Catching Up

I've got a lot to catch up on and we're getting ready to head to breakfast, so we'll see if I can still get internet later to finish up. This computer has a problem with its "T's", so if I have weird words, you'll know why.

John R took me and a fellow named Ed W. out to Tulsa, Oklahoma in the Bonanza, and we dodged weather all the way there.  He turned around and came home, and had a worse time getting home.  He said "It was bad, Momma!"  So now I owe him for taking us out there.  :)

Ed and I looked at his new Harvard MK IV (Canadian T-6).  It looked good, in good shape, so he agreed to finalize the purchase, and wanted me to do the test flight at 6 am the next morning.  The current owner said "The money hasn't changed hands yet, even though it's in escrow. What if she balls it up on the test flight before the money can transfer?"  Ed said "The money is yours now no matter what."  The guy wanted proof, kept talking about me putting it on its back or balling it up.  Once he turned to me and said "I'm sure you're a fine pilot, I'm just saying."  Ha.  I told him he was starting to make me paranoid about it.  ;)  I don't blame him for sure, it's a lot of money.  So they got the broker on the phone late at night who agreed that the deal was done and no matter what he got the money, even if I wrecked it.  Thanks for the confidence, y'all.  ;)

Up at 5 am the next morning, actually I woke up at 1:30 am and couldn't get back to sleep, but moving at 5 am was not fun.  We get out there at 6 am and get the plane pulled out.  I do a preflight, and he says it's full of oil and gas.  It's full of gas but it's below 7 gallons on oil, so I request another gallon.  Put it in myself. Clean off the windshield.  Note that the struts are low.  Pull the prop through by myself, climb in and look around for a minute to find everything.  He asks if I'm familiar with the energizer kind of starting.  I've never had one like that, but I've heard about it and am familiar with the concept, so I just say yes.  Then I ask him questions.  Which one is the PTT swich?  He doesn't know.  Is it a hot intercom?  No idea.  How much prime does this one like to start?  He doesn't know.  He never flew it, ever, which is why he's selling it.  I said "Don't worry about it, I'll figure it out."  I got it fired up on the first try, which was a nice confidence booster for them, taxied out, took off and flew it around for a few before coming in for two full stop takeoffs and landings.  Came back in, swung it around, shut it down, said "It looks good", and test flight was over.   No balling up, thank you very much.

We finished the deal, topped it back off with fuel, and then Ed and I flew it to Rolla Vichy, MO for our first fuel stop.  It took more fuel than expected even leaned out, so I made a note to do a more aggressive leaning for the last leg.  We took off out of Rolla, turned on course, I looked down, and the left fuel cap came off and was bouncing around on the chain on the wing.  So we swung around and made it a base to final and landed back on the ground.  The cap had been fully on, but it didn't have a strong "locking" detent.  We touched down, and the guys worked on the cap, putting some duct tape on the inside of the seal to build it up a little so it would stay tight.  Which it did.  We took back off, but now we had eaten into our fuel reserves, so I spent the next two plus hours of flight time calculating and recalculating fuel burn, time, distance, with a watch and staring at the fuel gauges, just like old times.  The heat index was over 110 degrees.  It was scorching hot both in Oklahoma and in Indiana.  And in the air.  I couldn't leave the canopy wide open or I couldn't hear, but I did have it cracked.  But the heat coming from the airplane, along with the heat coming from the, well, sun, it was FIERCE.   I was exhausted by the end of that day, especially after waking up at 1:30 and getting up at 5 am.  Just coffee and a blueberry muffin to eat all day, in super high humidity and temps.  Fortunately my head stayed okay, but when we landed we'd originally said we'd do training, but after we ate, we just wanted to go home.  So we did.  ;)

I met back up with Ed at 8 am the next morning, and we went over some ground school stuff, and then flew for 1.5 doing takeoffs and landings, as the ceilings were too low to do air work.  By the time he was done, I was feeling pretty good about him on it, and so was he.  So even though we hadn't done the stalls and such yet, he went off solo and flew his plane home.  When I get back from Oshkosh, we'll go up and do the airwork, stalls, etc. so he can see how that goes.  But all in all, another successful T-6 checkout in the books.  I think that makes the 9th T-6 I've flown, and a new model.  I'd never flown a Canadian Harvard before.  It has the backwards mixture (bah), a round stick (supposedly so if you get your hand shot off in war, you can stick your stump in there and still control the plane. Isn't that lovely?  ;)) and a few other odd things, but it was still just another T-6.  I enjoyed flying something new.  That makes it...T-6D, T-6G, SNJ-2, SNJ-5, Harvard IV, and...one more.  SNJ-4 I think.  :)

Leaving him at 11 am, I had to go to the post office and Glenndale to pick up packages, come home and load up the car, and then when Cathy was close, Steve and I Departed for the airport again.  Ann was having a bad day the day before, so we all wanted to make sure that someone was close by before we left. 

It was Super Hot and Muggy still.  When we took off in the Aerostar, we climbed up high enough to get above the clouds and enjoy a little cooler air.  Coming into Fond du Lac, it was dead quiet, except for the one plane in front of us who wasn't talking on the radio at all and made us do a go-around on final.  No other planes around yet.  Ha. 

We got into camp, and realized Steve had brought twin sheets for a queen sized bed.  So after we all went to dinner a Fox River, where I had Thai Chicken pizza with peanut sauce (better than you think), we stopped at Wal-Mart and I ran in and bought appropriate sheets.  I should have also bought hand soap or body wash, as I had to use my expensive shampoo as soap this morning.  ;) We ran the generators until 1:30 in the morning, somewhat illegally, but to keep the temps and humidity down.

Last night a giant storm ripped through Oshkosh.  Wind gusts over 100 mph.  Right when the gust front hit, Steve was by our canopy, and it levitated in the breeze.  He caught it, and we all scrambled to get it secured and tied down, then watched the weather sheet down like crazy, lightning show, heavy, heavy winds.  We were fine.  It was peaceful in our set up.  In a tent, not so much.  Several of the tent people got flooded out.  Not our tent people, but several out there.  This is why I don't tent camp. 

Anyway, that catches you up for now.  I'll run and do a few things, before today's round of storms hits, and then go from there.