Tinkicker

So Sunday turned out to be lovely and sunny in Edinburgh, completely blue skies, but a strong wind blowing from the North. Set up the nav for the final two waypoints - Inverness and Wick. I chose the inland route to try avoid any sea frets on the coast. A decision that nearly ended the trip before it started.... Took off and turned on course, directly over the three bridges, and climbed to 3000ft before switching over to the tip tanks, it is best to empty those first. It was a bit choppy, but the view and visibility was marvelous, so I settle down, switch on the autopilot and look at all the prettiness going by slowly.. Hang on, we are slow. What is going on. Airspeed reads 155mph. GPS groundspeed reads 90 mph. We have a 65 mph headwind right on the nose, just great. That is going to be costly in fuel. We grind our way slowly northwards towards Inverness and the gently rolling hills start to become big hills and then mountains in the distance. Time to start a cruise climb well in advance. 6000ft seems about right. We seem to be above the mountaintops in the distance, and the cloud dotted around them seems fairly benign. We trundle on... The clouds are obviously a cold front heading south and soon start building fast. Never mind, I can still pick my way around them. I continue. They become a solid wall of cloud somewhere in the Aviemore area and in I plunged. Concerned by the now invisible mountains around, I switch off altitude hold on the autopilot and increase manifold pressure to 23 inches and 2300rpm respectively to start a gentle climb of around 500 ft/min. It is starting to get a bit spicy, the autopilot struggling to keep the wings level and on course. My eyes are glued to the instruments as we climb up through the murk. I check the engine instruments.. All good, the engine is behaving itself. I check the fuel, all good but I will need to switch over to the inboard tanks very soon, the tip tanks are depleted almost to the limit of how much I trust the accuracy of the gauges. One thing running a tank dry in clear air, quite another in cloud. Another look at the instruments. Seems good for now, but we are rocking around an awful lot. I was starting to wish I had gone the lowland route. The strong winds over the mountains were making things very interesting. Carb heat applied, carb heat switched off, check instruments, check gauges. Oil pressure good. Fuel pressure good. Alternator charging. Manifold pressure stable, RPMs stable. Fuel flow stable. 8000 ft. Alt hold back on and time to switch over to the inboard tanks. Switching tanks in VR is not easy, it requires careful manipulation of mouse curser over the fuel valves until the curser changes to a hand shape, then you can click to operate it. It takes a lot of time and full attention, looking down at the cockpit floor between the seats where the valves are. Job accomplished, I look up and see a bright yellow light lit on the panel..... Turns out to be the stall warning light. I look at the airspeed indicator, it goes from virtually zero to 160 mph in a couple of seconds. What the hell. I look at the other instruments, the altimeter is climbing rapidly and the climb indicator is showing a 4000ft per minute climb, yet how can that be at 160mph. The comanche is incapable of a 4000 fpm climb. The unbeknown to me as I was messing with the fuel, the heavy turbulence has caused the autopilot to kick off and I try to make sense of all the conflicting instruments. HSI shows we are almost upside down, Airspeed indicator is once again showing practically zero. The altimeter seems to be steady, so I fasten my eyes on the HSI and get her back showing straight and level. Altimeter is now rapidly unwinding and we are once again showing showing 150 mph on the airspeed indicator. Hang on, we are descending at 6000ft a minute, straight and level and at 150 mph???? One of the instruments must have failed and I suspect the hsi. So eyes on direction indicator to see if we are in a spin, nope. Eyes on turn coordinator to try keep the wings level and eyeball the altimeter to get her out of the dive. I was fearing the wings were about to tear off. I drop out of the cloudbase about 1000ft above a valley and can get my bearings. All the instruments seem to be telling the truth, but why are we at full climb power in a nose up attitude, barely staying above 90kts and why is everything so hazy? I look out through the ice coating my side window to see a large ice buildup on the wing leading edges. Ah. I never even knew icing was modelled. I need to get out of there. I was in a series of valleys, surrounded by mountains hidden in icing cloud. I can not climb, I do not have the performance, all I can do is turn down all the valleys pointing south till I overtake the leading edge of that cold front and pray I do not run out of valley before I do. If the valley ends suddenly, I am dead. Luckily I made it south and by the time I was almost back to Edinburgh, all the ice had melted. What to do, land back at Edinburgh and call it a day, it was certainly a strangely frightening experience, finding oneself in updraughts, downdraughts, rotor winds and extreme wind sheer, all while being in a light aircraft weighing 1.5 tonnes. The 22 tonne hog would have probably had the mass and power to shrug it off once I knew what was happening. I weighed the options while I circle to the north of the Firth of Forth. Call it a day? Shame to do that. Go around and up by Aberdeen? A look at the fuel gauges suggested that I did not have the fuel for it, engine being at max continuous power for so long. A look back at the prominent line of clouds. They did not seem too high. Set up a very early cruise climb and go over the top? Maybe. So I turned north again and set up a 500 ft/ min climb. By the time I reached the clouds, I should be higher than the tops. The clouds were higher than I thought, and the tired old engine and battered airframe did have enough performance to climb higher than a little above 11,500ft. Just great. Was I about to use up my last life? I was hit by gusts, lashed by hail and got a case of carb icing halfway through, but the Comanche soldiered on and once over the Moray Firth, the cloud tops lowered and I was able to start a gentle descent to rainy Wick. Pretty surreal landing at Wick, with a groundspeed a little above a slow trot. I got her on the ground right at a taxiway exit and was immediately able to take it. Total flight time 2hrs, 45 mins. An example of how not to do it. Flying low level over mountains in known 60mph plus winds is pure folly. You are asking for windsheer. To do it while totally ignorant of the weather forecast ahead is suicidal. Throttle to the stop, she has nothing left to give. Not a good situation. I took the pic as a screenshot on flatscreen before diving back into VR. Screenshots in VR are crap. Thankfully, all the gamey "assists" shown on the screen that I hate so much are not visible in VR. If they were, I would have asked for a refund. She cannae take any more capn... Outside air temperature. Minus 20 celsius but no ice this time.

