Shape Lock

I have seen the video that Nick posted on making a joystick

and wanted to give it a try...

Weekend trip to Palm Beach & Back

I got up Saturday morning and the weather between me and Rough River was bad, but the weather between me and Palm Beach was fine. :)

http://www.everytrail.com/view_trip.php?trip_id=372221

Getting to Rough River

I planned on going to Rough River this weekend.


So far the weather is iffy at best.

Here is a 24 Hour Flight Rules Forecast from Duats:

Returning to Exile! :)

I was made an offer I can not refuse to stay in Monroe until the end of April.

I had to get my plane back so that I can go to Rough River

Here is the two days of ground tracks to get back to Monroe.



The flight from Monroe, North Carolina to Monroe, Louisiana was filed IFR and 50 minutes longer than planned. Almost 5 hours in the air at 10K & 12K feet.

Hit some nasty up and down drafts in IMC that will make anyone humble!

Driving home to NY (Returning from Exile)

I am wrapping up my final hours at the best job I have had!

It is 21 hours of driving back to Islip. I hope that I can make it to Harrisburg Saturday night to see my father.

I have to finish some packing and loading the car. I plan on driving out at dawn on Saturday. Tomorrow morning I'll be letting the air out of my mattress and strapping the bird & travel cage in the right seat. He did well on the drive down, hopefully he will be good on the ride back.

The Garmin 396 has an auto mode along with the air mode. I'll be giving it a try.

There is news that there may be flooding in TN, hopefully I will miss that.

Flight from FL to NY

I was flying from F45 to KHWV. I did most of the trip at 11.5k ft VFR over the top.

The forecast was 1800 ft 6 mile visibility in Islip. It was 400 ft overcast and 1.5 mile visibility. I spent the night in Delaware.

I filed IFR for the Deleware to NY leg of the flight. As usual, I filed an overland route, was cleared for a twin engine over water route, got another change en-route, and then got continuous changes en-route. Why do flight planning & program it into the GPS?

Only time I got to fly what I filed was going into BWI on a severe clear day!

Ground Tracks & Pics

Labor Day Weekend trip to Palm Beach

I am pretty amazed at the canard aircraft! I flew non-stop from Monroe Louisiana to Palm Beach Florida! This is an O-320 E2D 150 HP Lycoming.

Averaging 7.1 gph & 150 KT over the ground in 5 hours 725.7NM! I had a safety stop planned just after the pan-handle of Florida, no need for that! I could have flown 6 hours at 11.5k with reserve! Please let me correct that, the plane could have flown 6 hours, 5 hours was at the limits of my bladder. I was not LOP, I wanted to keep my speed, but leaning at 11.5k puts your mixture lever close to idle cut off.

I took off at 5:00 am central, it was great! I could the the constillation Orion! The air for the entire trip was smooth! Great views! The Garmin 396 with XM weather is a great tool! Even better is that I have all the METARs & TAFs. I still love selecting the radio frequencies on the GPS for the SL-30 Nav/Com!

See the GPS tracks and pictures of the sun rise at 11.5k feet!

My hands and feet were getting pretty cold! I'll have to get on that cabin heat project!

I hope to see you all at Rough River!

-Rich

New Job! Returning to NY from Exile in Monroe, La.

THANK YOU MONROE, GOOD NIGHT!

As Rush Limbaugh says, "When there is a recession do not participate." Well I did not and I have been working a contract in Monroe, Louisiana. I have had a great time, working with great people at a great company! I'll miss the friendly nice people and relaxed life style and all my new friends! I have a job 15 minutes from home in NY.

Monroe is one of those places that the phrase "You can't get there from here" was invented for. It is costly, takes a long time, and inconvenient to get to. There are no direct flights from NY, it is typically more convenient to drive 100 miles East or West to another airport for better flights. It is actually quicker and only a little more expensive to get to with my plane. Also I get to come and go on my own schedule.

In NY I am spoiled by having SouthWest in my home town. If I can't fly direct out of Islip, I can get a direct flight from JFK, Laguardia or Newark.

