Helicopters

I know nothing about helicopters. I had a few rides. One guy let me try to hover. I couldn't keep the thing in a 40 acre field. When I was a line boy at College Park, I had to be there at 6AM on weekdays to open up. This was so I could be ready for Captain Dan. Captain Dan was the traffic reporter for the Washington D.C. area. He was on WTOP, the most important and popular station. He would hustle in and land at the pumps with his Hughes 300, and I had to be there waiting for him. Every second counted. He needed more than a quick turn around. He needed down and up now. He said our pumps were so slow he was gonna go someplace else. But he never did. I had to hold on to that nozzle on the back of that helicopter with the rotor spinning just above my head. You had to be really careful when you pulled the nozzle out, that you didn't catch the rotor. I never got used to it, and I was always scared and Captain Dan complained I was too slow. But good ole "Cabbage Park" was damn close to D.C. People used to tell me that Captain Dan had flown choppers in the Army back when Nam was just somebody else's war. Somebody said that Dan had more time in a Hughes 300 than any person in the world. Dan was a legend. But Captain Dan was not the best helicopter pilot at College Park. Because the best helicopter pilot in the world happened to be at College Park. His name was Jan and he was my boss. He was Brinkerhoff's 50% partner and friend. Jan Bingen and Jeff Brinkerhoff were and are the two best pilots I ever knew. I was hired as a line boy by Jan. I was checked out in the Piper J-3 Cub by Jeff. Jan was an airshow pilot in the Army. They painted a face on an Army chopper. Jan was the U.S.Army Bozo the clown. Jan was the examiner for helicopter ratings in the area. Guys would show up from all over the place in all kinds of choppers and he would give them thier license. One cloudy day a guy came in in a Hughes for a checkride. Without much preliminaries, Jan climbed in and off they went. The next twenty minutes was an airshow exhibition. The helicopter was turned to a 90 degree bank which it can't do. It was pointed straight up, which it can't do. It did a dance bobbing it's nose and wiggling it's tail rotor. We were on the ramp, about seven of us, because the mechanics had come out to see. We were yelling and cheering and we couldn't believe our eyes. Even the guys who had seen it before. I had never seen it before. After the show, Jan was writing up the guy's brand new temporary airman certificate for rotocraft. Jeff said to the applicant, "did he let you fly it at all?" The guy says "No actually. I started it up. Taxied across to 13 and did a take-off run and when we hit transitional he took it and you saw the rest." The guy was smiling and so was Jan and so were all of us. Another time I saw the WTOP Hughes way down in the weeds by the woods. It was hovering and pitching. The airport bums were kind of walking down that way. I asked Buz who was the hardest working instructor in the industry, "What's goin' on down there"? He said, "Captain Dan is letting Jan show him a few tricks". I ran to catch up to the others. What the hell kind of tricks could they do in a swamp at the end of the runway? What they were doing was playing with some old empty 55 gallon drums that were now scattered on the ground. I've never seen anything like it before or since. You had to be there. You see, if you blow a drum with the rotor wash, you blow them all. But you can blow just one if you do it right. You can stand it up, roll it around, bang it into another drum, line them up, put one skid on a standing barrel, roll a barrel with a skid. You can wreck a helicopter real fast doing this. You can kill yourself showing off doing this. I was entertained, but I was nervous. And Dan! Mr. Cool radio personality. Involved in brazen flat hatting! One rainy day nothing was going on. But the big construction company had their Alouette Turbine rolled out and "Gary" who flew it was hanging around. My boss Jeff was trying to schmooze himself into a free rotocraft rating. He was making a deal with Gary to trade favors by letting him use the 172 for some commuting he needed to do if he could get the use of the the Alouette for an hour or so. At the same time he was telling Jan that the Alouette was all set up for a checkride and his paperwork was all in order and it was rainy and they weren't busy. I had no students and I was supposed to be cleaning the 150's, but I was sweeping and cleaning in the building because I wanted to see what what my bosses were going to do next. How could Jeff Brinkerhoff get a rotor rating? I had never even heard him talk about helicopters, let alone fly one. Did he have a written? Would he know how to fly a big turbine Aerospatiale Alouette? Not exactly a trainer. Would a big construction company just lend Brinkerhoff thier aircraft? The next thing I knew that big turbine was whining so loud you had to cover your ears inside the building. They took off in the rain and disappeared. No airshow in that monster. They come back shortly. More noise. Gary is smiling. His aircraft is safe and sound. The turbine winds down. Jeff and Jan are smiling. A temporary gets written up. This blows my mind more than the 55 gallon drums. So I've gotta say it before somebody else does. To Jeff I say, "So, did he let you fly it? "Yea I flew a lot" "But he flew it too right?" "Oh Yea".

