hihosland

I agree with Mike,

 

Stay away from LHR, trains trains and more trains, think about an over night, or even 4-5 hours in an airport hotel to break the long leg. A chance to stretch the legs, shower, sleep. It works out cheaper than business class and dramatically eases the pain.

 

We are thinking about Japan as our next break on the way to Europe, I've never been there and it is about half way.

 

enjoy the trip

 

Davidh

 

 

Riddells Creek is 1150 feet AMSL and the step overlying it is 2500 feet AMSL.M

I concede my VTC is anything but current however it shows land at 1223ft under a control step of 1500 within 3 miles of Riddells and 1400ft towers not much further away.

 

It has always been my belief that when Miranda vanished from the Hanging Rock picnic she was swallowed by a GE turbine on low final.

 

Davidh

 

 

Around Sundbury there are parts where 500ft AGl will violate controlled airspace.....

Great news about Pt Cook's change in direction.

 

Davidh

 

 

I don't know about destroying

 

but

 

I believe that we are compromising Australian recreational aviation by adopting the LSA concept from the USA.

 

i believe we are well and better served by the opportunities and protections provided by the combination of RAAus registration categories and VH experimental.

 

dem's my thoughts

 

Davidh

 

 

and always polish/wash in straight lines up and down the screen that way any induced scratches do not catch the light as do the ones created by round and round rubbing.

 

Davidh

 

 

For MBN you need a PPL, but no trouble in a RAAus registered aircraft if you have the PPL.

 

there is also Point Cook a military field where you can get permission to land with a RAAus certificate to visit the Museum but not for other reasons, and not for overnight stays.

 

Davidh

 

 

My 80hp 912 in the Skyranger burns less than 10 lit per hour when gently pottering around the block at 60kts and just under 4000RPM.

 

Difficult to measure precisely without going to quite considerable trouble.

 

At 75kts ecco cruise consumption is 14 lit per hr at 4900RPM

 

best wishes

 

David Hill

 

 

Jason did say>>>>

 

My requirements are:

 

• Good short field performance - my strip is likely to be about 400m with a 3 degree downslope
   
   
  
• Ability to handle rough strips
   
   
  
• Good cruise speed - 80kts or more
   
   
  
• Good useful load - enough for two persons, full tanks and an overnight bag for two
   
   
  
• Easy to build
   
   
  
• >>>>>>>>
   
  

 

400mtr is heaps for the SKR mine lived for a while on a 300Mtr (fence to harbour) strip that was very rough at each end with a good 100mtr of grass in the centre. Relatively easy to ensure all ops were on the centre good portion. Paul Dewhurst managed to clear a one mtr tape in 35mtrs from a standing start. But not many pilots are in his class.

 

Manages the rough grass no trouble, and I see little need to go for the optional large wheels or tail dragger configuration unless you want to operate out of river beds.

 

80kts is OK in the 80hp and long wing , faster with the short wing, bigger engine and the smoother fabric. At 60kts scenic pottering around your fuel burn is so low that you could get almost 6 hours out of the 60lt tanks.

 

I doubt there is a better payload ability that fits under the 544 MTOW and that delivers 80kts cruise at max weight.

 

Very easy to build, excellent manuals, heaps of assistance from an international news group, with over 1000 flying any problem that you will encounter will have been addressed by someone else. When the tubes come out of the box the bolts are already in the correct holes.

 

There must be a reason that 5 times world microlight champion Paul Dewhurst chose the Skyranger.

 

best of wishes

 

David Hill.

 

 

I do not know of any Jab motors in Australia there are several in the UK and USA check on the Yahoo Skyranger site. A very informative and helpful group.

 

As for the Rotax & Kiev prop combination my wife has never heard my fly over the house even when she knows that I am due.

 

I believe that the Rotax and Kieve are an excellent combination.

 

cheers

 

davidh

 

 

OK

 

Mathew and Jason

 

here with something that I wrote 2 years ago concerning my selection of the Skyranger.

 

Since that time I have I have notched up over 200 hours and am absolutely thrilled with the aircraft.

 

Good things about the Skyranger

 

1..not too expensive a kit

 

2..very easy and quick to build, You will have something recognisably an aircraft after a week of work.

 

3..very easy to fly

 

4..great short field performance

 

5..OK on grass and rough fields

 

6..can be tail dragger

 

7..can have big wheels for rough fields.

