Steve G

I was taking off not landing and had a ten hour flying day ahead to get home. The town had no power from previous afternoon no phone no internet no forecast no notams, so was departing VFR NOSAR until plan could be radiod in. This was quite legal until a forecast can be obtained. I felt under the circumstances that works could have been rescheduled. CASA agrees At Safety seminar this week. CASA said I could have required and requested the runway in which case ARO was obliged to cease and works men and equipment move within 15 mins, MOS STANDARD. MOS also says in such cross wind all cross wind works should be planned for another day if it created a hazard.

Yep just fat fingered dickhead with head up backside like so many people walking off footpaths and getting bowled over by traffic. Did you know they are even considering DONT WALK SIGNS in the footpaths as everyones eyes are down on the ground. You missed the point as usual. Its a computer and it will lock up. Cant profess to ever going through a storm cell.

At an Eyre Peninsula airport last week the groundsman decided to grade the dirt runway during forecast 22 knot cross winds and Notammed accordingly. This forced every aircraft to either not land or take off or abort. Or to land in difficult conditions near or at crosswind component. The question is in the interests of safety given the extreme wx should the council have abandoned the whip and opened the runway. There was no provision for men and equipment to vacate the into wind runway so it was a right angle crosswind or go sway, Over to you?

Yes I am ham I have an Icon A20. I have thrown three alternator belts in my flying life. I have had alternator failure out of Sydney in IMC and used the A20 to track in on the for to wagga. I went to inland outback last week to maralinga and had thevA20 and two extra charged batteries and a fig lighter plug, also have the adaptor to plug plane headset into it. Think of pal lights and alternator failure at night, you would not need to ask if a $300 radio might save your life. Its also good to have as pre flight tool to get aeib without starting your engine.

Was flying low avoiding bad wx on Friday across Eyre peninsula and tracking around Gawler Range from Ceduna to Whyalla on sum version and plane icon flew of the map and could not swipe the map. Strong westerlies and turbulence made it a two handed flying task so fooling around with the yoke mounted iPod to press and hold the on off switch was not my idea of a workload I appreciated at the time. The reboot took over a minute to get iPad back on line and reload ozrunways flight plan. Side by that was my WAC chart where I had been cross referencing my position which was near Kimba. My comment is that if you rely on an EFB in bad weather and something stuffs up you may rue the day you decided to use one. I am no fool, have 30 years up and several 000 flight hours and this was no joke. You get shit conditions and have to hand fly through around or over the weather you won't be worrying about the stupid frozen iPad with tiny buttons and a touch screen as you bounce off the seat in the orographic turbulence. This could even occur eg as you pass by the Grampians on a north wind day. Sometimes you are lucky to even hit the right radio knob. My iPad was on the yoke I imagine on the knee in turbulence would be even worse as you would drop your gaze from outside and off the panel to reset the iPad. It is a risk to be factored into bad weather flying.

Wow as they say everyone has an opinion to be sure. So here's my bit. High hours in mic flying home on a Sunday, had traffic to deal with Enrique crossing at Avalon , dial in up frequencies and on auto pilot and Mel centre asked, are you diverting around Avalon? Huh? Checked my scan, autopilot had kicked out dog had spun from 270 around to 185 nose slightly down and wings had gone from level to about rate one and was in start of what could have been an incipient spin down into the bay. Didn't hear or feel a thing. Decades later during recent renewal, again cross traffic at SHT fir waited to intercept track to MNG Omni, entered cloud with instructor beside me had not set up craft so fiddled around with radio dials, why would not that dial switch, got a tap on shoulder and went back to the scan and wow climbing the turn from 181 around onto 320 no warning. Third event at night bunch of students on board in a 182 elbow on the arm rest heading 180 after downwind departure, again fiddling with GPS to show how to set up arnav, tacking away, hit the go to button, Cedi went left off scale? Wtf? Had done climbing the turn to 320 never moved my arm off the arm rest. IMO even us experienced guys don't get any warning except off the six pack, Aviate, concentrate Aviate navigate, nothing else IMC nothing shut up think fly.

