From the Prez:
Understandably, I see mostly
guys at our meetings. We airport bums,
builders, pilots, etc. sometime get so focused on our airplane oriented activities that
the “home front” suffers a bit attention wise.
The program at our next meeting is a good opportunity for some togetherness as it
will be enjoyed by all. A good attendance by
the fairer sex at this meeting is encouraged. Got
the message guys??!!
Don’t forget to Bring a Buck and your four leaf clover so you
can participate and support our scholarship/refreshment program. It is a good cause, is
fun, is inexpensive, is suspenseful, and can even be profitable as can be attested to most
recently by John Bakken.
It’s
Working
Members are getting more involved all the time with
additional people signing up for committees and committees “doing their thing”.
After the last meeting there was a subsequent meeting of the Young Eagles Committee
chaired by Gary Shipley. Gary outlined plans
and a schedule for the first 2003 Young Eagles flights and it was pulled of exactly as
planned with Gary’s report appearing elsewhere in this newsletter. Not
only was it masterfully organized but Gary brought the donuts and rolls to the “ready
room” at the Avcenter where it was enjoyed by the flight and ground crew. My personal observation was that in addition
to meeting its objective of flying Young Eagles the whole operation provided a new level
of camaraderie amongst all members who participated.
It is also noteworthy that more members volunteered than were necessary.
Jerry Phillips has volunteered to be chairman of our Special Activities Committee
and a planning meeting of that committee will be held immediately after our next meeting
on the 19th. As a reminder; this committee will plan, arrange and coordinate
social and flying activities, so if you signed up for this committee or would like to
help, be there.
I flew down to ISU/PIH last Monday and Bill Steinbruegge and I met, after classes,
to discuss and make a list of enhancements to our website.
You will see those appear as Bill has time to incorporate them.
Miscellaneous:
In addition to Sport Aviation and
Kitplanes I subscribe to Air and Space Smithsonian. I
mention this since the latter is an excellent publication, which I recommend and will loan
my issues to anyone interested. The last issue has, among other things, a great article
about Jim Wright’s Hughes Racer. Last
Labor Day weekend on my way to the annual Lancair fly in at Redmond, OR I stopped by
Cottage Grove, OR for a HATZ fly-in. (Not a very direct route but perhaps reflective of my
navigational skills). On arrival Jim Wright
heard me call Unicom and inasmuch his hangar is a stones throw from the gas pit/flight
line he more or less greeted me and I had a great and “Decision at
Casablanca” which has to do with the controversy time visiting with him, a very down to earth congenial
person, and seeing his Hughes Racer. At the
time he had flown it but had some significant propeller problems, which had to be
rectified. Anyway, it is an incredibly
complicated and masterfully done project. Incidentally
no HATZ airplanes had yet arrived but seeing the Hughes racer made the stop a success and
I got to fly over the Cascades in nice clear weather.
I also have an opportunity to read the Air Force journal periodically courtesy of
Willis Weichel, via don Knauts, and it always has very interesting articles, e.g. “From the bicycle Shop to B-2 Bombers”
and decisions regarding daytime and night time bombing of Europe in WWII.
Hal
_________________________________________
Young Eagles Fly Again
On Saturday, the 29th of March, Chapter 407 held our inaugural Young
Eagles event for the calendar year of 2003. We were blessed with good weather,
plenty of help, and an outstanding fleet of aircraft. Those attending included Hal
Johansen, John Bakken, Oscar Batdorf, Jim Tibbitts, Joe Grover, Frank Prickett, Austin
Moses, Pete Stewart, Mark Edwards, Bill Smith, Bill Steinbrugge, and Tyler Van
Heule. Needless to say we had more that enough help, but it was great to have plenty
of resources available, and for newcomers to observe the different phases of the event.
Mark Edward acted as a liaison with the group who contacted him and set up the whole
affair. Upon arrival the group was welcomed and Pete
Stewart did the educational portion of the program. Pete did a fine job and the
young men were full of interest and question. One young man
even had a cheat sheet and asked some difficult questions, which Pete ably answered.