 

8..excellent visibility

 

9..easiest aircraft with less than 10 seats to get in and out of

 

10..good payload

 

11..OK, if not fast cross country, mine has been South Port to Avalon and back and then Southport to Yarram.

 

Because it is very light it is a bit bouncy in turbulence, and as with all others of similar design is is rather draggy and hence not very fast.

 

An absolute delight to fly.

 

best wishes

 

David Hill.

 

 

 

 

 

 

When we retired, the Spouse Person and I decided that in our future there would be an aeroplane.

 

So I prepared the check list of features that this aircraft would need. Over time this became a very long list. A list that included Australian manufacture, metal skin to lessen need for hangarage, factory built so that potential as school aircraft would increase its resale value, economical enough for spur of the moment flits around the block, long enough legs for serious touring, easy access for older bones and not seen as too claustrophobic for the Spouse Person’s sensitivities.

 

Over a couple of years the check list grew and grew while the decision seemed further and further away. At fly-ins I was the guy with the limp acquired from a surfeit of tyre kicking. Early on I decided against GRP aircraft for no other reason than rebellion against the ‘everybody has one’ phenomenon. If forced to justify that restriction I’d say that all the ones that I’d seen within the ultralight class were too heavy to have a reasonable useful load. A criticism I suspect more justified of the regulation than of the aircraft. Although I did make one local manufacturer an offer that he couldn’t refuse. He promptly declined.

 

Then we found the Foxbat!. Ticked all our boxes did the Foxbat. Spouse Person loved the visibility and swallowed the demonstration pilot’s line that a slow flight ability equated to safety and utility, hook line and sinker. There was room for all the essentials (hair drier, presents for the grandchildren etc) although the drinks trolley would require a substantial re design. To her mind the very best flying thing that didn’t have 7*7 in its name.

 

So we ordered the Foxbat and celebrated when Peter Harlow wrote back with a delivery date and a build number. Then I took the numbers, the other numbers, to the accountant and explained to him my clever financing scheme. Ah the harsh implications of the various regulations governing taxation and superannuation. The verdict was yes my cunning funding scheme would work. Work that is until the auditors had a good look. Would still work after their assessment but in the process our super fund would lose its compliant status. Meaning that we would have our Foxbat alright but with a severely slashed retirement income stream within which to enjoy it.

 

I wrote the “Dear Peter†letter, and Peter with courtesy, sympathy and understanding allocated our order to some other lucky pilot.

 

Back to tyre kicking. At this point something strange happened:- I completely forgot about the check list and went about instead seeking something that looked like a Foxbat; a less expensive Foxbat.

 

In New Zealand I spied a Skyranger, went for a fly with owner Wayne and immediately fell in love with the aircraft. Back in Australia I contacted Jean-claude Smitka and negotiated to purchase sight unseen his demonstrator Skyranger VH ULS. By the time that friend Jim and I arrived in Yarram on our delivery flight from Southport I was 100% happy with the new purchase.

 

Now about that checklist:- the Skyranger is not Australian, not metal, nor factory built. But it is the aircraft that struck the emotional chords for me. First I fell in love with it; a process that completely over rode my carefully prepared check list. Then I retrospectively built up a whole new check list that recorded the long list of positive features of the chosen one. Much the same way that I chose the Spouse Person.

 

Fortunately for me in both cases the post-decision list of positive features is extensive and in hindsight should have comprised the first list.

 

Excellent visibility, predictable handling, great useful load, superbly matched engine and prop (same Kiev prop/912 combination as the Foxbat), very easy for stiff jointed folk to get in and out of , comfortable seats, practical 80kt tourer and cheerful/economical 60kt around-the-block sight seeing platform. Couple all that with very good short field performance and lowish purchase price and for what else would one ask?.

 

When I heard about Skyranger’s four gold medals in the World Microlight Championships and three major awards Sun ‘n Fun I was reassured that others with better adhered-to checklists than mine have arrived at similar conclusions.

 

I did not build mine. I know David Hill too well to be up there in the first aircraft that he ever built. The Skyranger however would be very hard to beat for ease, speed and economy of home construction. (They say that two people can have one flying in two weeks). All that with a price differential from the Foxbat that would allow me to pay cash for a dearer motor car than anything I have owned in the last 6 decades.

