Good Neighbors, Clear Skies, Storms and Wind

Yes, I have the Baron but it is not home yet and I am not trained.  I am still flying the Bonanza.  Yesterday I took a nice flight with CC and this morning I decided to head out solo.  Well it was getting windy when I left and the forecast was for windier.  It was accurate.   It was also bumpy below 2500 and really bumpy below 1500.  I flew around a bit and decided with the strong surface winds to get gas at Palatka because Saint Augustine was a significant crosswind.

Arriving in the area, there was a Cirrus a few miles ahead.  As he cleared the runway, he said he was heading for the self serve fuel.  That was my destination as well.  I asked him if he could pull forward enough so that I could position for fuel after him.  He said he would.  Palatka has only a single pump and many people pull in short of the pump so if another plane arrives after and shuts down they are too far away to fuel without restarting or pushing themselves closer.

The Cirrus did a great job and he left me plenty of room to pull up so that when it was my turn the hose would reach.  After some fuel pump chatter, topping the tanks and checking the fuel, it was time to head home.

The headwinds were actually tailwinds now and I scooted along at 170+ knots ground speed back to Jacksonville.   The sky was blue and cloudless above but off to the North and West, you could see the outline of the approaching front and the rain in Georgia.  

Arriving home the tower put me on downwind for 23.  I asked for a tight approach but tower wanted me to follow a Cirrus on a 5 mile straight in approach.  I was not sure why, he was going 120 ground speed which meant he was 2.5 minutes from the runway.  I would be off the runway in 1.5.  The tower has final say, so I extended and the Cirrus promptly slowed down to 70.

I joined behind the slow moving traffic and held a good sequence but when the Cirrus landed he somehow did not make the middle turn off and then took his time getting off the runway.  I slowed a bit to build space  and when I got to 500 a hawk decided to circle right over the end of the runway.  I had been watching him and either he didn't see me or didn't care.

Not wanting to meet the hawk, I decided to go around.  I did and the tower put me behind a Skyhawk.  Again I was amazed the little Cessna, could not stop by the mid turn off and went to nearly the end of the runway.  The wind was 25-30 knots on the nose and I landed in just a few hundred feet and had to add power to get to the close turn off.  It all ended well with the plane full and safely in the hangar though. 

A new addition

The blog has been a bit quiet the last few weeks.  I have to admit I have been a bit unfaithful.  While I was still flying my Bonanza, I had my eye on a pretty Baron.  Today we planned to fly down to New Smyrna to close on the Baron but the weather was quite foggy.  We drove instead, it was a good decision.

Our new addition is a 1991 Baron 58.  The Baron has two 300 HP engines compared to one on the Bonanza.  Its faster but only by about 15-25 knots.  It does have significantly more redundancy and room.  During the purchase process we identified a few areas that need to be fixed so the plane stays at the mechanic for a bit.  

After this it will be Baron school for me.  I am rated for this aircraft but have never flown this exact model.  The insurance company requires some hours before I can head out on my own.  This was not a big deal as I had planned a more extensive program before I got the requirements. 

I started the blog to document our travels across the country and since the Baron is also a Beechcraft, the name still makes sense.  I may not land the Bonanza in each state but the Baron will hopefully let me complete the quest.

A lot more to come in a few weeks once I start training.

A cut above

Sunday started with some marginal weather which actually made me feel a bit better about having a work meeting at noon.  Once done with my call though, I looked out and the sky had begun to turn blue.

I decided it was time for the proverbial Sunday ride in the country.  We have been watching that ship in the Brunswick sound for quite a while and I saw on the news they had actually made a cut and removed a piece.  We headed up to Saint Simons to see for ourselves. 

While they had removed a piece and actually made another cut, most of the ship was still there. You can see in this picture the cut and how the section has been moved away from the main section and lifted slightly.

It was actually a pretty busy day up at SSI with a good bit of local traffic.  Luckily they were all arrivals when we showed up and they were using runway 22 which kept us well separated.  We also stayed up at 1500' to provide some extra margin.  On our second circle a Baron was departing but we modified our turns to stay well away and provide him plenty of room for his departure and turn North.

The excitement is now at the stern which left a nice view of the bow cut.  You can clearly see the cars still scattered between the decks.

After 2 times around, we headed South and enjoyed the views on our ride home.  Taking apart the ship is taking longer than originally planned but it does appear that they will be able to slice it up like they said.

There were a slew of small boats that looked like they were trying to manage the debris.  Hopefully they can complete the job without making an ecological disaster.

Train, Train, Train

I like to fly on holidays.  January 1, 2021 is a new year and a new chance to fly.  My hours were down in 2020 about 20%.  This was mostly due to cancelled trips.  I have been doing a good job training though and I wanted to keep that going.  With great weather I decided to start the New Year off with some more practice.

It pays to keep sharp.  On December 31st I had taken a quick run South with CC to visit another airport.  The winds were gusty and a direct cross wind.  Combine that with trees by the runway edge, low level wind shear and turbulence and you are one busy pilot landing.  This is why we train a lot.  Though challenging, it was well within the plane's capability and other than a really bumpy ride from 300 feet to 20 feet which we anticipated, everything was quite nice and I was even rewarded with a smooth touchdown.

Given that this was a holiday I decided to practice the things I really enjoy.  After clearing the area, I started with some steep turns.  Those went well.  You know because you hit your wake as you complete a 360.  It is pretty cool, because you can't see the turbulence you create but if you do a good circle and stay on altitude, you come back around and get a satisfying bump as you roll wings level.

After steep turns I did Chandelles.  This is a maneuver required on the commercial check ride.  You roll into a 30 degree bank and then smoothly increase pitch while turning 90 degrees.  In my plane this leaves you at 15 degrees nose up.  You then hold that pitch while smoothly rolling out of the bank.  If done correctly you complete 180 degrees of turn just as the plane reaches a speed to activate the stall warning.  Doing them left and right is quite different because the engine torque requires right rudder  so combining this with the different direction banks changes things up a bit.

My final maneuvers were slow flight variations.  I practiced flying just above stall and then worked on turns just above stall at increasing bank angles.  I worked up to 45 degree bank turns with partial flaps with the stall warning chirping as I made 180 degree course changes.  It was a glorious day and it was good to work on my basic airmanship.  When flying with passengers you try to limit the pitch and bank to optimize the experience in a good way.  Training has you practice a much wider range of the flight envelope.  In both cases, a smooth fluid flight is ideal.