...it's great when it all works

The logistics for the day were a bit complex. Three of us from the office needed to get to a meeting in Wantage, one of us had to get to Turweston, a photographer had to be picked up in Blackbushe and the 182 needed picking up from Henstridge before an air-to-air shoot with a Cirrus SR22. Plenty of opportunity for it all to go wrong, but I'm happy to say that it all went right! We were on time for the meeting, and on time at Turweston.

I flew the SR22 with Nick Tarrat to Blackbushe where we loaded a photographer and made for Henstridge via an approach to the strip to check some of the terrain warning system (it worked). The 182, complete with fresh Annual was ready and waiting and while I filled the tanks with fuel (ouch), Oli took the SR22 ground shots on a convenient patch of grass. It wasn't long before we were joined by an Apache helicopter who'd popped in for what I assume was a bit of training. We then did the air-to-air, and right on cue up popped a nice blue hole with some great light. Nick was flying the SR22 while I flew the 182 with Oli on board.

One of the biggest variables when it comes to air-to-air photography is the ability of the formation pilot. I'm not just talking about safety (which comes first, second, third and fourth in terms of priority) but about the ability to listen, to put the aircraft in the right position, and generally to work as part of the team. Nick was just brilliant, and the shoot went without a hitch. I took Oli back to Blackbushe (which had closed) and then took the 182 back to the strip enjoying the silky smooth air and the late evening sunlight.

The year in numbers

The Annual is nearly complete and I've been making sure that the logs are all up to date. Over the last twelve months the 182 has flown 127 hours, not a huge amount for an aircraft, but probably a little higher than the average for a single owner SEP. Of course, the trouble with low annual usage numbers is that the fixed costs - things like insurance, parking or hangarage, trust agreements and fixed maintenance (ie the Annual) work out quite high per hour. Putting all of these together for 'EW it works out that I'm paying roughly £35 an hour to cover the fixed costs. On top of that there's obviously fuel and oil to be added (about £65 at today's prices), so roughly speaking the 182 comes in at about £100 an hour. That compares very favourably with hire costs; the average for a C182 is about £175/hr. There are advantages to renting, the main one being that it doesn't tie up chunks of capital, but a renter also has the luxury of handing the aeroplane back at the end of the day, regardless of any mechanical issues, to get fixed at someone else's cost. But the rental aeroplane may not be available when you want it, you may have to have it back by a certain time, and you will quite probably find it difficult to take away for a week or so.

Aviation parts

I consider myself lucky. So far, and it is almost complete, the Annual on the 182 has only revealed the need for a small number of out-of-the-ordinary parts. There's a cracked blade aerial that I'm changing in an attempt to bring the DME back to life (it's a Narco unit, so I'm not hopeful), the brass plug in the carburettor bowl needs changing as we had to wreck the old one to get it out, and the top hinge on the pilot's door was well and truly broken. This was concerning, not because I thought the door might fall off, I didn't, but because I was sure that it would take a while to get one shipped from the US and I need to fly to Dublin on Wednesday. Luckily, thanks to a friend in the industry, I managed to find a hinge that was surplus to requirements in stock in the UK. It arrived through the post less than 24 hours after I handed over my credit card details. The hinge (which is actually only half of the hinge) is priced at about $200. Wentworth, a good source for used parts quoted $125 for a hinge, but in the end I struck a deal with Cormack Aircraft Services that suited us both. If there's no other snags, the Annual should be complete by Tuesday morning. Famous last words?

Klapmeier breaks cover

Alan Klapmeier, current Chairman, ex CEO and joint founder of Cirrus Design (now known as Cirrus Aircraft) today announced that he was putting together a team to secure funding and buy the SF50 jet project from Cirrus Aircraft. The announcement was made at M7, the annual event that brings hundreds of customers and their aeroplanes back to the factory in Duluth. Klapmeier has engaged Merrill Lynch and is positive about being able to raise the necessary finance. He estimates that it will take two tranches of $60m each in order to develop, certify and bring the SF50 to market - by the way, it could be called the Aegis jet if Klapmeier is successful. While no deal has been done, I understand that the intention is for the new company to take over the liability for the existing deposit holders, but not for the pending L3 lawsuit. L3 is claiming a total of $21.3m, $18.3m of which relates to a cancelled contract for 75 SmartDeck systems.

