It's a Blustery Year

Yep, it's that time of year again. Late fall is when the bluster is at its worst, although there are some years that are certainly worse than others. 2008 was horrible and 2012 will likely be far worse, but the campaign season of 2008 has been plenty bad enough. Oh, you thought I meant blustery weather? Well, we've had that too. I had hoped to give a ride to a co-worker last week but the 23G30 winds were clearly too much; we had to postpone. That's the kind of wind that I only land in if I'm returning from a trip and I'm met with conditions far worse than forecast. I can do it if I have to, but if I have a choice? Nope, I stay home.

Today was better, but not entirely perfect. We had a reported steady 9 knots from the northwest, but one look at the sky was enough to tell that there was probably more than that going on at altitude. It was clearly blowing pretty hard up in the flight levels where the jets ply their trade; you can always tell it's windy when the clouds look like they've been applied to the sky with a brush.  There's nothing wrong with a local hop with 9 knot winds, though. No reason to postpone this time, but I did suggest dressing warmly. It can be pretty chilly between the hangars when the wind forces its way between them and I knew we'd have to spend some time talking before getting into the plane.

The passenger, a future winner of the Caldecott Medal for her as-yet-unwritten children's book Everyone Knows a Dog Named Molly, asked if she could bring her family along with her in order to take some pictures of her daughter in the airplane. I could hardly refuse, what with some of my absolutely favorite pictures of Co-pilot Egg being those taken in one airplane or another. Egg, herself always eager to befriend younger kids, volunteered to brave the chill and go to the airport with us to help with the logistics of the photo taking.

She was quite happy in the plane until Egg tried putting headsets on her. That wasn't very popular at all!

To be fair, those ear cups are mighty cold when there's a chill in the air. I don't much like putting them on either!

While Egg was entertaining her guest, I did the preflight and explained a few of the things that I've learned to point out to passengers. Chief amongst those are things like:

1) The engine vibrates a lot more than what you're used to in a car and is quite loud. It also sometimes burbles when I throttle back to land.

2) I'm going to be pretty active on the rudder pedals during takeoff and landing. It's best if they're not being used as foot rests. This is especially important when it's windy.

3) And most importantly when flying with females: I will be reaching for the trim knob now and then, and any contact with your leg is purely incidental. In fact, I was thinking that one nice thing about the RV-12 will be that the trim is electric and actuated by a switch on the control panel, thus alleviating me of the concern that something might be misconstrued. My relief was short-lived, however, as I soon remembered that I'm going to have to brief the use of the crotch strap in the RV-12, something I don't have to do in the -6. That's going to require a level of delicacy that, simply put, I'm not exactly known for.

Not that it was an issue with Molly, but one of the benefits of explaining these kinds of things as we go through the process is to alleviate some of the nervousness someone might have when flying in a small plane for the first time. Confidence and competence, even if feigned, go along way towards calming jangled nerves. I remember one of my earliest flights in a small plane when I grew increasingly trepid as the pilot struggled to get the engine started. That's no problem with Papa, of course, since he always starts after pulling just one or two blades through. Such was the case today, although I just couldn't seem to keep the engine running after its normally easy start. I think it was the third or fourth time I had tried before I realized that I still had the mixture in idle cut-off. Oops! But, as I've always said, there are two people you never want to hear say "Oops!": pilots and brain surgeons. I put on my best meant-to-do-that voice and said, "Ah, I had it set a little lean."

Technically true, that, albeit in a somewhat Clintonian sense. It all depends on what the meaning of "a little lean" is.

Being early yet, we woke up the tower controller with our request to taxi but eventually managed to wrangle a clearance to runway 4 out of him. On the way out I explained that we'd have a left crosswind on takeoff which, combined with the normal right turning tendency from the torque of the engine, would ensure that there would be at least a few swerves as we accelerated down the runway. I also briefed my normal runway 4 takeoff method of accelerating to 120 knots over the runway before making a climbing turn-out towards the wide open farm fields just west of the airport. Doing it that way results in us being at 500' above the ground with best glide speed already showing on the airspeed indicator should anything happen that would require an un-powered, off-airport landing, but it's not the type of takeoff one would expect after hundreds of hours flying in airliners.

All went as planned and we were soon climbing towards the west. I had debated on the question of making my normal takeoff or foregoing that and climbing out straight ahead, the two choices pretty much differing mostly by how they would affect the passenger, but in the event my final decision to go with the more abrupt and potentially scary method was proven satisfactory by the gleeful laughing bubbling out from the right seat. That was a relief! If she enjoyed the takeoff, chances were that I wouldn't have to be ultra careful about banks and turns.

