POTY Award-Post of the Year Award!!

[Jabawocky]

Maybe a Mod can Sticky this thread......coz there is some GOLD posted from time to time

yeah and I hate to admit it but the first one goes to Taillie!

Why should it be simple and easy for an undercapitalised, tyre kicking dreamer with the business accumen and IQ of a gold fish, to enter the commercial aviation (or taxi, or bus) industry, with predatory, below cost product pricing and the financier (and thus the superannuation of many Australians) carrying the risk? It is those same undercapitalised, tyre kicking dreamers who also are unable to pay a fair and equitable wage to their employees and meet their obligation to creditors in a timely manner.

I stand by my previous comments.

There are threads on PPRuNe from time to time, seeking advice on buying an aircraft, usually "to build hours". http://images.ibsrv.net/ibsrv/res/src:www.pprune.org/get/images/smilies/pukey.gif In every case my professional advice would be the same: Take a cold shower, two BEX powders and a long lie down. If that doesn't cure the urge, go burn a fist full of $100 bills and if you find that a pleasurable experience, buy a 30 plus year old GA aircraft!

There are only two pleasurable days in old aircraft ownership - the day you buy and the day you sell.

Having said that, I also know of some very nice, well maintained 30 plus year old private aircraft, owned by fastidious, careful and astute owners who can afford not to count the cost. They are generally not the cross hired aircraft you find on line at flying schools and small charter companies.

[Tidbinbilla]

What? Sucking up to the mods now, Jabber?

That'll earn you brownie points, aye :}

[tail wheel]

Think I excelled myself Jaba? :}

I am perpetually bewildered by how little commercial pilots understand about the fundamentals of airline and aircraft economics and personal wealth management! It should be a core subject for CPL!

Why buy an aircraft when you can rent one from most flying school, generally below operating cost???? :confused:

Legislation now protects the unwary investor, but thirty years or so ago it was common to find otherwise intelligent airline pilots losing their entire wealth on patently fraudulent scams such as tree plantations, Morton Bay island land development, Norfolk Island art galleries and particularly, Ponzi schemes!

Do you remember the Ponzi Scheme operated by ex bankrupt Geoffrey Dexter and the Wattle Group? Aside from well heeled retirees, his principal target was airline pilots and Federal Police! Geoffrey is taking a well earned rest until 2017.

For those who don't remember:

The Wattle Group investment scheme had around 2,700 investors across Australia and raised in excess of $160 million. Investors were told that their funds were on-loaned on a short-term basis to provide a return of up to 50 per cent. Instead, it was a 'Ponzi-type' scheme that paid interest and refunds to investors entirely out of the incoming funds of new investors entering into the scheme.

DISCLAIMER: There are some very fastidious private aircraft owners, as there are some well managed, financially viable flying schools and air charter companies. But they are few and far between!

[Jabawocky]

Tids.....Brownie points ya say.....you been talking to someone...;)

And NO actually....

yeah and I hate to admit it but the first one goes to Taillie!
To be fair, as much as you guys are critical of things we devils on the other side do, and we are of you guys.......but credit where credit is due.

there are some pure Gold posts on these boards from time to time, and I am not talking about the smart ar$e one offs by say Owen Stanley and Frankie....I am talking about the treasures of advice.

Tail Wheels post is one of them.

Maybe I can have MOD rights to one sticky thread and post all the classics I see over time. A memorial to classic PPRuNe D&G quotes! Like aircraft ownership....how to fly an ILS.....and how to pick a flying school etc.

J:ok:

[Animalclub]

Are you sure that you aren't missing another "T" in POTY?

[Cactusjack]

Although I dont see 'eye to eye' with Tailwheel's posts at times, the below comment he made is basic in its context but absolutely spot on and completely correct in its structure.

I am perpetually bewildered by how little commercial pilots understand about the fundamentals of airline and aircraft economics and personal wealth management!

A very intelligent post.Yes,I can picture Tailwheel reading his morning stock reports while dressed in a checkered gown with matching slippers, sipping on a Henri IV Grande Champagne cognac and smoking a moist Ghurkha His Majesty`s Reserve Cigar. He ponders over life,religion, politics and regulatory affairs as he monitors the posts of aviators from around the globe in his quest to absorb knowledge and truth.
Perhaps Tailwheel is truly 'the font of all knowledge', a verified 'silo of excellence' and beholder of wisdom..........

[tail wheel]

Perhaps Tailwheel is truly 'the font of all knowledge', a verified 'silo of excellence' and beholder of wisdom..........

To the contrary, I hold a Degree in Commerce from the school of hard knocks! I'm also smart enough to know just how dumb I really am.

I can picture Tailwheel reading his morning stock reports while dressed in a checkered gown with matching slippers, sipping on a Henri IV Grande Champagne cognac and smoking a moist Ghurkha His Majesty`s Reserve Cigar.

