Longest Trip Yet!

Finally after weeks of planning and canceling due to family issues, scheduling and weather we were able to take the little Cherokee on it's first trip to the coast.
We got a late start on Sunday and didn't leave until around 2:30pm which was way later than I wanted to leave. This flight was also my biannual review and I wanted to work on some tower work. Our first stop was to KFLO in Florence SC. There was a big nascar race in town and the airport was pretty hopping. We stopped for a 'bladder break' and went into the FBO. I found a copy of this months AOPA Magazine on the table, about that same time someone recognized the plane N number and asked if this was the same plane from the article. That was a pretty surreal experience.
The plane did really great and I still have a lot to learn about controlled airspace. It's amazing how sanitized the training was for me doing controlled work during training compared to the real world. I realized that during my training we never actually went to a controlled airport, shut down, got out and got back in the plane. I had no idea how to 'get out' of a controlled field.

Here she is on the ramp in KFLO

















Hanging with jets...

The guys down at Florence were great and talked with us for about half an hour before we decided to head on to our real goal which was making it to the Myrtle Beach (KCRE) grand strand.
It was pretty bumpy down to KFLO, but the ride to KCRE was very smooth and what a view we had of the coast line. I have done this trip a few times in other planes but there is just something special about flying over the coast line in your own aircraft that just adds to the excitement. It was shockingly quiet despite being a holiday weekend but we made it into CRE just fine. Unfortunately all of the courtesy cars were out so we couldn't make it anywhere to eat, so we just ate a pack of crackers out of the vending machine. But to be honest I really didn't care because just being able to fly down was great.
The view I've been working over a year for... finally made it

Short final for CRE

It was smooth as glass on the way back, however it was VERY dark by the time we reached Monroe and we learned on final that our landing light had gone out at some point. Landing with no landing light is a lot harder than expected, your depth perception is really off and the ground will come up to meet you quicker than you think. All turned out well as my CFI friend gave me a little assist on the landing back to Monroe and we were back safe and sound. Total time was 3.7 for a total of 250nm. By far the longest trip yet in one sitting.

I replaced the landing light on Monday in prep for our trip this weekend to Triple Tree (SC00) if anyone is looking for a great place to come and camp out with your plane I encourage you to check out Triple Tree. The annual fly-in is this weekend you still have plenty of time to plane to visit! 7000ft grass runway, we are bringing Tinker Belle in this weekend along with the Cherokee.

Long XC

I'm pleased to report that Cody has completed his first long cross country solo in N2886T.  

Beautiful weather today for an early start and early morning flight down and back.  

The plane did well and this was the longest and farthest we've flown it yet. 

This is the world famous Triple Tree as seen from the Cherokee!

Here is Clemson University and Death Valley Stadium.

Past Pilots

I received a nice note from the AOPA which was sent into the "Letters to the Editor" section and wanted to share that here.

August 17, 2016

To the Editor:

Arriving home from work yesterday, I saw the September issue of AOPA Pilot sitting on the kitchen table

so I made a quick grab and headed to the recliner for some reading.  After a few minutes of thumbing

through the pages I ran across an article called "The $1,000 Cherokee" written by Jill Tallman.  Wow, this

excellent piece brought back some fantastic memories.  The reason for this is that N2886T is the aircraft I

completed my first supervised solo with at the now gone Alameda airport (Q64) in Albuquerque.  The date

was May 19, 1976 which was during my sophomore year of High School and my morning aerial

adventure made me show up late for class so I was sent to the Principal’s office.  When asked for an

excuse, I told Mr. Barefoot about what had just transpired and held out my certificate of solo flight.  He

looked it over, gave me a smile, a handshake and handed me a hall pass.

The last time I saw N2886T was on May 21, 1992.  I had flown a Skylane to Tupelo from Atlanta and

noticed it sitting in an area for permanent tie downs.  I walked over to where she was parked and spent

time reminiscing about that special day.  Thanks for helping me make another flight down memory lane

and I wish Mr. Atkins many years of great times and safe flying with the Cherokee I'll never forget.

25 hour oil change

Finally hit that magic 25 hour goal that we had set and it was time to change the oil.  