At the same M7 event Brent Wouters, Cirrus Aircraft's current CEO, also spoke about the jet project. Interestingly, while acknowledging that Klapmeier had approached the board and Arcapita (Cirrus Aircraft's main shareholder) he went on to say that he saw the SF50 as playing a key role in the future of Cirrus Aircraft. He also went on to say that he saw outside capital coming into Cirrus Aircraft in order for the existing company to complete development and certification as quickly as possible. The next few months promise some interesting times, particularly in the Cirrus Aircraft boardroom, or at family events.

Listen to Alan Klapmeier and Brent Wouters, both courtesy of ANN
Read about L3's lawsuit

Grey skies

I should have known. The tennis players have enjoyed four full days of play at Wimble -don and the crowds are heading for Glastonbury. It must mean rain, and lots of it. The plan for today included six flights, all of them in or through the bands of heavy rain and predicted storms. One of the flights was an air-to-air photo shoot, and unless you are looking for a low contrast moody shot, then sunshine is the thing that's needed. I looked for a glimour of hope in the TAFs, but I could see the day being spent in various airfield cafes waiting for the weather to clear and the sun to shine. For once the time pressure is not stupid (ie this one is not needed by now), so I took the decision to pull the plug early and wait for an altogether nicer day. Anyone want to bet that it will be raining next Tuesday?

Time for an Annual

At the end of June, the Annual for N681EW runs out. There was a time when an Annual meant delivering the aeroplane to a maintenance organisation and bending over while simultaneously opening my wallet. When the wallet was completely empty, I only had to ask when they'd like me to come back and bend over again. Usually after two or three months the Annual would be complete, and I'd contributed a year's earnings to some engineering retirement fund, or so it seemed.

I'm very pleased to say that I've since found an engineer who not only does a great job, but who is also more than happy for me to get involved in the maintenance too, so as soon as the early morning mist had cleared I drove the few miles to the strip and flew to Henstridge which sits right on the eastern the edge of Yeovilton's MATZ. I tend to give them a call, and today made contact just as I passed Alfred's Tower. I was more than a litle surprised when they asked if I could fly 'not above 500 feet' for coordination. There was a scattering of houses, buildings, fences, hedges and walls below meaning that I could easily find myself in breach of the 500' rule. Sadly saying that 'ATC made me do it and then they ran away' would not work as a defence. So I did the only sensible, mature thing and pushed the nose over, went to full throttle and picked my way carefully at 500' or less agl while studiously avoiding any man-made object.

Shutting down at Henstridge I took the cowls off and removed the to plugs from each cylinder for the compression test. With a Continental this is best done when the engine is hot or warm (hence the full throttle earlier, and you thought I was just having fun), I'm pleased to say that the numbers were all good, for a Continental that is. I spent the rest of the day helping to take the interior out, opening up all of the inspecton panels, cleaning, gapping and testing the spark plugs, taking the spats off and changing the oil. I'm glad to say that when I cut open the filter, and took a close look at the pleated material inside, there was a pleasing absence of metalic particles, indicating that nothing catastrophic was happening internally. This year there are a few small things to attend to, but with a bit of luck it should be complete by early next week. I’ll be heading back to Henstridge on Saturday to get my hands dirty again.

Wimbledon

OK, not a huge connection with aviation, but I'm sure I'll find one. I was given a pair of tennis tickets for Father's day - they were for day 1, court 1 at Wimbledon. I spent the day there with my younger daughter who's 17.

I've been to Wimbledon a couple of times before and really enjoy the atmosphere and of course the tennis. This year both lived up to expectations and we watched Sharapova beat Kutozova in two sets, and wildcard Ward go out to Fernando Verdasco. One benefit of getting a ticket to one of the early days of the tournament is that there is just so much tennis going on all over the place. Find a seat by one of the outside courts (there's no reserved seating for many of these) and you really are close to the action. Most of the people playing will have unpronounceable names that you wouldn't have heard of, but their skill leaves you in no doubt that this is tennis of the highest level. If I even managed to return a serve it would be by accident. All in all a fantastic day out.

