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Post by Tom Goodrick on Mar 24, 2012 9:49:46 GMT -5
I'm coming! I started the journey this morning in my Commander 690 Pjet. I have put only the essentials on my route because I have to create it from scratch. So far I have entered Seattle, S47, COE and MSP. I just left Alaska so I won't go back for a while. my flight for Boeing Field to Tillamook went well. I flew low enroute until I could turn west and fly unobstructed to the ocean, and then come down the coast top Tillamook. I turned in and made a landing on 31 (?). then before I could note the fuel, time and landing smoothness, I had a building crash while looking for a place to park. THEY HAVE NO APRON!!! What ditts! I don't park my pjet in the mud. So I converted it to a helicopter to search for a better parking place and then discovered why I don't fly helicopters anymore - no rudders!!!
Time for a snooze and then off to COE.
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Post by Tom Goodrick on Mar 19, 2012 20:09:26 GMT -5
Check out "Ice Pilots" on the Weather Channel. They show DC-3, C-46, DC-4 and an Electra Turbo Prop flying cargo in Canada. These shows come on variously day or night.
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Post by Tom Goodrick on Mar 15, 2012 6:28:12 GMT -5
Allan, that is a very scenic section of the US. I am sure you will enjoy your trip. When my sons went off to college, I lived in Massachusetts and they each chose schools in Alabama (for warmth and adventure). That meant I had to make several trips by car. I would head west to Scranton, PA where I picked up I-81 and would follow that to Knoxville, TN where I split off depending on which school I was heading for. That stretch from ScrantonThere are many points where you can depart I-81 for local excursions. The scenery over by Bill's neck of the woods is pretty neat too.
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Post by Tom Goodrick on Mar 13, 2012 21:59:35 GMT -5
Thanks Allen, but I have my original files. I just cannot tell others where to go if they want it. I have most of my old files available but on an old and unreliable computer.
When you guys leave Norfolk, MA, you might want to jog 10 miles west and do a touch and go at Hopedale (1B6) where I learned to fly. My FS9 is set for a lot of junk in the scenery and it has a lot more buildings there than used to be there. In the AOPA Airport Directory the only thing listed at Hopedale other than the hangar is a pool hall. But if you substitute trees for the buildings on the north end of 36 you get the effect I had to fly over. I did touch and goes in my training but when my kids flew there 10 years later, T&G's were banned and you had to do full stops. They got fewer landings in an hour.
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Post by Tom Goodrick on Mar 13, 2012 16:20:11 GMT -5
You forgot KNVD (Joe's place at Nevada, MO) and KIRK (upper central MO) where Flaming and his clan reside.
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Post by Tom Goodrick on Mar 13, 2012 12:46:36 GMT -5
I tried the 414 at Norfolk (flying from my old home base of 1B6 (Hopedale) and over ran Runway 36. My sim shows Norfolk fairly well but the trees are farther north of the runway than in reality. I tried the Cessna Mustang with the same result. (Its official length is 2700 ft which does not include the over run area at the south end of 18.
The ideal aircraft for me seems to be the Piper Meridian single turboprop. I'm not sure where it can be downloaded from. The original was on avsim but I had to modify that considerably to get it to fly according to specs.
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Post by Tom Goodrick on Mar 13, 2012 6:25:32 GMT -5
I see your point but had I known you wanted to go through Anchorage, I would have used Anchorage for a gas stop on the route from Nome to Seattle rather than Juno. I liked Jim Bertleson. He did some very good work in figuring out some details about the gauge design that Microsoft did not tell us about. I was corresponding with him outside this Forum when he suddenly disappeared. In my view someone here threatened his life. (He was an OBGYN and chief of Gynacology at the main hospital in Anchorage. I would certainly agree with a stop there in his honor although he would probably hide from us. It just seems like a bad way to start a tour by going north 675 nm and then coming back about the same amount. My own memories of long flights in piston twins are not as rosy as yours. I was glad when they ended. That's why I like to fly jets today whenever possible on such long flights.
Jerry is the guy who lives in Tillamook. He still writes on this Forum now and then. When he moved to Tillamook, we all found a very interesting place to fly into and out of.
