Innehållsförteckning för April 2017 från Plane & Pilot

Like most of you, I think of avgas in a very one-dimensional way, regarding our old true blue 100LL as the only aviation gasoline, at least until a 100LL alternative hits the pumps in a few years. But it turns out that’s not really true. There’s another approved aviation fuel for sale today, Swift Fuels’ UL94, an approved aviation unleaded gasoline. The fuel, you might not know (I didn’t), is available at around 50 airports across the country. And a lot of us can put it in our airplanes and just go flying. There are some of us who can’t, however, and here’s the story behind that, too. It’s no secret that lead is bad stuff, which lead paint user Vincent van Gogh and his poor ear found out the…

Come up with a great idea and the rotary world will apparently whoop-whoop a path to your door. That, in fact, is just what has happened with Genesys’ HeliSAS Autopilot and Stability Augmentation System, which has quietly become one of the most successful helo aftermarket launches in memory. HeliSAS (short for helicopter stability augmentation system) is the first of its kind certified for Part 27 rotorcraft, and if sales are any indication, there was a definite need for the technology. As is standard for autopilots, the primary function of the HeliSAS is to free up as much of a pilot’s time and attention as possible. The HeliSAS stands out because it’s aiming at light to midsized Part 27 helicopters. Most of these are single-pilot, fall into the light to midsized…

» PRICE AS FLOWN: $180,000 » BASE PRICE: $160,000 » MAIN CONSTRUCTION: ALL-METAL » ENGINE: ROTAX 912 ULS2 » HORSEPOWER: 100 HP » PROPELLER: WOODCOMP KLASSIC 170/3/R, COMPOSITE, GROUND ADJUSTABLE, 3-BLADE, 67” DIAMETER OR (OPTIONAL) SENSENICH 3B0R5R68C, COMPOSITE, GROUND ADJUSTABLE, 3-BLADE, 68” DIAMETER » AVIONICS: ANALOG SIX-PACK OR DYNON SKYVIEW HDX » LANDING GEAR: FIXED » SEATS: 2 » DOORS: 1 (CANOPY) » EMPTY WEIGHT: 855.4 LBS. » MAXIMUM TAKEOFF WEIGHT: 1,320 LBS. » PAYLOAD: 285 LBS. (FULL FUEL) » USEFUL LOAD: 465 LBS. » FUEL CAPACITY: 30 GAL. (180 LBS.) » WINGSPAN: 28.22 FT. » LENGTH: 21.72 FT. » HEIGHT: 7.6 FT. » CABIN WIDTH: 3.85 FT. » MAXIMUM CLIMB RATE: 825 FPM » TOP CRUISE SPEED: 108 KTS » MAXIMUM OPERATING ALTITUDE: 15,000 FT. » MAXIMUM RANGE: 516…

“Everybody’s gotta have a little place for their stuff. That’s all life is about. Trying to find a place for your stuff.” — George Carlin Stuff—we’ve all got it. We take it with us, everywhere. We take bags of it to work, to play, overnight, from room to room. We’ve got old stuff and new stuff. Stuff we can’t bear to give away and stuff we can’t wait to get rid of. We buy and sell it on eBay, give it away, receive it and re-gift it. We’re not like other species. We can’t do without our stuff. I like my stuff nice and neat. I can’t bear to walk into a cluttered house or kitchen with counters covered with electrical appliances, mail, calendars or pottery cylinders filled…

BEECH G35 2 Fatal The commercial-rated pilot and passenger (who owned the airplane) were conducting a cross-country business flight. Several witnesses reported observing the accident airplane overhead; one witness stated that the engine made a “sputtering” sound like it was running out of gas. She stated that the airplane was flying north and then turned west when it began to “nose dive” out of sight. A review of the radar data revealed that the airplane approached the destination airport from the southeast and proceeded north, tracking above the runway about 400 feet above ground level (agl). The airplane then climbed to 900 feet agl and continued northbound. About 8 miles north of the destination airport, the airplane was about 1,100 feet agl and then entered a left turn and descended.…

