Capn Wannabe

Did my first session of spin training earlier today....first flight in 5 months. Haven't had so much fun in an aircraft in ages!

They'd be Douglas Dautless dive bombers..

Former instructor here....and if somebody looked close to the limit for a Jab, I'd weigh them and either assign them to the Foxbat if they were over 100kg, get them to fly with a lighter instructor if our combined weight was over 220kg, or drain fuel to get the aircraft under MTOW. I was 90kg (a touch over now..) and didn't like the idea of flying overweight or exceeding structural limits.....they're there for a reason, after all.

Max weight per seat on the J-160 is 110kg, according to the POH. In the Foxbat, there's no limit per seat, but a combined pilot & pax weight limit of 220kg.

I soloed in a 172 after 8 hours, back in the late 80's. On that day, I was very surprised to see the CFI beside me rather than my usual instructor, and after about half an hour of touch and goes, he sent me off for one circuit.....but I snuck in another touch and go..

Here's what *really* happens..

Tokyo Drift..

Nope....t'was a Jab.

As a young lad, I used to be terrified of flying. My dad had his PPL, and would take me and my siblings up from time to time, mostly from Kyneton, and I hated it, especially when there was a bit of turbulence around. It wasn't until I flew in a commercial airliner for the first time that I realised it wasn't so bad. From that day on, I'd hassle dad to take me up every time we went near an airport. When I was 16, I applied for my Student Pilots Licence, and started lessons in VH-ABW. I got my PPL in 1990, and flew fairly regularly until 1995, when money became a big issue. In 1998, I got married, and that pretty much killed any chance to fly again, or so I thought - my ex-wife hated little airplanes. 12 years passed, then I got the chance to get my licence current again. Taking my kids up for the first time was one of the best moments of my life :) These days, I'm an RA instructor, and got my CPL in October last year.

A simple format for most radio calls in Class D Who are you addressing? Who are you? What's the weather like (ATIS information)? Where are you? What are your intentions? So a typical inbound call might be: Who are you addressing? Moorabbin Tower Who are you? Skyfox XXXX What's the weather like? Received information Oscar Where are you? Carrum, 1500 What are your intentions? Inbound And a typical taxi call might be: Who are you addressing? Moorabbin Ground Who are you? Skyfox XXXX What's the weather like? Received information Quebec Where are you? In the southern runup bay What are your intentions? Request taxi to runway 17L for Sugarloaf Ready to head off? Who are you addressing? Moorabbin Tower Who are you? Skyfox XXXX What's the weather like? Received information Tango Where are you? Ready 17L What are your intentions? For Sugarloaf Of course, you still have to remember to read back all clearances...taxiing to rwy 31 left or right is a bit of a mouthfull :)

On those all too rare occasions I have time to spare, I like to partake in the hobby of sniffing copius amounts of glue and paint fumes, otherwise known as scale modelling. This is the Minicraft 1/48 Cessna 150, modeled as N9828J, as seen in that ultimate of aviation classics, Iron Eagle. The first one. With the F-16s and stuff. First thing I did was to reshape the seats - they look bloody awful out of the box, a bit to big and thick for my liking. I sanded off the raised area around the edge of the seat, which thinned them nicely, cut the middle of the seat back to make them look like two separate seats (they're moulded together in the kit), and cut the backs down to 10mm high - think I took around 2-3mm off them. Finally, I shaped the corners on the top of the seat backs. I reckon they look about 97.6% better now, and probably a bit more to scale. All the C150/152s I've flown have had carpeted floors, which is definitely not represented on the kit. After some head-scratching, I found a roll of self-adhesive medical tape in my box of tricks. This stuff is very thin, and very sticky. Laying a piece over the floor, I teased into the nooks and crannies with a toothpick, then cut off the excess. A bit hard to tell from the photos, but there's a definite texture on the floor now, which should come up alright under a coat of paint. And the two of them together.. Painted the cockpit floor and really happy with the result. I think the medical tape worked very well.. After mucking about with the front seats, I figured ol' Dougie Masters deserved leather upholstery for being forced to be in such a godawful movie (I firmly believe that he had his character killed off on purpose in the sequel..). With that in mind, a google search turned up some nice patterns, so I set about painting the seats to match.. I got a bit of bleed under the masking on the RH seat, so I'll cover that with a map, or seatbelts, or something.. The kit comes with a rear bench seat - something I've never seen in person, but found plenty of pics on the interwebs - so they got the same treatment. Dunno if I'll put them in or not, though.. Once the paint's properly dry, I'll tone it down with a semi-gloss clear coat.. IP with bonus overscale throttle and mixture controls.. First attempt at seatbelts....a little too big - gonna have to shrink 'em down some..

AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!!!

I haven't flown RC seriously for a long time now...here's an Ugly Stik I built in about 2003. Found plans on the interwebz and modified them in CAD, before building it. Only a baby - 54" span, weighs in at 2.1kg with a .46 up front.

There are two theories that I've heard as to what actually happened to cause the crash: One is that it was a TIF, and the instructor was talking the student through the takeoff, student pulled the yoke all the way back and the aircraft subsequently stalled and crashed. The other is the seat wasn't properly locked into place and slid all the way back as the aircraft rotated, taking the yoke with it. I saw the impact - not very pretty to watch - and was very relieved to see the two occupants exit the aircraft unassisted.

G'day all, Saw the forum, and thought I'd better join..