Headed home from Oshkosh

Wireless internet at airports sure makes the time pass more easily. I'm sitting at Denver International awaiting my connecting flight home. The morning started out early at 5:00 am central time as my friend and I had camped at Dodge County Wisconsin after departing Oshkosh yesterday evening. Based on the times Oshkosh closes their airspace and my flight out of Chicago, we had to depart Oshkosh Saturday after the air show.

Wow, as usual, quite a week. Great weather, it only rained for maybe 20 minutes one night. Lots of picture taking. I think I took somewhere around 2000 pictures. I have a bit of post processing to do this next week. Once that's done, I'll post some highlights.

Even with general aviation activity down these days due to higher fuel prices, the field at Oshkosh was full. Fly in camping closed Monday which is earlier than I've seen in past years. I'd have to agree with friends that folks may be saving up their flying dollars for events such as Oshkosh.

Sorry I missed out on any meetups with fellow bloggers such as Aviatrix. As wireless access in the North 40 camping area was down more than it was up, it wasn't until Saturday that I read her post on the subject. Bah, maybe next year.

While I'm looking forward to getting home after a week of dealing with the Midwest humidity (who invented that stuff anyway?), I'm also looking forward to Airventure 2009. Yeah, sounds wierd but if you've ever been there, you know what I mean.

Required reading for anyone flying into Oshkosh

In addition to the NOTAM, here are two articles by Rick Durden that should be required reading for anyone flying into Oshkosh. Rick is very blunt and in your face about things but he makes several excellent points.

Original article

An updated reminder for this year

If you're flying into OSH, please first print out and read the NOTAM then read the two articles.

Oshkosh countdown

In a couple of days, I depart for Oshkosh. I'm going via aluminum tube vs. the Arrow this year. Not nearly as exciting but way more cost effective given a Left Coast departure.











My camping gear is packed into a huge 18"x36" duffel bag with some room to spare. New REI backpacking tent and sleeping pad included. Life in the North-40 should be dry and comfortable.

One very cool thing is that I should be able to arrive at Oshkosh the right way, in a Cessna Skylane. Well, ok, "the right way" is in a certain '71 Piper Arrow but I'll take a Cessna 182 arrival vs. bus/van/car any day. I lucked out as a friend is planning to pick me up in Chicago and we'll then fly to Oshkosh. How cool is that? Definitely the next best thing to actually flying there in my own plane.

Blue Angel ride

My brother sent me this today: http://www.terwilligerproductions.com/flyingfullcircle/ Absolutely an awesome experience...I'm seriously jealous! :-)

California burning

Just found this over at Pilots of America. Some amazing pictures of the recent fire fighting activity in California: http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2008/07/californias_continuing_fires.html

Camera upgrade

A couple months back, my Cannon SD100 died. I may have dropped it or it was in my backpack and slid off the wing of the airplane to the ground...I really don't remember. What I do know is that I tried taking an in flight picture of an MD-80 landing on a parallel runway but the viewfinder was all messed up. Seeing as I was the acting safety pilot, the camera quickly went back into the flight bag. After I got home, the camera would take pictures like this:



Eventually, they started to look like this:


Nice, eh? Cool effects and pretty colors aside, either way, not good and tend to get in the way of cool things like airplanes...oh, and family, the dog, etc. Wait, the dog *is* family. The cat too :-)

What to do...what to do?

I've always wanted to get back into photography but never made the leap to a digital SLR camera. I asked a bunch of friends, the ones that take awesome pictures, for recommendations, what they like, dislike, etc. A couple weeks ago, a flight instructor friend and I headed to the Golden West EAA fly-in where I was able to borrow his Nikon D80. Wow, what a difference and extremely easy to use. Some of the results:

Relentless

F-18 demonstration

Hawker Sea Fury

Nice looking T6

In short, I was sold and wound up buying the D80 from my friend. Now it's time to learn as much as I can and experiment by taking lots of photos. At least it's digital so mistakes are free, right? :-) All that stuff from my high school photography classes is coming back to me. Mr. Schwerin would be well pleased.

I'm now set in the camera department for my upcoming trips to Oshkosh and down the East Coast.