Ah yes, that aviation connection. Wimbledon as you can imagine has a bit of a captive audience and if you are not prepared enough to take your own food and drink into the grounds you offer yourself up for some good old fashioned gouging and the Americans would say. Parking? £25 please, sandwich? £4.10 please, small bottle of water? £2 please - and that makes it almost 300% dearer than avgas per litre, and I know which is more fun to consume.

L3 and Cirrus talk to lawyers

A few years ago L3 started showing its SmartDeck system at trade shows. It sported big screens, an intuitive HSI and a comms centre/FMS panel that had some really neat features. It was certainly a step up from Avidyne's Entegra and looked like it would give Garmin's Perspective a run for its money. I flew a SmartDeck equipped SR22 out of San Jose, California during AOPA's annual Expo last year and was very impressed. Whoever fitted the system into L3's SR22 could have taught Cirrus a thing or two about putting interiors together too.

Cirrus put SmartDeck in their jet prototype, and there were rumours that the company wanted to offer Avidyne, Garmin and L3 avionics to customers. It appears that the economy and internal policies put an end to that plan and Cirrus became pretty much an exclusive Garmin customer, even taking out the SmartDeck from the jet test airframe and putting in Garmin instead.

You can imagine how well that cancellation news would have been received. L3 - has spent what must be a small fortune developing a pretty damn good integrated avionics suite, then another stack of cash getting it certificated only to find temselves without an OEM customer. Pre-cancellation it appears that someone at Cirrus ordered 75 SmartDeck systems that the company no longer needed. Dropping L3’s SmartDeck has lead to a lawsuit being filed by L3’s lawyers claiming $18.7 million for the 75 systems and another $3m that is owed for Stormscopes and other standalone products. If mature, grown up companies take that kind of action then you can be pretty sure that the commercial relationship is pretty well non-existent. The court papers are effectively setting the fire that will burn the bridges, which is interesting because new-build Cirrus aircraft come with an L3 Stormscope as an option (that most people take). I suppose that Cirrus could switch to Avidyne’s TWX670, but so far that doesn’t look like it's happening.

So where now for L3s SmartDeck? They could offer it as a retrofit and compete with Avidyne who are doing just that with their R9 software and Entegra 2 hardware (another impressive system by the way), or they could look for another OEM. In the piston world, any kind of volume really means doing a deal with either Cessna or Cirrus and with the Cirrus/L3 bridges close to burning and Cessna well and truly wedded to Garmin I suspect that we won’t be seeing very much of L3’s SmartDeck in the future.

Airstrip life

There are three us who share this strip. Nigel, the strip owner has a monowheel Europa, Tony has a Rotax powered ARV and I have the trusty C182.

It's a great strip and Nigel has put in huge amounts of work, not only to get it in great condition, but to be good neighbours with anyone living locally. Each summer there's a small fly-in and free BBQ and local residents are invited along and offered a flight. We all work very hard to reduce any aircraft noise, and always take the time to stop and chat. So far, fingers crossed, this seems to be making for a peaceful life for all involved and long may it continue.

One of the regular tasks is the mowing. In theory the three of us take turns, but I've popped over a few times only to find the runway freshly cut, so I was actually quite happy to find it uncut this morning so that I could take my turn. The tractor with mower attached lives on a local farm where Richard the farmer provides tractor and land wisdom. He loves flying, and as a consequence when taking off on 26 we rurn right over his house avoiding a static home park. It takes about an hour to cut the strip, and on a nice summer's evening it's much more a pleasure than a chore.

The BIG O

The Big O, EAA AirVenture Oshkosh, is just over five weeks away. It's the biggest aviation show on earth with over 2,500 aircraft expected to fly in, 500 seminars and 800 exhibitors. The hundreds of thousands of visitors have booked most of the hotel rooms (it's bonanza time for local businesses). Flights and hotels are booked, and the press releases and invitations have started to flow. I'm really looking forward to seeing WhiteKnightTwo fly in during Monday's airshow, and to taking a closer look during the week.

