Post by Tom Goodrick on Jan 25, 2010 21:47:35 GMT -5
Back on topic, when I was testing my revised Flight Timer Gauge today, I returned to YCRG which was the site of one of the failures on the old gauge. The new gauge worked fine but I found out a couple things about our weather and what was probably causing the timer failures.
Speaking of "VFR Rules", here's the view of runway 6 at YCRG from my nose camera today as I turned final:
The wind on the runway was 8 kts from 135 degrees which is 75 degrees to the runway. I think what caused my problem before was not a gust but turning into the wind as I left the runway. (I had used runway 24 before as the wind was from 145 so the landing direction made little difference.)
I used the start situation for GAAR leg 5, replaced the aircraft with the Aerp Commander 560 I have been flying and then moved the plane to the runway at YCRG. I took off and made a high wide left-hand circuit that duplicated the approach I had made in the Rally. It was rainging on takeoff visibility and the ceiling were both low. I continued climbing on a runway heading to 4000 ft msl because I knew tall dark shapes were on either sides of me. On the "downwind" leg, a bigger white cloud from the ground up obscurred the airport. I was looking at a relief map on the GPS. (I don't think I could have completed most of these IMC flights without it.) The map showed a valley between the hills that I used on the two previous Rally approaches (C-123 and AC560). As I got below the clouds and entered the valley, I saw the view shown above. The peak on the left dissappears into the cloud. Similar clouds obscur the peaks east of the approach in some places.
I guess if we have any dynamic effect allowed in the weather, we get a slightly different weather system each time we fly. It does not take much dynamic effect to get clouds that obscure the runway. That dynamic effect (mine is on the half mark) can give different results depending on how long we sit in the starting condition getting set up for the flight. For the C-123 I had a lot of work to do and check getting ready compared to the AC 560. So that explains why I saw slightly different weather the second time through the Rally.
Speaking of "VFR Rules", here's the view of runway 6 at YCRG from my nose camera today as I turned final:
The wind on the runway was 8 kts from 135 degrees which is 75 degrees to the runway. I think what caused my problem before was not a gust but turning into the wind as I left the runway. (I had used runway 24 before as the wind was from 145 so the landing direction made little difference.)
I used the start situation for GAAR leg 5, replaced the aircraft with the Aerp Commander 560 I have been flying and then moved the plane to the runway at YCRG. I took off and made a high wide left-hand circuit that duplicated the approach I had made in the Rally. It was rainging on takeoff visibility and the ceiling were both low. I continued climbing on a runway heading to 4000 ft msl because I knew tall dark shapes were on either sides of me. On the "downwind" leg, a bigger white cloud from the ground up obscurred the airport. I was looking at a relief map on the GPS. (I don't think I could have completed most of these IMC flights without it.) The map showed a valley between the hills that I used on the two previous Rally approaches (C-123 and AC560). As I got below the clouds and entered the valley, I saw the view shown above. The peak on the left dissappears into the cloud. Similar clouds obscur the peaks east of the approach in some places.
I guess if we have any dynamic effect allowed in the weather, we get a slightly different weather system each time we fly. It does not take much dynamic effect to get clouds that obscure the runway. That dynamic effect (mine is on the half mark) can give different results depending on how long we sit in the starting condition getting set up for the flight. For the C-123 I had a lot of work to do and check getting ready compared to the AC 560. So that explains why I saw slightly different weather the second time through the Rally.