Ironflight

Ironflight

VAF Moderator / Line Boy
Mentor
I have written many times about the traveling capabilities of our RV?s ? fast, long-legged, able to leap half-continents in a single bound! Yet when I look in my logbook, I have an awful lot of 45 minute ?local? flights in there as well?.I was thinking about this today as I went out to ?warm up the oil? and shake the rust off a bit ? what do folks do with their RV?s on these ?local flights??

Today, for example, I took off, and dialed in a nearby airport with an ILS ? in 8 minutes I was on top of the outer marker and flew the approach VFR (eyes out the window, glancing at the EFIS) to make sure that all the receivers and displays were still working, and that I remembered how to push all the buttons in the right order. Missed the approach, then headed up the coast ? did a couple of quick aileron rolls, realized it was bumpy, and climbed a couple thousand to get on top of the scattered layer. Did a loop, a couple more rolls, then headed down to circle over my little community ? we?re moving our fire station from our old building to a temporary home this weekend, and wanted to see if anyone was working.

Seeing that work was indeed being done, I headed back for the airport, shot two landings, and put the plane away, then headed to the fire station to help. (All this after working all night and sleeping the morning away, of course). So a typical local flight for me ? a little radio work, a little acro, a little sightseeing, and a couple of landings. I am usually alone, so I do what I want!

How about others ? what do YOU do when you?re just out to ?warm up the oil??

Paul
 
Not as exciting as an RV... But the usual 'hop around the patch' in the 150 includes taking off, flying over our farm, flying over a few other friend's farms, a loop around the (tiny) lake about 10 miles away, maybe touch&go at a local paved airport, climb up, maybe a few stalls, a couple spins, and back to the home airport for a few touch&go's. During football season in high school I would make a couple circles above the football field thinking about how my friends were working their butts off and I was in the sky having fun!
 
Here's what I did to put .5 on the Hobbs yesterday. Departed runway 18 for the 3 minute hop to the turf airpark where our EAA built the new chapter hangar. Parked the plane and checked on my old CFI who was doing an annual on a fabric covered Stinson taildragger. He showed me the new T/W link and pistol style grip for his RV8 project. We also talked about getting together to do my BFR next month in my -9 which he hasn't flown in yet. Also talked a little about learning the Polyfiber covering system which I will have to learn for my new project.
I departed and decided to overfly the new airpark where my wife and I bought an acre lot on the runway. Nope, no new homes started lately. Must be that economy thing everyone talks about.
Got back in to the pattern at my home field (PXE) calling my positions for 18 as the wind was from 210 at 8 according to AWOS. On base, a Bonanza anounced he was entering left downwind for 36. :eek: I repeated my intentions again for 18 and looked for him. He was waaaaay out there in one of them bomber patterns and was sticking to his plan so I stuck to mine and was taxiing back to the hangars as he landed.
Put my baby away and went home to celebrate 16 years of marriage with the "original" Catalina.

P.S: I usually like to put close to an hour in with each flight. I'll do that tomorrow when I make a wood run to ACS. :)
 
I just walked in the door from a local flight:D I usually over fly the house head west and circle some other airports to see if much is going on. I usually always do some slow flight stalls and of course a couple rolls:)
And best of all I enjoy cruising around enjoying being in the sky and depending on my mood either cruise around at 3000' and above at 180kts or at 1500' and 100kts burning 3.5-4 gph
 
I have been down now for about two weeks doing the annual and the nose gear SB (got the gear leg back today) and am starting to feel a little withdrawl. I know the first flight will be one of those short ones. I find it strange that I am almost always drawn to the north of the field, perhaps going back to my UL days when I wanted to avoid flying over trees. I usually sneak up toward Greensburg and watch the progress on the new Honda plant, look over a couple of nearby lakes and head back. Almost always shoot three landings. I usually cross-check instruments, fine tune the mixture to see how lean I can run at those low power settings and do some sort of precision practice.

I really would rather have a passenger along, especially a non-pilot. I thrive on the joy that first time (or low time anyway) people often exhibit. That to me is almost as much fun as flying the plane.

Bob Kelly
 
Reef

Although I'm in the desert, I live right next to an ancient sea reef. It starts about 3 miles from the airport. A great many of my flights, in times of moderate winds, involve that reef.

There is a lot of relief. The elevations go from around 3,300 feet near the airport, to about 8,600 feet. Additionally the reef is cut through with many many rugged canyons and is riddled with caves (many hundreds).

I have flown over the reef probably hundreds of times, but the lighting is different each time because of time of day and time of year. Although I am pretty familiar with the area, it is great fun to just look out and see what new things one might see. One might see a huge sinkhole not seen before, or a new cave, or an unknown spring or an old stagecoach road or ranch ruins from earlier days. Maybe I'll see that there is an expedition in Lechuguilla Cave and dip my wings at the scientists.

I also fly the nearby flatlands to see the gypsum karst; a couple of weeks ago I saw a nearby cenote that I had no idea existed. I visit the oasis springs that are on private lands and check out the old training bomb targets to see which ones are still visible. I fly the amazing black river that has aqua waters that flow then cease then reemerge again.

I check out the salt spring mining operations to see what unreal colors the bacteria in different brine concentrations are producing today.

I take a look at the old closed potash mines to see what buildings are standing and what ones have collapsed since last time.

I look at the cows and the range conditions. I check which farmer's fields are in the best condition.

I look at the petroleum drilling operations and grieve over the necessary scars they leave.

Once in a while I fly over the old Project Gnome atomic bomb test site to look at the crater left when the ground heaved then vented.

I also like to fly around at 120 knots at very low fuel burns.

Just wish I didn't have more fuel tank leaks to deal with this weekend. I miss it a lot.
 
Site See

I usually fly north to get out from under the 1700 ft ceiling of the STL Class B and fly along one of the rivers (Mississippi or Illinois) then head south to intersect the Missouri river and circle back around the Spirit airport's class D. Just like the sight seeing at 3000 ft and 170 kts.
 
STL AREA

Phil, Come on over to the east side of town. We have a couple of RV builders that could always use a little RV motivation.

3K6 STL Metro East Airport
 
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