Bought a Fairchild 24

[Dave Hadfield]

Breaking News!!! Robin goes solo to Oshkosh!!!

I was working, then had Lysander duties, then a family reunion that I actually wanted to go to (!), and she got tired of waiting for me. So, polished up and ready...



... she departed, crossing the south end of Huron, clearing customs at Saginaw -- where officer was really pleasant! -- and then carrying on to visit friends in Luddington, Mich.



And then crossed the Lake as high as she dared, flew the Ripon Arrival, and landed with a "Nice one!" from tower.

[Dave Hadfield]

She didn't stay too long, and left before the next round of showers, but did volunteer at the 99s booth...



... and took a day trip to view a large planet...



... watched the RVs arrive by the hundreds...



... and then headed home.

[Dave Hadfield]

Selfie...



[url=https://postimg.org/image/yooxax23d/]

... and back home safe and sound. Where she swaggered home and very pointedly displayed her 2016 mug, and medal.

[url=https://postimg.org/image/f9iqvjy6x/]

And then, in a wonderful surprise, our neighbour Sion J, who flies out of Edenvale but also owns an electrical contracting business, had rewired the lights in her hangar, exchanging 2 dim bulbs, for this...

[url=https://postimg.org/image/630g89syh/]

What a nice guy!



Dave

[Dave Hadfield]

Terrific day at Edenvale yesterday! Blue skies and a 10 kt wind right down the long runway. I saw a few go-arounds during the busiest arrival time, but the Procedure on the website generally works very well. http://www.classicaircraft.ca/gathering ... -classics/

I had the Lysander there, but a wide variety of aircraft attended. http://gusair.com/htdocs/html/edenvale16.html About 175 aircraft, and at least 350 show cars. It all worked remarkable well, I thought. The only incident I heard of, other than simple go-arounds, was a retractable who forgot to lower his gear, and was reminded of it by the ECAF radio monitor when he crossed the threshold.

Early in the day, after taxying over.

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Later on..

[Dave Hadfield]

Last edited by Dave Hadfield on Sun Aug 07, 2016 12:09 pm, edited 1 time in total.

[Dave Hadfield]

I did 3 rides in the Lysander.

[Dave Hadfield]

And taught a lecture. "Taildragger 101". I even got top billing -- on top of the door, that is!



Viewed a lovely SV4B, owned by Rick R., who has helped us with our own Stampe repair.



And then towed away back to the hangar...



Dave

[Dave Hadfield]

A few in-motion shots from Bruce Craig, a pilot based at Edenvale.

The Mercury starts extremely well, cold or hot. Very reliable, never a hint of a backfire -- 6 shots of prime when cold, 1 if hot.



Taxying has been much improved this year. I actually have had brakes on each side! (We have kept the WWII pneumatic bladder brake system, augmented with an 12V electric air pump.) Our overhaul during the winter has worked so far.



This shows the Lysander's typical LEAP off the ground in the 3-point attitude.



Accelerating to 110 mph so that the slats will retract

[Dave Hadfield]

Fly away...



On approach you can sideslip it like a biplane, and sometimes this works best for adjusting the approach path because then the slats/flats don't radically change. (ECAF Cornell in the foreground.)



On a hot day in a Lysander the pilot roasts. A lot of heat comes off the oil system, and from the firewall. So, the first thing you do at shutdown is pull off your helmet -- and it looks like your hair is on fire!



Dave

[Dave Hadfield]

Our painting of the RV6a left a big pink splotch on the hangar floor. So I got around to dealing with it. First I rented a grinder to try to get the pink paint residue off. No luck. You wouldn't have thought mere mist, falling on a puddled-wet concrete surface, would adhere so well.

So I vacuumed the heck out of it...



... and got busy with concrete floor paint.



Meanwhile the Fairchild was punted outside. Rural, ain't it?

[Dave Hadfield]

Looks much better!





The upshot of the whole painting experience was that we saved about $5,000, and I ended up owning a good compressor. And I'll never have to buy a work-light or extension cord again. And we learned a lot. But we did expend many days labour.

And gained useful relationship experiences...

[Dave Hadfield]

Yellow Wings has been doing great things again in 2016. Not a lot of fanfare; just quietly taking up hundreds of Air Cadets from the bases their grandfather's flew from in WWII, in the aircraft they flew in WWII. And there's no better way to connect them with their Canadian Aviation History.

I joined them in the Lysander, here on the flight line at CFB Trenton.



We loaded a steady series of cadets...



And when we ran low on gas had to fly over to Mountainview to fill up with 100LL.



It was great fun landing on the infield grass, WWII-style, plopping down with full aft trim and rolling about 300 ft, and gathering at the pumps.

[Dave Hadfield]

Mountainview is where the cadet gliding takes place. Other than a Scout doing the towing instead of an L-19, it looks exactly the same as when I was there in 1972. (It's great that they try to keep the "Air" in Air Cadets!)



Fueled up and ready to start engines...



Back to the rides -- the Lysander did very well, working hard in the 90F heat for 2 solid days, suffering about 25 hot starts with never a problem, and generating no snags. It even had both brakes working throughout, in its own Lysander way...

Here's a cadet from my old squadron, 820 in Milton.



Busy, long, hot summer days...



Dave

[Zac Yates]

I don't post much on your thread Dave, but I love seeing what you're up to. Especially with the cadets. Top job!

[Pogo]

Yeah, me too, this thread is an old favorite!