They Still Make Vespas. I want One

God it's a beautiful day today. The weather is not cold, not hot. The clouds are fabulous. About a 3000 ft. broken ceiling. The blue sky in the breaks is burning bright. Perfect flying weather. I had to run an errand in town. What town? We live in a five mile triangle of 3 very little towns. It's about 20 miles to a good size town that has movies, restaurants, etc. And an hour's drive will get us to a city like Salisbury, or Dover. An hour and 15 and it's Annapolis. 1:45 and we can be in D.C. or BMore. My errand was in Hurlock. Five miles away. It's so damn pretty outside. So I'll see if my old bike will start. Remember the motorbike craze of the mid sixties? I was in high school. The bike I wanted was a Honda 160. It was a little twin cylinder, kick start, came in red or black. I can't think of anything I ever wanted more than that, as far as a material object. I never got that bike. When I got to college I had a Honda 90. It went about 40 mph tops. I loved that bike. My friend Jerry had a Sears Gilera 125 which was a very nice motorbike. We would ride together on those bikes all day long. That's about all I did in the summer of '67. We had no money, no girlfriends, no cars, no real jobs, lived with parents. All the back winding roads we explored and raced on in eastern PG County, Md. are now completely gone and replaced by subdivisions and highways and malls and parking structures. My youth disappeared along with those old winding roads. Oh, am I not talking about aviation? I used to take that Honda 90 out on the runway at Freeway Airport and run full throttle laying down on the bike with my feet on the back passenger pegs and my helmit in the handlebars. I could get about 58 mph on a good day. My friend Chet had a brand new Triumph 650 which I coveted. He would let me ride it. When I took it down the runway slowly because I was afraid of hurting his bike, it was way over 60 in second gear. This was way before people learned to ride on Harleys. Everybody had Jap bikes. The guy that had Freeway Airport(and he still does), he had a bike called a Suzuki X-6 Hustler. It would go zero to 60 mph in 6 seconds. This was in 1967. Decades before the "doner cycles". Another buddy would let me ride his dad's Harley. This was before Harleys were all pretty and popular. It had a foot clutch and a hand shifter. You had to take your hand off the handlebars to shift! It was called a Duo Glide. You had to kick start it. But it had this big long flat pedal starter that was geared or something because it was real easy to push and real smooth. But it took a lot of tries to get it fired up. That was cool and I was thrilled . But for some reason I just never got Harley fever. And when I'm at a wings and wheels and I see a hundred Vee Twin HD's all lined up, they just all look the same to me. But then I'll see a Honda 50 step thru in perfect original condition and I'll freak out. Anyway, back to today. I want to see if my bike will start on this Labor Day Friday. My bike is a classic Suzuki 425. 6 speed. It's rusting and pretty dirty. I can't remember which way the choke lever has to move for choke. I suspect it's out of gas. It is notorious for using oil. I dropped it last year on the airstrip going only about 5 mph and still bent it up and I got hurt too. I didn't check anything, like the tires, or the oil, or the lights. I just climbed on and hit the starter. The starter ran but no hits. Try again, starter slowing down a bit and it starts backfiring. Wish I knew which position to put the choke lever in---guess I could stop and put on my glasses and actually look at the choke, but she starts running a while and stalls. I get my helmet out of the man cave. It has what's left of a bird's nest in it and the foam padding is dried out and falling out in chunks and dust. In todays world, a new hemet is $300 to $800. I only paid $400 for the motorcycle 15 years ago. Our rule of thumb for a used bike was $1 per cc. So Harleys were $1200. I guess you could get out of the "Harley Store" today for $1200 if you only got a few items of clothing. So, I gotta live with my old helmet. I cleaned the plastic face shield and from that same roll of paper towels, I stuck a couple towels in the helmet to keep that disintegrating foam out of my hair. I always ride with boots, jeans, heavy shirt, leather jacket, leather gloves. For some reason today I just want to go with what I've got on. A white T shirt, (by the way, I always wear a white t- shirt-- if you see me at a fly-in I'll be in a white V-neck t-shirt), no socks, slip on tennis shoes(my wife says slip-on tennis shoes are for old men--well?), no gloves. I get the thing running again and blast off. I ride to "town". The choke must be in the correct position. The fuel petcock is in the reserve position though. Not a good sign. I run my errands. While in stores and things I leave the key in the ignition and the helmet on the seat. What would a young thief want with my old toy? Errands done, I go to NAPA. The glass sight gage is kind of blank looking on the crankcase. It doesn't have a dipstick. I fear that I am the dipstick because the bike has no oil in it! I buy a quart of oil and put it in the bike. No register on the sight guage. I go back into NAPA and get another quart. Now I chat with the two really nice women who run the store. I put the second quart in. A slight register at the bottom of the guage. Back into NAPA for one more. That does the trick. Then to the Citgo. High test. she takes 3 gallons. I dont know if we were empty or not. I select "on" instead of reserve on my tank and away we go. It was amazing how much better the bike ran with gas and oil. On the way home I saw some trees that were starting to turn a little early. I could smell dry leaves on the ground. It smelled great. I ran through the spray of an irrigation rig which was along the side of the road. It felt great and just barely got me wet. Smelled something musty. Then smelled something burning far away. Smelled a cut field they were harvesting. Then I smelled something that was the reason why I got the bike out. I smelled Autumn.

