fair bit of time in RV's and you get ahead of the speeds fairly quickly ,but that first time!!!

Got give an A for effort, its not easy to knock that pesky nose wheel off a piper!

Well that would be great if it was clear what is required, just look at the thread on ozrunways, so why don't help us dumb asses to be safe ,what regs lay out exactly what we have to carry,,,now ,no opinions just the regs ,

I'm kinda wondering when it'll change from "smileys and just for education" to " here's a fine for non compliance " and " have a nice day you have thirty days to pay that"

Watch a very experienced P51 pilot do a HUGE couple of bounces in a classic Waco last weekend , lots of witnesses! I had a personal rule "never do a wheelie (motorbike) in front of a crowd" , it gets a bit hard when they build aeroclubs at the thresholds !

Well Phil, CASA gets to pick the BAK question here and at times it feels like a test in English comprehension rather than aeronautical knowledge,,,,,,and they can be ba5tards! I probably do 20 to 1 TW hours to training wheel hours, I usually do wheelers , the last flying comp our club had I came sliding down final ,concentrating on the spot landing , rounded out ,thinking "looking old" ,,,,,,the instructor quietly says " please flare,please" ,,,,oh yeah oops !

I got to the GFPT point and the school shut down, so I went to the local RAA school and did the conversion, about five hours , and then went on to do the navs with RAA , I'd also done the BAK with the GA school so once I was seen as competent in a tecnam I was let loose. Not sure but I think the RPL shouldn't be to far off, you can already get a lower PPL with a modified medical and a few restrictions now.