boleropilot

never built anything (except a nice little deck out the back - (Kiwis pls note: it is made of wood) but in case you didn't hear about this incident I will enlighten you:- one of our club members at The Flying Tigers (Boonah, S E Qld) had his Savannah almost totally destroyed by a supercell that went through Avalon a few years ago he trailered it back to Boonah and rebuilt it, which is why it sports Phoenix nametags on the sides... when I mentioned to the pilot that no tiedown ropes/anchors would have held, he replied "yes they did, it was the tiedown brackets in the wing that failed" during the rebuild he re-designed and beefed up the brackets - he is confident they will not fail again! good luck with the build, I'll be keeping track over time cheers BP PS if you want a good laugh, look up the videos about Kiwis building decks....damn funny eh bro

congrats scre80, having your own aircraft is something I never thought I could afford - then I found out about Drifters!!! my lovely missus (46 years married this year) is a long-suffering partner of an aviation tragic - she puts up with all of my airborne foibles - she even came to visit me in hospital when I snapped my leg off paragliding) she didn't like my low flying over home (rural area, we have 34 acres) and made me put a sticker on the dash of the Drifter - SHOWOFFS DIE - helps to keep my Fun Thoughts in check... bottom line m8, if you have any concerns, fit a ballistic parachute cheers, looking forward to seeing you visit The Flying Tigers at Boonah some time in the future! BP

at least a happy ending (for those on board) - no fire is a big deal, but then they do build those lil' buggers strong don't they? saw a Phantom run off the side of the runway at Amberley due to 'arrestor wire' malfunction they elected to take the wire due to hydraulic failure in flight so no brakes used during rollout - the wire was incorrectly set up and the F4E was thrown sideways when it let go it went about 90 one way, then (due to rudder input) about 90 the other way, kinda straightened up (more rudder) when it went off the right side of the runway one big cloud of dust and grass and it just about stopped dead with the gear folded up under the aircraft - the gear went the second they went off the runway canopies up, two blokes stepped out (no ladder needed!) and ran rather swiftly across the runway... almost as exciting as the F4E that slipped through the sound barrier during a 'high speed pass for VIPs in the tower'...loudest thing I ever heard...oops BP

yeah Frank - hoping the 72 hour window will help with the cost = 1200 Friday to 1200 Monday. at this point also it appears that proof of hours flown + STOL "endorsement" from a CFI will also help. problem words are '200 metres", "hills" and "surrounding vegetation" - who wooda thunk? apparently you even have to cover food/drink supplied - wtf? BYO everything sounds good to me but not what I had planned... might have to re-name the occasion if it gets off the ground - the STOL fly-in might work - youse guys got any other ideas? please - no mention of gonads/coconuts!!! it might even come down to "DO NOT LAND HERE - OH YOU DID - WELL, TOLD YA NOT TO" - don't think that will work somehows... as far as distance is concerned m8, you don't have to do it all in one go ya know... cheers BP

no sign of damage to the prop either indicates the engine was not under power at impact - engine failure? when bought my Drifter had a siren mounted for mustering sheep - might be a better option for chasing crows than that big blue GA thingo...

hey Wayne, thanks m8 - yeah Frank, that's the little puppy...a bit overgrown after us being o/s for a month, will be doing some work on it tomorrow. got some big thorny weeds to eradicate and maybe drag the rack (depending on the state of the grass - we've had sfa rain here and 40+ temps). currently setting up a 500 litre water tank that I can fill from local dams to try to promote grass growth - tank in the trailer, pump in the back of the unbreakable Hilux, boom spray to cover 4 metre width what could possibly go wrong? will have to do some investigation on public liability insurance before I can set a date for a Drifter etc. weekend...fly in Friday/Saturday, out Sunday. Biggest firepit in The World on Saturday night! on that auspicious occasion, anybody arriving at the 'field and deciding to land at Roadvale instead (about 6nm west of here) will be collected by moi in my Fairlane limo! How good is that??? cheers BP

Wow Marty, I thought my 2 years on the sideline was Bad...28 years - but hey ya never forget - push stick forward, trees get bigger, pull stick back, trees get smaller, keep stick back trees disappear then reappear!!! I'll be o/s until 14th Feb but pm me after that and we'll get together at YBOA - buy ya lunch at the Doogy to celebrate getting your licence back! Hey Peter, I'll check out the vid - pls let me know if you're ever going to be at Boonah, I'd love to have a close look at the Onex cheers BP

yeah all the Tigers refer to it as a carrier landing strip - at both ends! haven't flown there for ages but the bloke that owns it is now interested in a tenant for his hangar - if we can come to some agreement in relation to (a) the cattle, and (b) installing sliding doors on the hangar, we might see 0455 there again - might be a better option than trying to find the dollars for a hangar at Woolooman... BP