A Nordo at Heart

I've become a really cranky old bastard. Sometimes I just can't let stuff go. I have to bitch and whine. I promise not to whine right now about Centigrade on the ATIS while keeping the F temp. a secret. I want to whine about radio use at the basic unicom level. Non-tower, CTAF, etc. This has gotten so bad that the AOPA and the FAA are doing some extra education items about it. Even though Gen. Av. is dying a slow and not so slow death which makes for less busy patterns, the radio chatter of useless talk is getting worse. On a busy Unicom frequency any extra chatter can cause someone to miss important information. Now don't get me wrong-- I love to talk and I love to bullshit on the radio. But I do it when it's safe, not busy, and I do it on a bullshit frequency. I've found lately, that on a busy CTAF frequency, you can't hear all the traffic because some planes are just talking too much. I'm preaching to the choir. But if I could talk to these big shot pilots who just have to hear themselves talk all the time I would say this: Stop talking. Just listen. It's safer. You don't have to report every leg of the pattern, even if your instructor told you to. He was doing that to get you used to the radio. Not so you would do it in every pattern for the rest of your life. You're not a student anymore. So shut up. Don't report "clear of the runway" after landing. This is a stupid rookie waste of air time. One exception is that if the runway has a slope, or there is fog, or you are unsure of your position, of course, obviously, speak up. In these cases, you need to be saying "I'm still on the runway" Remember the two 747's in the Canary Islands. Worst air disaster. Now having said that, at a normal airport the planes in the pattern can see you. So there is no reason to take up busy frequency time making a really stupid call. Almost as bad is the stupid call of "this is N- so and so taxiing out for takeoff. I hear this a lot. Don't do it. Unless the end of the runway or taxiway is not visible. See above. I really think that these kinds of superfluous calls are just because pilots want to play "controlled field". But we need that frequency free to alert airplanes of real conflicts. Now the worst of all. The call from the pilot who is making his initial Unicom call. He says his position and intentions. That's fine. Then he says something like " is anyone in the pattern?" Or even worse "anyone at so and so airport please advise" These calls are from pilots who don't know what they are doing and want everyone else to report to them and tell them what to do. When you hear that call, now you are forced to tie up the frequency to find out where that asshole is because he may get you killed. The trend on CTAF seems to be an attitude of "I'm gonna use my radio to talk my way in here and that will keep me safe". My advice to pilots in a busy pattern on a busy frequency is shut up and fly your airplane. I have an example of of the talk too much attitude. It happened about a month ago. I was coming home from down south in my little airplane. I needed fuel and it was about 7 PM and a lot of places close at five. I wanted a bathroom and some food too. I wanted a big airport, but not a tower. So Richmond's Hanover Ashland was perfect and I was only an hour from home . Fuel would cost a little more but I'd get a happy quick turnaround. I