We general aviation pilots are used to, for all intents and purposes, dispatching our own flights. Even if we don’t think about it in those terms, that’s what we’re doing. We get the weather, figure our fuel needs, do weight and balance calculations, arrange for tiedown and fuel, if needed, and take care of all the other tasks related to the flight. Sometimes this is an easy thing to do. Sometimes, as you’ve no doubt learned from experience, making all the arrangements can be a bear. Airline pilots have it easy, comparatively speaking, anyway. In commercial operations, the pilots team up with FAA-certified dispatchers to get all the dirty work done. The primary purpose of a dispatcher is to ensure that flights are safe and efficient, which is no different…

“An out only works if you stick with the plan. If you change the plan, you must create a new out.” Even if you’re a cool hand at the poker table, or in the cockpit, it’s always nice to have an ace up your sleeve. No pilot can have a contingency for every conceivable flight scenario, but having an “out” tips the odds to keep you flush because a bluff isn’t an option. If you’re flying the Eastern Seaboard of the U.S. and things gets socked-in by heavy fog, you want to have a good out. When I flew turboprops for a Virginia-based regional airline, there were many occasions when the temperature dew point spread kissed and the resulting fog swaddled wide swaths of the Eastern Seaboard in a blanket…

1. Conventional and harmonious flight control: It’s a great flying airplane that handles well, even in breezy conditions. Even taxiing is great, thanks to the nosewheel steering design. 2. Cockpit comfort: From great headroom, shoulder room and clearance from the sides, the Sport Cruiser shines here. And the visibility is as good as it gets. 3. Rotax power: The choice of the Rotax 912 ULS gives pilots a proven powerplant that has a large service network. I should add that Sensenich’s three-blade composite prop is as quiet and smooth as it is pretty. 4. Dynon SkyView HDX: This is a terrific choice for a sport plane, with large, sharp displays, touch or button control, a great little autopilot and all kinds of additional safety utilities. 5. Bringing the factory to…

“Autopilot-Autopilot” sounded through the cockpit speakers as First Officer John DePaola assumed manual control of the Embraer 135 regional jet. His left hand palmed the white-knobbed thrust levers; his right encircled the ram’s-hornshaped control yoke. The 37-seat aircraft sliced through the placid air. American Eagle flight 4539 had departed Toronto at 7 a.m. Boston’s suburbs unfurled below an hour later. Instructions from Logan Airport’s tower cleared the flight to land on Runway 22L. DePaola peeked over the glareshield; bronzed haze still veiled the landing surface. His instruments would have to guide him a bit further. “Gear down, flaps 22 [degrees],” DePaola called. “Landing checklist.” Captain Rich Joslyn pulled the wheel-shaped lever out and downward. A whooshed roar filled the cockpit as the nose gear doors opened into the slipstream. The…

“I started with loops, Immelmanns, Cuban 8s, and Split S's, along with the gamut of rolls—barrel, slow, and point—then, initiated variations on those basic themes...” When I was a kid and could only dream about being unhinged from Earth, I assumed all airplanes could fly in three, full dimensions. Every pilot knows that’s the definition of flying, but only to a limited extent. As a government brat living in a suburb of Washington D.C., I used to ride my bike a few miles to College Park Airport, the world’s oldest continually operated airport since 1909, to watch the parade of airplanes circling the pattern and landing again and again. I remember being struck by the fact that the airplanes never seemed to maneuver very much, but I knew they could…

“Perhaps of greater concern is the number of near-midairs reported by pilots to the FAA. In 2015, there were 179 reported, with 123 of them involving a miss of less than 500 feet and a collision being avoided only by evasive action. Naturally, there’s no way to tell how many near-midairs weren’t reported to the FAA, nor how many pilots remained blissfully unaware of the fact that their aircraft was almost hit.” When it comes to keeping airplanes from bumping into each other, it still looks as if one of the best things we have going for us is the “big sky” concept. Put simply, there’s such a vast amount of airspace, and aircraft so often fly random routes, that the odds that our aircraft will not be in the…

“The winds created a sharply rising line of air along the ridge. From those rocks I’d spend hours watching the ravens, silhouettes of shimmering rainbow-feathered light riding the lift back and forth for no reason but flight.” I’ve been fascinated by the flight of birds since I was a child. I’m hardly the first young person to turn his eye to the sky and never look down again. For a thousand years, birds have inspired people to dream of human flight and, later, just over a hundred years ago, to finally build a heavier-than-air machine capable of carrying exactly one soul aloft. Just like a bird. A kid’s passion for flight is easily kindled. Back in 1970, like millions of other people young and older, I read Richard Bach’s novella…