I've got a mancave full of RC aircraft - fuselages on one wall, wings on t'other, either side of a big work bench. Lifted a fuselage down to do some work on the acft, placed it on the bench - lifted down the wing and as I turned to place it on the bench Benny Brown Snake popped his head out of the fuselage, took one look at me and decided (obviously) that I was the one who had interrupted his little nap...he had a big lunge at me, I dropped the wing (as you do) and fled the mancave with Benny in hot pursuit - he followed me into open ground where I had been working with a pick and shovel to dig a hole Benny then decided to get friendly and help me finish digging the hole - he stuck his head in the hole to check the depth for me and - who wooda thunk - his head got in the way of my shovel. So sad. Poor Benny - he was only about three feet long - and after the event, I recalled (as you do) that the fuselage did feel a little heavy when I picked it up off the rack....those Eastern Browns are quite slim really - perhaps why they are so damn fast!!! BP

yeah Wayne you are right, 200 metres it is...obviously I will be doing lots of test approaches once (a) 0455 is back in the sky and (b) the runway is all grassed and no rocks found.... I recall a landing I did at Roadvale (6nm N of YBOA) from the south where I sideslipped all the way to abt one second before touchdown (just past the 45 degree drop-off at the start of the runway), kicked her straight and whacked her down and got hard on the brakes, the lil beasty pulled up just past the turnoff to the hangar - that must have been around a hundred metres...main problem at Woolooman is the lack of stopping distance if the engine hiccups during take-off - there are at least some options if things go banana shaped but they all involve a turn to the west toward relatively open ground that is lower than the runway...my testing will be done on a day when there is a gentle breeze straight down the runway.

hey congratulations DW, one of the most memorable events of your life, no doubt. The flying school I went to gave me a club hat (Lone Eagle Flying School - Clifton) with the date embroidered across the back - 18 NOVEMBER 2007 that little hat is one of my most prized possessions - I got my Pilot Certificate professionally framed with my gold wings set in a small window at the bottom. It hangs on the wall of my study (under a nice pic of my Drifter). if you're ever around S E Qld, make sure you drop in at the Flying Tigers clubhouse at Boonah to say g'day... BP PS hey Peter, I've always had the hots for a Onex - where can I see some pix of yours and some notes on flying the lil beast - twood be a great idea to write an article for Sport Pilot magazine on what it's like to own/fly

here ya's go: BP

hey Oscar, they were unbelievable machines for sure - believe it or not, when riding in the wet in traffic I used to keep a tiny little pressure on the brake lever to keep the discs dry and warm - so that they would work straight away, without having to wait a couple of seconds for something to happen! yes, I went through some disc pads, but I worked in a m/c shop so that helped - and I'm still here! not all that many years ago they were available from the states for not a lot of money, but lately the prices have moved too far north for my tired old wallet.....always loved those VFRs - so nice... BP

my favourite bike was my big white/blue Honda CBX - six cylinders across the frame, fed by 6 tiny carbs. nobody could tune it until I met a motorcycle mechanic who had 4 of them and was a genius - first ride after he tuned the big beasty and I found out what those six cylinders could really do....and the sound...omg, six into two exhaust system and it howled like a banshee all the way to top revs...God I miss that bike - sniff, sob...at 100km/h you could drop it back to third, crack the throttle - and hang on tight or else! not sure, but I think I might have a few problems fitting a CBX motor to my Drifter...wouldn't go any faster but crikey it would sound good! BP

wow, just found the big thread started by fly tornado - going off to read all of that now BP

to tell the truth I have got the hots for a BMW motorcycle motor - apparently they are popular in Europe with trike flyers who are getting harassed by new (and increasingly stricter) 2 stroke regulations there is some stuff about them on the internet, from what I've read they would have to be a pretty flash unit for a Drifter, especially if you got one of the newer units with fuel injection and engine management systems - apparently that virtually removes all the problems associated with density altitude (not an issue for me doing all my flying in sunny Queensland) in the meantime I'll stick with my recently acquired 500 hour 582, it will see me out with what flying hours I have left to look forward to in my old age... BP