Once we got up to a safe altitude, I let her take the controls. My early impression proved correct. After just a few mild exploratory turns, she loosened up and rolled us into 30- to 40 degree banks quite readily. We were lucky to have a few scattered target clouds to play around with too. It's somewhat rare to have those bite-sized clouds lounging around at a convenient altitude, and when I do find them I like to play around with them a bit. As there was one just below and to the left of us and Molly was obviously getting more comfortable with controlling the plane, I had her put us in a descending left turn straight towards it. We brushed across the top of it at a good 175 mph. That's a great way for someone new to flying to see just how fast it is that we're going. It's hard to tell when you're a few thousand feet above the ground, but the close-up reference to a stationary cloud shows it very well.

She then flew us over another little cloud just behind the first and I took over as we zoomed on past it. I pulled us up into a left wing-over and dove back down towards the cloud we had just brushed over. After three or four of those, we had both had enough fun to last us the day. Which is to say, well, there was a little queasiness afoot. Pulling G's like that is an acquired taste and something you have to do pretty routinely to stay acclimated to it. She'd never done it, and I hadn't done it for a long time. It was time to move on to something more sedate.

I headed us back towards the east, the plan being to fly over The Ohio $tate University campus and downtown Columbus. Unfortunately we were over a pretty thick haze layer. While the sky was beautiful at 5,500', the view of campus and the downtown waterfront wasn't that great. I turned us back to the west and we descended back down towards Bolton. I called the tower as we crossed over Darby Dan and got the expected "report mid-field left downwind runway 4" in response.

As we crossed over my neighborhood, I made a continuous curving approach from downwind to final. We still had quite a bit of altitude, but with the throttle to idle and a good headwind component we had no problem losing the excess height by the time we reached the runway. I had covered my bases in preparation for a bad landing during the briefing, but it proved unnecessary. The touch down was smooth, and had it not been for a gust of wind that caused a little swerving and bouncing on the roll-out, it would have been a very good landing for a blustery 9 knot day.

There's no such thing as a routine flight

I'm not the first to say that there is no such thing as a routine flight, nor is it an idea that I've but recently pondered. It's just that it was proven to me again yesterday as I made a trip that I have made more often than any other, if I exclude shorter hops like MadCo and Urbana. I'll modify the criteria by defining "trip" as a flight upon which I spend more than an hour on the ground and actually leave the airport itself. I make plenty of those, but none as often as I make the trip to The Farm. If anything in my aerial repertoire could be counted as a routine flight, that would be it.

The last couple of times I've gone, though, I've dealt with events that are slightly out of the norm. The last time I went, I ended up using the Garmin 396 and its XM-based weather radar display feature to circumnavigate an inconveniently placed storm cloud. This trip too involved dealing with a little bit of weather, but it was much more widespread. We had 11,000' ceilings for most of the day, which were easy enough to stay underneath with adequate visibility, but they unfortunately also produced some light to moderate precipitation. There was nothing all that difficult about it, but it is a stark departure from the days when even a hint of green on the radar was enough to me to just decide to stay home.

This is what it looked like on the way home. Note the ground speed displayed on the GPS - that's with the engine throttled back to an economical 2,200 rpm. The trip from Bolton to The Farm was also at a 2,200 rpm setting, but resulted in only 115 knots across the ground. So yeah, it was a bit windy at altitude.

The more interesting event was on the trip out when I saved a minimum of two lives, one (and if I'm honest, the more important) being my own. As I was flying along at 3,500', my normal scan outside the cockpit detected another airplane that was headed on an almost parallel heading, but about 500' higher than me. I say almost parallel because he was slowly converging on me. I watched as he crossed almost directly over me from right to left. Given his obvious fixation on his course, no demonstrable effort to avoid me, and the fact that he was 500' above me, I assumed that he was on an IFR flight plan. This notion was reinforced by the fact that we were just northeast of Dayton International's Class C airspace and he was headed right at it.

