Newsletter Volume 30, Number 8

Calendar

28^th Annual Aces Picnic is a Sail!

Moss Landing (the TALL xPG&E smoke stacks) is about 60 miles from San Jose via highways 17, or 152, or 129. Enter the harbor area at "The Whole Enchilada" restaurant. Follow the road to the right about 150 yards to the parking lot just before the one lane bridge going to the marine lab. You'll see the RV there at a little park with picnic table and big tree at the entrance to "A" dock where the boat with blue sheer strip and two black masts is moored right next to the bridge.

Mandatory RSVP
Call 831 475-6868 to let Doug know your head count for food and your sailing preferences.

Great Fall Lineup of Programs

September	Gould and Forster report on Oshkosh Reno Air Races: September 15 - 19 (Who wants to go?)
October	Todd Whitmer provides speaker on gliders
November	FSS Speaker, then plan on a November 14th Fly-In to Oakland FSS.
December	Holiday Party!

Happy August Birthdays to

Nick Lira on the 11^th
Kevin Shawhan on the 14^th
Siamak Jonaidi on the 23^rd

Next Month's Article

Night Flying and Landings By Kenneth Pheley CFMEI

Perception and Flying, Installment 2

Installment one discussed some perceptual problems as they relate to IFR conditions. This installment will discuss some perceptual problems, which occur during V.F.R. day conditions.

Most pilots have had the experience of flying somewhere on a V. F. R. cross country, over a route they may have flown before, when they get the feeling that somehow the scenery does not look right. They begin to question if their V. O. R. is correct. Maybe their directional gyro is precessing. It just seems things don't look correct! In VFR conditions, when aeronauts can look out the window, they clearly perceive more information than when relying solely on instruments, but these fliers are still subject to perceptual distortions.

At times the view outside conflicts with the inside instruments. There are many reasons for these inconsistencies. For example, inside the cockpit, the DGI. should always be checked against the magnetic compass for precession. In addition the actual magnetic heading required to track a V.O.R. radial will change over a long distance. A receiver can easily be several degrees off. At sixty miles from a V.O.R. station, each degree of inaccuracy is equal to one mile of course deviance. Add this all up and the pilot's perception, that things do not look right, may in fact be correct. As I.F.R. pilots know is unusual to have a V.O.R. receiver less than three or four degrees off.

Another common problem is not taking into consideration the aircraft's orientation. We tend to look over the nose of the aircraft as though the nose points in the direction we are heading. This may not in fact be true. The wind has an on the aircraft. A 35 knot wind coming from 90 degrees from the left, can be expected to change the aircraft heading as much as 16 or 17 degrees. The mountain or valley the pilot is used to heading toward may now be between 1:00 o'clock and 2:00 o'clock position, instead of 12:00 o'clock location he is used to seeing it in. The wind factor should also be taken in to consideration when a controller is giving the position of another aircraft. If the controller states an aircraft is at 1:00 o'clock under the above wind conditions, the pilot should in fact look at his 2:00 o'clock position.

If the pilot only points the nose of the aircraft at a point in the distance and does not take into consideration heading changes or wind conditions, the route may be circuitous. He may be flying many miles out of his way because he is homing on the aim point instead of tracking. In good VFR conditions, the pilot not only has the compass to aid in solving this problem, but also can use the relative movement or relationship of objects on the ground. For example, two cities or structures that are in line with the course. This is one reason new students are given checkpoints which are about 15 miles apart. They should never be out of sight of an intrinsic part of their route.

Perception can be a problem in areas unfamiliar to Pilots. For example if they are not used to flying in mountainous terrain, they will often see the mountains as being higher than they actually are. The accepted method of dealing with this problem is to pay close attention to the elevation of the terrain and compare that with the altimeter. Remember that the altimeter is often not accurate! It is susceptible to temperature and pressure changes. As the old saw goes; from high to low, watch out below One inch of pressure equals 1,000 ft. on the altimeter.

It is a good idea for the VFR pilot to watch the relative position of terrain when crossing mountains or ridges. If the terrain is expanding on the other side of a ridge being approached, then the aircraft is going to cross above it. Expanding means to see more and more of the ground beyond the obstacle to be crossed. Keeping in mind winds, updrafts and down drafts, our stalwart pilot should be O.K. On the other hand, if the terrain appears stationary, the aircraft is at the same altitude. If the topography on the other side of the crest is disappearing, he is below the ridge and had better climb.

Often it is what the pilot does not see that gets him in trouble. Any time a pilot is flying low he has a chance of hitting wires, as they are invisible from an aircraft. Power lines are often draped over passes. Even worse, most tall towers have support wires, which invisibly stretch away from them at wide angles and can extend, to a considerable distance from the actual structure. Scud running, buzzing and flying low can be very unhealthy. Whenever an aviator is flying low, such as during an approach for a landing, he should look carefully at the charts for obstacles and stay away a long way away from radio towers.

