Scudrunners

It seems that there is a spot light, especially with young and keen pilots, on conventional gear and all the how to's and don't's. There is a wonderful wealth of knowledge from the core group and even some of the "fly by's" . It would be wonderful and entertaining to exchange and share experiences with techniques for various other disciplines. I'll drop the first punt.

Float flying:

I started my career flying floats and now I live on a lake right beside a busy float base. Some of the things I see drivers doing now would have been subject to severe tongue lashings or WTF was that all about and I just shake my head. The sad thing is that I see this stuff on a daily basis so it obviously has become the norm. Most are small and under airmanship but still the abuse of the aircraft makes the hair on the back of my neck stand up.

We would never do runups if it was windy, check mags and run prop through at taxi RPM and do a normal runup when we had the luxury of glassy water. Power applications is the worst aggravation, when prop can't keep up that is the worst. It's like someone just kicks the throttle. What happened to gentle -- lol --

Xwind techniques but that seems to carry right across the whole board. Water handling and obsession with step taxi. Finally gusty wind landings. You can't dick around and it's such a simple thing. Just find a cat's paw and land in it. So simple just pull the power just as you are about to enter it and hang on. One of 2 results, touching down in the gust and grease it on or come out the other side and you bang it on. The result you are on the water where you wanted to be and not dicking around floating from gust to gust trying to wrestle it on the water and running out of space. My simple rule for landing, floats, wheel or skiis, is hit the target.

I never flew a boat so chuck that's your bailiwick.

A lot of this is about our love of "vintage" aircraft and large flat and round engines. Airmanship from these days is still a good way to approach current aircraft as well.

Good thread, I changed the title.

Let's take it easy on the equipment.

Related comments for the piston/prop crowd:

1) don't take chunks out of the prop blades. Be careful what you taxi over. Choose your run-up
location carefully. Apply throttle slowly on gravel.

2) after start, minimum RPM to allow for oil circulation and (esp for cold start) to minimize
metal-on-metal damage caused by differential metal expansion rates.

3) know what oil you are running. Straight grade and multigrade both have advantages and
limitations which apply to YOU the operator, with horrific consequences.

4) learn to prime cold and hot. The best way to do this is without a starter. I remember my
friend Peter had his starter die in his Pitts S-1T at a contest. I hand-propped it all the way
home. Peter knew how to precisely prime. Please don't overheat your starter and kill your
battery by running the starter excessively. If it doesn't start in the first few blades, try to
figure out if you are too rich or too lean. Pro Tip: if you get a fire going, keep cranking and
try to melt down the starter and kill the battery. They will be the cheapest things you will
have to fix, and may stop you from burning down your airplane. Suck the fire into the engine.

5) learn to safely hand bomb. Get someone that knows what they are doing (shudder) to show you.

6) learn to safely apply external power, and when to disconnect it. Read the POH!

7) lean the mixture after start for maximum RPM on the ground. If you must idle on the
ground, do it at 1100-1200 RPM with the mixture lean to avoid fouling the plugs. Lean
the mixture after landing. Lean the mixture in the descent to keep the engine warm.

8) Never gamble in the casino unless you have learned to count cards, in which case
don't get caught.

I never flew a boat so chuck that's your bailiwick.

Flying flying boats is all about the proper attitude when landing, there is about five degrees of safe attitude to contact the surface safely.

Improper nose attitude can be fatal especially in large flying boats due to getting in an uncontrollable porpoise.

Don't forget to take the condoms out of your pocket when you get home from an extended stay away from home.

Chuck Ellsworth wrote: ↑

Fri Apr 17, 2020 1:34 am

Don't forget to take the condoms out of your pocket when you get home from an extended stay away from home.

Over a period of about two hours, my late uncle told me about his WWII experience. He was a nav on a Halifax bomber. He said that the day he left to join up at 18 years old his father put a condom in his hand to which my uncle replied, "what the hell is that for'. He went on to tell me about training, the boat to England, flying over France in Wellington's, moving over to the Halifax, missions to Germany, his last flight which was a mission to bomb Hamburg. But they never made it. They were brought down not by enemy fire but a violent thunderstorm in which control was lost. Captured by the Germans, he spent almost two years in Stalag Luft 3. Toward the end of the war as the forces from the east approached, they were force-marched in the dead of winter for many miles to a new camp. On day, the German guards disappeared and were replaced later that day by Russian soldiers. The poorly treated Russian captives were handed rifles and told to go fight while the allied captives remained for a while under the watch of their thieving liberators until they were finally cleared to go back home. My uncle said that they were given a week off to do as they liked prior to heading for the ship. He said to me "what the hell did they expect us to do for a whole week?" I was tempted to say that he could finally put the condom to use but just politely nodded instead.

Was an interesting story though.

Use your eyeballs. God gave you two, and one mouth for a reason.

I can't tell you how many times a guy starts up and blasts the person/object behind them (hangar door, etc..). Which is what alludes to what the Col said in point #2.

General lack of Situational Awareness. It's hard to teach that. Look, Listen, the speak. In that order.

Why am I teaching FO's, some who have more hours than I do, when getting a frequency change, pause for a second before pushing the PTT to check on?
When 3 other planes are lined up for runway 12L, don't ask for 30R. I'm glad we don't have a pay to play per radio transmission. That is wasted radio space.
Oh yeah, if a plane is on short final, don't key up and tell the tower you're reading for takeoff... You know you'll have to hold short. Then for good measure, choose not to read back the hold short WITH the runway. Then get snippy to the tower when he says it again. All due to a lack of situational awareness.

