Aviator90 Episode 32

[music]

Chris Palmer: [1:00] Welcome to another episode of Aviator90 from Angle of
Attack. Here we are ready for another cross country flight. So,
today we are going to go from Whiskey November 10 in Washington
near Mount St. Helens, which is a famous volcano, to 21W near Mount
Rainier in Washington as well. This flight will take us over some
beautiful mountain terrain and it should last about half hour.
[1:23] So, we also will be flying in an aircraft which is the
Aerosoft Beaver that is very high powered to take us over the
varying terrain today. And in additional, also introduce you to the
GPS. I think you are going to have a blast with this episode
because the terrain is beautiful and flying with the GPS is quite
easy and fun.

[1:48] So, as I mentioned before, our route is going to take us
from Whiskey November 10 to 21W. We’ll be going pretty much direct
but we’ll also be flying at 7,500 feet in a mountainous terrain so
we may have to make some deviations here and there for terrain and
other things. So, let’s jump right into the cockpit and get to it.

[2:18] All right, so here we are and the first thing we are going
to do is just get ready to start up the aircraft. We want to turn
in the alternator and the battery. Also the beacon light and the
nav lights and center fuel is on. We want both magnetos on and then
we will check the power, make sure that our mixture is all the way
rich and then we’ll crack the throttle for the start.

[2:46] I’m going back to the switches panel and find the starter
all the way in the left and we’ll start the engine. And there we
go, a good start and it’s nice and smooth so we are good there.
Now, I’m just going to check the flight controls here really quick
and make sure we have full range in motion in every direction. I’ll
also check the rudder pedals here.

[3:22] It’s always part of the pre-flight. I want to make sure
there aren’t any hang ups. And then we will run through some other
items. Let’s put our flaps to takeoff before we taxi down the
runway. And then I’m going to turn my radios on, which is the
avionics master switch. So that turns the radios and the avionics
on.

[3:53] And then what we’ll do is we will just check the engine
instruments. We are going to rev up to 2,000 rpm. Actually about
1,500 rpm and then we will check our instruments here.

[4:19] We cycle the prop a couple of times, get some oil going
through that and we won’t explain that for now but it is good to
set that up before the flight to make sure that everything is
flowing smoothly. And now we can check the GPS. So, what we are
basically going to do is to a direct two way point which is right
here so we can click on that.

[4:51] Now, we then use the cursor area to move between fields. So,
press on the right one will go to the next field and we want to go
to two and then you press down which takes you to the next area one
and W. And W is behind where the cursor was so there it is there.
You see 21W and we just hit enter three times so we activated it
and now it’s ready to go. We see that it is in the right direction.

[5:16] It is the correct airport. Everything looks good there and
it’s all set. And you can zoom out. You can hit the terrain key to
show you the terrain in the area and then you can zoom that to kind
of see what we are going to be dealing. So, you see our flight path
takes us pass Mount St. Helens and Mount Rainier which is the
darker brown areas on the map along our flight.

[5:59] That keeps things pretty simple. Now, you can enter an
entire flight plan into the GPS but today we are just going to make
it simple and just do a direct two way point from our current
position which is Whiskey November 10 and that keeps things simple
there. So, I’m going to turn on the landing and strobe lights now
because I’m about to turn out on to the runway. So the strobe
lights will remain on the entire time and landing lights will be
turned off soon after takeoff.

[6:18] All right, so let’s power up here, ready to go. Push the
power a little bit and we are going to be taking off pretty much in
the direction we are going now but we need to gain some runway back
here so turn right and come over here. Then we will taxi down here.

[6:40] It’s not going to take a lot of runway to get off with this
aircraft. It’s very high powered. It’s made for this type of flying
at these odd airports. It’s also got the Tundra tires on today,
which make it even simpler. Something to look up here so you can
see the dash. We’ll just continue to taxi on down.

[7:03] And the tail in aircraft act a little differently, you have
to add a bit of power in the turn in order to get the tail to whip
around, which seems to work quite well in flight simulators.

[7:24] So, we are going to get down to the end here or we see the
little grass growing and then we’ll flip around in the lineup. We
spent too long in the runway. We are just going to power up and be
out of here. It should be a really quick take off so you are not
going to hear the normal call outs. We’ve already done somewhat of
a run up.

[8:07] And everything is good to go. So let’s continue to whip this
around and we’ll face into the wind here and then we will power up
for takeoff. All right, all set up, we’re lined up. Let me get back
into my normal view here so I can see my instruments and here we
go. I’m going to hold the brakes while I power up, smoothly
advancing power, checking engine instruments. Everything looks good
and we can release when ready. So here we go with the Tundra Wheels
aircraft.