I decided to keep an eye on him. As we continued to the west, I could see him a mile or two off to the south. I kept expecting him to start a descent into Dayton, but his altitude remained constant. He made a couple of steeply banked course corrections, something that would be abnormal in true IFR conditions, but we were still in good visual conditions so there would really be nothing precluding him from an aggressive correction. I kept glancing over every couple of minutes or so until about five minutes later when it appeared that he might be getting closer to me again. I increased the rate of my glances to every 30 seconds; it soon became abundantly apparent that he was, in fact, closing the gap between us. Eventually he got close enough that I had to take evasive action. I descended a few hundred feet to allow him to cross directly over me. He never knew I was there! Had I not kept watching for him, there is a very real chance that he would have flown right into me. How close was he? I could have easily read a one-inch high tail number if it had been painted on the bottom of the fuselage.

This is why we look out the window!!

While I was at The Farm, I stopped by my brother's place to see what he's working on. This time around, it was his new race car for next season. The Schmetterling sponsored ride has been stripped of its goodies and relegated to jack stands. Reportedly, the Schmetterling logo will be even larger on next year's car!

Simplifying the equation

Here's the equation that's been bothering me:

X + Y = ???,

      where X = Will This Airplane Fly and Y = Can I Fly This Airplane?

Granted, it's a year away at least, but it will have to happen eventually. There will inevitably come a day when I have to fly this thing, and it's apparently never to early to start worrying about it. I wouldn't call it butterflies in the stomach at this distant point, but pupae in the belly wouldn't be too far off the mark.

I simplified the equation today. There will still be worries over the fundamental airworthiness of the completed airplane, but at least I will know for a fact that I can fly it. Today I flew a little more than an hour in the left seat of an RV-12 and made a total of three takeoffs and landings. As a bonus, I also made a fourth landing approach and a go-around. For practice, like. Or so I would have you believe.

In what has to me one of the most masterfully created win-win deals of the young century, I offered to assist a sort-of local RV-12 owner with an introduction to the operation of his Garmin 496 GPS in exchange for a little more time riding around and getting familiar with the flying qualities of the -12. He flew up from Lancaster to pick me up at Bolton and while we were chatting on the ramp in front of the tower, he shifted over to the right side and offered me the Captain's position. Yowza!

Before we started the engine, he gave me a quick tour of the Dynon D-180 so I'd know where to look for interesting tidbits of trivia such as our altitude above the ground and our velocity through the cool fall air. Good stuff to know, those things. The increased level of complexity and sophistication over the more pedestrian mechanical equipment in my RV-6 was in stark contrast to the amazing simplicity of engine management. Time to start the engine? Fine, show me the mixture knob. What do you mean, "there isn't one?" How can that be? Okay, fine. Turn the key? Piece of cake. Whoa! I was expecting to click through left mag, right mag, both mags, and then into 'start'. The last thing I expected was to turn the key straight into 'start'. And wow, it sure does start easy, doesn't it?

Taxiing was a little odd too. Rather than the steerable tailwheel I'm used to, there's just a castering wheel out front. Pressing the rudder pedals has no effect whatsoever on steering. No problem, though. I adjusted right quickly to getting turns started with a little jab at the brakes and stopped with a little jab at the other brake. At the end of the runway, I received a briefing on how to perform the takeoff with the least amount of stress on the nose wheel. The idea was to hold the stick back as I fed power in, and not be surprised when the nose lifted almost right away. Once it did, I was to lessen the nose-up stick and let the nose kind of find its own level. The plane would fly away on its own when it was ready. It sounded a little complicated, but in the event it was quite simple. It was a good thing that I had been forewarned that it would feel like I was going to bounce the tail on the runway with the extreme feeling nose up attitude or I would have panicked and plopped the wheel right back down onto the runway.

I fed the throttle in slowly, but even still it was only a matter of a few hundred feet before we were climbing away from the runway. I have no numbers regarding climb performance to share, unfortunately. I sure that data was available on the display somewhere, but as with the rest of the performance data I found it much more difficult to deduce values from a simply glance like I can with my old clock face gauges. I can tell you this: it was slower than in the RV-6. I knew that would be the case going in, though. It was not a surprise.

I was ready for the light aileron forces, having experienced them in my previous ride, but this time around I realized that the -12 is actually lighter in aileron than the -6. It's actually what I would describe as nimble. As we were climbing away from Bolton, I spent a few minutes explaining how to enter a destination into the GPS. With MadCo firmly locked in, I also took the liberty of reconfiguring the GPS screen to what I consider to be a more useful page setup. I like to split the screen between the moving map and the HSI direction indicator. I think it's a more natural way to look at it for old school pilots.

