old man emu

I was rearranging stuff in my storage shed when I came across a portable filing cabinet I bought in he very distant past. When I opened it to see what it contained, I was pleasantly surprised to find some magazines from the  1980s about radio controlled flying as well as sheets of plans for a number of aircraft from the inter-war years. 

I have plans  for:

a 48" Ford Flivver by Derek Woodward through the American Radio Control Modeller

a 58-1'4" Aeronca C1 by Phillip Kent through the English Radio Control Modeller

a 53" CAC Boomerang from  Australian Radio Control Modeller

a 42" DH89 Dragon Rapide from Dumas Aircraft, Kit # 1815

and  a 52" Comper Swift.

If I can make them, I'll have a nice little display.

Imagine the cost of replacing all those hoses when a BMW Radiator Hose - Upper for a 325i E9X costs $50 Priced Individually (GST included) Connecting the upper radiator to the top fitting on the engine (next to the oil filter housing). Manufactured by original equipment supplier using the BMW Genuine plastic hose connectors.

New cars have more pipes than the Sydney Town Hall organ 

On 27/07/2023 at 10:58 PM, Litespeed said:

What keeps aircraft in the air?

After all the discussions of this topic, especially Bernoulli -v- Newton, and hundreds of person-hours of research by NASA and others, I think that the conclusion reached is "We don't know how, but wings work. Live with it." 

Forget about the jet, that brickwork is excellent.

Facthunter, I wish you would use the Quote facility in some of your poasts. Not doing so makes it hard to see what you are referring to.

2 hours ago, facthunter said:

Isn't that where the "Munsters" live?  Nev

1313 Mockingbird Lame, Mockingbird Heights. 

7 minutes ago, RFguy said:

I do like that suggestion : "Deciding on some easy map points as lead ins to the airport area gives your mind some time to orient."

That's a very fine thing to do, but if you and I are approaching Cowra how do we both know that we are aware of the easy map points that help getting into the circuit? I tried to establish a set of 10 Nm points for approaching Tooraweenah so that people coming from different directions would have some clue as to where another aircraft was. That work was roundly poo-poohed right here. In the end it didn't really matter because hardly anyone asked to be provided with the information pack. 

In following this discussion, I am forming the opinion that those engaged General/Recreational aviation consider themselves to be a Sovereign Citizen,  someone who believes that he or she is above all laws.

50 minutes ago, Old Koreelah said:

It amazes me that it isn’t. half the world’s people can afford mobile phones,

That's the requirement to carry a radio. A hand-held costs less than a mobile phone and weighs a fraction of the ones from years gone by. Still, how many aircraft are obviously carrying radios, but not using them?

I wondered why the light twin would do that, then I realised that there was probably no wind, so no advantage in taking off into wind. 

I've been eavesdropping on this topic since I don't fly, but from what I have been reading, these are the impressions I get:

1. Despite all the advice, operations at uncontrolled aerodromes are out of control.
2. Despite the authorities publishing advice on operating in and around uncontrolled aerodromes, the advice is generally ignored.
3. Although there is supposed to be a maximum speed limit within the circuit area, the wide range of performance of aircraft using an aerodrome makes it impossible to set a speed limit that the majority of aircraft can operate at. For instance if the maximum speed in the circuit was 70 kts, would that produce an orderly flow of traffic? Perhaps a "No overtaking" rule might work.
4. The published circuit diagrams do not specify the lateral outer boundaries of the circuit. 
5. The establishment of Lanes of Entry with readily identifiable starting points might solve the problem of locating aircraft approaching the aerodrome.

Avoiding landing fees by failing to make calls within the circuit is tantamount to stealing from the general community and our fellow aviators. It costs a motza to maintain an aerodrome to the standard we would all like. These uncontrolled aerodromes form part of the national transport infrastructure. The Federal Government long ago washed its hands of maintaining aerodromes, leaving it up to local councils or Big Business. Local Councils in rural areas bear the brunt of the maintenance costs, which money comes from the ratepayers. It is any wonder that Councils are closing aerodromes and trying to convert the land to produce higher income?