Most VFR day pilots believe they can see other aircraft in their vicinity easily. Experiments have shown that this is in fact not to be true. Two aircraft flying towards each other actually only have a few seconds to see each other. If flying directly at each other, they represent a small visual target to one another and are closing at the maximum speed possible. A good outside scan should be learned and practiced by anyone flying V.F.R.

V.F.R. day conditions are the most comfortable way to fly for most pilots. This perception of comfort can actually create problems for the unaware or uninitiated pilot.

Hiller Museum Fly-In

Sunday July 11th, it was unbearably hot in the bay area, nearly setting records for Gilroy and San Jose. Four of us were scheduled to fly together in Cessna 5093K, Doug Groom, John Nogatch, Christoph Bohmann and myself. But a previous pilot had remarked that he "had to abort takeoff due to a great amount of shaking." The only other available plane had a faulty vacuum pump, with inoperable heading and attitude indicators.

We decided to take our chances with 5093K and gave it a thorough preflight inspection. The engine sounded good at startup and all the gauges were in the green. We pulled the mixture out one inch for taxiing - something that is clearly listed in the plane's startup checklist, to help avoid plug fouling, but which some pilots ignore.

Doug Groom gave the engine an extra rev at the run-up area, listened for anything out of the ordinary, and checked each magneto, then gave it a thumbs up for the trip. It flew well, having no trouble carrying four of us. The previous pilot must have been bothered by an overly rich mixture, or a temporarily fouled plug, or by 93K's normally jumpy panel.

The winds weren't in effect at San Carlos on this hot, hot day, and we landed with the windows wide open. The tower directed us to the transient parking, past the far north end of the runway, near Houlihan's restaurant. This would give us a short walk to the museum, if the gates were opened. Unfortunately, they were not. After searching for a break in the fence, we were rescued by the airport's fuel truck driver, who opened the gate and let us pass.

Another Aces member, Bart Kolodziejczak braved the heat in a 152, and was waiting inside. We hadn't arranged for a personal tour, but the staff pointed us to the water faucets and the cold soda machine! The museum is setup to accommodate a very comfortable self guided tour, and the air conditioning felt great.

The museum doesn't look big from the outside, but it's big inside. The exhibits took us back in time to the nation's first controlled, powered flight of 1869 near San Francisco, and to the early gliders of local inventors. We stood in front of a cross section of the original Stanford wind tunnel, the Wright's first engines, and posters for the race to be the first person to cross America by air. Who was Cole? Who was Fowler? How much did the Wright brothers charge for using their style of ailerons? How did other pilots get around that? What is a pusher? What is a tractor?

The museum owns some very old planes, including one pusher that could perform aerobatic loops, which made its pilot a fortune for many years before 1915. Multiple planes hang from the ceiling, daring the visitor to look up into the bamboo frames and be transported to yesteryear. Planes on the ground allowed us to get within inches to inspect the wings and fabric, held together with stitching and controlled by a delicate array of piano wire. A great number of these planes have been restored to working condition, and include a video of recent flights taken in the bay area.

The tour next moved into the First World War, when planes began flying with much larger engines. The Curtis "Jenny" looked like a flying Ford Model-T, with its propeller sticking out from a giant radiator. It was amazing to see the landing gear held to the frame by ropes.

The museum has some nice planes from the 1920's and 30's, from a time when the wealthy could take up flying, either as passengers or as pilots. There are two Fairchilds, a Waco, and a Stinson Detroiter in perfect condition. World War two is barely touched upon by the museum, but Mr. Hiller's helicopters get a good showing, as well as his flying platforms, which allowed soldiers to hover above any surface and to move about by merely shifting their weight.

Turning the corner from the 1940's into the next room brought stares and silence as visitors were confronted by a massive Boeing SST supersonic mockup in the middle of the floor. The museum has a 90-foot front section of the original SST aircraft, including the drop nose, the flight deck, and a passenger section. It is in poor condition after being abandoned and mishandled for more than 20 years, but it is being restored by the museum, even while on the display floor.

Once past the SST, visitors can sit in an actual F4 Phantom cockpit to get a feel of what it was like for the aviators and Blue Angels of the 1960's and 70's. Hanging above us, like a giant bird, was a dark black spy plane from the 1980's, which set records for prolonged flights. It is made out of cardboard laminate, and was piloted by remote control.

At the far end of the museum, we watched a computer generated video of how a space plane would use the atmosphere to skip from one part of the globe to another, yet be able to takeoff and land on a 10,000 foot runway. One possible future?

The tour lasted about two hours, just enough to see everything before it got tiring. If you missed the Flying Aces tour, you can still see the museum any day, from 10 AM - 5 PM, seven days a week. Our recommendation: don't miss it.