As we approached MadCo, I became increasingly aware of one thing about the RV-12 that I don't like. More specifically, it's something about the Rotax engine. For some reason that I'm sure would make perfect sense to somebody like a trial lawyer, there is a very strong spring on the throttle that is perpetually trying to pull the throttle knob to the full throttle position. That's all well and good for those times when you want to blast around at full bore, but for the rest of the time it's a right bugger. You see, to keep the throttle from working its way forward, you have to lock the friction control on the throttle down as tight as it will go. That makes power changes somewhat of a struggle. Not knowing any better, I loosened the friction and pulled back the throttle for our descent into the landing pattern. Imagine my surprise when I noticed a couple of minutes later that we not only weren't descending, but weren't slowing down either. The throttle had returned to the higher power position of its own volition. I was to be mildly irked by this behavior for the rest of the flight.

We entered a left downwind to runway 27 and were confronted by the challenge of my first landing with a wind that was blowing directly from.... the west. Right down the runway. What could be easier! As I dropped the flaps (accomplished quite quickly in the -12 by virtue of a flap lever rather than the glacially slow electric flaps of my -6) I hardly noticed any nose down movement at all. Lowering the flaps in the -6 has a far more pronounced influence on the trim. In subsequent landings I would notice that there is a pitch trim change required when lowering the flaps in the -12, but it's minimal. What's far more noticeable is how much heavier the ailerons get when the flaps are down. I don't know if that's by design or just a lucky fluke, but it adds a nice feeling of stability in the landing pattern.

I came down final at 65 - 70 knots and entered the flare at 65 knots. I deliberately flew a much shallower glide path than I do in the -6, correctly thinking that the -12 probably wouldn't be able to lose altitude as quick and easily as I can in the -6. I found out later that while it doesn't come down quite as rapidly as the -6, it is still pretty capable of coming down when you need it to. As I flared over the runway, I was pleasantly surprised at how much more feel I had than in the -6. With the -12, I could move the stick quite a bit in pitch with minimal yet predictable changes in the landing attitude of the plane. The -6 is, in comparison, very twitchy in the flare. The least little movement has a tremendous affect on the attitude of the plane, and in consequence can cause all kinds of embarrassing bounces and oscillations. At the end of the day, it came down to this: I greased all three of my landings, at least on the Richter scale that I use for grading landings in the -6.

I mentioned a go-around earlier. After MadCo we headed over to Circleville to try a crosswind landing. Without the wind coming right down the runway to abate our ground speed, I ended up high and fast on short final. I punched in a bootful of right rudder and held the wings level with left aileron and we dropped down like a brick, but I still felt that an awful lot of runway was sliding behind us and the plane wasn't perceptibly slowing. Discretion being the better part of valor (and me not wanting to abuse the generosity of my host), I poured on the coal and took us around for another try. Better attuned to the weather conditions and the performance of the plane, I squeaked on the second attempt. Two for two, if you don't count the go-around. Call that one a mulligan.

By the time we got back to Bolton, I was completely comfortable in the airplane. While it will take time to adjust to a 110 knot cruise speed, I will quickly learn to love the 5 gallon per hour fuel flow. The benign flight qualities will please, but the bouncing around that comes with the light wing loading will take some adjustment. I was again surprised at how quiet and smooth the engine is and how comfortable the seats are. And the improvement over the already exemplary visibility of the RV-6 is amazing.

All in all, I can say in all honesty that the RV grin that I wore for the rest of the afternoon was well earned by that wonderful little airplane.

Miami University - Middletown Campus

I'm sure I'm not the first parent to go through this, nor will I be the last. I'm assured in my knowledge that I'm not the first because I put my parents through the same thing. When I was co-pilot Egg's age, I too had no idea where I wanted to go to college, or to be totally honest, whether I wanted to go at all. At that age it seems like you have done nothing but go to school; the prospect of even more doesn't really garner excitement. As with my father and me, I am the one pushing her to start planning for where she will matriculate next and what she wants to do with her life once forcibly ejected from the warm nest of public high school. When pressed, she vacillates between nursing, physical or mental therapy, and going pro on Facebook.

I think the latter is her preference.