The aircraft was given a once over and any maintenance issues repaired. I am told that the vac pump, fuel boost pump and alternator will need replacing soon, but are currently serviceable. It was wheeled out of the hanger and test flown on Saturday afternoon without problems. I rocked up at 17:30 and threw my stuff in the baggage compartment, while the maintenance foreman was clucking around like a broody hen. "We have arranged to have the oil and filter changed at Wick, take it easy on those new jugs". So got her started up and warming while I inputted the waypoints into the nav. First waypoint is Carlisle, second is Edinburgh, third is Inverness and lastly, Wick. Took of on LBA runway 32 and headed north. Weather was very poor and I was fighting a 40kt breeze from the north west, which cut my ground speed considerably. Dark and very little to see with mist and low cloud and the wing skins oilcanning as they flexed. I took a vote and decided to land at Edinburgh and start again in daylight. With the poor visibility and the darkness, there was nothing to see. The mist changed to light rain just before Edinburgh, but I could still see the castle lit up and the three bridges across the firth of forth as I turned onto the runway heading. Landed at 19:03. Total time of flight 1 hr, 33 mins. Fuel used 15 gallons, leaving both tip tanks about half full.

Three weeks later.. The technicians have signed the aircraft off for a temporary exemption certificate for a 15 minute flight to Leeds. Repairs conducted so far: Full compression check on all six cylinders. One cylinder was found to be badly cracked and not able to fire at all. Three cylinders were just at the lower limit of the service spec. Two cylinders were mid range serviceable. Replace 4 cylinders. Replace the left hand magneto and replace badly pitted points in the right mag. Replace 12 spark plugs. Replace complete ignition harness. Replace hardened and brittle fuel hoses. Replace broken engine baffling. Replace fuel gascolator filter. Replace oil filter and oil. Replace battery and battery cables. Looking through the logbooks it becomes clear why the aircraft ended up getting snatched back by the mortgage company. Seems that a couple of years ago, the aircraft was owned by a company in Knottingham that specialised in aerial photography and powerline inspection using thermal cameras. It was suddenly parked up for around six months, then submitted for its annual inspection. Seems the faults detailed, plus others became known at that time and the repair bill was going to exceed the value of the aircraft. Guess this is when the oil got changed. The aircraft left the maintenance facility in Knottingham and apparently teleported itself to Sherburn. No paperwork record of the flight whatsoever. The bank had been informed of the location of the aircraft and attempted seizure of the logbooks from the Knottingham FBO. During this time, the aerial photo business had gone into liquidation. Meanwhile, the Knottingham FBO still had not been paid for the work they started and refused to hand over the logs, essentially rendering the aircraft scrap value only. Discussions between the aircraft salvage company began regarding purchase of the airframe and an agreement was reached. The salvage was purchased from the bank for a nominal sum and the salvage company, already on good business terms with the Knottingham aircraft repair shop, agreed to pay their bill in exchange for the logbooks. A win win. Major parts like the prop, sold as inspected and serviceable require their original log book. The aircraft was slated to be broken down for parts, until a completely unexpected offer to buy it came from the US, via an intermediary broker in the UK. A deal was struck. Pete was brought into the deal as the delivery and predelivery maintenance service, leaving me stood looking at a forlorn looking piece of 1950s technology and wondering if I will still be alive at Xmas.... Aircraft flew to leeds bradford airport sucessfully and is getting a full checkover by the techs in the Multiflight hanger. Meanwhile, the intermediary broker paid the repair bill for the engine repair work already carried out at Sherburn without question, the delivery is progressing steadily. Someone in the US has some very deep pockets. I am starting to wonder if I am about to meet a Miami drug runner in the near future. Textron Lycoming Cylinders..