You've definately got the wrong guy! :}

[The Green Goblin]

At the risk of being vilified by Much Ado and Tid, Tail Wheel is everyones favourite mod :ok:

Some say he uses AVTUR as shaving cream,

Others say he once went hang gliding without a hang glider and still managed to stay up longer than anyone else.

All as we know, is he is The Tail Wheel :)

[Jabawocky]

GG.......You're GOOOOONE!!! :}


Now this was meant to be a serious thread.....I think we need to sticky it, and someone has moderating access, and the real gems of wisdom, like some of Chimbu Cucks night circling on a DME arrival at night posts, or TW's plane ownership posts etc get kept as a educational cornerpiece of D&G.

Anyone agree? or do we just post golden gems...and then all take the P!$$ for a few pages till the next one comes along.

Whats the vote?

[MyNameIsIs]

like some of Chimbu Cucks night circling on a DME arrival at night posts.....
as opposed to day circling at night, or night circling during the day?

or do we just post golden gems...and then all take the P!$$ for a few pages till the next one comes along.
Yep!


sorry Jaba, you left your door wide open for that one!

[PLovett]

I for one remember Chuck's post on flying in PNG as one of those gems and I just happen to have it somewhere............mmm...............yes, here it is:

Its a broad subject so a little background first.

First don't invest it with more difficulty than it deserves. It required precise positioning and speed control but beyond those two requirements it is just a reasonably normal landing.

Speed/flight path control was made more difficult by the mountains. There is no natural horizon when you are flying in mountain valleys (even on CAVOK days) with terrain very close by that might be 5000' higher than you or the elevation of the airstrip. You certainly got good at imagining where the horizon might be if the terrain wasn't in the way but really, in some respects, it is almost VFR instrument flying. It does become second nature pretty quickly.

Most people who pass the CPL flight test have the beginnings of a decent instrument scan which they use to fine tune their visual flying, some dont. Those that dont struggle just flying S&L in the mountains until they do develop a scan.

Certainly newbies didn't go into REALLY challenging strips on day one...or 12 except in the RHS on area famil before starting their route/strip training. Talair would generally start new pilots off based on the coast, say Daru/Wewak/Vanimo (plenty of bad weather/few, if any mountains) where they might spend 6 months, the first 1 under very close supervision which slowly reduced as skills were built. Then that pilot would be transfered somewhere mountainous and given a week or two flying with an experienced type training captain before being signed out to specific (relatively easy) strips - a few weeks later another period of training into harder ones etc - and over specific routes and the alternate routes between those strips. Make no mistake this was intensive training...8,10,12 sectors per day with normal PNG loads - CHOCKERS!!, 6 days/week.

We, usually, didn't fly willy nilly all over the joint for the first couple of years by which time you might be considered experienced enough and competent enough to be given an exemption to CAO 28 which outlined the minimum route/strip ICUS requirements. The CAO 28 exemption garnered a small pay increment and was known as a 'license to be lost and scared'. Certainly you were generally exempt from CAO 28 by the time you flew the Twotter but that wasn't universal. I officially got mine in Talair when one morning the Lae Port Manager said "Chuck you're doing DCA strip inspections this morning to Bawan, etc etc" (about 6 more - I had been checked into 2 by the SBP and when we flew past Bawan one day I asked about it and he said NO FECKING WAY am I checking you in there!!!)

"But Muddy I haven't been checked into etc" "No worries shags I got a dispo from the CP's office" (I was naive - I didn't find out the CP's secretary was pretty free with 'dispos' until later ) Several days later the CP pulled me aside and quietly asked if it was true that I had checked myself into Bawan. "Yeah and Lowai, etc etc" How? I asked so and so and did what he said. A few more searching questions and I was approved to be lost and scared and earned a small payrise.

Realise too that a topographical chart is of VERY limited use in valley flying where you don't have time, or the terrain clearance, to have your head inside trying to work out where the **** you are...you are INSIDE the chart...2/3rds of the map is above you. As a result your training captain would teach you the routes via landmarks that you just had to learn to recognise. I cannot over emphasize how intimate we became with our 'patch'. Individual trees, rocks etc. The only way we were able to do it in bad weather was that deeply intimate local knowledge.

That is why the CAO 28 exemption was a big deal and, initially, quite scary - for me anyway. You'd pitch up at work to be told "Shags, take that load to XYZ" and XYZ was half way between this patch and your last patch. You'd get to the edge of your intimate local knowledge and gaze out at the ughknown and think '****...ahead there be dragons". There wasn't of course but it took me YEARS to get over that feeling.