I figure for at least the first two years of a four year program, there's not much difference between the core classes required for nursing or therapy. Anatomy, ethics, chemistry, and classes in managing third-party or government payers are foundational to both. With that in mind, I've been looking at nursing programs on her behalf. One of the locations I'm looking at is Miami University. To begin with, it satisfies the number one requirement: it's not THE Ohio $tate University. Egg has what I have taken to calling a Higher Education Donut Hole.  Much as with the "donut hole" more commonly referred to in reference to the Medicare Part D program, it refers to areas where coverage is available. It's actually an inverse donut hole: she has to go somewhere outside of Columbus but inside Ohio. Note that when I say "has to" that it's just like when I say she "has to" help mow the lawn; it by no means conveys any type of actual authority on my part to enforce such a command.

Anyway...

I flew out and visited the Miami University campus in Oxford Ohio last year and found it to be quite pleasant. Very collegiate, architecturally appropriate, and a few nice restaurants. I was more or less sold on the idea but further research showed that the nursing program is only offered at two regional campuses, one of which is in Middletown. I initially balked at that idea, thinking that there was no way we would pay that level of tuition only to have her attending classes miles from the town of Oxford. Once I looked a little further into it, though, I discovered that the tuition is commensurately lower at the regional campus.

Well then. Now you're talking my language!

Parallel to my thinking that I'd visit the campus this weekend, I was also trying to track down an outfit that offers dual instruction in a Stearman. Having lunched with Dr. Stan last week and gotten the idea into my head that I'd like to fly one at some point, I poked around on the internet for awhile trying to see where I'd have to go and what I'd have to pay to try it out.

At first it looked like I'd have to travel as far as Florida or Maryland and pay over $300 an hour for the experience (and that's not happening!!) but I eventually came across a link to Red Stewart airport. They have a Stearman that they offer dual in for around $200 an hour, including the instructor. Better yet, I could get a shorter ride for $80. That seemed perfect! Now I've been around the internet long enough to know that while web pages may last forever, the things offered on them may not. I first had to verify that they still had the Stearman. I happen to know of a flying blogger that does all of his flying out of Red Stewart and figured that surely he would have mentioned that Stearman at some point on his blog if it was still there. He had, and it is.

Red Stewart Airport is close to Middletown, so I thought I could combine a trip to Red Stewart for a flight in the Stearman with the flight to Middletown to visit the campus. Unfortunately, I had waited too long. When I called to book my flight in the Stearman, I was informed that the schedule was already full. Not to worry - they told me that they will fly on any day when the temps are over 45 degrees. I still have time to get it done.

Without the Red Stewart stop, I was able to fly direct to Middletown. That meant that I could take a flying buddy with me. There'd be a lot of walking (Google maps reported a walking distance of 2.2 miles each way from the airport to the campus) but I knew just the guy that would be thrilled to take a walk that long.

Middletown is southwest of Columbus, and our route took us directly over KilKare raceway where my brother races his Nascar Modified.

It was perfect flying weather. High pressure and reasonably low temperatures make the engine and the wings happy, and the clear, smooth skies and calm air make the pilot happy. These conditions are perfect for flying, but they do present a challenge. With no wind to speak of, uncontrolled airports become difficult to operate in and out of because there is no clear deciding factor regarding which runway to use. That, and they bring out a lot of traffic.

To make matters worse, Middletown is in a region that I don't much like flying through anyway; there are quite a few airports in the area, both large and small. Traffic becomes a big issue in that area no matter what the weather. Middletown also presents its own unique challenge in that they use left traffic for runway 5, but right traffic for runway 23. What that means is that pilots flying the right downwind for 23 are on the same side of the airport and heading directly at pilots flying the left downwind for runway 5. With the winds being reported as "calm," there is a very real risk of a head on collision on downwind if two pilots choose differently on the question of which runway is preferred.

And if that's not enough, there is a high-end sky diving outfit that operates there. They're up and down all day in a pair of Cessna Caravans, dropping jumpers right on the middle of the airport. The end result of all this is that Cabot and I would have to be on the lookout for large jets, airplanes headed right at us on downwind (and, by extension, on the runway), and falling human bodies. Wow! That's a lot of responsibility for a nine month old puppy!

As we were approaching the airport a twin Cessna reported something or the other having to do with runway 23, which was concerning given that we were entering the downwind to runway 5. The Unicom was a nightmare of the high pitched squeals of two radios transmitting at once and a long-winded individual telling his life's story as he worked his way laboriously through a landing at Blue Ash, so the second half of the Cessna's transmission was lost to me.  I tried to get the guy to answer my "What did you say???" calls, but he was oblivious. It all worked out and the landing was uneventful other than being a bit bouncy.