Energy management. It's not just some fancy term for big airline guys. If you're in a 152, and you float in ground effect longer than your ground roll after landing, you have too much energy. Crack open a physics book, or YouTube. There are some great short video's explaining how to manage energy.

Civil Air Patrol.
No.
Just stay away. It's the American equivalent of Air Cadets, except they seem to be 10x worse in everything they do.
1. You're not in the military, so don't act you're really a Colonel. You're not.
2. You're not special. If I, in an actual military aircraft, don't receive special handling, why do you think you should?


Lastly, don't assume/project your (lack of) experience on to another pilot (stranger). If I'm covered in grease and grime at the end of the day of playing in the hangar, with a 2-3 day beard stubble, don't assume I can't afford to have a shower and shave before going to work as a professional.

If you're going to critique someone, know what the hell you're talking about before you open your mouth. "Can you do that as an owner? Don't you need an A&P?"
"No dickface, open the rule book on occasion and read it."
Which leads me to knowing the difference between the AIM (recommended good practice) and the FAR's (required practice). (sorry, this is an American ranting here...)

Lastly last this time: When you're shooting the shit, don't tell someone else's story. If you can't captivate the attention of the group with your own, perhaps it's a good sign to keep your cum-dumpster shut and listen.

What grinds my gears is the FAR chanters.

They signal their virtue and vast knowledge by screeching,

"Not only is that UNSAFE, it's a VIOLATION of FAR XXX"

which makes it clear that in addition to being poor judgement (in their eyes), it's always illegal.

What sanctimonious bullshit. Ever heard of a waiver? I've been flying under many
different waivers for many different FARS in many different locations for 20 years now.

difference between the AIM and the FAR's (sorry, this is American)

When I lived in Canada, I was always having the same discussion. People thought you
had to do what was in the AIP. No. You can only be charged with a contravention of
the CARs not the AIP. Pilots struggled greatly to comprehend that.



Very few pilots actually read. This is why they have to go on type rating courses.
When they want to know something, they ask another pilot - say, their instructor -
who can't possibly be wrong.

I hear ya chuck, my father was a recreational pilot and got into trouble in a lake with porpoise, he was lucky and not a scratch but ended up sitting in a lake amphibian full of water after skipping down the lake in progressive undulations. He did the "factory" checkout with the canadian dealer at the time but obviously it wasn't sufficient. If my memory serves me right they operated out of the old Orangeville airport.

It seems that engine handling and knowledge is going the way of "user" devices of today. People are just users and have no idea of how they work. I get it but being a bit of a gadget guy I just shake my head. Like the old round engine and helping engineers with inspections one can build up a knowledge base. The flying learning part was strange by today's standards, one got a lot of "learning" in the bar -- haha -- I can remember being forced into the learning mode on more than on occasion. The "mentors" loved to straighten you out over a beer and several rums. Things have certainly changed. They are now producing pilots that know everything, just ask them. That's what some of these schools are trying to brainwash the students to this attitude and reality checks are left to their first job. Some turn out very well and some never lose the attitude.

I call the present the "like" generation. There is an absolute preoccupation of hitting the "like" button and it carries on into their everyday life.

I know I sound like that "old" guy but when I look back from when I learned to fly until the end of float planes and ski planes I realise how much fun it was back then, free, open and all about stick and rudder skills and not a over powering preoccupation on theory and rules. Ironically, I don't think accident rates have improved that much, as the colonel says, "there is no new causes for accidents"

I digress and drift - don't worry I still know my name and can find my truck keys

Ski flying is really the area where knowledge is dropping off and with that self sufficient winter know how. Blow pot -- haha -- stuck in the slush and camping out at 40 fucking below. Damn you can't even buy good winter gear, especially boots today. I had to hunt all over the internet to get a pair of acton boots. The new generation boot uses too much plastic and even a -30 souls turn to rock and you can't stand up. Straight skis are almost gone and now everyone demands prepared strips so even on skis it's like operating on wheels.

Hand spanking, another lost art. I have propped just about all the piston aircraft I ever flew. The norseman was the hardest solo but a bungee cord and an old mitt worked. Strangely a DC-3 was easier than a fuel injected flat engine. You can hand start a DC3 with no available electrics. Pour a little gas down the carb and find a big buddy, set the engine up for a start and away ya go, 2 guys on the prop and run with it.

a fuel injected flat engine

I have hand-bombed a few 3-blade AEIO-540's and don't recommend it.

The metal 2-blade AEIO-360 is ok. Just have to get the prime right.

One thing worth mentioning is impulse coupling vs buzz box. A good example
of this is the Decathlon / Citabria with the overhead switches for the magnetos.

You only want the left (impulse coupling) magneto of the Lycoming turned on
during cranking (either hand or starter). Right mag does not have an impulse
coupling and thus should be off during start, and only turned on AFTER the
engine is running.

This differs from the flat fuel-injected Continentals with TWO impulse coupling
magnetos. You want them both on for start, because they will light up after TDC.

That's probably why the fuel-injected TCM are so much easier to hot start than
the Lycoming - two impulse coupled mags, plus a return line on the fuel injection.

I think the safety issues of moving a prop are largely ignored. I had a friend get a minor scalping moving the prop on a 180 during maintenance. Those impulse mags work well. A live mag can be a killer and ignition switch position is not always a reliable factor. I think people get lulled into a false sense of security based on how hard engines are to start in their mind. To me a prop is like a gun, treat it as if it is loaded.