Another cool EAA video

Just saw this on www.airventure.org



It must be the first day of summer or something...Oshkosh is just over a month away.

New milestone...

...unfortunately, non-aviation related. For the first time, I broke the $50 mark putting gas in my car.

It's a Civic.

11.7 gallons and it was just North of $51. I realize many folks with larger vehicles these days would love to have $50 fill the tank. I can only imagine what gas is costing some folks on a monthly basis.

Still...$50 to fill up an economy car? This is crazy. I'm still shaking my head.

Necessary Aviation Content: I hear gas is $5.60-something at my airport. Sounds about right as it's been running right at $1.00 more than regular unleaded.

Crazy I say...just crazy

And now for something completely different, installing an engine

Background: Brother is building an RV-6 and around Christmas time the big brown box from Lycoming showed up. An early Christmas present of sorts. He had a few items to contend with before hanging another 180 lbs off the front end of the airframe so he's been busy since the big brown box's arrival. Two weeks ago, I get the "Do you want to help hang the engine?" e-mail. Um...let me think about this for a nanosecond or two. Heck yeah, I'll be there. Last Saturday was the day.

After a 2.5 hour IFR (I Follow Roads, 0 AGL via non-flying Civic) trip to Bro's house, it was time to start the fun. In addition to my brother, his buddy, a fellow airplane builder, joined the festivities.

Baby Lycosaur waiting to meet Mr. Engine Hoist. This looks so familiar as it's essentially the same engine in our Arrow except it's not fuel injected (an extremely expensive option BTW).


Hooked up and ready to move:
The three of us were extremely careful not to bump anything hanging off the rear of the engine (prop governor in particular) against the RV's engine mount or firewall. There was a small bracket to remove from the governor that made things easier in this regard. In general, getting things to line up so that we could start fitting the upper mounting bolts through the engine mount and Lord mounts was fairly straightforward.

Inching closer, being extremely careful while moving 180 lbs of metal towards the engine mount and firewall:

Closer. This is where "bolt #4" aka "the evil bolt" holds the engine...but I'm getting ahead of myself :-)

We were working from some instructions written by another builder who had experience installing a few engines in RVs. Unfortunately, the instructions were not written up in a checklist fashion. Instead, you had to wade through several paragraphs that contained forward references to other paragraphs.

The top two mounting bolts installed with relative ease. A couple adjustments of the engine hoist, pull engine here, push engine there and we could thread the nuts onto the engine bolts.

Things are looking good:

The first of the bottom bolts was somewhat more difficult to line up in order to get the bolt through the required hardware. At this point, things are looking better and better. The three of us are thinking wow, this isn't all that hard. We were seriously wrong about this but wouldn't realize so until hours later.

At this point, it was time to make a parts run as one of the four engine bolts had a manufacturing defect. Parallel to the bolt, there were a couple of indentations that looked as if you'd crimped the bolt with a set of pliers. Seeing as any reduced strength from one of four engine bolts that secure a very expensive engine to the airframe would be a bad thing, it was a no brainer option to replace the defective bolt. Fortunately, my brother's friend has the same engine mounting bolts awaiting his future engine installation so it was a matter of a short road trip. For me, it was a chance to see an RV-8 under construction. Very cool.

Once we returned from the parts run, things started getting interesting. Ok, not really interesting, more like hard, difficult, a pain, less than fun, etc. since the fourth bolt hole just didn't want to line up. Here's what it looked like:

We push/pull/grunt/groan/lift engine/lower engine for a long time but the alignment doesn't improve. Some movement of the engine makes it worse, some makes it better. Since each engine bolt angles inward and down (top bolts) or up (bottom bolts), it's like solving some strange multi dimensional geometry problem but where certain movements had the opposite of the desired effect.

We try using a drift pin to line things up but it doesn't help much. The defective engine mounting bolt meets an untimely demise and is converted into a larger drift pin after it meets Mr. hacksaw and Mr. bench grinder. It's sacrifice was in vane, this doesn't help either.

Frustration sets in.