Note that all the faults and problems I have described are exactly what I encountered in the sim. The comanche fully replicates every single fault and failure possible on the aircraft. It actually wears itself out as you fly it. My red comanche that I have been flying thus far has had a brand new, zero time engine put into it. Well actually that engine has 16 hrs on it now. It was well tired when I got it. I am not telling a tale, I am simply recounting the facts and adding characters and background situations to the bare bones to make it into a story. The aircraft I chose for this flight was in auction condition with the highest hours I could find. It is suitably knackered. The comanche has three condition modes to select. 1. Brand new and factory fresh. 2. Used. Buy from a dealer. Fully checked over and serviced, ready for flight. 3. Auction. A mixed bag bought sight unseen.. You could get a bargain or a nightmare. Ferry pilots often have to contend with option 3 type aircraft, so that is what I have gone with.

Moving around to the pointy end, we have a very recent McCauley three bladed, variable pitch prop and a very shiney spinner. Nice. The dipstick reveals a sump full of brand new oil. OK. Back in the cockpit again. Check all circuit breakers. All in. Fuel valves set to inboard tanks. Battery on. Fuel boost pump on. Fuel pressure and quantity good. Mags on both. Mixture set to rich. Prop set to fine. Give her five good pumps on the primer. Hit the starter. Whirr clunk. Damn, flat battery. One of the techs at the salvage firm wanders out with a charge pack and plugs it in. Try again. Fuel on, battery on, three strokes of the primer and hit the starter... I count about 15 blades before it has a sniff of an inclination to fire, my word she is tired, then she lights off. I juggle the throttle desperately trying to keep her running and finally get her to sit around a thousand rpm. What a horrible engine, she is coughing and spluttering with at least one cylinder with a hard misfire and the other five not showing a great deal of interest. Oil pressure ok. Fuel pressure ok. Fuel flow steady. Oil temp rising. Cylinder head temp rising. Manifold pressure all over the place. RPMs all over the place. Ammeter shows she is charging. Mag switch from both to left mag. Instant cut. Try again... Mag switch to both and hit the starter. The choir of unhappy parts resumes. Mag switch to right mag, no change, so the left magneto is bad. Pete looks at me through the windshield with a raised eyebrow asking if i am prepared to fly it the 15 minutes it takes to get to leeds bradford and a team of licenced technicians able to make the neccessary repairs. I shake my head, hell no. I very much doubt it is capable of dragging itself into the air before the end of the 7000ft runways looms and there is no way am I going to fly it across the large built up area called Leeds. No way am I going to file for an exemption flight permission to ferry it to the LBA FBO. Far too dangerous. It is going to have to be put in a hanger here and enough work carried out on her to make it even viable to take to a runway. The new owners in Florida are not going to be happy...

