Have I pressed the right button?

[Guest Waspot]

Hello everyone - I joined up a couple of months back but technology and I don't have a great rapport, so it's taken me a while to sort out what to do and how it all works.

 

I'm probably slap in the middle of the "bell curve" for RAA flyers - keen since a kid, middle aged, ex-GA PPL 25 years ago, dropped out with the costs and regulations, had a family to feed and educate and a job to do but, fortunately, a very supportive wife. A couple of years ago she bought me a TIF in a Gazelle and, typically, all the good stuff came flooding back and hooked me into aviation again. Next birthday a windsock! Last Christmas a GPS! How good is that!

 

Instead of having a total mid life crisis meltdown, I sat down and wrote out what I would like in a plane. Metal (I fly a hired J-160 pending the arrival of the new bird, but I'm a 'tin man' at heart), high wing, Aussie, Rotax, tricycle, STOL (the strip on the farm is only 300m), reasonable range/speed and affordable. Ole Hatmann's new Wasp seemed to fit the bill (with a shoulder wing), so I stopped in at Taree on a trip north and lo, the first factory LSA version is underway. Hopefully I'll be banging around in the Southern Tablelands in a couple of months.

 

Anyway, that's enough rabbitting on.

 

Have had a bit of a read of the material on this site and you folk certainly seem to be a knowledgeable lot - I don't expect I'll be able to add much, but appeciate the opportunity to see what people have to say.

 

Sorry I don't have any pictures here - need to work out how to do that one day. One fight with the computer per day is all I can manage.

 

Cheers, Col

 

 

[Yenn]

G'day Col and a very warm welcome to the site. As an ex GA pilot I am sure you will be able to add to our ramblings. That is where I came from and I find it a must visit site.

 

 

[blueshed]

Hi Col

 

and welcome, Did my Pvt license at Tumut in 85, learnt to fly in the club Blanik first though.

 

Probably know a few from Tumut!

 

are you going to the Echuca flyin on 23 Feb, just a couple of weeks away!

 

Cheers Guy

 

 

[Guest Waspot]

Thanks Guy - did my PPL out of Canberra when a Navex was full reporting every 30 mins plus or minus 2mins, so can still read a map. Only really know Pete Wilson at Airescape over at Tumut, plus a few of the old timers who hang about the club.

 

Great image - "big blue shed"!

 

Cheers, Col

 

 

[Guest Waspot]

Thanks for the welcome Ian - sorry for the delay in reply. Would you believe the Internet wouldn't work? That's what happens when you run out of coal for a steam powered computer. If planes crashed that often, no one would fly.

 

Col