We bust out the Van's instructions for installing the engine. These are much shorter but don't offer a ton of help. Briefly, we contemplate removing the engine mount from the firewall, mounting it to the engine, then the entire assembly to the firewall. In short order, we're convinced that this doesn't really change anything. Hmmm, what to do, what to do?

We talk about removing bolt #3 (the other bottom bolt), and install bolt #4. Maybe bolt #3 going on last will be easier(?) It seems reasonable so we proceed. Unfortunately, it doesn't really improve things. It seems as if both bottom bolts are now looking like the above picture, maybe each is slightly closer to being centered. Better seems relative at this point.

More contemplation, more frustration, more reading of the installation instructions. At a critical point, Bro's friend takes him away from the scene for a much needed milkshake at In & Out.

I have an idea. At least I think it was me but by now, it's hard to remember the sequence of things. What if we can push up on the bottom of the engine to improve the alignment of the bottom bolts? A couple of 2X4s and the scissor jack from sister in law's car get added to the mix and things look better but not quite good enough for both bottom bolts to align. Things are better. At this point, that's a good thing.

Disclaimer: The details are starting to get fuzzy in my brain so the following may not be entirely sequentially correct. At some point, we manage to get bolt #4 lined up and the nut threaded on. Bolt #3 is not installed so we've essentially shifted the original problem to the other side of the engine. The bad news is that the misalignment looks maybe the same, maybe slightly worse. It's hard to tell. More pushing/pulling/grunting/groaning/etc. but things don't change a lot.

I think it was Bro's friend that thought of the next idea. What if we can move the Lord mount out of the cup like structure of the engine mount and get the bolt through the engine boss? We proceed.

In an almost anti climactic finish, less than five minutes after this idea was considered, shazam, Bro announces "it's through". He threads the nut onto the bolt and we wiggle the engine to get the Lord mount to seat into the engine mount. Tightening up all of the bolts, removing the scissors jack from below and the engine hoist from above and this is the final result:

And that's all there is to it! Take three Engineers and given enough time in one day, they actually can install a Lycoming engine on an airframe.

In the end, it was a fun and educational experience for me, the only non-builder of the installation team. The next time I'm at my favorite airplane repair facility, I need to ask my favorite A&P about engine installation tips/tricks. For some reason, I have a feeling I'll walk away smacking myself on the forehead and having visions of the "Wow, I could have had a v-8" TV commercials.

Passed CP written

I made the first tangible bit of progress towards my commercial pilot certificate today by passing the written test. As with the instrument written test a couple of years back, I posted my best score when taking the test for real. Weird but, ok, I'll take it. A pass is a pass. :-)

Now it's time to hookup with a CFI and plan the flying part. With the days getting longer and temperatures getting warmer, I need to start getting out for power off 180 spot landings, 60 degree steep turns, Chandelles, etc. Sounds like fun to me. If all goes according to plan, I'll exchange my private pilot certificate for a commercial pilot certificate sometime in early Summer. Cool!

One thing to mention re: written test prep material. A friend loaned me his Gleim test prep stuff and it was excellent. I already had the ASA book but found the Gleim had better explanations for some things. Also, I found the Gleim CD based test to be an excellent way to study and take practice tests.

A couple new photo sites

What, two blog posts in one day? Um...yeah, after a long silence, go figure :-) I suppose I could blame it on spending my time on the Commercial Pilot written test preparation and that would be partially true. Speaking of which, I figure I'm approx. a week or so away from actually scheduling the test. I've been spending a ton of quality time with the Gleim test prep on my computer.

Anyway, checkout Jay Beckman's photo sites I've added to my blogroll. Jay is a fellow pilot and hails from the uber-hot region of Arizona. While he's not frying in the AZ summers, he takes some very cool photos. Since he recently created a zenfolio site, I thought I'd do a little shameless advertising for him.

The reasons I go to Oshkosh every summer...

Ah, here we are in the middle of winter and EAA comes out with this video. It is absolutely the best description of why I go to Oshkosh every summer. This year, I might go via the aluminum tube route vs. flying the Arrow but that's ok. Being able to hang out in the North-40 with friends I've made over the years will be worth the price of admission.