So I just got a phone call. Someone needs to deliver an old dinosaur of a plane across the Atlantic Ocean. It was made before I was born, and has not had a cossetted life. I am summoned to leeds to survey this refugee from the JF kennedy era and see if it is doable. I think not, but....God loves a risk taker. I stand there in a far out of the way corner of Sherburn aerodrome, surrounded by several large shapes lashed into tarpaulins. It is a depressing place, a place where repossessed aircraft come to rest. Some may fly again, most will not; they will be towed across the airfield to a large hanger and dismantled, the parts carefully inspected, refurbished, catalogued and put into storage as serviceable replacement parts ready for fitment into other aging, long out of production aircraft where new parts are getting increasingly hard to find. I am stood with my boss in front of a blue, 1964 Piper Comanche 250 looking a bit rough around the edges, it is clearly well used. Pete asks " well what do you think...Is it doable"?.. I take the keys from him and climb into the cockpit. It is worn, but has been upgraded in the last 20 years or so. The original King radio stack has been replaced by a Garmin 530 GPS/ Comms unit and a Narco mode C transponder. I look at the hobbs meters for engine hours and total airframe hours. 2936 hours on the engine and 3400 total airframe hours. That cannot be right, the hobbs total time meter must have gone around the drum, so in actual fact it must have 13400 hours on it. No spring chicken then and the engine is overdue a overhaul. Out I climb and do a quick preflight. Flap linkages have a fair bit of wear. Ailerons OK. The tip tanks look OK and no water in the fuel. The wing skins have no obvious serious corrosion issues and are not rippled. The landing gear oleos are still charged with nitrogen, the tyres are inflated and the creep marks still aligned. Treads are good. Right brake pads need replacing soon. Looking down the fuselage reveals no rippling, missing rivets and no serious corrosion. Crouching down to peer under the belly and everything appears good, no buckling or scrapes due to a wheels up landing. There are no signs of blue crustiness under the wings indicating long term fuel leaks. The stabilator feels good and the servo trim tab is doing its thing. So far so good for the airframe, it is very tired but still managing to hold itself together. It appears to be flyable.

You say i should write a book. I will do exactly that for you during this simulated ferry flight.... The misadventures of a bloke who had a bad idea....

Yup. That is why my ferry flight ends up in florida. I loved watching the Richy Vida US tour on you tube, setting off from cold, wet Canada and heading south into better weather on VFRs. I always fancied doing that trip. Same with this ferry flight. Starts in grim weather that gets worse and extremely dangerous, then starts to get better again. Being a long time flight sim pilot with 1000s of hours of military aircraft flying under my belt, I am doing things ( simulated) that I could never have done back in the day in real life. I could not have even flown the comanche, because it was regarded as a "complex" aircraft due to retractable undercarriage and a variable pitch prop. After 1000hrs flying the A10C warthog and many hundreds of hours flying everything from a spitfire mk9, to a F15 jet fighter, and everything in between, of course I find the comanche ridiculously simple. Same as the new skills I picked up along the way, very few general aviation pilots in real life actually bother with instrument ratings and cannot fly in cloud for more than a minute or so before killing themselves. Since instrument flying is a big part of military flying in all weathers, it is something I picked up along the way. Not that I in any way, try to pull the wool over anyones eyes that I could pass a CAA instrument rating skill test, I most certainly could not. But I can fly in zero visibility to my hearts content, not that I enjoy it. It is very hard work. It seems very strange thinking that putting my 1995 real life pilot self today, in the cockpit of the comanche in VR, would have left me completely out of my depth when the weather turned bad. God forbid what I would have made of the hog. I recall, back in 2011 when it first came out, it took me a full two weeks to learn just how to start the thing and get it ready for flight. When I got the comanche, just sat in it, looked around the cockpit, started it up and away I went... No manual required. Partly through my real life flight training back in the day, and mostly through years of experience since. Things have certainly come a long way since Flight Simulator 1998. I used to deride flight simmers in those days that had the temerity to call themselves "pilots". These days, realism settings cranked up to max and all gamey "aids" switched off, esp in VR, the realism is such that I can no longer do that. These days, it is more a case of attitude. There are those playing a game with pretty scenery with everything set to easy, where the sim basically flies the plane for you, and those with the attitude that they really are flying a plane, it just does not hurt when you get it wrong.. I got a blue 1964 Piper Comanche 250 to deliver...