I blame Cabot. He stares at me. It's discomfiting.

 Just after we landed, some of the parachuters did too.

The walk to the campus had been planned for me by Google Maps, which has a "find a way for me to get there by foot" function.

I had used the Google StreetView feature to determine that there were sidewalks the entire way. I've often found that what looked like an easy walk on the map is anything but because it ends up being on a narrow, busy road with no sidewalks. This walk was 90% through residential neighborhoods. Cabot was very well behaved on the leash.

As we walked, I evaluated the neighborhood as a place for Egg to live. The regional campus does not have dorms; if she elected to go to school there, she would have to have a place to live. That might work out well; I saw this well-groomed house for sale.

They're asking $82,500 for it. Buy it with a 20% downpayment on a 30 year fixed and the payment is $350 per month, plus insurance and the like. A roommate could halve that cost. Four years down the road, sell it. Would that be cheaper that living in an apartment or a dorm at some other school? Maybe. It seemed worth thinking about, and that's exactly what I was doing until I was distracted by this sign.

Really?? "Your juvenile judge?" We haven't got enough juveniles in government already?

It was a pretty long walk, so it came as a great relief when I finally saw this sign. Cabot was equally thrilled when I read it to him.

The walk was up a fairly steep hill at that time, and at the crest of the hill we found our goal.

Our climb up the hill was wasted; the campus road heads right back down. The first sign of being on a campus was this statue.

How was that statue an indication that we were on a college campus? Easy, it was there because the subject was a rich man that gave huge amounts of money and/or land to the university. Had we been in a public park, it would have been a politician that had done the same, albeit with someone else's money.

We worked our way down the hill and past the university buildings.

When we reached the bottom of the hill, I realized two things. First, in twenty-first century America our civilization has advanced to the degree that we no longer provide publicly-accessible water fountains. Cabot was panting up a storm and seemed very, very thirsty. I had brought a plastic bag with me to fill with water to give him a drink, but had come across no source of water. My second realization was that we had reached a dead end.

The prospect of retracing our steps to the top of the hill was not pleasant. I decided to keep going on a gravel path that continued on past the end of the paved road and see if it looped back around to where we had come it. Luckily, by doing so I discovered water!

I ran some water into the bag for Cabot to drink from, but he refused to do it. Nothing but tap water will do for him, I suppose.

Elitist.

We kept going and soon found a trail that looked like it headed back up to the road we had climbed earlier.

It did, and a little more than half an hour later we were back at the airport. I had packed a fabric fold-up water bowl for Cabot and a bottle of tap water to pour into it. He was much more receptive of that! Spoiled rotten, I figure.

Oh, and I was taunted about my failure to get a ride in a Stearman. For the second time in as many weeks, I was sharing the ramp with one.

He didn't share the panache that Dr. Stan had. Somehow blue hearing protectors just aren't the same as a leather helmet and jacket. Still, it sure looks like fun!

Cabot was one tired puppy, but he stayed awake long enough to enjoy the flight home.

Once we got home, though, there was only one place he wanted to be.

I soon joined him.

Kacy J's

The MERFI fly-in was this weekend over in Urbana. I went last year, but this year I decided to find something else to do. I'm getting more and more afraid of things that I used to do without a second thought, much like Brave Sir Hogarth is as he too advances in age. For him, the new thing is the child gate that we've been using to restrict the movements of the as yet not-proven-worthy-of-trust Puppy Cabot. Hogarth won't go near it. For me, it's large groups of planes converging on uncontrolled airports. Besides that, there's very little there to attract me. Last year it was nice to go over and meet the guy that built my airplane, and this year it would have been fun to visit Lynda at her Girls With Wings booth, but it's getting late in the year and I still had not made it to Kacy J's, the new restaurant at the airport in Muncie, Indiana.

I think the original attempt at Kacy J's was back at the beginning of summer on or around Fathers Day. I was going to land at KVES (Darke Co. - Versailles airport) and pick up my dad for a ride over to Muncie. Airport restaurants have come and gone at Muncie, and the most recently departed of the bunch didn't have a very good reputation, but word-of-mouth had it that the new establishment, Kacy J's, was worth the trip. A perusal of their online menu showed that there was something there that would be worth the trip: the Indiana Classic,their name for a breaded pork tenderloin sandwich. I'm not sure where I heard it (maybe Man Vs. Food, a ridiculous but surprisingly enjoyable show on the Travel Channel) , but the pork tenderloin sandwich is reportedly an Indiana specialty and I wanted to try one.