Turbo is spot on about the decline in the practice of adequate flight planning. My recent experience in this area has been well documented elsewhere on this forum.  One call cite the adage, 

I'll not copy and paste what Turbo said about planning because he's correct. The job of flying is not done until the aircraft is shut down on the flight line. To my mind, the decline in flight planning ability has been caused by flight planning is no longer being mandatory, as Turbio laments. While it's handy to be able to use software which only requires one to enter the locations of points A and B to enable the software to access stored  aircraft performance and current Met data to produce the information to go from A to B, there is still the need to pre-plan what one is going to do at the departure and destination aerodromes by applying one's knowledge that conditions around aerodromes are different from flight to flight.

Operating at uncontrolled aerodromes seems to be a bit like having a railroad crossing on the road between your place and town. You get so used to simply driving across it because you haven't had to stop for a train there for years. Then one day you are travelling at a time you don't normally travel at, or there is an "special" running on the line. Suddenly you are shocked out of your reverie by a big thing blocking the road. At least trains are big and slow and can only be found in a permanent location.

14 hours ago, ClintonB said:

have you solved the DAME thing yet,

I've put the idea aside for a while. The impetus for getting back into flying has been removed, but not for health reasons. I was saving up for lessons, but can only put enough away for an hour per month and that's not enough. I don't know if I could get a personal loan to pay for ten or fifteen hours in a block. Then there's the problem of accessing a plane.

Actually, I'm thinking more of getting back into radio control flying. I've got lots of open space now to learn to fly in with no neighbours so I could even use my fuel engines (if they still sell fuel for them). I'm going to buy myself a brushless motor and speed controller and make a trainer out of corflute. I have a couple of 1/4 scale kits and planes for a CAC Boomerang and an early Aeronca C3 (?), but those might just be built as display models.  

Coonabarabran Aero Club has joined up with the local High School to put a smallish flight simulator in to entice the kids onto aviation. THe conversion from "free period" to flight school is low, but one is better than none. A couple of the lads have passed solo at the club. 

27 minutes ago, facthunter said:

you can just jump out of one in to the REAL thing and fly it.   That's after about 7 four hour sessions

Wasn't that the way some Indian airlines were getting people trained for Second Officer duty?

I thought they basically took the recruit "off the street", bunged them in one of those simulators that was specific for the plane the company wanted the "pilot" to work in. The result was a person who actually could operate one particular aircraft, but had no other aeronautical knowledge. Since all the route details would be uploaded by someone in an office, these "pilots' didn't have the background knowledge that was behind all aspects of flight planning. As for aircraft handling, I doubt if the simulation course would include handling a situation like the Gimli Glider incident.

Today I was given a spectacular book about the P-51 Mustangs operated by the RAAF and RNZAF. I have never seen a book so full of detail about the actual aircraft themselves. The book does not go into operations and such, its everything you wanted to know about them from their  individual construction number to the paint finishes used for internal surfaces. The book has profiles on each aircraft including the ones built by North American Aviation ( A68-500 to  A68-813 and A68-1001 in service and their civilian lives and those build by the Commonwealth Aircraft Corporation (A68-1 to A68-200 and their civilian lives).

Available from Red Roo Models of Melbourne (www.redroomodels.com) at a mere $138.60. If you are into making scale models, this book is a unique source of material. 

13 hours ago, Kyle Communications said:

I had a stress test back in 2012 and all was fine so they told me..then 6 months later I am on the table with 4 arteries 90% blocked 3 days after the angiogram

Which just goes to show you that the results of these various tests are not good predictors or descriptors of the state of a person's body. Actually, as I think about it, a stress test is a pretty primitive concept, comparing it to how we test aircraft components. If we want to check for metal fatigue in a spar, we can do several types of non-destructive examinations. I wonder why we can't do an ultrasound examination of the heart. Ultrasound examinations for monitoring foetal development can detect minute details of the foetus from very early in the gestation. Surely an ultrasound would pick up blocked arteries.

