Hank

We're leaving early Friday morning for a long, long 60-minute flight. Want to arrive in time for an IPC with a real Mooney instructor. I'm still legal, but am getting rusty . . . see ya'll soon!

These were definitely "vintage" 172/182s. Didn't know they've upgraded to wet wings. The day is not wasted, I've learned something in just half of it.

my friends with leaky Cessna tanks just remove the aluminum tank from the wing, wash it out really good and have it welded up. That's not an option for us; I flew to Florida and had mine resealed, flying roundtrip from Ft. Lauderdale home while it was being done.

I put little Teflon washers from Spruce under all screws that I remove at annual, including those in my polished spinner. Never had a problem getting any out. I'll give you some Fri or Sat, I keep some in the plane. Seems they come in bags of 100 for just a couple of bucks.

the back seat in my 1970 C folds down, left side, right side or both sides. They lean forward but don't lay flat u less I remove the (one piece) seat bottom. Much better than not leaning forward at all.

There's something to be said for being wet . . . (yes, I've resealed my tanks.)

Since you only gave directions of the wind and the other runway, I would also lean to wind shift. When it's twitchy, I'll rotate at 75 mph instead of my normal 70, but still get stall chirps while climbing out through 80 mph. also, just like landing in strong gusty winds recommends flap reduction, so does taking off in similar conditions.

I think the new cowl give the same MP as running with Ram Air Open, but without bringing in unfiltered air. I'm all about more power! Then again, I fixed some induction losses at annual in Jan and have picked up 12 mph in cruise. I'd love to get some more speed for free.

I have Flite Custom main tires and a Condor nose tire, all with Air $top tube$. Love how the tubes work! Ruled out Flight Custom III as the only difference I could see was the speed rating [equal to my cruise speed] and the much higher price. In eight years, I've replaced the nose tire twice, and the mains once [in Dec '13]. Nose tires seem to last about six years; I'll see how this one does, it went on a year before the mains.

Prices are on his website. Going from memory, the kit for my C is about 3 AMU; installation should run about 40 hours. He has quotes for installation at his place, and travel rates to do it at yours. Not a bad deal!

those are the infamous pants, aren't they? Not sure I recognize the. Since The Mrs. gave them a good washing.

Sounds like my recent problems. Reset timing, worked well for a brief while. Then bad idle, L mag drop ~200 at runup; I tried to burn off the plugs and it coughed, spit and had small backfires so I backed off and put her away. Next step was clean and check all plugs and harness, all good. Then pulled L mag and sent to Kelly. Reinstalled, retimed, ran beautiful on L mag and bad on right. Pulled all plugs again, retested, put 'em back in, R mag good, L mag 200 rpm drop! Replaced all plugs, no problems since. Now I have eight plugs in the hangar, of which seven are good, but neither I nor the FBO have a bomb tester to check them and find the bad one. good luck solving your problems. I would start with the plugs. As I found out, resistance checking plugs and continuity testing in the harness isn't enough, you need a bomb tester for the plugs. If that doesn't fix it, you're looking at a magneto issue. OH runs about $500 each . . .

Byron, there are five "stations" in Auburn, AL, out behind the mall. Just a leisurely ten to fifteen minute drive from the interstate where you will be passing through. So your "fuel stop" here will be an hour. I have many choices right along the interstate and will be gone again in five minutes. Happy recharging. My parents are about 450 miles from here, don't really want to stop for an hour right before I get there . . . And firing up the computer to look for charging stations enroute and programming them into my GPS every time I go anywhere isn't my idea of fun, either. But the Teslas look like fun little toys! I'll get to the beach in NC in one day, you'll be spending the night somewhere near a plugin standing in the middle of a parking lot.

Drive 200 miles, stop for a half hour, doesn't sound attractive. Especially when there are so few supercharging stations available across the country. May be a good commuter, back and forth to work and the grocery store, but you'll need a real vehicle to travel more than about 80-100 miles from home. meanwhile, I'll be watching to see whether VW actually pays the fine, or if they negotiate it down to nearly nothing.

and here I thought S stood for, "S#&@!! Put the gear down!"

Went one county over from home, two counties over from the hangar, for a Surprise! birthday party at the airport. The evening flight home was beautiful. My wife took these photos looking behind us, while I maneuvered to get the required views.

How do you charge it up to make a 500 mile trip to see family? Our planes do not have 100% dispatch rate.

Jose,mthe fine is not for the pollution, it's for stating publicly that they meet pollution standards to avoid paying penalties, when in fact they did not. Like speeders on the highway, they rolled the dice and lost. Don't do the crime if you can't do the time. Pay the fine . . . I drive a 2004 Ford Ranger, inherited from my father in law. The best thing about it is that Ford didn't build it, they just swapped out the Mazda insignia. It hauls a load well, pulls heavily loaded trailers well, but the list of shortcomings and design misses is quite lengthy. Having owned two Hondas, an Infinity and a Jaguar, I readily admit that I am not their target demographic. But I needed a truck, this one was available, and Mom in law can't drive a stick (but her daughter can).

I don't want a smelly, noisy diesel that uses smelly, greasy, expensive fuel, regardless of what badge is on the grill. at least here in Alabama, they don't need to be plugged in to crank in the winter, but I still don't want one. Electric isn't a real option, either, it will take three days with two overnight charges to drive to see family in NC.

some of us don't bother with disabling it, and just turn the yoke anyway. I fly with the Brittain heading bug most of the time when going places, but leave it off when just farting around or practicing approaches / maneuvers.

Aaron, I've worked in several manufacturing operations that didn't have floor drains. Actually, I'm working in my fourth factory, none have/had floor drains. We used mops. Where I am now is mostly one large open building, call it 150 yards or so long, not as wide. There are several small, room-sized structures inside it, and some one-story offices at one end. We also mop the floors. Is it really so bad? what do you produce? I've been in medical manufacturing for a long time, but have now returned to my roots in commercial manufacturing. Working for the OEM is nice.

i found this to be very true, in just minutes . . . A few talks with the previous owner, one flight, and I was writing a rather large check and talking to an insurance broker. hooe to see you at the Summit, Big Air!

West Virginia University caught the German engineers with their pants down!! Ha ha! I'd say something positive about the Mountainers (almost all of my in laws have gone there the last three generations), except I earned my Masters across the state at Marshall.

neither would be welcome companions for the year-long return trip!

VW rigged the software to run cleanly for the tests, then on the road to run with more power. Pollution control reduces the available engine power, like an artificial high DA. People don't want to struggle uphill, and to be able to pass other slower vehicles. VW diesels tend to be small for fuel efficiency, and as Big Daddy Garlits said when I was a little boy, "there's no replacement for displacement." This was before much pollution control, too. Increase engine size, mileage goes down, so VW opted to increase their power output by disabling pollution control devices. no,mthe fine won't clean up 10 years of VW pollution all over the world, but there must be a significant penalty for flagrant, willful, long term violation of the rules, or it will happen again and again.