Yesterdays flight was a workup towards another madcap idea I have had. Currently reading Kerry McCauleys Ferry Pilot yet again, a stonking good read. A big time ferry pilot, delivering small single / twin engined planes all around the world. So an idea was formed. I will conduct a flight in a well used piston single from leeds bradford to florida, flying to Iceland, greenland, newfoundland and working my way down the east coast of the US to see if I make it and live. Three ferry pilots a year die crossing the northern atlantic route. I could go across via morroco to the azores, thence the US, but the little comanche does not have the range, even with the original tip tanks fitted. Just about do the northern route though. I could simulate having ferry tanks fitted and do the azores, but i do not fancy 14 hour flights sat at a PC with a VR headset glued to my face, looking at nothing but the ocean. So yesterdays flight was leeds bradford to Wick John O Groats airport, stopping off place for all the ferry pilots flying the northern route. Weather was a bit grim ( always fly in real time weather - the sim takes the latest hourly weather reports from various airports on route and processes them into real time conditions if you so wish. Most do not, they like to fly in sunny weather. I prefer realism). Weather over England was grim up to Newcastle, then it cleared a bit until I hit the Firth of Forth with sea frets and cloud bases at 2500 ft. It cleared again past Aberdeen, but got very turbulent, and got really bad again crossing the Moray Firth, with low cloud and mist obscuring Wick. I was headed towards it via GPS alone. Luckily my HSI started receiving glide slope information, so I flew the pipper down to the runway. Broke out of the murk about two miles from the runway. Was very glad to see the glideslope pipper responding because I was somewhere over the fogged in Moray West Offshore wind farm. Another Interesting landing in a gusty 20kt crosswind but I made it down in one piece. There I was. Wick. Hallowed ground indeed. Only runways 13 and 31 are in a useable condition. The other four had large crosses marked on them yesterday. Wick Today I will aquire a suitably beat up ebay comanche with tip tanks, look through its systems repairing badly worn, non flightworthy items, but leave those that are still operating, although not in the first flush of youth, just like the ferry companies do before setting out. Be interesting dealing with failed alternators ect en route. The flight should keep me busy over Xmas and keep my mind off the truly appalling flu I have picked up. Kerry McCauley..

Had a couple of 305s at our bike club. They were " Wifes Bikes". Nothing wrong with them though, they were were just thought of as low, slow and reliable for the vertically challenged.... I recall following one in a quite dreamy state for many the mile, watching the tightly packed, leather clad female arse esconsed within. Then the missus came along and such pleasured meanders were rapidly curtailed due to two thick ears and a third " misguided" comment out for the judge and jury to consider..... Sentence... Life without parole and a new mortgage.

Todays flight was a bit of a failure. Was looking to bump up my hours in the comanche so a max endurance flight was on the cards. Manually inputted all the waypoints into the nav system. Leeds Bradford to Prestwick, Prestwick to Fort William, Fort William to Aberdeen and Aberdeen back to Leeds Bradford. A pretty dangerous, bumpy flight over the Pennines and the Lake District skudding under the cloudbase at 3000ft. Crossing the Solway Firth, the cloudbase lowered drastically and I was down to 1500ft and still having trouble seeing the ground. So 1500ft, 1/4 mile visibility at best and mountainous terrain ahead... No sirree bob. So I turned around and headed East instead. Came to the east coast at Sunderland, only knew it was Sunderland because I could see the Nissan plant below - aviation maps are not like road atlases, they only depict radio beacons and airfield letters, so you have no idea what town you just flew over, unless you have a map. VR headset in place, you cannot look at a map, so just have to eyeball it from zooming the nav chart right out and approximate your location based on where you are; looking at the outline of the UK. Headed down the coast past Whitby, Scarborough, Filey and Bridlington before heading west for Leeds Bradford. Quite horrible weather with sea frets around Filey and Bridlington, then again around the Driffield area, all dark and gloomy mist. I eventually popped out of it with Drax power station right on the nose. A bit better weather, but very turbulent. On the way around, I worked out how to tune the nav radio and slave the HSI to it to enable me to shoot an ILS approach to Leeds runway 32. Far too turbulent. Very gusty wind. The little comanche gets affected badly by turbulence that the beefy A10C would shrug off. It was going ok till a couple of miles from the runway, and as the beams tightened ever more with the approaching runway, I could no longer keep the needles centred and had to land visually. An " exciting" landing nevertheless. Crosswind was way above the crosswind limit of the aircraft and the approach was crabbing a full 30 degrees into the wind. Pretty landing it was not, but I got down. What I should have done was divert to another airfield with a runway facing more into wind. Total flight time today 2 hrs 51mins. Total Flight time in the comanche 30 hours 47 mins. Total miles flown 4355. Which gives a rough average groundspeed of 140mph