[8:27] We’ll nose over just a little bit. And there we go, we’re
good. I already have my RSP, so I can lift off now and we are in
the air. So, during this initial climb, because we have two notches
of flaps, I’m going to make sure that I get about 300 to 500 feet
of altitude and then I can pull up that first notch of flaps. And
then we will use the climb flaps for just a little bit.

[8:48] And then we will transition to the cruise climb, which is
the clean configuration, so no flaps. And then we can just slowly
climb. But we’ll slowly climb as far as vertical speed, but we will
be going much faster across the ground, which helps out quite a
bit.

[9:07] So, you can see the GPS. And basically what we’re going to
be doing is just follow the magenta line – magenta, purple, pink,
whatever you want to call it. Technically it’s called the magenta
line. And we will follow that line to our destination. And it’s
really that simple.

[9:29] Now, if we wanted to, this aircraft is actually capable of
tracking that course with the autopilot, But I think that’s a bit
too complex to get into now. And besides that, we don’t want you
guys to become button pushers. We want you guys to learn how to
control the aircraft, hand flown, on flights like this.

[10:07] It’s very important to get that feel for your machine. And
that will serve you well in the future. And say that your autopilot
went out. You really don’t have that option of having it there all
the time; so you’re going to need to know how to fly in those types
of situations. Not only that, it’s a good skill to have, anyway,
just in case something else goes wrong and you have to disengage
and take over yourself. Not every aircraft, and very few aircraft
for that matter, will land themselves. And only the most complex
airlines will actually land themselves.

[10:27] So, at least to some extent, you’ll be hand flying the
aircraft every flight. So, you may as well get used to it. And by
doing that, you can learn the intricacies of how the aircraft acts
in certain situations and what the autopilot would actually do if
it was in control.

[10:54] Now, I believe there is also a lot to learn from the
autopilot itself, meaning that you can watch how the autopilot
controls the aircraft and you can then mimic that in your own
flight experience and when you’re hand flying. So, the autopilot
can actually teach us quite a bit about how to control the
aircraft, how to make small corrections here and there, how to make
big corrections smoothly and many other different things.

[11:29] So, just keep that in mind as well. The autopilot isn’t
your enemy. It’s there almost as a copilot. And in those situations
where you have a lot going on and things are quite hectic, say,
you’re in instrument conditions. And you need a little bit of extra
help, say you’re a single pilot – well, you almost always are
within Flight Simulator. Then the autopilot can, like I said, be a
copilot for you, which is extremely helpful in those stressful
situations.

[11:43] And that’s not to say that you stop watching your aircraft.
It just says that it gives you a little bit more assistance to
where you can focus on different things.

[12:30] So we’re just continuing the climb here. Again, we are
climbing to 7,500 feet. And right now, we are just passing through
4,000 feet, as you can see on the altimeter, just now passing
through 4,000. And I’m just going to the left side of Mt. St.
Helen’s here, which is pretty much where our route takes us anyway.
And we will enjoy the beautiful scenery as we do that.

[13:00] I think the GPS is great for this get-in-and-go mentality
that we have talked about quite a bit. It just allows you to dial
in the correct airport or the correct flight plan and then enjoy
the scenery and have fun with your surroundings. And it works out
pretty well.

[13:23] So, I like the GPS. I’m a huge proponent of the technology.
I think it’s very reliable. And it’s making the precision of
navigation even greater than it ever has been. It’s like having a
precision approach anywhere in the sky, because it has that sort of
accuracy to it.

[13:52] And not all GPS are created equal. So, some are more
accurate than others. Some are approved for IFR and some aren’t.
For example, if you have a wristwatch GPS, it’s not going to be as
powerful as one that is certified for flight.

[14:17] So, the ones that are certified for flight have a lot more
redundancy and they allow the pilot a certain amount of work. They
allow the system a certain amount of error. But they have that
redundancy there, and so those errors just don’t show up as often.
And GPS aren’t perfect, just like any other navigational
instrument. But they are highly reliable.

[14:32] All right, so there’s a cloud here that formed and we’re
just going to try to steer around it a little bit. Those types of
clouds can be pretty dangerous. It’s what’s called virga.

[14:51] And you can get a lot of turbulence that can really, not
only hurt your head because you’ll end up hitting the ceiling and
that’s with a seat belt on. And I’m not even kidding. You can have
your shoulder harness and seat belt on and you can get such a huge
bump that you can hit your head on the ceiling.

[15:15] So, we just avoid virga all together. It usually shows up
around thunderstorms and precipitation. But it can also show up in
other situations. So, we just avoid it. We’re just going to come
around here. It could also be just rain or snow or something else.
But you don’t really know that. And so you just err on the side of
caution, make sure you’re set.