The first trip fell through when my preflight planning showed that the Darke Co. airport was closed. A few weeks later after Darke Co. was re-opened and I wanted to try again, Muncie was closed to all traffic except helicopters.  One thing led to another and before I knew it was counting the days until the end of the traditional flying season. As it is, today was plan B. I had hoped to fly out on Saturday but the final weather forecast check in the morning showed the strong possibility of rain and low ceilings. Today was better, although the wind was expected to pick up to as high as 15 knots in the afternoon. I'll fly with a forecast for 15 knot winds, but it's right on my borderline. Had the prediction been 15 gusting to anything, I would have probably canceled again.

The flight out to KVES was okay, but it was already starting to get bumpy. I could tell that it wasn't going to be smooth sailing coming back later in the day - it was only going to get worse. It was the kind of bumpy you get when the sun heating the farm fields and causing updrafts combines with the turmoil of wind-addled air to make it hard to even press buttons and turn knobs on the avionics. You reach for a button just as you hit a bump in the air and your hand goes shooting off in unpredictable directions. It is precisely that type of air that has convinced me that I will never give up my avionics that have real buttons in favor of the ill-advised move to touch screens. No, no, no, NO! I will NOT GO!

I tuned into 122.7 as I flew south of Urbana and mentally patted myself on the back for deciding not to get into that mess. There were no less than five planes trying to sort themselves into a reasonable line for the left downwind when some yahoo called that he was planning a straight in approach.  Good luck with that, fella. That's rude on a normal Urbana breakfast Sunday. You gotta be kidding if you think that's going to fly during a high attendance event like MERFI. I didn't hang around on frequency long enough to see how that turned out - I wanted to get over to Darke Co's ASOS and see what the winds were doing. 320 at 7. Not bad at all! I made a pretty decent landing, although I didn't get stopped as short as I'd have liked to and rolled about 10 feet past the first taxiway. A quick 180 on the runway fixed that.

I wanted to get out and stretch a little bit before jumping right back into the plane for the short 40 mile hop over the Muncie. While I was out walking around, I came across the coolest canopy cover I've ever seen.

While I was taking pictures of the Piper, my dad was approached by one of the uniformed pilots of the big Cessna Citation 7 I had parked next to. He was looking for someplace to get some coffee and donuts for his expected passengers. Unfortunately he hadn't realized that KVES is a very rural airport and there's not much of anything nearby. In fact, that Citation was the largest jet I've ever seen there. The past competition was small for that honor though, as I don't think I have ever seen a jet there. As he wandered off to find the airport manager, my dad told me that the corporate pilot had asked what kind of plane I was flying, and suggested that he thought it might be a trainer of some sort. As if!! I explained to my dad that it's not uncommon for the guys that fly business and commercial jets to not know much about the smaller planes you'll find out in the boonies. They live and fly in a very different world. I think, though, that at least some level they envy us for our type of flying as much as we envy them for theirs. The grass? It's always greener, isn't it?

The ride over to Muncie was all too short. Before I knew it we were dialing in the ATIS and learning that the moderate winds were pointed right down runway 32. As we were approaching from the east, I figured we'd either get cleared for a pattern entry into a right base for runway 32 or into a right downwind for the same runway. I was hoping for the right base entry so we wouldn't have to fly up north to meet with the midfield downwind or, I suppose, try to negotiate for the entry I wanted. Muncie Tower responded as I had hoped and we were cleared to enter on the right base. Just before we got to the pattern, I heard another plane being cleared to land. It was a Stearman. That was lucky - I thought my dad would be interested in seeing a venerable old workhorse like that. And an actual trainer, no less! Albeit a trainer for WWII military pilots.

The landing was accomplished with no more that a light bounce and a gentle scuffing of the tires on the wide, wide runway. I easily made the first turn off to the ramp. And there it was: the beautiful Stearman was right there in front of the restaurant. I parked nearby.

My dad wanted to go take a look at it but seemed wary. I told him to go on over - other pilots are usually fine with people walking around and looking at their planes as long as there are no hands or feet involved. Look, but don't touch. They aren't Braille, after all. You can see just fine without climbing all over them or smearing your hands all over the canopy trying to look inside. Can you tell I have a little experience with this? It's another of the reasons I don't do many fly-ins anymore.

Note the lack of a GPS. I think he was flying via pilotage and a sectional chart: old school!