In Real Life I flew into Norfolk MA a few times. That's a nice place and a good place to practice short landings (about 2600 ft as I remember - no problem for a Cessna 150!). MIT based their soaring club there and they came over my house once in a while when I lived in Bellingham (west and upwind from Norfolk). They would get a ride to a position near my house and then fly back to Norfolk. I also had a friend who based his own Cessna 150 there. Flew with him one evening to Martha's Vineyard and back. I think he wanted some company for the over-water leg.
I still can't get your flight plan to stick in my system. I copy it in and then go to look at it. Only once did I see the entire path. Usually all the waypoints disappear. Guess i'll have to construct the path from scratch.
I would recommend using Norfolk as an operational test for any aircraft you want to fly. I am still planning on using the 414 but might consider the Mustang Jet.
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Post by Tom Goodrick on Mar 12, 2012 16:17:31 GMT -5
I checked out my Cessna 414 file today and found it works fine. Then I modified the fuel tanks because I am sure it has aux tanks but I am not sure what their capacity is. I do not have real good specs on this plane because it was not being made during the times my best books were being published. I used a couple of magazine articles to set up the model. Thus I got the total fuel right but not the proportion between main and aux tanks. Because it is very sensitive to fuel/payload split, I felt the aux tanks would help. I put 32 gallons in the aux tanks, 70 in each main. That leaves full main tanks good with the pilot and three others on board. I think I'll fly that for Ed's USA Tour unless anyone can come up with better info. My first landing, in an 8 kt crosswind at HSV was at 109 KIAS and -101 fpm. It flies nicely.
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Post by Tom Goodrick on Mar 12, 2012 8:24:36 GMT -5
I will try to get back into sim flying some more. But every time I have said that recently, something comes up to keep me grounded for a while. Health has been ok but not great. Last summer the heart acted up again. It does worst in the hot weather of which there is a lot here in Alabama. Then recently my diabetes flared up. I gained back a little weight which always brings up the glucose count and my doctor has stepped up enforcement of diet and glucose measurement. But knowing the numbers does not help me control the numbers so that is very frustrating. My main activity has been snoozing - morning, afternoon and evening naps! I even downloaded two reference books on diabetes for my Kindle. This works pretty well because my entire library (mostly novels but four reference books now) is always available for review whenever the Kindle is in reach (and charged up).
But, finally, as of last Friday, my Doc came up with a new diagnosis that could clean up a lot of these problems - Vitamin B12 Deficiency Anemia. I have started taking B12 pills which might solve the problem. Hopefully the pills will work and I won't need the B12 shots. If it turns into pernicious anemia then I get the shots for the duration. The symptoms of this deficiency are hand numbness, memory problems and balance problems hinder walking. The funny thing is I have had these symptoms for over 20 years in the background, never very prominent. But a doctor I had over 12 years ago did try to fix these problems with no success. He sent me to nerve specialists for "Carpal Tunnel" because of my affinity for computers and to ear doctors to fix the balance problems. (I found out I have Tinitus - a continuous source of white noise in my head which I can tune out.)
So I am taking B12 pills and hoping to remain awake a larger portion of the day.
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Post by Tom Goodrick on Mar 12, 2012 7:57:19 GMT -5
Looks like a very interesting route, Ed. I will dust off my Cessna 414 and fly that route. (If anyone is interested in my 414, I think it is still available from Avsim. It does not have an operating door but has most everything else people like in planes these days. Don't remember if I finished the Virtual Cockpit but I know it has good inside-out views.)
I am going to need some help getting this flight plan loaded. I tried copying it into a blank Notepad file and then re-naming it. That gave nothing. Then I vaguely remembered there is a hidden header on the .pln files so I loaded a working .pl n file, erased the body and copied in your body. That worked except that it los all the waypoiints. It showed KBFI and MMMY and nothing in between.
What is the secret? In the past I have just emailed flight plan files to anyone who asked for one.
