Saturday, the local EAA chapters, the SIU Rotor & Wing club, and what's left of the FBO, hosted a little brunch fly-in and Young Eagles day at the Marion airport, KMWA. This is actually all of about 9 miles from Carbondale, so I was pretty sure I could make it.
Coming into Marion, the tower let me do a "low approach" and I got a lot of nice compliments from the guys on the ground. This was my first off-KMDH landing since the rebuild, so I guess that's kind of a milestone.
With that under my belt, I decided to take on a much grander trip, so Sunday I flew all the way to Decatur, KDEC. Whoo-hoo! A whole hour each way!
On the way, I attempted to do some climbing exercises to determine if my Best Rate of Climb had changed, but about half way there I decided my methodology was wrong and abandoned that part of the test card. It's pretty clearly spelled out the the FAA's publication for testing homebuilts and I just need to do what the durn book says.
On the way back I had fun fooling around with the mixture profiles and get that a little more in line.
It ran well, but I can't a maintain high throttle setting for extended periods of time because of the the oil hitting the revised red line, but at least it got me there and back.I now have about 13 hours and 18 landings (47 if you count all the bounces) since the rebuild and I feel like I'm generally getting most of it sorted out.
Funny, I was thinking (yes - dangerous, I know) that I was so glad to make a 250 mile trip, when 10 years ago I flew all the way across the whole durn country in one day. Maybe that just comes with getting older.
1 comment:
Sammy - been awhile but wish I would have known you were coming to Decatur - Just catching up so hope all is well. Tad
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