 

ULS is now 19-4397 and I hope cringes less now at my approach than during my first attempts, after a 15 year absence from 3 axis flying, to guide her through the air-ground interface .

 

 

Jason

 

Must have been one hell of a wind to stop the Skyranger,

 

PM me with any questions and i will do my best to reply with my impressions.

 

My SKR is now 290 hours on the 80hp Rotax

 

David Hill

 

 

I think that is the version that has ailerons on the rear wing with the fore wing free floating. The only control pitch control being a large trim tab in the centre of the fore wing.

 

Is there a web link to this aircraft Ian?

 

davidh

 

 

Free Willie?

 

 

Whilst "putting it on line with the flying school" is regular practice in the GA community the regulations governing RAAus aircraft would seem to make that practice challenging to implement while also complying with the no hire or reward requirements.

 

If you put it on line with a RAA school at a rate greater than a equitable cost sharing then I am sure that some authority would argue that practice in breech of the regulations.

 

If you put it on line at a break even cost sharing arrangement, what happens when the aircraft is bent whilst being used for training? Who pays?

 

Very murky waters.

 

Davidh

 

 

Ian,

 

Is it possible to list on the site links to catalogues of manufacturers' whose products you can access. With a view that forum members can identify a product and then contact you for quote to supply?

 

Just a thought

 

Davidh

 

 

So

 

Where is the benefit-of/need-for LSA in Australia?.

 

It seems to me that in the USA the LSA category was created to resolve a problem that existed in the States but not here in Australia.

 

Our 24-**** RAAus category meets rec aviation needs adequately in Australia.

 

Is there any other advantage in LSA other than 600kg ? A benefit that can be more easily gained by increasing the RAAus MTOW to 600 and ignoring the LSA category al together.

 

Or am I missing something here?

 

Davidh

 

 

Mike did say

 

" The key point about LSA is that the airworthiness authority for any LSA a/c is the manufacturer."

 

So what happens re the airworthiness when/if the manufacturer ceases operations?

 

Does that aircraft effectively become an "VH experimental" or "RAA 24-****" ?

 

Davidh

 

 

As I understand it

 

GA PPL can fly anything up to 5700kg that is VH registered but need endorsement for

 

retracts, constant speed prop, floats, multi engines.

 

RAA cert fly anything up to 544kg (600 on floats) that is registered under RAA including retracts, sep endorsements for PPC, weight shift, 3 axis, tail dragger, floats.

 

No constant speed and no multi engine

 

LSA ticket I presume permits one to fly LSA registered aircraft which excludes multi engines , retracts and variable pitch props.

 

I am ready to be corrected

 

Davidh

 

 

Ben did say

 

"When studying physics, we did lasers, and I did a special piece on them. The key to the laser is the fact the light is coherent, in other words, photons travel in a parallel path to each other, which explains why laser light does not spread out over distance - the inverse square law.

 

This fact is used to advantage by laser distance measuring devices, including those used to measure the distance from earth to the moon."

 

So what is measured in the distance measuring devices? Time for the signal to return? It would have to be some incredibly short interval for short distances. Or is something else measured such as a phase differential? Or the dispersal pattern? or the intensity differential?

 

Just thinking

 

Davidh with to much time for thinking

 

 

Browng

 

Bait well taken and service well returned.!!

 

Wen you make the great trip to the far SE I'll be in front of the crowd crawling in the mud to beg a ride. That's if we ever see any mud ever again.

 

best of wishes

 

Davidh

 

 

you could build two new Skyrangers with the stick between the legs option for less than $100k

 

Davidh

 

 

PS

 

Very interesting aircraft the Savage Cub.

 

& very well priced,

 

However I do not doubt that the curmudgeons in the classic J3 community will lament the rear command seat.

 

Davidh

 

 

It was as Brent did say.

 

I had completely forgotten that I had responded to an invite for information on a web site that I did not at the time associate with one of Michael's consortia.

 

He and RAA are due an apology from me and also from all those who jumped to the conclusion the door to which I left open.

 

Apologies all.

 

David Hill

 

 

My understanding is that you are OK to transit the VFR lanes when East Sale is active in any aircraft registered under CAO 95.55 ie RAA aircraft with either a 19 or a 25 prefix.

 

best of wishes

 

Davidh