OK I figured out what works - maybe. I made a new flight plan just from BFI to MMMY with no waypoints. Then I copied in the waypoints from Ed's file starting with the second and ending with his MMMY waypoint. It worked. I saw his complete route.
There is both a hidden (non-ascii) header and trailer that are lost if you just copy the text you see in a listing of the .pln file.
Why go back up to Anchorage and then back down? I'd start at Anchorage and go to Seattle and the KCOE.... I made those edits in the corrected file. Not sure I can fly the Cessna 414 on all the longer legs. I'll check it out. The 414 is the same as the 421 except the engines are direct drive on the 414 - no gearing to the props.
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Post by Tom Goodrick on Mar 1, 2012 9:32:55 GMT -5
I just checked the NTSB site on this crash. Here's their preliminary report:
On February 23, 2012, about 1859 central standard time, a Beech 58, N99EZ, experienced a total loss of engine power on both engines during a visual approach to West Houston Airport (IWS), Houston, Texas. The pilot subsequently made a forced landing about 7 miles northwest of IWS and near Cypress, Texas. The certificated commercial pilot was uninjured. The airplane sustained substantial damage to the wing. The airplane was operated by the pilot under the provisions of 14 Code of Federal Regulations Part 91 as a personal flight. Night marginal visual meteorological conditions prevailed and a flight plan had not been filed for the flight that originated from Vicksburg Municipal Airport, Vicksburg, Mississippi, and was destined for IWS.
He had a failure of both engines on approach to the airport at night. He made a pass at one lighted sports field and saw kids on it. He had enough speed left to go across the street to an empty lighted field and get down. Amazing!
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Post by Tom Goodrick on Feb 15, 2012 10:11:18 GMT -5
" . . . how low you have stooped . . . "? was in reference to Flaming's note that the Island Flyover in Wii (on the Sports Resort disc) is a low level flight sim. In case you do not know what that Wii game is, it is just a mechanism for viewing the entire island on which the Sport Resort is based, showing the location of the various events. You are given a fancy little aerobatic seaplane to fly, giving fellow competitors a ride. The control mechanism is your Wii controller wand which you tilt or roll to make the plane move. The control is obviously very unrealistic and inverted turns are reversed in direction from what they should be. They also make it very difficult to land because you stall and crash into the water when you try to land on the water.
The basis for the game is to get points for shooting or crashing into balloons and for crashing into little tourist signs placed in awkward locations (like inside volcanoes, etc.).
I like to do it whenever my granddaughter is not around. She makes me look like a doddering old fahrt.
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Post by Tom Goodrick on Feb 13, 2012 6:24:30 GMT -5
This is all very sad. Comparing it to the Wii flights around a ficticious island shows how low you have stooped. I will continue flying FS2004 with considerable satisfaction. Nuts to M$.
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Post by Tom Goodrick on Feb 4, 2012 14:36:52 GMT -5
Look at Amazon.com for the type of music (Probably in the category "Easy Listening") You might see the album cover. They often used the same photos on LP albums as on tape albums. My dad had some tape albums like that. I mainly had LP's. I have bought several good old albums from Amazon. Try a search on "Music to Dine BY".
The album could have been done by a "no name band." But it could have been done by some out fit like Gordon Jenkins, Montovani, Hugo Winterhalter, Percy Faith, or Frank Chacksfield. Here are some band names from an "Instrumental Gold" album I have that reproduces many popular band pieces from the '50's: Leroy Anderson, Les Baxter, Prez Prado, Frank Mills, Billy Vaughn, Martin Denny, Frank Pourcel, Roger Williams, Nelson Riddle, Ray Conniff, Bert Kaempfert, Don Costa, Robert Maxwell, Arthur Lymon, Les Brown, Richard Hayman, David Rose.
Check some of these names on Amazon and you might see your cover. Sorry I am late on this but I don't look at this side of the Forum often.
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Post by Tom Goodrick on Jan 28, 2012 8:38:58 GMT -5
Yesterday, 1-27-12, the Boeing Dreamliner made a direct flight from Dublin, Ireland, to Huntsville, AL. It was on display for a while for the Boeing employees to see. One of Boeing's Huntsville plants did some design work on it.
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