Way too soon

I went to Graeme Kidd's funeral today. Graeme and I both worked at Future Publishing in Bath, but that was at least fifteen years ago and I haven't seen him since. Not surprisingly the funeral had some Kidd touches, the coffin was followed down the aisle by a pint of Hereford Pale (later drunk by his elder son I believe), and the congregation contained a mixture of black ties, bow ties, T-shirts, mohicans and mayoral regalia.
After the service a couple of hundred people gathered for a drink and a chat. It struck me that we should hold these wakes before we die, we rarely appreciate those around us enough, and how much better would it be to get together without the necessity for a funeral?

Striping delight

I had to go to Ludlow today and really didn't fancy spending at least five hours in the car, or even longer on the train. With great weather forecast it seemed logical to fly, but of course who's ever heard of Ludlow airport? A quick look at Navbox revealed a couple of options. Shobden offered the traditional GA airport experience, while Milson Airstrip offered the more rural, farm strip option. I called Chris Jones for PPR and booked a taxi to pick me up from the strip.

Milson Airtrip runs north-south (17/35 to be precise) and has a slight upslope that makes it a one-way-in, one-way-out strip unless the wind is really strong. There's 450m of nice grass, so while not very short, it does need some respect with regards to approach speeds. Come in 10 knots too fast here and touch down too late and you'll be needing all of the upslope and some heavy braking to avoid embarassment, particularly if you have a heavy aeroplane with a decent amount of inertia.

The landing fee at Milson is a measly £2, a bargain for such a great facility.

Tecnam retracts twin

OK, not really - but in one way or another it was the talk of the show yesterday. Initially that's because it hasn't been seen in the UK before, and as a new economical twin (it is powered by a couple of 100hp Rotax 912s engines) it's got many people checking their bank accounts to see if there's a spare £300k or so they'd forgotten about. It continued to be talked about, in the trade at least, because there are rumours that there's going to be a new dealer. The 'old' dealer, Nick Marley (also the man behind Yeoman Light Aircraft Company, wasn't at the show.

Jamais deux sans trois as they say in France, so the next big talking point happened when the nose-gear collapsed with Flyer writer Nick Lambert sitting in the cockpit. Luckily Nick had touched nothing, as confirmed by someone from Tecnam, but it gained a fair bit of interest and a temporary wooden trestle to boot.

ELA1 Permits

The AT4 looks like being the latest aeroplane to be sold in the UK with an expiring Permit to Fly. It is likely that the Evektor SportStar and the CZAW Sport Cruiser will also be available, ready built with the same permit. The CTLS and the Remos G3 are already here, flying and on sale under the same scheme.

The scheme goes something like this... we are due to get the final set of ELA1 rules soon. This will simplify certification for aircrfat in that category. EASA has apparently taken a look at the above mentioned aircraft and fully expects them to be certified as ELA1 aircraft. In the meantime, ahead of the rules being finialised and coming into force, the aircraft can fly on a Permit to Fly.

Assuming that the rules get finalised and the aircraft get approved, then each Permit will become a full Certificate of Airworthiness (and will become subject to maintenance under EASA's Part M).

This course means that if you buy one of these machines now you could be getting the aircraft that you want ahead of time. It also means that if there are any delays or changes, once that Permit to Fly runs out, you will be left with an aeroplane and no way of flying it. Although that is a possibility, I agree that it is not very likely, but stranger things have happened.

Flying high(ish)

I went for a flight in Cessna's Corvalis 400TT today. The weather at Cranfield was interesting, with bright sunshine and clear blue skies ten miles away, but with low cloud and heavy rain in the vicinity. We, that's to say Steve McKenna, Richard Kerr from Patriot and Pana Poulios from Cessna drunk much coffee while grumbling about the British weather. We took advantage of what we thought was a clearing to fly, but by the time we got to the aeroplane it had started raining heavily again. More coffee, more grumbling. Eventually we got airborne and made good use of the aeroplane's twin turbocharged Continental to pick our way through the holes that had now appeared to some nice clear, unlimited visibility sky. Settled in the cruise, 80% power (a frequently used cruise setting) gave us almost 200kt TAS while burning 17usg an hour.

You can go a long way at those speeds. A strong point of the aeroplane is its ability to take you to the sun (or snow) in comfort - it can climb above most European weather. The service ceiling is FL250 - so you'll need to be using the built-in oxygen.