No I am flying VFR below 2000ft (visual flight rules). As along as I avoid getting within 4 miles of a large airport I am golden. Besides ATC is glitched, I turned the bloody annoying thing off. Climb to 3000ft, descend to 2000ft, climb to 3000ft ad infinitum. Controlled airspace around an airport is like an upturned wedding cake. The TMA is from ground up four miles around the centre of the airport. The next layer is above 2000ft, the one after that if it has one is IIRC 6000ft. Long time since I put the books away.. Still have the full set of books somewhere, I never threw them out. It might pay to dig them out...

This morning, leeds bradford to Le Touquet via duxford, detling, dover, calais and did the thing that all newly minted PPLs do. Stop for a coffee and bagette at Le Touquet, then visit the hypermarket and fill the baggage compartment with booze.. Set off from LBA in clear skies, the weather once south of the Thames is crap and got worse the further south I went. Proper dark and dismal over Dover. Time for a spot of dinner, then i will bring the aircraft back to LBA.

Yes I make all my flights as realistic as possible, using real time weather and all with a specific goal in mind. Todays flight was Leeds Bradford to Liverpool, took in the Liver building and both cathedrals, set course for Anglesey, a touch and go on the runway at RAF Valley, set course north for the isle of man, crossed the coast at Castletown, right by the Ronaldsway airport, turned right over Glen Helen, headed back over the irish sea at Douglas and made landfall at Barrow in Furness and Morecambe. A quick murky and bumpy jaunt in the clouds over the pennines and back to leeds bradford. I fly the aircraft exactly as I was taught, way back in 1995. Only difference is that was a cessna C172, 110mph flat out and fixed landing gear. I would have needed an extra rating on my licence to fly the comanche, it being a " complex" piston single because it had retractable gear.

Still full of bugs but steadily improving. Piper Comanche 250 paid for addon is a far better aircraft than the stock ones as I can attest. I have around 8 hours in it so far and it certainly keeps you on your toes. You can have three versions of the aircraft. New, used or auction. Of course I picked the auction one, which is supposed to be a bit of a mixed bag. I had an "interesting flight" in it. Scenario. So one saturday evening, I was idly smooshing through ebay after several pints of heineken. I came across a sorry looking 1969 piper comanche for sale. It looked a bit careworn, but hey all the logbooks were up to date. I put in a cheeky bid and found I had "won" it two days later. Of course, I had completely forgot about my beer hazed shopping spree and was somewhat surprised to find myself as a new aircraft owner. Buyers regrets are legion, but hey, a deal is a deal. I found myself on a bus, headed for Lydd Aerodrome at the tip of Dungeness in Kent to pick up my new aquisition. On arrival, I went through the paperwork with the seller. It had just had a fresh annual inspection and a cylinder compression check by Lydd Aero Services and although was very tired looking, it had obviously been looked after well. It had the tip tank delete and various go faster mods fitted in the late 1990s and was supposed to be a bit of a hot rod. A quick preflight, kick the tyres and get her started. She sounded fine, so a cheery wave to the ex owner who was inexplicably running for the airfield car park and away I went. Took off to the south and turned north westish for Leeds Bradford. My what a fine aircraft. Levelled off at 3000ft, leaned the mixture, set the manifold pressure at 20" and prop at 2000rpm. My word, she was hitting 160mph in the cruise, while sipping 10 gallons per hour. Great. Buzzed across Royal Tunbridge Wells and could see Croydon and the city of London ahead. Great, time for a little sightseeing. Because I was using real time weather, it was a bit of a choppy, murky day and I needed to stay low for my sightseeing bonanza. 15 minutes since I set out on course for home, so time for the standard checks. Fuel pressure ok, quantity ok, oil pressure ok, oil temp ok, direction and altitude ok. A quick burst of carb heat and time to realign the gyro card with the compass. So while waiting for the compass to settle on a reliable reading, peering at it intently, I saw something red flash on out of the corner of my eye. It was the engine monitor and it was flashing three red letters..OIL. What the devil. A look back down at the oil gauges said it all. Oil pressure below the green and oil temp above it. I was losing oil. What to do, I could see a large airport in the distance, probably heathrow, but there was no way I was chancing my luck across a large built up area with a failing engine. No choice to put it down in a wheat field, gear down. I sat there carreeening across the field, sounds of distressed metal banging and jangling and various scary things going on. We came to rest, engine still idling away nicely. Was it an instrumentation fault? Could I have chanced it? I dunno. Anyway it was down without damage, the devs who wrote the code for the comanche were kind to me. In real life, I reckon I would have torn the nosewheel strut out of the firewall, destroyed the prop and shock loaded the engine... But I would have walked away from it. What did I learn about flying from this sorry tale? Mainly, do not buy an aircraft off ebay while pissed as a newt.