Moving video

Not aviation related but I felt this was worth of posting. As I understand, this was put together by a 15 year old young lady. Granted, I'm somewhat biased as my Dad was an Air Force pilot but watching this made me think more on the subject of supporting our troups so I thought I'd pass it along.

One chapter down in ASA CP written test prep.

One chapter down (basic aerodynamics), nine more to go. Lots of highlighting. Good thing that I bought that new 4-pack the other day.

So far, so good. I've had a few "Um...I have no idea" thoughts as I read through and attempt to answer the questions. I definitely plan to read through relevant chapters of a CP text or buy the FAA publication FAA-H-8083-25, Pilot's Handbook of Aeronautical Knowledge. I'll be borrowing my partner's Gleim CP text and brushing up on the aerodynamics stuff in short order. The stack of books continues to grow.

I've found a couple of websites that look like they'll be good candidates for practice tests. I haven't tried either of these yet but plan to do so fairly soon.
http://exams4pilots.org
http://mypilottests.com

It must have been a bad day at the ASA printing facility as my FAR/AIM showed up with a 25 page section upside down. Kudos to Amazon.com though. The return process was painless. They paid for return shipping and had a new copy to me in a matter of a couple days.

It's not all books/no flying. I'll be learning some of the commercial maneuvers from one of my partners who just recently earned his CP certificate.

Next up: Aircraft Systems...

A new piloting journey

I've just taken the first small step towards obtaining my commercial pilot certificate. Granted, it's a small step (ordered & received written test prep book plus an '08 FAR/AIM)...but it's a step none the less towards my transition from PP-ASEL to CP-ASEL.

All I need to do now is start studying for the written test and I'll have accomplished my goal for '07. I figure I'll take the written test in early '08 and start the flying portion in late winter or early spring '08. There is that small matter of my CFII and whether he'll be located in California or Oregon but that's ok. First thing first: study for the written test, pass it and have it out of the way.

I do have two nice advantages that I plan to exploit. One: A nice complex aircraft at my disposal. This is one of the reasons I bought into the Arrow and after nearly three years of ownership and several hundred hours flying it, things are extremely familiar and comfortable. Two: One partner just recently received his CP-ASEL certificate so I plan to use his knowledge to learn the maneuvers in our plane.

I'm hoping to post more about my experience progressing from PP-ASEL to CP-ASEL. For the immediate future, I'm sure this will not be very exciting since it quite likely may involve rants about written test questions and such. :-) Blah...I promise it will be more exciting some number of months down the road.

New prop, one less AD & great customer service

This past December, I was lamenting our options in dealing with AD 2006-18-15, the repetitive eddy current inspections on our Hartzell prop hub. Our prop had been through three overhauls and it likely would not have made it through one more (prop shop did some measurements while on the plane and it was a matter of how thick the paint was as to whether or not it could go through another overhaul).

We considered repetitive inspections as well as priced out our options for 2-blade replacement props. We'd ruled out 3-blade options mostly due to the increased cost. After posting about it on Usenet, I received an e-mail from Kevin R. at Hartzell telling me about their 40% discount on a replacement prop and hub. As it turns out, this was about $1400 less than what a local prop shop had quoted me for a 2-blade McCauley prop & hub. My partners and I pondered the options and decided to go with the Hartzell option.

This past week we had the prop installed and it looks and works just fine. Yea for us! AD 2006-18-15 has been terminated. One thing I wanted to mention is the great customer service response from Hartzell. I'd been a little soured on them due to a pretty lame response to my questions of their guy at their booth during the 2006 AOPA expo. My experience in dealing with Hartzell for the replacement prop, however, dramatically turned my opinion around. Kevin provided all of the information for ordering the prop as well as answering a bunch of questions about returning the old prop. It was a very positive interaction and in the end, we received exactly what we were looking for at a substantial discount.

Milestones

Aviation milestones come in various forms. There are certificates, ratings, aircraft/people/hours flown, owning a plane, flying to new locations, or just learning to do something a different way. Some milestones are small and seem insignificant while others (like passing a check ride) are absolutely HUGE. Whatever the milestone, I've always enjoyed them at the time as well as when I crack open the logbook for a peek backwards in time.