So, the Lancair, no Columbia. The Corvalis is yours for just $635,000 including a non FIKI (Flight Into Known Icing) TKS system. Full report in the magazine. Nice touches - inflatable door seals giving a very quiet cabin, air conditioning that can be used all of the time (many AC systems need to be off for departure and landing), and speed brakes. Not quite so nice touch - the lack of a stormscope, even as an option, something to do with the lightnining protection mesh used in construction I'm told. In the US they have XM weather, here we don't, at least not yet.

Edit - Talking to Avidyne at Aero Expo it seems that their TWX 670 has recently been STC'd for the Corvalis (N reg only for now though).

Need spares?

Need spares for your aeroplane? You'd better hope that you don't have anything new! Some French friends flew their Diamond DA42 to Aero Friedrichshaffen this year. They had a great time, but on April 5th at 10,000' on the way back they had an engine failure and diverted into Troyes. This particular DA42 was equipped with the original Centurion 1.7 engines rather than the later Centurion 2.0 and had recently had new gearboxes fitted.

Another friend, the owner of a Columbia 400, recently took his two-year-old aeroplane to Germany to have a TKS system fited. The original owner had paid for the Evade option (Columbia's electric wing de-ice system), but when Cessna rescued Columbia they dumped the system, honoured the option and offered TKS instead. During this install the German maintenance company verified that the ADs and SBs were all up to date (and that's another story), and found that the rudder needed replacing. The new rudder should have arrived two weeks ago, but as of today it's still 'on the way'. The owner of the Diamond DA42 now has his aeroplane back, but it took the best part of two months to sort out, much of which was spent waiting for parts.

Contrast that with the easy availability of parts for many older aeroplanes and something doesn't seem quite right. Imagine the reaction if you were to pitch up at the garage with your new BMW only to be told that while parts for a Ford Cortina could be had with little difficulty, those for your new car could, and probably would, take ages.

Top marks for Sandtoft

I flew up to Sandtoft yesterday with Nick Lambert. We were up there for Nick to fly the Savannah VG for the magazine, something we've been meaning to do for a while now.

There was loads going on with fixed-wing, rotary and microlight training taking place and a nice little cafe serving a good range of food at fair prices. The place was really bustling despite it being a Wednesday afternoon, hardly a traditionally busy time of the week for flying schools. Despite the variety of traffic, it was also really good to see the air-ground radio used to an absolute minimum - bucking the trend of many air ground stations to act as if they were FISOs, or even full air traffic. From what I hear, there's a great little social scene at the airfield too. Hurrah!

Cessna's Corvalis

We got a call in the office today. Marc Cornelius who looks after Cessna's PR in the UK was on the 'phone explaining how the Corvalis production line, until recently in Bend, Oregon, hadn't been closed down as we'd suggested in news. He went on to say that it was in fact on about eighty lorries heading for Cessna's facility in Independence, Kansas. That's good news, but judging by the recent GAMA report on GA shipments, the Corvalis will need to grow some sales volume to justify the cost of relocating, rebuilding and restarting the line.

I look forward to reading Cessna's press release announcing that the first Corvalis has rolled off the new Independence production line.

A few Tunisian numbers

I'm busy writing up the trip for the magazine, but in the meatime here are a few numbers. We flew for 26.1 hours and landed at nine different airfields (five in France, four in Tunisia) over twelve days. The total distance covered was 3,036nm. Of the ten legs, the one from Clermont Ferrand to Calvi saw the highest ground speed of 131kt, pretty good considering it involved a climb to FL100. The leg from Djerba to Monastir was the slowest with a ground speed of 99kt. The entire trip averaged 116kt. The cheapest fuel was in Clermont Ferrand at just over €1.50 and the most expensive was the 100LL supplied by the Tunisian military at €3.20. they were the refuellers at every airfield (avgas is otherwise unavailable in Tunisia).

For a few pictures, click here

It's mostly about the people

This post is a bit of an experiment. Most of the time one picture per post is all that's needed, but sometimes it is useful to post several. One way of doing this is an embedded slideshow, which if it has worked you should see below.

This is a small collection of pictures from the recent Tunisian trip. The flying was fantastic, but the entire experience was enhanced by the people with whom we shared the experience.