[15:56] So, another thing I just did, was I pulled the mixture to a
leaner area, which means that, because we’re climbing in altitude
we need to lean the mixture. And so I’ve done that. Basically what
you do is you pull out that mixture until you hear an increase in
RPM. And as soon as you start hearing a decrease or a choking of
the engine, then you know you need to add just a little bit more of
the mixture. A little bit more fuel and you’ll be good to go there,
on your mixture.

[16:18] And that’s very general terms. When you get into higher
performance aircraft like this one, for example, I’m sure that
there’s a much more technical explanation for that particular
leaning procedure. But that one will do just fine. It will keep
your engine temperatures good. And you will be getting better fuel
economy that you were prior to doing that.

[16:31] So, keep in mind that as you climb, you’re going to need to
lean the aircraft. And as you descend you’re going to need to
increase the mixture or adding more fuel.

[17:09] Awesome scenery around here, just incredible. So I’m really
not sure if this an actual volcano or if it’s just an inactive
volcano. But I think they would still consider it an active because
it erupted in the ’90s or the ’80s or something. So it was a pretty
big event. I can imagine how scary that would have been, living in
that area.

[17:33] All right. So now we are coming up on 7,500 feet. And as
always we are going to level out the aircraft, pull back the power
for a better cruise setting. And then we will continually trim the
aircraft as we accelerate.

[17:50] Now today we’re actually going to stay pretty much full
power. I want to get this flight done rather quickly. There’s no
sense to get better fuel economy, when we have plenty of fuel and
everyone’s time is precious. So we don’t want to drag out the
video.

[18:15] And that’s basically it for this portion of the flight. So
what I’m going to do from here, is I’m going to fast forward quite
a bit once we get to Mount Rainier. And then I’ll take over from
there because we’ll be about 10 minutes away.

[18:31] But just follow the track on the GPS and monitor terrain.
You’ll see me swerving here and there to avoid terrain. You’ll see
me making altitude adjustments and other things, as this video
accelerates.

[18:49] But you’re in control. You’ve got plenty of terrain
clearance here. And just have fun with it. Follow that GPS track
and I will fast forward this to save some time and I’ll see you
guys in a few minutes here.

[silence]

[20:21] All right. So you can see that we are now at Mount Rainier.
And instead of running straight into the mountain at our altitude,
I’m actually going to turn a little bit here, if you guys don’t
mind. And we’ll just wrap around the east side of the mountain here
and set up for our descent into Ranger Creek.

[20:47] And all the while, I’m just going to enjoy the scenery.
Quite awesome.

[21:06] Now it’s safe to say that mountain flying isn’t exactly
this simple. It can be a situation or a particular flight situation
where you can potentially get yourself in a lot of trouble.

[21:22] So there’s a lot more rules to this mountain flying thing,
than just what we’re doing today. Because updrafts and downdrafts
can be pretty scary in the mountains, and we’ve got to be diligent
in making sure that we aren’t putting ourselves in a situation we
can’t get out of.

[21:40] And if we do get in a situation, there are specific rules
and things we can do to get out of it. But unless you’re trained
and you know how to do that, then it’s going to be difficult and
you will probably never come back.

[22:02] So maybe we’ll do another episode on mountain flying. But
because we’re safe in what we’re doing today and this kind of stuff
isn’t necessarily modeled within flight simulator anyway. Then we
are going to just kind of go with it and not do any of that stuff.

[22:12] So, basically, the fact that the winds are pretty light and
variable today, you wouldn’t have to worry about a lot of those
winds, anyway.

[22:25] That’s a pretty sweeping statement so, that isn’t how it
always is. It can be perfectly calm where you are 20 miles away.
And then once you get in the mountains, it can be quite intense.

[22:52] So, just watch out and be careful and know your
surroundings and, you know. The way that you tell what the aircraft
is doing within flight simulator is you just watch the aircraft, to
see how much it’s buffeting and how much turbulence there is. What
the vertical speed indicator is doing, because you can get yourself
in a lot of trouble really quick when you start to lose a ton of
altitude with a downdraft. So keep that in mind.

[23:08] All right, so on the other side of here, we’re only a few
minutes away from Ranger Creek. That is cool. Excuse me for being
interrupted here. That just looks awesome.

[23:24] All right, so like I was saying, we’re a few minutes away
from Ranger Creek. And it’s down in this valley right in front of
us. So what we’re going to do is we’re going to start descending
towards that area and we’ll get nice and set up.