The forgoing was the 'ideal' followed strictly by Talair etc. I didn't start at Talair I started at Simbu Aviation. A C185 and an Islander based in the Central Highlands. A CP, me and a handful of local 'cargo bois'. Within 3 months I was CP and training a newbie with 400 hrs...I'd arrived with less

Every time I got a charter somewhere a few provinces outside my patch I'd ring up Al Craigy (boss of DCA in Port Moresby) and say "Al I gotta trip to..." "Yes?" "Well Al I never been to..." "Chuck you're the CP - if you can't find your way to...you don't deserve a licence" "thanks Al"

There is NOT ONE GOOD REASON why I survived that first year...I did some REALLY dumb things...all I can do is prostrate myself and claim 'young, dumb and full of cum'.

But I was having fun!!!!

Talair took me into their system and a year or so later I checked myself into Bawan and I was off lost and scared again every second week.

As to the nuts and bolts of the fun strips..and they are SOOO much fun.

Well hold your arm out straight angled down like a final approach path and with your hand palm down and flat. That is a normal approach like you're all used to. Now cock you hand up while keeping your arm steady...that is an approach to a steep strip. You MUST look high all the way...you're making a completely normal approach to a runway that is tilted up. The only concession to that slope is you vary your speed to ensure enough energy to round out, flare and land normally. The rule of thumb, if memory serves, was no additive up to about 5% slope, 5kts between 5% and 10%, 10kts above 10%. Of course that is zero wind...which was rare after mid morning when adiabatic tailwinds became the norm. The biggest trap for the inexperienced was a deep seated desire to make the approach look normal...which put them below the strip climbing...with, usually, disastrous results...that happened from time to time.

Tilt your hand down to be more in line with your arm and you see you must look low going into a strip with a downslope..and there were plenty of strips where the first part was downhill and then the last part was up...and the middle was deep slushy mud - OFTEN.

This was what made Bawan infamous. You approached the elevated threshold at probably 2000' agl. The first cone markers were probably 30' in from the cliff and the second set 30m further on where the strip disappeared from view completely before coming back into view with about 7% upslope and maybe 3% side slope. It was about 400m long and 19m wide...miss the flat bit at the beginning and you wouldn't touch down until the uphill bit...and you'd never stop before the end...you could slide off the side turning around at the end to taxi back to the parking bay beside the level first 30m if you turned downhill a bit quick doing your 180 and it was wet...which it was part of every day. Those big tire double wheel boggies on the Bongo van are GREAT at sliding with locked brakes. The terrain around Bawan was such that you couldn't fly much of a circuit and I nearly inhaled the seat when I turned final that first time even though it had all been explained in fine detail. By the time I could put two coherent thoughts together (OH and ****!) I was beyond the point of being able to go around and have a think...or go home and confess my abject uselessness to Muddy.

NOTHING concentrates the mind quite so completely...give me steep any day...steeper the better...you can actually cock up and land long on 17% and get away with it...some guys did so deliberately and would come bounding to the top at silly speed. Perhaps more concerned about stopping before the top than not stopping AT the top - and a few didn't. There is NO way you can taxi up a really steep strip so 99.9% of us would touchdown in the correct spot, between the first and second cone markers, at the right speed, and then apply power before whipping it off again and trickling to the top and turning across the slope if there was no flat parking bay off to the side.

The real skill in sloping strips/mountain flying is being able to recognise instantly what looks 'right' at any given combination of up/down/cross slope and not falling victim to optical illusions caused by terrain, windshear, rain on the windscreen etc. I am unable to explain the process of developing that skill...its a mysterious and wondrous thing beyond my ken.

Turning takeoffs/landings on strips like Kamalai are not that hard...you just make the aeroplane go around the corner by whatever combination of controls is necesary...you still touchdown parallel to the strip at the touchdown zone and then go around the corner...it feels completely normal and unremarkable after doing it a few times.

Takeoffs on steep strips, particularly wet, steep strips generally engender in the participating pilot some deep thoughts about what they would do in the case of an engine failure..and their mortality...because once you have rolled about 60m you are not going to stop the aeroplane no matter how motivated...you just are not. What your next most excellent idea might be was very pilot and airstrip specific. If the threshold was elevated, like Kamalai (very common) I always figured I could reduce power just enough to maintain directional control and dive off the end and regain speed in a dive before feeding the power back in...and then think of something else clever to do next...maybe you could descend down the valley to a lower airstrip, or in some cases (Kamalai) to the coastal plains...a smart pilot had each escape plan tucked away so you were not trying to be spontaneously clever. Trundling off the end of short, flat elevated strips 'a little' below flying speed on two engines was common practice with a big load so we were quite accustomed to the basic concept.

If that was not possible any combination of deliberate ground loop or taking the aeroplane off the side of the strip (or the end) and using the jungle to slow you down relatively gently was quite reasonable.

If some of these sound like fantasies born of desperation they are...but there really were no other options so you either got creative or accept the consequences of a failure of some kind meekly. I never met too many meek bush pilots.