What does a stress test determine anyway? To my way of thinking, it only shows the heart's reaction to rigorous exercise. How many of us are at their peak aerobic capability? How many of us regularly run continuously for 15 minutes. How many of us have knees in such good condition that they can sustain a continuous 15 minute run?

Have a look at the grass near where the photographer is standing. Do I detect the indications of a tailwind? 

Begs the question of why they didn't use the road.

This artistic expression has adorned Hickson Road, Dawes Point, Sydney for quite a few years now. I think it i only recently that the original artist's work was critiqued and the rock anthropomorphised.

I find it very interesting that my knowledge of local weather gained from living most of my life in Southwest Sydney or the Southern Highlands is  near useless now I live further north. Looking at this synoptic chart, I would be expecting  strong south-westerly winds here, but it has been calm. 

You can see from the forecast synoptic charts that the strong High tends to block the Low from coming much further north than the Murray River and the pressure gradient lessens along a diagonal between the mouth of the Murray and the NSW Central Coast. 

About 30 kms south of Gilgandra is the boundary between the Macquarie River catchment and the Castlereagh River catchment. It seems to mark a rainfall boundary as well. There's a little village close by the boundary where the rainfall is less than surrounding towns and villages. In describing the rainfall totals there, the locals  say that when it rained on Noah for forty days and forty nights, they only got forty points.

37 minutes ago, Thruster88 said:

In 2014 cowra aero club member Bert flew the brumby 610 around Australia solo age 90.

Becaue no one was game enough to fly with him 😄

Congratulations! 

42 minutes ago, facthunter said:

One wouldn't have been there. They are not a X country thing taking passengers.   Nev

Stop using Common Sense. You know that. I know that. We all know that. But the Regulators would ignore that.

I'm going to throw in a pot-stirrer here.

An incident like this doesn't augur well for the introduction of something like Part 103.

Jabiru caught on camera entering Hangar 9 -3/4 at Hogwarts Airport. 

On 30/06/2023 at 10:35 AM, danny_galaga said:

 

Wonder what he flew?

That's from the initial post.

The question was referring to a comment from the bloke who cancelled his ticket for the Titanic dive that proved fatal who said, "I'm a pilot, I have my helicopter pilot's license, I wouldn't get into an experimental aircraft,"  You have to read the linked article for the context of that statement. Quite simply, the speaker was talking about Rush flying to an appointment in an aircraft the speaker labelled as a "experimental". Apparently Rush wanted to talk to the speaker about another aircraft, not the one he was flying.

Danny has done some research and found out that the aircraft Rush was flying was a Glasair 3. Most likely that aircraft was a homebuilt kit, but although it might wear an "Experimental" label, many would argue that it is not an aircraft that is experimenting with some unique aerodynamic feature. 

So here we have a comment from a pilot, who flies a type of aircraft that many think of as a collection of moving parts flying in formation, dissing a class of aircraft of which he admits he has no experience. Obviously posters here have failed to read the linked article and raced off down a track towards which the original poster had not erected a pointer.

Not saying that the resulting discussion had no value, but sometimes it is necessary to pluck the pearl from the oyster and place it, with a new grain of sand, in another thread to generate another pearl.

9 hours ago, BrendAn said:

this is in the classifieds. didn't know it was a jab option.

That's the picture that prompted my creating this thread. I didn't want to raise the matter within the seller's thread.

What also directed my line of thought was that this aircraft is VH registered, and therefore the owner must comply with the CASRs.

I'm not saying that the owner of an aircraft with folding wings would not know how to do the job correctly. What I am saying is that I believe that under CASR, a dual inspection is required when anything to do with controls has been connected (or re-connected in this case). The second party to a dual inspection can be any person who is legally permitted to carry out and sign off a daily inspection on the Maintenance Release, i.e. a qualified pilot. It doesn't have to be a LAME. 

I doubt if RAA would have a requirement for dual inspections, but I can be corrected.