KRviator

Not for the price! Dimensions of block: 325mm x 323mm x 37mm Pack of blocks (10): covers 0.95m² Price: $33.25 500mx20m = 10,000m2 = $332,500. Another brand "Turf cell" seems to be marginally cheaper, but still well over $30/m2

Geez at $2000+/20kg and 10g/m2, you're looking at roughly $1/m2 for the surface you want to seed.

Even though I'm based there, I only know what the ATSB has posted, but VH-OAJ was involved in an accident at Somersby this afternoon. A local news outlet reports the pilot was airlifted to Royal North Shore, but no indication on his condition.

Meant the 440-odd kg C150 you were talking about. That'll teach me to proof read things after nightshift.....

Of course it is. I have a 445kg BEW, but registered 2 seats. Nothing at all wrong with that concept so long as the 600kg TOW limit is adhered to. So full tanks & me, or half fuel and one of my rugrats. How's that any different to a 152 operated under RAAus?

Ain't that the truth. I tried to get on the MPC being held in Perth next week, and never got a call back from SAAA HQ with the details or anything. The course last year in Perth they ended up cancelling at short notice - too bad if you'd already booked flights and accommodation. I think I'll stay with RAAus a bit longer!

The same as my RAAus RV-9. Nothing wrong with it so long as you respect the limits.

I don't think you can see individual responses in the poll, so we'll never know who just had a birthday!

I work FIFO and the number of people in my crew who are intrigued that I built my own plane, and the performance you can get from some light aircraft is surprising. As I tell them, for much less than the cost of a 200-series, you can buy a Mooney/Bonanza and have door to door times faster than paying $5,000 for a round trip for your family to Perth - and without having to deal with the muppets at airport security! A 9 hour drive becomes a 2H45M flight, etc etc. Sure it isn't RAAus, but it's a start!

Strewth, that'll teach me to proof-read my bloody posts... And now I cant even put them in the right order!

Following on from musings in the Qantas cadet thread, it got me wondering just how many young people are coming through the ranks who fly for fun. It seems to me that most recreational pilots are on the wrong side of the 50-60 age bracket, and there are not an awful lot of people taking up flying for their own enjoyment at the younger end of the spectrum. My personal opinion is people simply can't afford it if you want to own a house these days, but that was also my experience 20 years ago when learning to fly out of Toowoomba... So, that leads us to the poll above, to see just what sort of demographic we have here on the RecFlying forums...

If I've used the right calculators, a new C172P cost $34,000USD brand new in 1981. According to the RBA, the exchange rate was 91.75c/USD in 1983, which I've used as the conversion rate, so a new P-model would have cost $37,000AUD (I haven't updated the purchase price from '81-83 to give the benefit of the doubt to the Cessna...). Australian inflation since then works out to 214% or from $37000 ->$116,000AUD for a brand-new C172, excluding GST and import duties...According to several articles, you could buy a house for a smidgen over $80,000 in the early '80's, with an average annual income of $21,000, or a roughly 4:1 price/income ratio. In 2015 the average Sydney house price is now over $900K with an income of $78,000, or an 11.5:1 ratio. Based on a $37,000 172 and a $21,000 salary, a new 172 these days "should" cost around $137,000 AUD. The lack of disposable income - a direct result of rampant housing & cost-of-living increases - means most working people simply cannot afford luxuries like flying - particularly on an average salary around $80,000. It is only when you've been able to pay off your mortgage are you likely to be able to afford such luxuries.

Can't fly in a GA plane less than 30-40 years old at most aero clubs.Can't fly at my local airport without paying 600/hr for circuits IN MY OWN PLANE. Can't add an experimental EFIS to a certified plane without CAR21M EO, which leads to; Can't fly behind an EFIS at most aero clubs, stuck with antiquated vacuum gauges. Require TSO'd GNSS position source for ADS-B. Can't use Dynon/Garmin solutions for experimentals. Can't import a US plane at a reasonable price due GST being applied to landed cost and exchange rate. Can't buy a reasonably-priced NEW aircraft anymore, though this is a worldwide problem now... Airports closing, being sold off, or otherwise being rendered inaccessible due cost/insurance/admin issues. Can't owner-produce parts for certified aircraft. Can't owner-maintain certified aircraft for private ops. Can't access an RPT airport without an ASIC. Which you now have to renew in person....at whatever cost every 2 years. Can't get hangarage at reasonable rates at an awful lot of airports due council/owner/insurance costs stifling investment. And I'm sure others will have plenty more examples.

