Remind me why we do this

[thing]

Finished work early, nice sky, wind dropped. Thought I would do an hour while I had the chance. The a/c I was going to fly took off as I drove onto the airfield. No probs I'll take a 28, the one I wanted was taken, the other was OK apart from a flat battery....

OK I'll take a 172. The 'nice' one has a panel off for some reason. OK, one a/c left; took the cover off, check A done. Back to crewroom, booked out with ATC, did the tech log, checked Notams, planned myself a route and all the other good stuff. Went to a/c, strapped in, took ages to start the bloody thing. Started taxiing, checked the brakes, right brake u/s. Tried pumping it while taxiing slowly, no joy. Call ATC to tell them I'm taxiing back to stand (only in anti clockwise circles) and notice the turn indicator is sluggish and the AI now has about ten degrees of bank on. On the way back the engine stopped.

I love flying I do.

[sevenstrokeroll]

the sky didn't want you that day. take it as an omen and join another flying club.

[thing]

The club is fine, the a/c are usually fine. As you say, I wasn't meant to fly today. Perhaps someone is looking after me.

[RTN11]

The a/c I was going to fly took off as I drove onto the airfield

If you had a booking, that's poor form and look for a new club.

If not, a definite omen not to fly that day, better luck next time.

[Pilot DAR]

In fairness, you probably never reached a high enough engine RPM to get enough vacuum to get the artificial horizon gyro spun up, so it's going to topple, particularly after a number of turns in one direction....

But, yes, sometimes it's just not the day to fly....

[thing]

If you had a booking, that's poor form and look for a new club.

I didn't have it booked, I had a feeling everyone would turn up tonight in a mad dash to get some flying in given the recent weather, it was first come first served. It's a good club, really, a very good club. Just wasn't my night tonight.

[piperarcher]

This is the frustration with renting. Its worse when you have a group of family and friends with you and you find the plane you hired is not there, or is half an hour away, or it's got 0.8 hours left before the next 50, or something doesnt work, and so on.

I am not saying it's not without it's own hassles (particuarly costs), but getting a share in something is the way to go, if thats possible for you. You know the aircraft, you know what works and what doesnt, you know where it is, you can probably use it whenever you want, flexibility of time is on your side, you know the last person left it in a good state......

[Gertrude the Wombat]

you find the plane you hired is not there, or is half an hour away, or it's got 0.8 hours left before the next 50, or something doesnt work, and so on

Half an hour away will happen from time to time in an environment where people are taught that rushing and hurrying introduces unnecessary risk. Your own schedule might be safer it it had half an hour slack in it so that the delay didn't matter.

The others are reasons to choose to rent from someone else if they happen more than very very occasionally (and the 0.8 hours shouldn't happen at all, they should have warned you about that when you made the booking).

[piperarcher]

Gertrude - You are right, but if that plane is half an hour late, and you come back half an hour late, someone will moan at you. Me, I used to book a plane for a 3 hour slot, buying me some time either end of what would normally be a 2 hour slot just in case.

I now have a share, and I wont deny it has cost me a lot more money (than I have really) than renting, but I'd have given up flying by now if I hadnt bought into a share. It has also opened up so many opportunities flying wise than you get with the constraints of renting and specific time slots.

[thing]

There's a share available in one of our own a/c which is a very nice aeroplane but then with a fleet of five (or four and one static display as I like to call it, in joke) of three a/c types there's never really any problem picking an a/c up, plus I like to jump into a different type, having your own share I suppose makes you want to fly it to the exclusion of everything else. I would have to fly it for three hours a month to break even against renting so being as I do around 5 hours per month on average I suppose it would make financial sense.

I fly from a non profit member run club which is so cheap I daren't even tell you so the cost isn't a great issue. I find it a bit jaw dropping what some people pay to rent a plane or pay per litre of fuel.

[Gertrude the Wombat]

You are right, but if that plane is half an hour late, and you come back half an hour late, someone will moan at you.

Yes, it needs everyone at the club, including the next hirer, to have the "better late than never" attitude. I've never been moaned at for being late back due to deliberately deciding not to rush things.

[thing]

If I'm going somewhere I tend to book it out for the day, saves a lot of faffing around.

[piperarcher]

Gertrude - I dont think its that simple to be honest.

Student and Instructor A have a plane booked for a 2 hour slot and they plan to land away. After a brief, walkaround, startup etc, they take off having used 30 minutes of their slot already. They fly for half an hour, land, get out and pay, startup again and get airborne again, after landing they de-brief they hand the plane over to you 2hr 20 minutes later. Thats 20 minutes of your slot gone. You now have 1 hr 40 minutes.

You also planned a landaway so you are now under pressure to get going, land, turnaround quickly and come back. It was supposed to be a fun relaxed flight with friends and now it isnt. However, you didnt rush because you wanted to be safe so you too land 20 minutes into the next persons slot.

Student B and Instructor B are now unhappy with you. Do they really care that it was the person before you that caused the delay? Probably not.

Take a nice sunny day, lots of people are using the planes and delays inevitably creep in and invariably increase as the day goes on.

Thats the frustration, and in my opinion you either book 3 hour slots to try and counter those delays, or try and get into a share. Changing the system and having everyone being on time or not over using their slots isnt easy.

[RTN11]

Perhaps flying clubs should follow the airline tech log policy where you put a delay code in the tech log or notes after the flight.

Thereby, anyone picking up the aircraft would see why it was late. In your example, it could be the first flight was delayed due to weather, or instructor needing a pee, and then you would put your delay down as a reaction, since you didn't delay any further than the delay you inherited.

It would certainly stop you feeling bad when handing over the keys late to the next guy, as there is a paper trail showing it's not your fault.

[Mungo Man]

On the way back the engine stopped.

Wow! Sounds like a the holes in the cheese nearly all lined up. You should be thankful the brake failed and you didn't have the engine quit just after take off. ANy idea why the donk stopped?

[thing]

Nope. It did start again straight away so maybe some condensation in the mags, don't know. It has flown since then with nothing untoward happening. I guess whatever dampness there was in the engine hadn't dried out as I hadn't had time to get the engine warm. It hadn't flown for a month and had been stood outside in all the bad weather.

The brake problem was a duff seal by the way.