The Young Eagles drew from a hat for their aircraft assignment and we were ready to
begin. Much credit goes to the owners and pilots. They were as follows: Hal
Johansen and his Lancair 360, Austin Moses and his Pulsar XP, Mark Edwards and his Rans
S-7, John Bakken and his Cherokee 140 (with thanks to George Merrill), Frank Prickett and
his Cessna 172 (with thanks to Melvin, Shane, and John @ the Avcenter).
Upon completion of the flights, the Young Eagle certificates were presented to the new
Young Eagles. The event was considered a rousing success.
New members Joe Grover, his wife Becky, and Tyler Van Heule enjoyed complimentary rides from their
mentor John Bakken.
Many thanks to all who participated and we are looking forward to planning and conducting
events in Pocatello, Blackfoot, Idaho Falls, and
returning to Bear Lake County in a drive to reach our chapter goal of 100 Young Eagle
flights in 2003.
Thanks again to the Avcenter for their cooperation in this event. I hope other FBO's
will follow their lead.
Gary Shipley
From
former member John Hong:
Hi from Arizona! You asked about how the Glasair was flying and
what problems I found. I’ll try to give
you a short version. I originally thought I
was experiencing valve sticking problems. The
engine would suddenly run rough and adjusting either the mixture or throttle forward
slightly would cure it. I disassembled the
valve springs, checked for freeness of valves and found no problems, no friction at all. All compression readings were excellent. Next I thought it might be ignition problems, put
all new plugs in and even changed plug wires on the electronic system. Problem was very intermittent, but becoming more
frequent. Finally had the presence of mind to
switch off the ignition systems one at a time when it happened and found no effect from
them. I then thought it has to be in the fuel
system. I went through the fuel system
thoroughly and changed filters, etc., even removed a small orificed bypass line I had
installed to try to prevent vapor lock to eliminate that as a possibility. I thought for a while it might have been vapor
lock, but the old timers around here say they don’t believe 100 LL will vapor lock in
their experience. It seemed like everything
was OK after going through the fuel system for a while then the problem progressed to a
surging engine on application of takeoff power, very disconcerting! I was at Sedona airport when this happened once
and Sedona is kind of like a carrier deck landing as the airport is on a butte and the
terrain drops away rapidly off both ends. I
didn’t dare take off with the surging, so left the airplane there and came back with
a mechanic. We looked at everything we could
think of and couldn’t find anything wrong. Tried
full power runs part way down the runway and it, of course, ran fine. We decided it must have something to do with a hot
engine and sure enough when I decided it was time to take off and head home, the surging
was there again. I let the airplane cool down
for an hour and tried again. This time
takeoff power was normal and I flew it home without any problem. Someone gave me a copy of the Lycoming trouble
shooting publication while I was still scratching my head; there it was in the section
that said “surging engine”, look at your injector nozzles. I soaked the nozzles in Hoppes No. 9 and blew them
out with air. I knew which cylinder to
suspect from EGT reading that would vary (No. 4). Something
looked different about the hole through the nozzle for No. 4 and with a magnifying glass I
could see the tiny wire grid in the hole appeared to be lying on the side of the hole. When I would blow air in at the bottom of the
nozzle, the grid appeared to flip up into place and looked plugged. Blowing air through the top seemed to open it up
again. What apparently was happening was the
grid would randomly move in and out of position making No. 4 cylinder suddenly go from
normal flow to very lean. Rather than buy one
nozzle, I decided to buy a set from GAMI and it seems to have fully solved the problems. By the way, the GAMI nozzles are super good stuff. I’ve been as much as 75 degrees on the lean
side of peak with no unusual roughness. Before
the change, with the bad nozzle, the engine would occasionally go rough at 100 degrees on
the rich side of peak. I guess I’m
getting educated on the in and outs of operating injected engines.
John Hong
Celebrate the Centennial of flight – Fly to Alaska with us in
2003!
You are invited to join us for Alaska Air Adventure – 2003. no charge to come along; just provide your own
airplane and pay your own expenses. Leaving
June 18, 2003 and returning June 27, 2003.
Sponsored by Idaho Air Adventures – Blackfoot, Idaho. Telephone
Richard at (208) 785-6433.
Idairadventures@aol.com
April, 2003 Edition