Hi I need to know how you paired any phone with an IPAD I have an AIR and a MINI 4 with wifi and also have an N70 Nokia which has a data allowance and it would solve my airborne problem OK on east coast coverage Yes we know. Out here west of the black stump/Grampians garriwerd no such luck I think they ran out of money and despite the maps its no joy Interesting talking with FLIGHT SOLUTIONS by email in USA and how we get OZERWY traffic and he was flabbergasted that we would use a carrier to get traffic Steve says Here in the States you lose most 4G / cellular connectivity at about 1000' AGL, which would make it difficult to update via the VFR traffic sharing feature. My mate in Telstra planning laughs at me and says that 4G works with deliberately downtilted aerials are for road use land use not air use. I wonder what happens when you drop the ipad below the windows on the plane, whether you get signal drop out?? Anyway if it works why bag it. Hope to hear from you re pairing to an ipad from a phone..

A few facts about 4G to report alarms back to our Operational Control. MT WILLIAM 5000 Feet AMSL 15 K from western highway The only way we could get a cell lock was to aim a LONG YAGI at DADSWELLS BRIDGE and decline it at a 15 degree down angle Whips did not work on the 4G modem on that site a mile high. you could see towns all around in every direction with cell coverage. I asked my Telstra Manager why and he said QUOTE The maps are for ground level coverage. 4G cells have directional antenna aimed at highways out in the countryside. He was not surprised we had issues a mile up on Mt William. He specifically said use of phones from planes was not envisaged by TELSTRA Use of cellphones in country Australia away from highways and byways is guaranteed to fail. e.g. In VIC VALLEY at 2000 feet there is no CELL COVERAGE and often at cell boundaries like Hamilton airport you get drop outs as the phone tries to lock on Mt Dundas Dunkeld or Hamilton In a plane you aren't even using an antenna on an ipad but an internal one as with most phones. so efficiency will be 2% at best. Its why Telstra have tradie phones and high efficiency phones with aerials. Phones in cars without car kits drop out without external aerials as soon as you leave the highway. No doubt different stories different towns. If you don't believe come to my town go to the airport and walk around while you try to order a taxi. 2 cents.

Yeah wonder how we find that out? The CAAP talks about approved mounting and does mention kneeboard. Its not rocket science we drive rally cars at 200 km/h with nav roamers and they stay bolted even in roll overs. Maybe check rally shops rally roamers will be better and cheaper than AV kneeboards.

A pen a prayer wheel and lapboard were my constant companions for over 5000 hours some of the maps have that many lines on them and 10 mile marker points and pencilled scribble its amazing and from 1987 to 1997 passed ten IFR Command renewals using ERC Low NO DME NO GPS just prayer wheel pencil and ruler doing NDB and VOR navigation in a single engined Cessna 150. Dave Henry suggested I buy an auto pilot and I fitted a SYSTEM 40 wing leveller to the 150 to permit some cockpit relief time. But the first ten years were hands on flying. Now in 2016 fly a Cherokee 14o ifr no autopilot and still using a mostly paper cockpit..plus GNC300XL.

Thanks Im with you Brilliant and better than joining maps with sticky tape to draw big long track lines like I just did for trip to Maralinga. I just checked the CAAPS re the Type one devices and shock horror The EFB may be:  hand held but is to be stowed during the following phases of flight; during take-off and landing; and  during an instrument approach; and  when the aircraft is flying at a height less than 1000 feet above the terrain! which means on approach to land and all those low level spots I see on OZRUNWAYS Looks like I need to get approval to mount it and find approved mounts in OZ. I think for flight planning only and the odd map consultation and storing data is the main use as I see it.. At $169 per year sure beats paper subs.