And all the above have been used in anger with varying degrees of success.

At some strips you would just die and there was not a bloody thing you could do about it and people did. Kanobea was like that...everyone's (who ever went there even once) least favorite strip.

Full power against the brakes and a quick check all in the green? Yes if you could...often the aeroplane would be sliding with locked wheels by the time you got significant power on so it wasn't always possible.

Above all it was professionally deeply satisfying flying...much more so than the very proscriptive nature of jet flying...which I enjoy too but for different reasons. Bush flying is two hands, two feet and a brain...very little more than broad policy outlines written in the company ops manual. No rules as such besides those conferred by common sense...and they were inviolate.

A longy but a goody. :ok:

[propblast]

Just reading that post scared the sh1t out of me. Let alone flying it. That is the true essence of bush flying, and covers concepts that alot of pilots these days (myself included) never need to acquire.

Which is quite sad really.

Keep'em coming.

[Captain Nomad]

Mmm... Memories - both good and bad...!

[frigatebird]

So should we all feel guilty that we are not brilliant at all the other things to what we do best, and have had the most practice at? Sorry, not going there. With a nom de plume like tailwheel, I thought there was a little adventure in the soul.. (One gets a little tired of being lectured on others off-topic hobby interests. Like gnadenburg and remoak do. Must get to you after a while, moderating all the whinges. Perhaps you need a break to smell some roses, tailwheel)

[tail wheel]

To the contrary frigatebird, it is not the knowledge you have that matters, but the wisdom to recognise the knowledge you do not have, that is important.

I've been around PPRuNe for 12 or 13 years. I still come here because I want to and still enjoy the comments and opinions of others in the aviation industry.

And the roses smell wonderful at this time of the year! :}

[frigatebird]

That's alright Tailie, know where you're coming from. You do a good job. :) (Some of the sharper tools that used to share my garden shed aren't around any more, but the old blunt axe still gets some use.)

[tail wheel]

Some of the sharper tools that used to share my garden shed aren't around any more, but the old blunt axe still gets some use.

:ok:

Our paths have crossed over the years and I've always felt you could comfortably handle both with ease and dexterity! :E

[frigatebird]

You're too kind Sir. I don't even know who you are.. (you obviously know who I am from the e-mail address. When you spread a bit of yourself on a page....)

[Capn Bloggs]

And the roses smell wonderful at this time of the year!
Eh? Mine have just had their heads chopped off-they don't grow too well in the chill of winter?! ;)

[frigatebird]

Warm up by thinking of the coming spring, and the Toowoomba Carnival of Flowers, Bloggs. When I lived at Dalby as a kid (cold place Dalby in winter when the winds blow and the taps are frozen .. - for Queensland) we used to go there for it. Never could make anything grow myself, with black thumbs.

[tail wheel]

Bloggs.

Try a little fresh horse manure.

It seems to work well on this forum! :} :}


Frigatebird

It is many years since our paths crossed, when we were both inspired by the exuberance and irresponsibility of youth, rather than the wisdom of age.

[Pinky the pilot]

PLovett; Your c&p of Chuck`s post on PNG ops was good to read again. Like Captain Nomad reading it brought back memories both good and bad.

Thinking about it, I kind of wish that I could have read something like that before I first went to PNG but then again it may have scared the hell out of me so much I would have not gone there in the first place.

But I`m glad I did.:ok: Even if I did only get a partial `licence to be lost and scared.`

Chuck`s post for POTY. With Taily`s as runner-up.

[Jabawocky]

peuce

:D

Actually, I don't support or oppose people ... I support or oppose their arguments. Dick's a good bloke and I think he believe's his arguments are correct and right. That's why it's no use having a go at someone who believes they are doing the right thing. In fact, he could be 100% right and I could be 100% wrong. The only way to test our arguments is to place them in front of our peers and let them be the judge.

Well done!........

http://www.pprune.org/dg-p-reporting-points/421413-dick-smiths-letter-pm-re-tasmania-4.html#post5821439

[FGD135]

I am perpetually bewildered by how little commercial pilots understand about the fundamentals of airline and aircraft economics and personal wealth management! It should be a core subject for CPL!



And don't think for a moment that those "commercial pilots" are just the young, newly graduated ones!

Plenty of those "commercial pilots" can be found sitting in Qantas, Virgin Blue and Jetstar cockpits.

It should be a core subject for CPL!
Seriously concur! I have been saying this publicly for a number of years. If I haven't said it several times on PPRUNE, then I must have come very close.

[arnellis]

"airline and aircraft economics and personal wealth management"

Well all three interest me! so im listening if someone would like to pass down some information, I can trade information for beer? :ok:

[Jabawocky]

Not his full post.........but this is a one liner classic :D:D:D

Never mix religion and PNG bush flying - its dangerous enough without thinking God is your co pilot.