Again as before i was relieved to find that we had no trash in the oil filter.  This time however I opted to send the oil off for analysis.  Should have the results back in a few weeks.  

No Glitter! 

AOPA Live!

We made it to this weeks edition of AOPA Live!  Our segment is around the 8:23 mark.

https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/aopa-live#.V60rmP02mOA.gmail

The real purpose of this blog has and always will be to remove the mystery of airplane ownership and to emphasize that GA aircraft ownership is possible by the middle class.   I am so grateful that the AOPA picked up on this and not only produced this story piece but also highlighted it in their broadcast.

Some XC time for Cody

Cody received his solo endorsements and was able to get some solo practice time in this afternoon.

Few nice pictures from the flight between destinations.

Offical AOPA Digital Article and Video

The digital edition of the Sept Issue of AOPA Flight is out now and has a link to the video piece that was done back in June.

Read the full article here and watch the video segment at the end.

https://www.aopa.org/news-and-media/all-news/2016/september/pilot/The-$1000-Cherokee

What a weekend!

Boy what a weekend....hot on the heels of the AOPA article we had 3 major accomplishments back to back.

First, I finally was able to take the Cherokee up for my first solo flight.  What a flight it was!  Second, I was able to fly my first formation flight and on a beautiful summer evening.

Finally,  Cody received solo sign off and was able to solo the Cherokee for the very first time.

Enjoy these beautiful pictures!

 

AOPA Article

The article on the little Cherokee is out!  Seen in this month's issue of AOPA Flight Magazine.

First Long XC to Darlington SC

Hey guys,
Sorry for the delay it's been so brutally hot here for the last month that flying is just miserable. Today however we braved the heat and decided to take the little Cherokee for her first long cross country.
There were a few showers in the area and I wasn't really keen on flying through rain so practiced a little storm avoidance. Aside from a pretty good 17kt cross wind at our destination it was an uneventful flight. The little plane is doing great and did just fine today zipping around.
In total we flew right at 115nm which is the longest (in one sitting) that we've flown so far. The next goal is to take her on a first trip. Thinking I might take it to the beach for the day here coming up soon.

Engine out procedures

Finally, a weekend where I do not have a million things going on and can fly.  The weather cooperated however it was incredibly hot and as you can see from the start the video below take off and climb was sluggish.  Today's DA was 3180 so not a lot of power today in the climb out.

I wanted to do some power off simulations so I can see first hand the glide characteristics of the plane.  The book said that it's best glide speed is 79mph and it certainly seems to have held true.

The first power off 180 was so/so but the second one was a real belly flop, but I guess in an emergency it's nice to know you can get it down if needed.

AOPA Article Video Shoot

Wow what a crazy two days....the AOPA came down and did a full photo and video shoot in addition to a follow up interview.  I can't wait to see the article (it's scheduled for September issue of AOPA Flight Magazine)

On Tuesday I got to the airport very early to take some morning drone footage while the airport was nice and quiet.  We ended up shooting videos for almost 3 hours, it's so interesting to see how all of that comes together to produce a small piece on the internet.  I can't wait to see the finished product.

On Wednesday the other members of the AOPA came in from Maryland to do follow up interviews and to shoot some one on one video interviews.  I can't wait to see how that turns out, we ended up recording almost 3 hours of video and spent another hour taking pictures.

Here are just a few of the RAW video from the shoot.  These videos have no edits but still really cool shots...

iFly 740

It's pretty evident that most of the avionics in the plane are pretty dated.  A few months back I was able to pick up a gently used iFly 700 unit for the plane.  While having an iPad is great, I still wanted something that was geared specifically for aviation without fear of an arbitrary update rendering the app useless.

While an older unit the iFly 700 worked great and I was able to use it on a few flights, as seen in a few of my videos.  Well, fortunately the guys over at Adventure Pilot also follow the blog and sent me a note asking if I would like to upgrade my 700 to a brand new 740 unit!

Well the new 740 arrived today and what a difference!  The WIFI updating is very nice and it will even connect to the stratux ADS-B unit.  I like the idea of the backup battery being able to power the unit in the event the plane power goes out, and I'm really stoked for the ability to have an "augmented" instrument panel which can serve as backup to my steam gauges.

I cannot wait to try this new unit out!