got the AWOS and figured they'd be landing south. I monitored the frequency. The frequency was quiet. It was so quiet that I felt comfortable talking to the FBO on Unicom. The nice young lady on Unicom told me yes on fuel and that they use a truck and she would send a signalman out to park me. It was a lovely summer night. I flew a crosswind over the field, and I announced it. Not a plane around. Landed south and taxied in. Got a great turnaround and was back in the plane refreshed with a coffee to go in 20 minutes. In no hurry, I sipped my coffee and listened to the AWOS on the ramp. Winds only 4 knots still favoring the south runway. So I taxi out. Finally comes my example. I hear a plane on the frequency announce a base leg to the north runway. I don't really care that we're setting up to different runways because I got a long way to taxi and I just figure I'll let him land. We can both use the runway we want. OK fine, but the guy starts calling me on the radio. "Ah, airplane going to runway 18 at Hanover what are your intentions"? So now I'm not having fun anymore, because I got to think about this guy who has to talk to me before he can just land. I don't have him in sight. Then he announces he is departing on runway 36. I still don't care what he does, but now I'm confused. I would have sworn he called on base leg a couple minutes ago and I don't see how he could have landed and taxied back that quick. Maybe he did. But I got the feeling he was on the ground the whole time and just accidentally said base leg. Now this guy is taking off north and says he is staying in the pattern. Fine. I check the pattern carefully, as both runways seem to be active. I announce my takeoff and go on 18. He calls me again asking if I am staying in the pattern. I answer him while I am rotating. This breaks my own rule of "Fly the Airplane". This guy had drawn me into his sick world of all the airplanes must talk and coordinate. If he would have just left me alone and made simple announcements, it could have been safe and nice. I shook all that off as I climbed, turned down the radio, opened the canopy, flew northeast, watched the sun set behind my left shoulder and saw the Rappahannock, a silver snake at my twelve.

You want it when?

When I stumbled into my M-10 Cadet I also stumbled into a fantastic mechanic. And a friend. Which is harder to find? A good friend, or a good mechanic? I just spent a couple of days working with this guy. I learned so much. But I'm old now and I really don't want to learn anything, because it's too much work. I only want to do what I want to do. Usually a mechanic charges me double if I watch and triple if I help. But Dan had me almost convinced that I was helping. He was being too kind. I went with him to look at an airplane he was phase checking. It was a beautiful Airknocker Chief a guy was recovering. In half a day, I went from buggering up screws on inspection plates to "assistant" inspector on a house call! But Dan is amazing in the way he works. Whether he's inspecting or painting or beading or torquing he seems to have a calm rhythm about him. He seems to see where the task is going and how it's going way in advance. It's like he can see into the future. And he gets stuff done really fast and it never looks like he's hustling. I guess it's like that with any real pro. They make it look easy.