A quite old bloke these days who was quite a name when I was a kid, who I was on first name terms with and gave me and a few other "biker" kids some tips on motorcycle riding on shaw cross pit stacks.. ... One day he told us about about motorcycle handling. " You get a bike, you ride it. It handles like it handles. Get used to it. If you get used to it, you learn to get the best from it, if you can't get the best from it, get another bike". No amount of modifications will transform a bike you cannot get along with". My take is if it is ok, but not quite there, spend the time to get it right. If it is crap, get rid. That mans name is Mick Grant. He found a crap bike and got rid. It was a full works Honda NR500, of oval piston fame. It was in his words "crap". Honda racing (HRC or whatever in those days) actually contracted with Suzuki to provide him with a full works spec Suzuki RG500 to complete the world gran prix championship season on to save face. Why spend money on a bike that has been "upgraded" into something you do not like? Buy basic first and spend the money later. I once had a " swap over" ride in a mates yamaha FZR400RRSP. Within a mile, I knew it was not the bike for me. Horrible, but it was supposed to be the dogs bollocks. He hated my bike just as much..... Each to his own. Try as he might, he could never pull away from me when i was on mine.. A bike handles. The mark of a good rider is how he assess and rides accordingly. Not to blow my own trumpet, I have absolutely and regularly blown into the weeds, the one piece leather, arai helmeted, knee slider equipped, latest model fireblade types with £2000 white power suspension mods; with me on a 15 year old Honda CB900F on stock suspension. In those days the bike club i was in was known as the wacky racers and many " guests" would show up to try their luck. Why and how?. I had that bike for over 10years, completely restored to the last washer and split pin, and knew its every deepest secret. I knew when to open the throttle and when to close it. I knew when to tip in earlier or dive deeper... I loved that bike and it loved me. Bikes handle. Play to their strengths and avoid their weaknesses. Do not buy a bike because someone tells you it is great. It may be great for them, although, privately they may hate it, but not say so, because they do not want to admit they spent £10k on a lemon. Do not be swayed by the marketing men because marketing men invariably destroy everything they get their greedy mitts on. Rely on others judgement means you do not learn from experience. Buy for yourself. I doubt that you will hardly be able to tell much difference between either model. If you had enough experience to do so, you would not feel the need to ask here.......... Buy the cheaper one .... BTW. I love "soft suspension". Let me elucidate... Suspension is like a woman. Soft is reliable, comfortable, but maybe a little boring at times. Easy to take for granted.. Hard is fast, exciting and keeps you on your toes, most tittilating while the going is smooth. Hit a bumpy patch of road, the soft women give you plenty of warning to mend your ways and adjust accordingly before it is too late. Hard women women enjoy a romantic evening with you, kiss you bye on your way to work next morning and you return home that evening to an empty house and bank account.... Very little warning if any.. You pushed it and got short shrift.

No dog should be off the lead in a social situation. Period. No matter how gentle they are are in a family situation. Pic taken 18 months ago when she was a puppy. She is double in size now and over twice the weight. Imagine if we went to a pub and a handbag dog attacked her. A quick bite in retaliation is one thing, a fling ten feet in the air then a good mauling, however deserved because we took her into a public place without her being under control is quite another. Not that I kid myself.. I am a big bloke and that lead is nothing but an illusion to her. But I try..... I could not stop her. Early morning walks in the fields and always on a lead because she does love to hunt deer... The prey instinct is very scary. Sometimes she looks at the two basset hounds she grew up with at 32kg each, with her prey eyes.... Good job she loves her dad, because if she decided I was prey, i am toast..... Ex bodybuilder or not. Back to the first sentence. She is the most loving dog you ever could wish for......

