Top Of The Mark

Willy

Willy

Administrator
Here at the Top Of The Mark club in San Francisco, feel free to post your tales of your experiences in the Western Roundup. Exciting events, near disasters, heck we'll even listen to your stories of total disasters. Screenshots are also good, remember a picture is worth a thousand words.
 
Made it to Orcas Island. I found a secure space to park the Cessna while I went in search of a good hot dog.


 
One leg so far and I think I've had about enough excitement for the whole race! Checking weather reports before departure indicated it wouldn't be the best, with quite low clouds at the destination. Having decided to do this race properly VFR(-ish) I decided to take fly up the valley from Vancouver, past Whistler to get to Pemberton. Approaching Vancouver the clouds where getting lower, so I had to descend from my initial cruise altitude of 8000 ft to about 5000 ft. The clouds stayed above me until reaching Vancouver, when it started to rain. In the valley heading up to Pemberton, the ceiling dropped towards 3000 ft, so naturally I had to descend further. The ground in the valley reaches about 2000 ft around Whistler, so I knew I was in for a treat. Passing over Sqaumich I was getting a bit squeamish...

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But, at least I knew I had somewhere to return to if I had to turn back. Then followed some nervous minutes until a minute of sheer terror... Around the time I reached Whistler, flying below 1000 AGL and just under the clouds, my engine started losing manifold pressure! While simultaneously trying to find Whistler below, among the hills and trees and buildings, I tried to figure out what was happening. The engine behaved as if it had carburetor icing, which would be very peculiar, given that the Legacy has fuel injection! I figured the cause was FSX weird engine modeling and tried to remember the default keybinding to turn on carb heat, as the Legacy doesn't have a switch, for reasons of the previously mentioned fuel injection. "Ctrl+H? Lets try. Umm.. Why did the flight director pop up on my artificial horizon?? Must have been the wrong button, I'm going to die. Where is that ****** airport?" Then, as mysteriously as it had gone missing, my manifold pressure was back. I must have clicked the correct hotkey as well (just "H" if anyone is wondering ;) ). It was quite a relief turning around the next mountain and seeing the airport dead ahead.

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Nice screen shots, DarkCharizma! That looks like a nice ride too.

Here's some kodaks of my flight to Bowerman. 1) Climbing out ot Orcas Island, headed south, towards the Straight of Juan De Fuca. 2) Over the afore mentioned body of water, where once I passed from the flight deck of the USS Nimitz (CVN-68). That's a big body of water, and I was glad for the spare engine I had over on the other wing. On the other hand, Willy has been going faster than me, and since he has only one engine using gas, his fuel milage is about half mine. I suppose it was a "no-brainer" to use a single engine ship for this event, but dang it, this is such a pretty airplane! 3) Over the Mighty rain shadow producing Olympic Mountains. They're pretty high! 4) Final approach to Bowerman. Now off to Lana's Cafe for some coffee.
 
Those straits are pretty good places to park an aircraft carrier. I've got a Nimitz class about a dozen miles to the west of the flight path from KORS and KHQM and a CVL with a BB escort near Whibdey Island. Probably a good thing I didn't fly the SBD, or I'd still be in the Chief's Mess with coffee and donuts.....
 
No pics, but an interesting time landing at Bozeman this afternoon. There I was on final with a couple of the grandkids watching over my shoulder and from their comments about fires, I think they were hoping to see a crash. The closer I get to the runway, the more to the left I'm going. I did a quick wind check and realized that I had a 25kt crosswind. O' course this is about the point that I'm heading sideways for the trees next to the airport. Kicked in a bunch of rudder and some more throttle and got it started back to the right but at about a 45* angle to the runway to crab it in. Just above the runway I straightened it back out and managed to bounce the heck out of it a couple of times hard enough that I was expecting to make the grandkids happy with a bonfire. But somehow the Bonanza held together long enough for me to get it stopped.

Why is it that things go all fouled up just when you have an audience?
 
Here's a pic of the luxury accommodations provided by the Race Committee in Heber, Utah (36U). The "facilities" are in the little wooden building with the half moon on the door behind the "hotel"..

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This wasn't my run, but it was a test run i did the day before my first flight. :) hehehe but pretty similar. :)
 
Just finished a nice flight from Heber to Moab in Utah. Went through some scenic mountains and checked out the traffic on a highway.

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The landing didn't go so well though. Had a 25kt crosswind at Moab and ended up setting it down in the grass. Then I hit a gopher hole and lost the nose wheel, skidding to a stop. Left a nice bonfire back there where I hit the hole too....

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This banker fellow is making noises about catching a bus....
 
There I was on short final to KSQL and the finish line and this Beech 18 pulls out onto the runway in front of me, so although it put me to having to hop some trees, I shifted to the right to land on the taxiway..

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Having cleared the trees, I realized that I was a bit high and rapidly running out of airport. So following Flight 19 tradition, I dove for the ground. But I hit a little hard and that hastily repaired nosewheel packed it in. Anyone interested in a slightly bent Bonanza?

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Anyway I made to the Top of the Mark and drinks are on me until the next guy makes it in. Just tell the barkeep to put 'em on Moses' tab!
 
Leg 7, 36U-KSBS

Had my first "Top Of The Mark" moment on the leg into Steamboat. Thought I would be cute and approach runway 14 from a sharp angle and fairly hot to cut a few minutes of time. What I didn't fully consider was that there was a 23knt crosswind going on. The Viking has a large rudder area and it will weathervane as much as it can so when I touched down hard I bounced and then crabbed and bounced again. As I was wrestling the mad Viking, it got away from me and I veered off the runway towards the ramp into a spin and busted a main. Thankfully Lionheart modeled in plenty of scrape points so I was able to slide to a stop before hitting a parked Mooney. Damaged the said left main, left wing and part of the tail. Hope they have Bellanca parts in the area!

My passenger slowly got out of the plane and muttered something about heading over to the motel to change his pants...
 
Moses03 said:
Thankfully Lionheart modeled in plenty of scrape points so I was able to slide to a stop before hitting a parked Mooney.
Click to expand...

Wow... inconceivable.

Glad you walked away from that one. Gonna need a whole lot of duct tape and bailing wire for that one.
 
Minor damage. Nothing a little duck tape, chains, rope, and a little welding can't fix.
 
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