I suspect Mr NewBerry might be a closet Pastafarian - whereas I am happy to talk like a pirate and wear my WWFSMD t-shirt - which of course means: WHAT WOULD FLYING SPAGHETTI MONSTER DO ? but - seriously, folks (?) - Pastafarianism is so weird, it just must be true - imagine a Heaven with a beer fountain and a stripper factory...how good is that!

hey Mr NewBerry - does your wife let you go out in public with a colander on your head? Arr Me Hearties - Aaaarrrrr!

anybody know where I can get a 65hp electric motor for my Drifter? BP

Ah come on Kiwi - do you reckon Woolooman International is scarier than Walkers Scary Place? Anyway, I heard your 'boys' have done well and Baaarbara or Baaasil is about to join the Drifter Society...is that right? Tonxy

Hey Brent, very nice setup and I would love to have a crack at that one day - having said that, I can reciprocate by offering you some time in the back seat of my Drifter around the Scenic Rim - deal? The said Drifter (I do hope you are flying 0455 on your system) is currently having an engine swap and some electronics additions/alterations, but it won't be long before she's slipping the surly bonds again cheers BP PS ah - just saw that you use X-Plane...as far as I know, the Drifter is FSX only

I tried out the 737 full-size sim at the Gold Coast as a precursor to an article in one of the Oz GA magazines - took off from the new HK airport, did a 180 on climb and set up for a landing into Kai Tak. Wasn't the best landing I've ever done there but all those landings with my own system (in everything from F-111s to 747s) helped out - the sim didn't reject my landing as a crash, but my instructor said that it was borderline...he also said the average non-sim pilot who tried that approach would not have had a hope in Hell of getting the 737 on the ground in one piece. BP

wow, I just saw the date of the last post before mine......lol

G'day fellow simmers, just my five cents worth... I wrote flightsim articles for all the major Oz GA magazines for many years and have developed a comprehensive library of software, teaming it with state of the art hardware - my video card cost $800 and will run 6 monitors... I won't get into the discussion on whether flightsimming helps (or not) with real world flying - everyone reacts differently so everyone has a different outlook on the process. Realism is obviously the key to a 'realistic' result, and as you would expect, you just can't get that with the standard sims - you have to pay for both software and hardware, and when you do that you get a magnificent toy. Developers like Anthony (Ants Airplanes) produce a brilliant product that is exceptional value - he used my aircraft (0455) for his development of the Drifter for FSX (which is why you will see moi at the controls in my red helmet!) When he was working on the Drifter I would fly 0455 to Boonah (which he has done as freeware, along with Roadvale, 6nm to the north) and fly a perfect circuit, and make a note of heights and touchdown point. I would then go home and fly the same thing on the sim and check to see if there was any difference - if so, I would email him and he would make adjustments and I would check it again, until we got it pretty well spot on. That is why Ants Drifter behaves a lot like the real thing, even down to being able to sideslip the lil baby - most default (and some payware) aircraft won't sideslip because of the amount of time needed for the developer to make the changes needed to allow that to happen. Scenery add-ons are a must-have, particularly if you are going to practice navexs - when I was planning a trip from Boonah to Lismore to get some work done on 0455 by the sadly missed Wayne Fisher, I flew the trip with the sim quite a few times, matching the terrain and landmarks with the aviation map on the desk beside me. With Orbx software, the matching was surprisingly good - when I flew the actual course, the amount of identical features was very reassuring. Someone earlier on mentioned the head tracker gadget - that would have to be second on the list after a good HOTAS joystick/throttle combo for realism. Add a second monitor (little ones are as cheap as) and you can transfer all your radios, GPS and autopilot across so you have all that stuff away from your cockpit view. Rudder pedals are a must, and the HOTAS system will mean your keyboard keystrokes will be minimal. Cheers for now, and Happy New Year! BP PS If you haven't got Ants freeware Boonah Airport on your sim you are missing out on a real cracker, there are guys working on their gliders, skippys munching on grass, and chicks hanging out for a fly outside the Flying Tigers clubhouse...all moving.

Hey K1W1, Happy New Year m8!!!!! Your old friend Rocky is going to help out with getting the 582 back together...how good is that! Woolooman International Airport is looking good, mostly grass now, nearly ready but a few more 'rock runs' to make sure it's safe - but who will be the first Drifter Driver to land here? Or the first pilot of any aircraft for that matter. Up until now, only RC aircraft have used it. kiwi replies - NOT ME !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Ah fair enuff m8 it is a little scary - but not as scary as The Scary Place.... Hope you change your mind about visiting here for the Drifter Weekend some time later this year. Would like to see some aircraft doing practice approaches, might put a post somewhere else on the forum. BP