A 2 Day Dual Cross Country With Doug Groom

We students, Kevin Shawhan and John Nogatch, obtained the weather briefings, filed flight plans, preflighted the C-172 (including windshield cleaning), and computed the weight and balance. Finally Doug arrived and we flipped coins to determine that John was flying the first leg: San Jose to New Jerusalem, estimated time 27 min., time off 17:46.

John to New Jerusalem: Altitude and heading no problem, even remembering to check the compass, picking up the checkpoints on schedule, until the last leg! 7 minutes after the power lines, we're over nondescript farmland, just like the pen and ink drawings in the Kershner textbook. There's Manteca not too far ahead, Tracy is still where it was with a road running between it and us, and here's the river. Circle to the right, then to the left. There! We see 2 parallel rectangles, fly over them feedlot roofs. What's that other rectangle with the big 32 on it? Down and stopped it has taken 32 min. to cover that final 7 min. leg, and we observe that the parallel runway is camouflaged with hay bales stacked all over it.

Columbia: Kevin then flies northeast toward Columbia by way of a VOR. After the Woodward reservoir the green rectangles of farmland suddenly end, the mountains rise in front of us, and we see the dam and New Melones reservoir. We sight Columbia off to our right and can see planes parked on the grass runway, which the NOTAM warned us was already closed for tomorrow's airshow. As Kevin calls Rancho to close his flight plan, they ask us to look for another Cessna that is overdue. After landing on the paved runway, we taxi down the grass to see how slippery it feels, and then park near the campground. We see the missing Cessna and report it to Rancho, and a few minutes later we meet its pilot who had just realized that he had forgotten to close his flight plan.

Fresno: It is still very warm as the sun is going down, and the thought of sleeping in the open with the mosquitoes is not too inviting. John then plots a course direct to Fresno and we depart, turning left just after the beacon. Cruising along at 3,500' we see the lights of highway 99 off to the right, dark mountains to the left, and the blackness of foothills below us. After an instructor induced power failure, it becomes clear that we are too low over the hills, the only visible landing surface is water, and we would be much better off if a small dogleg to the west had been chosen, instead of the direct course through the hills. When the DG suddenly stops agreeing with the VOR, John realizes that the last checkpoint is not visible in the dark, we are in reporting distance of Fresno, and he still can't see the airport. Identifying as "Unfamiliar", Fresno is tolerant and helpful.

Bakersfield: Kevin takes over as we continue southward toward Bakersfield, now on the LA sectional. Once again, we fly right to the airport, whose beacon the passengers can see, but the pilot does not, because his attention is diverted by flying the airplane. After hours LA Approach is surprised that we bothered to call them and tells us to proceed. Kevin clicks to mic switch and an enormous burst of red, green, and white lights welcome us to the heart of Tule fog country. The tires hum as we set down on a bed of white lights set into the runway surface. The motel is a short walk from transient parking, and we are in our room around 02:00.

Next morning, housekeeping is not interested in hearing Doug's VOR lecture, and the front office has called twice to tell us we're already overdue the 12:00 checkout time. We retire to the lawn beside the pool, eating picnic food and plotting flight plans, until the sprinklers come on.

Oceano: By 14:00 we are preflighted and baked alive in the afternoon heat. The flight to Oceano is uneventful, except for the second digit of the transponder not working right and John's difficulty in flying a large enough pattern for landing on a tiny runway. Oceano is having a beautiful sunny day, just like the picture in the 7/99 issue of AOPA Pilot, and the cool sea breeze feels great after standing around on the ramp, waiting for fuel, at Bakersfield.

San Ardo: Kevin then flies north, passing over San Luis Obispo and Paso Robles, and prepares for a straight-in to the tiny strip at San Ardo. Everything looks good, except for the X at each end of the strip; this is not San Ardo! The real strip is hidden behind a row of tall trees, the approach bracketed by a church spire and a water tower.

Carmel Valley: A quick change of pilots, short field takeoff, and John follows highway 101 northbound, trying to answer the question "Well, when do we get there?" just after being told to find Carmel Valley. Monterey Approach is perfectly willing to give radar vector directions, and the airport appears sooner than expected. Trying to fly a large pattern, the trees seem rather close, but we probably needed that go-around anyway, just to chase the joggers, dogs, and kids on bicycles off the strip. After running into one of the tires that are used for tie-down anchors, we lock up and walk to a nearby restaurant.

San Jose: After a nice dinner and lots of paperwork, we step outside to see the marine layer approaching. Kevin takes off toward it, advises Monterey that we were climbing above it, and then heads homeward, first over Salinas, then on to a route we are already familiar with: Watsonville to Scotts Valley, through the Los Gatos pass, and back to San Jose. A few people are still eating at 49th Aero Squadron, as we taxi by, but after more debriefing and paperwork, it is after 23:00 when Kevin and John finally turn in the keys and leave Squadron 2.

E-mail articles and notes for your newsletter to the new club secretary, John Gould at gould42@aol.com

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