A few days ago, I did just that with my logbook. Part of this was prompted by knowing that I'd recently added another digit to the "hundreds" column of my total flying time. After realizing that I'd added another 100 hours, I started thinking about where I'd been and what I'd done in that time.

I remember my first 100 hours (nearly 80 of which involved getting my private pilot's license). When I hit that first 100, it was a nice little milestone in the same year that I earned my PPL. Sure, not a big deal but, it was fun to reflect on the fact that I'd spent 100 hours untethered from the planet and doing something that I enjoy beyond measure.

Taking a look through my logbook, this last 100 hours in the air has taken me to quite a few wonderful places and let me do several great aviation related activities. I've had a chance to:

• Fly my youngest passenger ever, a 3-year old. He now talks about airplanes all the time and calls me "Captain Jack". I've already apologized to his folks for their future expenses getting Anthony's pilot's license :-)

• Flown another Angel flight, this time to Santa Monica enabling a cancer patient to get some regularly scheduled experimental treatment.
  

• While on the Santa Monica trip, I just had to stop by Van Nuys. Didn't get a chance to land on 16R but that's ok, it was very cool just being at such a great GA airport.

• 2006 and 2007 Oshkosh trips. There's just something about traveling a long distance via spam can. Along the way, I've stopped in some out of the way places, found some great spots to eat, and met several great folks.

• Flew into the 2007 Salinas Air Show and hung out right in front of where the Snowbirds parked.
  

• Participated in two young Eagles events where I've had the privilege of flying 17 kids, a couple of whom had never flown before.

• Stayed mostly IFR and night current. At the moment, these are two areas I need to work on :-) I guess that's what happen when a few months go by with little flying activities.

• Continued to hone my aircraft ownership skills via performing oil changes and whatever else I'm legally allowed to do on an airplane. I doubt I'll ever become an A&P but it sure is fun learning more about what I fly.

Looking ahead a bit, I'm hoping to celebrate a couple more milestones in the near future. I hope to start working on my commercial pilot certificate perhaps early next year. I also plan to complete the next phase of the FAA's WINGS program in lieu of a BFR. I figure it's money well spent getting some recurrent training.

So, yeah, it's fun looking back a bit and remembering things along the aviation journey. If you haven't done so lately, crack that logbook open and remember where you've been and what you've accomplished.

Seven more Young Eagles

Today was our second annual "airport day" at my home field and I had the privilege of flying seven kids as part of the EAA Young Eagles program (www.youngeagles.org).

It's amazing the different reactions kids have when flying. Some are very excited and ask tons of questions while others hardly say a word (until they are back on the ground and talking to their parents about how fun it was). Today I had kids on both ends of the spectrum. Sometimes I had to ask for it to be quiet so I could hear on the radio and at other times, I was the only one talking as I pointed out landmarks.

Another 1.6 hours in the logbook but a very special 1.6 hours as I had a chance to share my love of flying with seven kids ranging in age from 8-12. Three of these kids had never been in an airplane before and I was lucky enough to be their first pilot. Now, *that* is very cool. I'm not sure who has more fun, the kids or me.

If you ever have a chance to participate in something like this, jump at the chance. Even if you have to rent an airplane, I guarantee that it will be some of the most enjoyable flying you'll ever do.

Field replacing an alternator

While I'd hoped to post some Oshkosh related items during the trip, that...um...never happened :-)

The trip great as usual. We stopped in a few new places this time which meant we found a total of three new airport dogs to pet. No new airport cats to report though.

Everything was going well with the airplane until approximately 50 miles from Oshkosh when I notice a low voltage indication on the engine analyzer. I go through the drill of cycling the alternator but nothing changes...still reading right at 12 volts where it should be 14-14.1. At this point, I'm not too terribly worried since I recently installed a brand new battery and it's a wonderful VFR day. I do, however, shut down COM2, transponder, and the DME. When arriving at Oshkosh, one never knows when you might be required to hold due to arrivals being temporarily closed.

