Re: [f-AA] Report

[John Rodkey]

Well, here I am, comfortably ensconced in a chair at the Casa Grande Airport office (which is much bigger and nicer than Santa Ynez's...  enjoying the wireless internet and power outlet.

I should have brought the charger for the iPhone: it looks like I've already used up 60% of its power, and it wouldn't charge from the battery I brought along, so I've turned it off.

I got up about 5 a.m., loaded up the last things (except the iPhone charger :(  ), and set out on the journey about 5:30.  At 6 a.m. it was 33 degrees at Santa Ynez, and the airplane had a thick coating of ice on its wings.  I loaded up the 70 pounds of junk that I  brought along (I should have cut down some, but since I didn't have a passenger, the weight limitation wasn't a big motivation.  So I have tent, sleeping bag, clothes, tools, computer, books, music, GPS, food, ... the list is pretty long.  But it all  fit, despite not having a proper baggage compartment.  I ended up lashing a few bags to the tubing in the baggage compartment area and putting a couple things on the passenger seat and seat-belting them in.

By 7 a.m. the sun had started making slush of the ice, I took a bathroom stop, chatted with the 'Airport Regulars:' Bernie and Alan.  They marveled at how early I had to start to get to Casa Grande before nightfall, and said that Carl would be coming with his Culver Cadet later on.

About 7:30 I sluiced the remaining ice off the wings, fuselage and windshield, started up and made my way out to the runway.  The cold air gives the Chief great performance.  It's still slow, but it accelerates and climbs like crazy.  Well, as crazy as an Aeronca ever gets. I was getting consistent 600 fpm climb up to 5500 feet.  There was a cap of clouds over the mountains, but otherwise it was clear and smooth.  First stop was Santa Paula.  Filled up with fuel and was back in the air within 20 minutes.  From there, I overflew Agua Dulce,  Big Bear (at 9500 feet!) and landed at Roy Williams Airport.  I was planning on refueling here, but the price of gas was really high.  However, the old guy at the airport said to try Twenty Nine Palms, where gas was reasonable.  

After fueling up there, I flew on to Blythe.  I wasn't going to land there, but I had been trying to find an altitude that didn't have as much headwind (I'd been having about 15 to 20 mph headwind most of the way) I ended up going down to about 100 feet off, and then I was getting bounced around a lot from thermals.  So I decided I'd stop at Blythe just to give myself a little rest.  As I was entering the pattern, I heard from Carl, who had left Santa Ynez about 10 a.m. .  

Bought a candy bar and got back in the plane for the final 180 miles.  The headwind tapered off a bit, and I arrived at 5:20 local time, a few minutes before Carl arrived in his Culver Cadet.

Tied down next to Joe Abrahamson's beautiful Aeronca Sedan, and talked briefly with Jerry Furnas and John Todbotham (?sp?).  Jerry is from San Diego, and has a very nice Chief that he recently completed rebuilding.  

Spaghetti dinner and bluegrass band rounded out the evening.

Oh, and I had an unfortunate event:  as I was taking the battery out of the airplane and putting it in the tent, my hand bumped against the seat, and it knocked the battery out of my hand.  The battery dropped onto the fabric below, tearing a gash in the fabric.  Not much to do for it:  I bummed a length of duct tape from someone here and patched it back together.  :(

Well, we're getting kicked out of the office.

pictures:  http://picasaweb.com/poobahster/CasaGrande2010

On Fri, Mar 5, 2010 at 12:40 PM, John Rodkey <rod...@westmont.edu> wrote:

Left Iza at 7:40
Left santa Paula at 9
Flew over big bear at 10:50
Left twenty nine palms at  11:50
Now about 3 hours of flying left.
42 miles to Blythe
Fighting a 15 mph headwind.

John love

Sent from my iPhone

[Mark PETERSON]

Well, you have your first "dent in the new car" over with....

Now you can fly worry free!

Mark

---

Oh, and I had an unfortunate event:  as I was taking the battery out of the airplane and putting it in the tent, my hand bumped against the seat, and it knocked the battery out of my hand.  The battery dropped onto the fabric below, tearing a gash in the fabric.  Not much to do for it:  I bummed a length of duct tape from someone here and patched it back together.  :(

Well, we're getting kicked out of the office.

pictures:  http://picasaweb.com/poobahster/CasaGrande2010

---

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[John Rodkey]

Oh, I've got plenty of dents in this car!  :(

Well, We just had the awards banquet, and in the Aeronca arena, Jerry Furnas's Chief won Best Aeronca and the Texas Chapter award.  Mike Friedrich's 65TC got best warbird.  

The latter is remarkable, considering the batch of big iron that showed up:

A Yak 11,  a couple P51's, a Bearcat, a Spitfire, multiple T6's ...

Both awards were well deserved:  beautiful aircraft.  Congratulations, Jerry and Mike!

Correction to my last post:  it's John Todhunter, not whatever I posted before.

Right now we're waiting to see what the weather will do: will it allow me to go on home, or will I have to stay another day to let the weather clear up a bit. We had some thunder and lightning here tonight, but so far no rain, and only about 20 kt winds at the worst.

I'll be adding more pictures to http://picasaweb.com/poobahster/casagrande2010 shortly.

John

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--
John (poobah) Rodkey - N9361E 11AC at Goleta