While I was doing my best to act as a Stearman tour guide, the owner/pilot returned. He was working his way back from someplace down south back up to his home in Wisconsin. That's a pretty long trip in a Stearman! He mentioned over lunch that he usually takes his T-6 (!!!) on the longer trips. A Stearman and a T-6? Wow!  As I've always said, when it comes to airplanes you need at least two but no more than five. I often entertain myself on my long drive to and from work trying to decide what my five would be, and a Stearman or a T-6 always make the list. I probably wouldn't do one of each, though. I can tell you this: it would be mighty hard to decide between the two! I love them both.

We headed into the restaurant where we were greeted by the owner(?)/manager. The place was not at all crowded which came as something of a surprise to me. Muncie has a huge GA ramp, big runways, a friendly tower, and very little traffic. It seems perfect for a weekend lunch stop, but there was hardly anyone there. It makes me wonder if they're having trouble getting the word out that there's a new restaurant there and that it's not affiliated with the former place that had gotten such a bad reputation. It's clearly a pilot-friendly outfit - just look at the decorations:

The owner(?)/manager was particularly proud of the light on this corner table. The airport had recently replaced their runway lights with LED models and he was able to get ahold of one of the old lights. He had to find a fixture for it and step the voltage down from what it was expecting (3000 volts, I think he said), and his first choice of bulb, a 100 watt halogen, was far too bright, but he finally got it working. I wish I had thought to ask him if he could build another for me!

As we were working our way through our Indiana Classics (which, by the way, were every bit as enjoyable as the conversation with Dr. Stan)...

...  another military retiree landed.

That one is a T-34 Mentor.

Dr. Stan hasn't got one of those.

Yet.

Awww, come on. I'm allowed to be just a little bit jealous, aren't I?

Kidding aside, I'll bet he's tempted. They're wonderful airplanes, despite their AD history. Use them appropriately and they're fine.

After lunch we headed to our respective planes. I suggested to my dad that we stick around long enough to hear the Stearman's engine start. They make a wonderful sound and I can't get enough of them. They kind of stumble into life, as opposed to the immediate blast of noise from something like my Lycoming. The restaurant owner(?)/manager, himself a pilot and owner of two airplanes (what is it with these guys???!? I had no idea that I wasn't alone in my "at least two" thinking, Harrison Ford notwithstanding) apparently agreed since he too came out for the show.

By the time we hopped into Papa for the short flight back to KVES, the wind had whipped itself into the type of frenzy normally associated with Puppy Cabot when he hears bacon coming out of the fridge. If the flight to Muncie had seemed short, the flight back was going to be no more than a chip shot. The ASOS at KVES unemotionally shared the bad news: winds were 320 at 15 gusting 18. That was going to be a treat! We hit the left downwind with 120 knots showing on the speedo, but 145 showing on the GPS. Nothing for it but to man up and work my way through it. It actually didn't turn out too badly, although I must have looked like I was simultaneously trying to churn butter and squash grapes while I wrestled our way through the landing flare and touchdown. One decent bounce and a lot of aileron and rudder work had us down and rolling on the runway, but there was no hope of making the first turn off this time.

I didn't mind. I was just happy to have it over with.

The trip back to Bolton was equally brief, at least relative to the normal ride. I was cruising at an indicated 140 knots, but the GPS was showing 168 knots across the ground. As I called Bolton Tower over Lilly Chapel (a reporting point 8 miles west of the airport), I was again showing 120 on the airspeed and 145 on the GPS. Now I've heard a lot of real whoppers this year ("It'll bend the cost curve down." and "Gee Dad, I don't know how that dent got in my car." and "He'll calm down once he's neutered.") but none of them hold a candle to this:

"Four six six papa golf, report two mile left base runway four, winds three zero zero at five."

Five? As in five knots?? Are you serious??? When I'm doing 145 knots across the ground and showing 120 knots on the speedometer, there is no way I'm facing 5 knot winds on the runway. It had to be at least 12 to 14 knots.

It was. Gusty, too. But again, it wasn't a horrible landing. Practice seems to be helping!

There was quite a bit of clean up to do in the hangar. It's late in the summer and the bugs are fat. I think the updrafts help to carry them up high enough for me to hit them, too. There were at least three smears on the windshield that had to come from bugs close to the size of sparrows. I wonder what happens when a bug like that hits an open cockpit Stearman. I shudder to think....