Getting my fix...

Finally made it back in the air after a 4 week hiatus... this morning was looking pretty grim, with every other line on the weather reports including CB's, aka Cumulonimbus aka Thunderstorms :-/

Not really a big deal, as I went to a poker night last night and was not feeling too pleasant this morning anyway ;-)

Instead, I went for some Helifun with Nick in his R44... My first time ever in a 'moving' helicopter... my verdict? they move funny... probably not helped by my feeling so shifty! Was very good fun, and hopefully we will go play up in the bush sometime in the future and see some of the more 'interesting' landing spots.

Following that, I was thinking about calling it quits and coming home, when CFI Rob asked me if I would mind whipping up a couple of logbook sticker templates in Word. By the time, I had finished, and had visited the local and legendary bakery (Calum's) for lunch, the sky was looking quite blue.

So I decided to go for a flight to blow out the cobwebs... I had been planning on taking JBL to help get the hours off, when I found out that it was already able to do circuits, having just had its 25Hr check. So I decided to take LMA, as it had not flown for a month!

Glad I did, it is such a smooth aircraft, with lots of grunt and just handles so well. I took Nathan (the club captain) for a quick city scenic, and around Waiheke...

The arrival back at the airfield was interesting, after I called joining long final, UNICOM informed that I might like to try joining non-traffic side, as they had around 9 or 10 aircraft in the circuit! Glad I decided to take their advice, it was an absolute log jam! Luckily, I managed to slot into a nice big gap in the stream without any drama's.

Another 1.2 for the logbook... and my addiction fed for another week ;-)


This flight: 1.2 PinC
Total Hours: 127.2 (78.9/37.7 Day, 4.9/5.7 Night, 5.1 IFR)

Nothing to see here, please move along...

*sigh*... I hate winter... Actually that is untrue, I hate bad weather :(

3 weeks and I am starting to get itchy... Have spent the last couple of weekends in Hamilton with Trevor. First one was in the Sim, I am actually picking up a bit of the instrument flying stuff and can follow along quite well.


This weekend just gone, we actually got airbourne in FWS. Massive frontal system was moving in from the North-East, so the planned trip to Tauranga and Rotorua was out, so he decided to just bash the Hamilton approaches. This was the view climbing out from Runway 36.





For someone who, as an instructor, does not actually do a lot of hands-on flying, I thought he did great. Notice the perfect (climbing) Rate-1 turn! Very smooth... I actually thought the auto-pilot was flying... but turns out he did not even use it!




Top Down view of NZHN... looks quite small really, but they put 737's in here. At least, they did, before Air New Zealand shut down Freedom Air. Believe it or not, but the small area on the right is the commercial terminal building. All of the stuff on the left is the Aeroclub, CTC, maintenance hangers etc.





Glad someone can "see"... This, ladies and gentlemen, is the reason people get instrument ratings! Unfortunately, Instrument Meteorological Conditions are not very conducive to photography... and neither is the Blackberry Curve 8310! ;)



I also got a chance to compare my in-ear homemade headset to my normal headset and deduced that it it indeed quieter... not a staggering amount, but once you factor in the comfort value of not having your head in a giant vice and getting hot, sweaty ears, I can definitely see the value in it! :) Now I just need to decide if I want to drop some $$$ on an ANR headset.

Given that I have not been flying for 3 weeks, I can probably afford it now! :P

Diversions and a different perspective

Woke up this morning and figured that flying today could be a bit problematic weather-wise, given that I could barely see my back fence through the fog!

Was hoping that it would burn off while I pre-flighted, had breakfast, did the flight planning etc. It was starting to burn off quite nicely around Ardmore by the time Nick and I had had breakfast at the aeroclub cafe, so the plan was to fly to Taupo (NZAP), Rotorua (NZRO), Thames (NZTH) and back to Ardmore.

I gathered all the weather and did the flight planning. The forecasts at the various locations were all for early morning fog that was due to have disappeared by around 11am.

So we gassed up JBL and headed out. On take-off we discovered the cloud base was only around 1500' through the Hunua Valley but it appeared to clear over the training area. Unfortunately, this only lasted until just north of Hamilton. When the tower asked if we wanted 'Special VFR' when we requested a clearance to transit their zone, we knew it was pretty much over :(

We decided to divert towards Tauranga, as it looked relatively clear over towards Matamata. As we flew up the valley it appeared that the cloudbase was down towards 800'... so we headed back up past Lake Waikare and out into the Firth of Thames. Here the cloudbase was well up over 1000' and we could see all the way across to Thames and the Coromandel. So I called Christchurch Information, amended my flight plan to Thames and then onwards to Ardmore and extended my SARTIME out by a half hour.

I flew over to Thames, made a missed approach and then a Touch and Go and then headed back to Ardmore.

1.7 hours of PinC, a new airfield and some valuable lessons learned... like call the airfields where you are planning on going and get some 'on the spot' weather rather than relying on forecasts.

After debriefing with Trevor and discussing decisions made etc. CFI Rob called wanting to know if I would like to get some paid for flying tomorrow. All I had to do was fly a guy around over by Glenbrook and Waiuku following a steam train so he could video it. I was happy to go, but Rob then realised that I would need to do it from the right hand seat as they wanted video of the left hand side of the train. Flying from the right hand seat is a bit different and Rob was not sure whether or not it would be a good idea. I said that I was more than happy to go and do some flying with Trevor then to prove competency. Rob agreed but noted that I would need to pay for that which I was happy to.

All I can say is that it is a very different experience flying from the right hand seat! Left hand on throttle, right hand on the control yoke is very interesting, as my brain has become used to the opposite... so on a couple of occasions I found that when I was needing to push the throttle in, my right hand was still reacting and pushing the control yoke in!

Also, the parallax error on the instruments like the AH and Turn Co-ordinator have to be taken into account... on the positive side, I was always at the targeted RPM, as that Tacho is right in front of you on that side!

The end result being that, weather permitting, I am going train spotting tomorrow :)


This flight: 1.7 PinC + 0.8 Dual
Total Hours: 126.0 (78.9/36.5 Day, 4.9/5.7 Night, 5.1 IFR)