Of course it matters. Australian GA is dying - and has been for years. These students that Monash - and others - are training do not go on to fly in Australia, they bugger off back to their respective home countries and fly there. Additionally IMHO, there's a huge difference between the likes of these sausage factories with their international students and integrated courses that are propping up the movement figures, vs your average weekend warriors that either no longer fly themselves, or are not being replaced by the current Gen Y'ers and Millenials.Have a look at your average aero club - there aren't an awful lot of young folk coming through these days, most members seem to be at least 50 or older...And that's been the case since I first joined the DDAC 20 years ago! I reckon it'd be an interesting poll on RecFlying, if we asked everyone their age bracket.

How many of those Moorabbin movements are training foreign students though?

When you can qualify on the heavy metal without setting foot in the real thing, one has to wonder how long it will be until a suitable simulator for ab-initio training is introduced. Zero flight time PPL's anyone?!?

Sorry. that should be VOR/NDB info, VOR shows up as a VOR, the NDB's as a "Tower_Short" icon. Can't seem to edit the above post...

Thank's lads, with Excel it doesn't take too long to do at all, so I've included the NavAids as another CSV download. It only has VOR/ILS info in it, no ILS/DME/LOC info but if you need to find an ILS in a hurry, odds are you've got bigger problems than this can help with!

Because I am a good-natured bloke (and get bored easily) I decided to work out a way to import all published Australian airports into my SkyView system - a process that was relatively painless using the DAH, Adobe and Excel. However, as the RecFlying forum architechture doesn't allow uploading of *.CSV files, you'll need to actually download them from my post at the Dynon Forums, over here... Now, given there are many hundreds of Certified and Uncertified/ALA's in Australia, I cannot guarantee these are accurate inasmuch as I haven't screwed up something in the PDF-XLS conversion, but those in my immediate vicinity correlate perfectly with the OzRunways VTC overlay. That is my way of saying you use these files and the data therein at your own risk. If you get lost, that's your own fault, these are intended for situational awareness only. Furthermore, I haven't been anal enough to go through and categorise each and every airport to their respective icon in SkyView. If it's a Certified airport, per the DAH, it gets a "Filled" icon, if it is a Uncertified aerodrome or an ALA, it gets a "Hollow" icon. Additionally, these will show up as User Waypoints in SkyView, so you need to have the "display user waypoints" option selected at a suitable map range to enable you to see them. I will endeavour to keep these two files updated with each revision of the DAH unless AsA has a dummy spit, or I get tired of doing so. Anyway these are based on the November 2017 revision, with the next being due in May 2018. Eventually I might do the NavAids as well, but for now, here's the two airport files. Happy Flying!

If you're happy to let an instructor learn on your plane, you're more than welcome. Me on the other hand, feel this is an unnecessary risk, particularly when it can be avoided and I wouldn't stand for it. The 'suck it and see' mentality has no place in aviation.See that plane below? It was someone's Belite. Here's what happened in the pilots (note, NOT the owner) own words.

It is just another plane, but like most every plane they all handle differently, that's all. As the instructor, you need to be aware of the aircraft's handling quirks to be able to catch a students mistake, which, if you've never flown it, means you're learning at the same time as the student and that doesn't leave you much time to be able to salvage something if the student fluffs it - clearly not an ideal scenario.The Foxbat also has this funny arrangement for mounting the elevator and flaperons that leaves you with the impression a series of bolts, washers and clevis pins have fallen off, when that's just the design - which if you didn't know about it could lead you to trying to ground a perfectly serviceable aircraft. And the flap handle is inboard between your heads, so you can't simply drop the flaps anytime you want, you need to be established in a comfortable flightpath, swap hands on the (centre) stick, drop the flaps, then swap hands again.

I could probably teach someone to fly a 737 even though I've never flown one, too... I flew in a FoxBat today (3rd time) for my BFR after 18 months flying my RV and it was different enough to cause a few hiccups. I wouldn't want to try to learn from someone who themselves is learning the plane!Don't stress too much about the RAAus aspect. Learn under RAAus in a Foxbat, send the form off to CAsA to RPL your RPL (sorry, couldn't resist...), and away you go. The only limitation may be if your Foxbat is VH-...

AND IT WORKS NOW! You can now transfer your flight plan from your old iPad2 running iOS9 to SkyView via the WiFi connection. BIG thanks to the OzR lads!

Pretty much, yep. The 24.2 is accurate based on flight time tests, not just indicated fuel flow, though it does vary slightly up to 24.5 sometimes. This is for flight at 8,500', and it takes 10.5L to climb to and descend from that altitude. With the engine in my -9A, you can run MoGas too, so there is not a significant difference in operating costs between a Rotax-powered Lightning, (for example) and an RV-9A. And depending on your mission, the -9A can be registered RAAus too - mine is one of two on the register.

FP Sensenich G/A prop, 145KTAS at 24.2LH in my -9A, and I could probably have pushed that out towards 150KTAS if I had paid more attention to drag reduction during the build. EFII would also make a significant-enough-to-warrant improvement next time too!