All goes smoothly with the arrival. Well, there was a Cirrus pilot who got a little concerned (unnecessarily so) about the tight arrival spacing. I was #2 in our flight of 6 and tower called the base turn and cleared my friend ahead of me to land. All of a sudden, the gal in the Cirrus, on maybe a 2 mile straight in final (likely an IFR arrival), says to the tower "You can't do that, I'm on final...I'm going to have to do a 360". Tower responds with "Mam, unless you see something I'm not, I don't see any issues here". Never mind that her doing a 360 in either direction would have been a bad idea due to the current arrival flow. I'm listing to this as I wait for tower to call my right base and clear me to land on 27. My brother picks up the Cirrus, we extend somewhat downwind until tower calls our base and everything works out fine. Sure, the spacing was tight...if this had been a normal airport but this is Oshkosh, you're expected to land on the numbers at the same time someone else is touching down maybe 2000 ft. in front of you. Ah, but I digress...

We setup camp in the North 40 and the next day, I start to investigate our alternator problem. It turns out that the ring connector to the main output stud had broken off due to being old and somewhat rusty. After breaking off, it sat there and arced such that the stud was worn approx. a third of the way through. The stud was also very loose. And, to add insult to injury, we found a crack in the alternator housing. End result: we decide to replace the alternator. It may very well have been the original and I know it had been rebuilt at least once in it's lifetime.

Fortunately, I have a friend who lives about an hour away from Oshkosh and who does a ton of his own maintenance. He is also logging time towards becoming an A&P. He shows up with tools in hand and the first thing we do is crimp on a new ring connector. I then spend a couple hours visiting the vendor exhibits and decide on buying a new Plane Power alternator. Yikes, $450. Ah, but it comes out of the partnership maintenance fund so it's "free"...as in "already paid for". Very cool :-)

The next day, we have the alternator installed and I crank up the plane and verify that it puts out 14 volts with everything electrical turned on. Life is good. It gets even better though as I have another friend who is an A&P and he shows up for a party the next night and says "I understand you need a sigh off for an alternator installation". Why, yes...yes I do. We wander over to the plane, he takes a look, and writes up a logbook entry for me. It sure is nice to have friends in aviation.

Just getting started...dropping the lower cowling:


The installation in full swing:

The rest of the show was great and the trip home uneventful with the alternator outputting it's normal 14-14.1 volts the entire way home.

Oshkosh preparations

When I start pulling the camping gear down from the garage storage, it's officially Oshkosh preparation time. Bright and early this morning, me and my airport dog in training hit the garage and did just that. Out came the step ladder and down came the camping gear. Airport dog in training was more interested in chewing on sticks in the front yard. He has no idea that his world is about to change when I disappear for 11 days.

Today was a banner day in the Oshkosh related mail department. The last of the ordered charts arrived in the mail...one more thing to check off the "to-do" list. All I need now is a North Central AFD and I'm set. Well, that and print out a bunch of NOS approach plates for a bunch of airports. Last year I ordered and hauled way too many bound NOS charts. This year, I plan to print out whatever I think I'd need based on planned gas and overnight stops. Not only do I kill less trees this way, I haul probably 6-7 less pounds on the 3000 nm journey.

Even better in the package receiving department, my Aircraft Spruce order showed up today. The main component of which is a new Concorde RG battery for the Arrow. Our old battery is on its way out and I really don't want to get stuck somewhere on the way to/from the Left Coast to Oshkosh with a dead battery.

It's time for some serious hangar rat duty. Battery replacement, mounting a fire extinguisher, replacing wing tip screws/washers with new stainless steel hardware, troubleshooting the copilot side PTT switch not working, and gluing on the pilot side right rudder pedal rubber pad. Oh yeah, tonight may be a late one at the hangar but that's ok, I'm long overdue in the hangar rat department.

Another item checked off the Oshkosh to-do list was updating the W&B spreadsheet I've perfected over the last couple of years. I still have to plug in a couple of final numbers but, for the moment anyway, we're approximately 100 lbs under gross with full fuel. Life is good :-)

T-minus 13 days until launch. If I can, I'm thinking about adding blog entires along the route.