We've got an upcoming "event" that's going to involve propliners, airmanship and vintage navigation, so I figured I needed to start getting in a little practice as my flying has been a bit on the lazy side of things for a while now.
I started up the JBK Boeing 307 Stratoliner in my Merc Air livery in FS 1954 at Memphis (KMEM) for a short cross country hop upriver to St Louis (KSTL). Had a bit of a wait trying to get to the active at Memphis with the AI traffic hogging up the place, but eventually made it to the head of the line for take off.
I climbed to just about the top of the cloud layer (Real Wx) to help hide the view down below as I was running VORs to get to St Louis instead of my usual letting the GPS do the nav duties. I could of stayed lower and just followed the Mississippi river, but I wanted to follow the needles to get there.
The instruments I was using were a windriftmeter for dead reckoning and the DC-3 style radio with the DC-3 radio compass in the panel to point out direction using VORs. As I'd filed a flight plan and this was practice, I did periodically check the map to see if I was off course which for some strange reason I stayed pretty close to it.
It sure was good to look out in front of me about a dozen miles or so and see KSTL on the ground. I quickly contacted the tower and got permission to land. Once on the ground I parked for the night (saving the flight there) and will continue on with it to another airport tomorrow, probably Midway in Chicago.
Who needs GPS?
I started up the JBK Boeing 307 Stratoliner in my Merc Air livery in FS 1954 at Memphis (KMEM) for a short cross country hop upriver to St Louis (KSTL). Had a bit of a wait trying to get to the active at Memphis with the AI traffic hogging up the place, but eventually made it to the head of the line for take off.
I climbed to just about the top of the cloud layer (Real Wx) to help hide the view down below as I was running VORs to get to St Louis instead of my usual letting the GPS do the nav duties. I could of stayed lower and just followed the Mississippi river, but I wanted to follow the needles to get there.
The instruments I was using were a windriftmeter for dead reckoning and the DC-3 style radio with the DC-3 radio compass in the panel to point out direction using VORs. As I'd filed a flight plan and this was practice, I did periodically check the map to see if I was off course which for some strange reason I stayed pretty close to it.
It sure was good to look out in front of me about a dozen miles or so and see KSTL on the ground. I quickly contacted the tower and got permission to land. Once on the ground I parked for the night (saving the flight there) and will continue on with it to another airport tomorrow, probably Midway in Chicago.
Who needs GPS?
