Rare and interesting aircraft.

[Colonel]

Speaking of Larry, here he is with his DH.87B Hornet Moth



It was as weird as anything pre-WWII British that you can
imagine. It was swing-wing. I'm probably one of the few
people around that have logged PIC on it :^)

Pro Tip: with inverted engines, pull and clean the spark
plugs frequently.

[Slick Goodlin]

That Hornet Moth remains very high on my bucket list.

[Colonel]

If you ever fly a Hornet Moth, please operate it as intended: from a large grass field,
always taking off and landing into wind.

It was never designed for ANY crosswind. Only an incredible stick like Larry Loretto
could operate it with a crosswind from a dry paved runway.

It has a non-locking tailwheel. Modern (sorta) airplanes such as the Beech 18 and
Pitts S-1S have a full-swivel tailwheel that you lock for takeoff and landing. To not lock
them is insane. Very bad things will happen.

That's what the Hornet Moth has - a full-swivel, non-locking tailwheel. I pestered
Larry pretty annoyingly to replace the tailwheel with a locking one. He said there
was one available, and I think he was in the process of installing it.



I have a terrible fear that the next owner will wreck it. Freddy in Key West had that
problem - every time he sold an airplane that he had flown thousands of hours, the
new owner would wreck it.

Like Larry, Freddy had no virtue, but was an awesome stick. Bob Hoover had no virtue,
either, but he was an awesome fucking stick. As a North American test pilot, he
would routinely dead-stick experimental single-engine fighters to a short runway
and greatly admired Freddy's P-51 aerobatics at OSH.

Note the pattern of an inversely proportional relationship between virtue and stick skills.

(cough cough) Dick Piche (cough cough) ... the @ssCan retards hate him, but gosh, that
boy could fly.

[Slick Goodlin]

I have a terrible fear that the next owner will wreck it.

Truth be told I was harbouring a fantasy that I could be the next owner but the current slow down at work has pretty thoroughly kicked that dream in the balls.

I’m not super worried about a castering and non-locking tailwheel on the thing, I have a couple hundred hours on similar equipment and have only embarrassed the crap out of myself a couple times. The flow of traffic at an uncontrolled airport may sometimes be for a tailwind runway and edge lights are frangible, in case anyone ever wondered.

[Colonel]

The flow of traffic at an uncontrolled airport may sometimes be for a tailwind runway and edge lights are frangible, in case anyone ever wondered.

Ha. I would not accept a quartering tailwind in any of those variants, on dry pavement.

I am not a good person, but I would arrange for a runway change at the uncontrolled airport
so that I could land into wind.

Note that unlike the owner of Draco, I have not crashed. But sometimes I get letters. That
is a choice I am comfortable with.

This is not just a tailwheel thing. Many times, IFR in a little airplane, ATC has insisted that
I fly into a Cb for their convenience. After all, on their secondary radar, there is a large hole
that they would like to fill with aircraft. I get that.

"Unable. Right 30 or left 60, your choice"

On occasion, faced with rapidly developing Cbs, I have told ATC, "I have a revised routing for
you. Advise when ready to copy".

I have no virtue to signal. But I have a perfect lifetime safety record. I know that's not fashionable
in the 21st Century, and I'm cool with that. I'm a 20th Century pilot that is waiting for the
"Cognitive Dissonance" diagnosis from 4900 Yonge St.

[Slick Goodlin]

I would not accept a quartering tailwind in any of those variants, on dry pavement.

I should have paid more attention to conditions too but in the end nobody was hurt, nothing was badly damaged, and I can’t un-ring that bell so here we are.

Still wanna fly that Hornet Moth.

[Colonel]

Buy it!!

It's important to realize that there is no such thing as free will or randomness
in the universe. Everything is pre-ordained.

My last Pitts S-2B hunted me down and tried to kill me when I flew it for the
first time. Dear Old Dad had a cow after I landed and he found out the stick
jammed. I had no choice but to buy it. I love it dearly.

Don't fight the fickle finger of fate. It will fuck you.

You don't buy an airplane. It tracks you down, and tricks you into thinking
that you are acquiring it. Hahahahahahahahaha. Far from it.

There. Will that help with the diagnosis of "cognitive dissonance" from TC?

They've been telling everyone how stupid and what an incompetent pilot I
am for decades, but even they see now, that's wearing thin.

Time for a Bob Hoover "Fuck You".

[Chuck Ellsworth]

Another interesting one is the Sorrell Hiperbipe.

It is a rear bird that is a four passenger IFR capable machine that can also do unlimited aerobatics.

Joann Osterud did an amazing show with one.

[Colonel]

Interesting airplane. A few years ago, I saw a guy fly overhead the airport
in a HyperBipe to join the mid-left downwind .... snap-rolling!

I'm sure he had paper for that. He was this grumpy old guy that didn't give
a shit. Little did I know that I would become him.

[Chuck Ellsworth]

Another interesting thought came to mind tonight.

What was the biggest tail wheel airplane you ever flew.

For me it was the Douglas R4D-8.