[23:44] This whole thing is going to go really quickly. We’re not
doing a pattern. We’re going to be flying straight into the
airport. And that will keep us nice and honest here. And it’s all
going to happen really quickly. I’ll talk you though exactly what
I’m doing, during the process. And so you can set up for things
yourself and know how to do it.

[24:01] So I nosed over and didn’t pull out the power. And I was
getting kind of close to red line. So what I’m going to do now is
pull out some power as we descend, to make sure that we are within
a safe air speed as we descend along the creek here.

[24:27] And this is mountain flying at its best. I’m going to pull
back a little more as the powers up and just let the speed settle
down.

[25:08] It’s a pretty high altitude at this airport. It’s 2,500
feet which is quite a climb. But, you know, right now we, it looks
like we’re at 6,500. I’m not reading that correctly, 5,400. So
we’re about 3,000 feet from the airport and that’s not bad. We’re
at a good descent. The creek bottom is pretty close here. So, we’re
going to stay on this current path. It looks like we’re gliding
down nicely here.

[25:20] And the nice thing about this aircraft, it’s made for
situations like this. So, you know, say we spotted the airport
right away. It was only several miles away, say right in the bend
in the creek right there.

[25:36] You could really pull out the power and start to get the
flaps down. We could make that landing. It’s made to get in
situations like that, where you really have to slow the aircraft
down quickly, dump the flaps and be landing with only, within only
a few seconds.

[26:09] All right, so I’m going to look for the airport here
because I know it’s up there somewhere. And I think I see it. Just
straight ahead on the right side of that ridge, at the creek
bottom. I can see a strip there. There’s a little void in the
trees. So that is where it is, looks promising. And you can also
look at your GPS, if you need to, at this point. But I pretty much
know we’re set. So, we won’t have to worry about that.

[26:34] All right. Now, I’m going to pull back the power, all the
way, because we need to get within the safe area for the flaps. So
I’m really going to pull out the power here. That will allow us to
slow down quickly. And then I’m going to turn along this other
ridge.

[27:04] All right, you can see it better now. The strip is off to
our left. And I’m going to set up for somewhat of a final landing
leg here. And I’m going to put in some flaps. Start to get slowed
down. We’re in this safe flap operating range. And now we’re just
watching our airspeed. We’re quite high right now but we’re going
to be able to adjust for that. This aircraft, especially at fill
flaps which I actually just put in, can really descend quite
quickly. So you can see that.

[27:26] And I am at idle power, full flaps. And we’re actually
still degrading too much in our air speed. So unless I nose over or
add power, we’d probably stall out. So let me add some power here,
as we come down and set up for this landing.

[27:40] And this is, this is more of a short field landing because
this isn’t asphalt runway. So we don’t have to worry about the sod
field too much. But it’s in bad condition and we do have tundra
tires so we’re going to be OK.

[28:12] All right, so now we’re watching our air speed. And just be
very commanding with your power in this bush flying situation. So
let’s bring it down, right on the edge of the runway here. Use
rudder at this last second to make sure you get lined up. Pull
power when needed and then just settle in. There we go. We’re down.
A little hard but, we’re down, we’re safe, no one’s hurt. And we
have plenty of runway to spare.

[28:25] And you’re not going to have a lot of that relaxed feeling
at other mountain airports. You may have a 1,200-foot runway, for
example. And you don’t have time to mess around. You’ve got to get
down.

[28:37] So, it’s nice to practice that and just always have that
mentality. And then when it counts later, you can be confident that
you can get in that situation and perform correctly.

[28:50] So let’s bring the flaps up. We no longer need those. And
then we will continue down here and park. Should be pretty simple.

[29:24] So, good job on this flight. I really, I love the GPS
direct stuff. It works really well. It keeps thing simple. It’s a
reliable source of navigation. And it allows us to enjoy the
scenery and have a confident co pilot, if you will, in the cockpit.
And that helps out quite a bit. We’ll be using GPS a little more
later. I’m not sure how much. We need to touch on VOR stuff and,
but we have plenty, plenty of room to do this more.

[30:10] So let’s come up here. And I will add more power to whip
around and just park right next to this cub. We can just pull the
mixture, shut down the engine. And that does it. We cheated death
once again. So let’s get down to the panel here. I’m going to turn
off the lights, beacon, nav, strobe, landing light and also the
avionics master. And turn the battery and alternator off, and the
magnetos to off. And that does it folks.

[30:34] So thank you for joining me on this episode of Aviator90.
Next time we’ll be doing another cross country flight. Again, I’m
not sure exactly what that’s going to be. But we’ll come up with
something cool, something pretty like today’s flight. And we will
have a good time no matter what it is. And we’ll see you next time.
Until then, throttle on.

Transcription by CastingWords