Give me the small zero- commercial Fly-in

I couldn't even remember how to sign into my own blog. It's been so long since I've posted. It's not writer's block, because I never shut up unless I get really tired. Faithful readers, my friends, I have missed you. As you know I have an airstrip in my back yard. My son thought, until he was about eight years old, that everyone had a plane in their back yard. We have had some great parties in that back yard. Planes doing fly-bys that just knew we were there. A guy dropping in in a Twin Bonanza, many times. My buddy coming in for a visit in his Fairchild Cornell. Our specialty, the bonfire and the campfire. Swimming pool parties. Live music, open mike. BD and the Stearman. You know all this. But! a couple of Sundays ago, I went to the best General Aviation venue in the eastern United States. This guy has a fly in every Sunday! Everyone is invited. He is the nicest guy in the world . Vicki and I flew there in the M-10 of course. BD met us there in the Stearman, and my good buds Clark and Ken came over from Lee in a Buck-Seventy-Two. You chip in $5 per person. Have soup, Chili, Burgers, Hot Dogs, Sodas, dessert. The Sunday we went, there were about 30 or more planes. There was a bright yellow Staggerwing. There were these two guys in classic J-3's that flew in and out in perfect formation. I swear they ate their hot dogs in unison. My wife is a hard sell on Fly-ins. She likes horses and things. But there were some dogs there that she liked. She wants to go back again! The place is down below my place on the peninsula by about 75 mile naut. It's just below Accomack. The place dates back to the 30's. Check it out. It's called 9VG. Nine Very Good. The nice guy down there who will feed you is Gordon. I will C U there!

Just Puttering

It's been great fun exhibiting my little Mooney M-10 Cadet at some places during the Fly-in season. My friend Clark made me a beautiful poster board to put up in front of the airplane when it's parked. One of those signs that tells about the plane. Clark also made a nice little model of the plane. He made it from scratch. People ask me if I'm going to this Fly-in or that. In light of all this, I'd like to spruce up 42V a bit. It sat for six years in the weeds. It needs cosmetics. The right wing has these huge "potholes" in the paint down to the primer. I have no money for a paint job. I have no knowledge of paint. I went to an auto body and paint shop. I had a panel from the plane. They stuck it under a computer camera thing and matched my wing paint. They asked me what kind of paint I had on the airplane. I did not know. They asked me what kind of paint I wanted. I did not know. They asked me who was going to do the painting and I said "Me, I guess". They asked if I'd ever painted anything before and I said "yes, with a spray can". They said that they could put my color in a spray can if I wanted. But I didn't want to be limited to spray cans. So they sold me a quart of a Urethane product. It comes with something called "reducer". And something called "actuator". I literally asked the parts lady to tell me how to mix and paint. She told me, and it sounded like "reducer" is paint thinner and "actuator" is hardener. One quart of paint and it's additives came to $175. Pretty expensive touch up paint. So now I had my paint. But only a quart. And I didn't know if it would match. I have a nice spray rig that I bought before I retired. It's a good enough gun. It's new still in the box and I don't know jack about how to use it. So I thought about this for a few more days. Then I went to the hobby shop and tried to buy an airbrush to practice with. The airbrushes he had were set up for ready made cans with ready made colors. Also they would be hard to adapt to my compressor. And they cost about $100. I thought about it some more. I went back to the lady at the auto body place. "You wouldn't have an airbrush would you"? "We carry one type" "Will it work with a compressor"? I say. "Only way it will work. Do you have a regulator that you can set to 25 PSI"? "Yes". "Do you have a water separator on that regulator"? "Yes". So 42 dollars later I have an airbrush. I think about this some more. One day I fool around with the compressor fittings and I get that airbrush all hooked up and get my compressor regulator dialed down. Then I think some more. A couple days later I finally open that quart can of paint. I take some of that reducer and I run it through the airbrush. I mix up a minute amount of paint. I take some more reducer and clean the surface of the wing I'm going to touch up. Then I start spraying with this gypsy rig and it's really kind of fun. I realize I have no idea what I'm doing. The paint match is really damn on. The wing looks better already. I've got a feeling it's gonna be a pretty steep learning curve when I start spraying with a real gun. I'm going to think about this some more.