While in Islip, cheaper faster to fly commercial. While in Monroe faster more convenient to fly private.

So I have many things to deal with, all good! I have a great room mate that is taking over the apartment and responsibilities that go along with it. I'll be flying the plane to NY on 9/11-9/12 and then flying SoutWest back 9/13 with a multi hour lay over in Orlando.

September 18th is my last day at the old job, and I will be packing my car and driving out that weekend, starting the new job 9/21.

My favorite canard event of the year Rough River is the following weekend. I hoped to make a long weekend of it, with the new job, I'll be getting there Saturday morning, leaving Sunday.

I'll be busy until October! :) More important, it is with good things!

Weekend Trip to Kansas City

I flew with my roommate to his home town to see family. It was a nice change of scenery!
GPS Tracks of Trip there


GPS Tracks of trip back

We went to World Famous Arthur Bryant's, great food no frills!

Cheap gas in RI & Walk on the beach in Montauk

You can still get to the beach without a car, if you have an airplane!

Weekend Return to NY

This is the first flight with the New Garmin 396

It is connected to drive the autopilot




And you can select frequencies on the GPS and have them loaded into standby on the NAV COM Now I need to do the ultimate lazy thing and put a remote flip flop in the joystick.




This is the planned flight from KLMU to KHWV


This is the actual flight from KLMU to KHWV
http://www.everytrail.com/view_trip.php?trip_id=315153

Fun Ride With Co-Worker & his son

Friday, I had the pleasure to take a friend and his son for a ride in the Monroe, Louisiana area.

Here are more pictures

Back in Monroe Louisiana

I had a great time with Valerie & Robert Harris! What is better than talking airplanes with such knowledgeable people! They are also great hosts! You have to love that Southern Hospitality!

Oh yes, the condition inspection... Some intake & exhaust gaskets, gapping & cleaning plugs, oil change, leak down test etc... There also was the avionics inspection. The plane has a clean bill of health!

On Sunday morning 7:00 am there was a line of thunderstorms and heavy rain stretching from West Texas to Norfolk Virginia! I had to wait until 6:00 PM to take off. I plotted an IFR route just in case, programmed the GPSs & the SL30 for all the frequencies and routes. I got lucky and was able to keep it legal VFR, at 10,500 ft. It got cold as the sun started setting. Some year I will get heat in the plane!


I struck a deal for space in an unwanted hangar down here with no lights or anything. I am happy to have the plane inside! There are offices there and everything, maybe I will get electric and rent it to other consultants! JOKING!!!

Speaking of consulting, I need to get one of those SAP consulting jobs @ $100/Hr so I can get myself a jet! I want a turbofan though.

I plan on heading over to the hangar after my laundry comes out of the dryer. I will try to download my ground tracks from the GPS and post them here.

Long XC Ferry Permit & Condition Inspection

This is the proposed route of flight for my flight.

1092 Mile trip, 55gals, 5:48 min Cost: 55*$3.75=206.25

I think that is cheaper and faster than the SouthWest flight with the lay over, not counting the drive & wait time. Their travel time is 5 hours. :(

Stopping at Deck for some cheap fuel and breakfast with Dad. Turning the corner at Pittsburgh to avoid the mountains, then I need to fight to stay awake! How did Dick Rutan & Steve Fosset do it? I go 4 hours solo and get tired!

Tennative safety stop at Bowling Green before landing at EZ Jet Inc (M04) for the annual condition inspection.
Navigation Log

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Grove Brakes

Hi Guys, here are some photos of the Grove brakes. Way too easy not to do.

My Wheel pants required modifications, which are not yet complete.

I have been having fun with GPS Babel, I use it to download my GPS
flight data and post it on www.everytrail.com

It appears that if you download in garmin logbook format and upload
that to everytrail it looks the best.

I was thinking we can follow our aviation intrests by using searchable
twitter terms like:

#cozy
#KISP (airport IDs)
#snf09 (events)
#osh09 (events)

Here are links for my twitter, and gps tracks.

http://twitter.com/FlyingRich

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