SITUATIONAL AWARENESS??? What skills will you get, retain and what will you lose? You raise an interesting point here. As a newbie to EFB I am experimenting to see how it adds to my situational awareness IFR when flying an approach. Keeping approach skills is going to be hard enough with so few aids left to keep recent upon. Most will drop to GNSS NPAs as sole means I think. I imagine other IFR guys are thinking along the same lines, what can you use an IPAD for legally? I have developed all my IFR skills dating back to 1987 and some 5000 hours on my scans and instrument interpretation. Within limits I can nail the drift and fly VOR and NDB approaches in the worst winds and hold tolerance or get back onto track and be accurate on final. GPS came along and I did a GPS cource and passed a GPS NPA in 2008 and got endorsed in GARMIN stuff 430, 430W 530, GNC300XL And flew approaches to their limits. Then along came EFB with a nice coloured map and you can set the WAYPOINTS on the map and the aircraft pointer shows where you are going. its a great addition you can even see the inbound course and track you are steering on an approach plate. My concern is if it dumbs down the IFR skills of a pilot who chooses to look at the IPAD map what does he use to interpret his approach? The GPS or an IPAD Mini MAP? For a review renewal you have to demonstrate skills on the TSOd approved Black Box. Not a hand held computer..

Thanks Yes I swapped from IPAD Mini 4 WIFI to an IPAD MINI 2 with sim I did this because I needed a back up power source to plug into the Lightning Connector on a long flight so unless I wanted to drop my position I needed to ensure a continuous coverage this the sim card model. It does track and my plane shows up where I am. Map can track north but map doesn't track You have to swipe it manually. When you fly manually no ap IFR the IPAD is the last thing you want to be messing with. I also did lose my subscription on the ipads when I combined so now I download all subs on my IPAD AIR and do a peer to peer connection away from my WIFI in the plane and its very fast to put new DAPS update into the IPAD MINI OZR say with my AU SUB I am allowed an IPAD MINI an AIR and two phones wow, so I use one IPAD AIR as base download on WIFI and keep the thinned down minis in my flight back and transfer the files I need via peer to peer as required. OK on mounting will check. Steve

ON OZR many have punched the Aircraft Icon and get OZRUNWAYS traffic from all over. Some call-signs some not but at least an ICON. S0mene at Nhill Air-show last year with an EFB told me they had all the traffic sorted out at 30 miles OH YEAH? The issues as I see them are this ADSB TRAFFIC VFR TRAFFIC not equipped with any mode. VFR easy see and bee seen as CASA say ADSB easy buy an OPEN FLIGHT SOLUTIONS ADSB IN box and wifi connect it to the IPAD MINI using STRATUX ISSUES STRATUX uses 192.168.10.1 and IPADS don't, can be made but don't OZRUNWAYS cant use the GPS hooked up to the STRATUX ADSB In BOX. On ADSB IN you cant see the ozrunways traffic. 4G does not cover 90%of OZ Try the Grampians and west as an example.. cells don't work well at altitude, out in the boondocks why cos 4G is designed to cover highways and directional down tilted antennas are in situ beaming down the highways were the general population travel in autos. Ask Telstra is 4G designed for aircraft and they laugh at you. Re traffic OZR and AV They are working on it. In the mean time VFR rules apply until someone comes up with a compatible traffic solution.

Been there done that, didn't understand how OZRUNWAYS works so bought an IPAD MINI. Then had to buy a GPS dongle from SPORTYS AVIATION $99 Mounted the IPAD on the yoke and in turbulence IFR found hard to read so upgraded to an IPAD AIR Mounting a IPAD AIR in a PA28 is not an option. Having an unsecured IPAD of any sort is not an option. I then bought a cheap IPAD Mini 2 with SIM slot and it tracks better than the GPS equipped mini 4. I found some good yoke RAM mounts from WA for about $100 not the high price aviation dealers. My intention is to have the IPAD AIR as back up with all maps I need with the flight plan... and AIP and ERSA a printed copy of the flight plan... a DC connector to charge it on long flights (using SIM version as the slot for the GPS takes up the lightning connector) and use peer to peer transfer to the yoke of the maps I need which are simply WAC AUS ENR LOW AUS DAPS ERSA AOPA QED PS if you don't have right printer it wont print from IPAD unless its an AIR PRINTER