As for the bike, it slept on unconcerned. The new shed roof withstood the wind as did the solar charging system. We are still coming across stuff that is damaged. This morning, the missus said the back gate will not open. Seems the shiplap planks on the gate have been sprung essentially making the gate wider than the opening. A clout with a hammer to push the nails back in and a few woodscrews to hold the planks in place will sort it. No biggie.

A picture you have seen before. The bike is not the focus this time. The gates are very similar to next door but one, and the hinges identical, ours survived, theirs did not. Look at the hinges. Our front garden is probably 30 yards from theirs, yet we found one of those in our garden.. A big bit of metal to be flying around. What amazes me most is that we have had two huge gates and miriad objects flying around, from bricks and roof tiles, to tennis balls and not one of our cars was damaged. One was parked on the road with two heavy gates flying overhead. The other is in the drive, surrounded by bits of mortar and broken roof tile. But not a single ding.

Had a good look around this morning. We have a tile off next to the chimney, right under the ridge tile. The top row of bricks on the chimney is missing on one side, and we have several lifted tiles at the rear. The gate latch strap has broken, it has torn off the steel plate roof on the garden lampost, bolts were rusty and snappped, and thrown it across the garden (thing weighs about 5kg), a broken tile on the front porch, presumably where the upper tile landed on it. We found a ripped off hinge from next door but ones ripped off 6ft garden gates in the front garden and one of the gates was found in someones garden about 50 yards down the road. The other was laying in the road nearby. Our gates withstood it, apart from the broken latch, which is a miracle. Both next door neighbours houses gable ends faced into wind and have lost about 40 tiles in a patch from the gutter to about half way up the pitch, luckily our gable end was in the lee of the wind. This is a common theme in a swath about 200 metres across through the village. The village looks like a village in the somme during ww1 with all the holes in the roof. I flagged down a passing roofers van, on his way to do an estimate and he thought it was a one off job. He cannot believe what he is seeing.. Anyways, our repair £375. We got lucky. Many houses have £1000s worth of damage. We have removed around 20 assorted kiddies toys, broken exterior xmas decorations and stuff like tennis balls from the garden that were not there before. I never saw the like before. For 10 seconds the whole house shook and I really thought the windows were coming in, not that you could see out by then, it was like someone throwing buckets of water at the window. You could just about see the car headlights stopped outside on the road, apart from that, everywhere was pitch black. God knows what that poor driver thought.. I bet it was trying to pick the car up.

Next door but one have two wooden six foot gates. Apparently they have gone missing..... Maybe I will find them in my back garden... Nothing I can write here can convey the absolute power of what I just witnessed. You know I am a bit of a jet fighter pilot... F 14 tomcat on full afterburner.. Not even close.

Power back on now. Need a full inspection tomorrow to see what damage occurred. But after the shit flying round and the generator started, it was a bit of a non occurence. We had a beer or five and watched telly.. Should I feel smug when watching candles flickering in everyonelse's windows, or feel that my efforts in always ensuring the generator was ready to go and serviced 3 times a year. We had an asda delivery, and apparentltly our house had the only leccy in five miles in each direction. Worth it? I am always the guy that says " what if"? Unfortunately, what if needs considerable effort and planning.

Power went out about 17:30. I was upstairs and looked out of the bedroom window and I never saw the like. A car was coming down the street with headlights on and was hit by apparently buckets full of water and stopped. 10 seconds later such a wind, everything flying around on the road in the car lights. It has moved one of our sheds about six feet into the house wall. Back garden full of assorted wood including a full length staircase handrail from next door who are renovating the house. These things have flown over a six foot wall. The entire house shook and I thought the window was going to blow in. 10 seconds later it was gone. Soddin scary, I never saw the like before. Apart from minor stuff, we at the moment seem to have got away with minor inconveniences. Next door have lost about two dozen tiles from the roof and a wooden shed toppled over. I guess it just missed us. Power is off in the entire village, just lots of torches shining around. Luckily we have the standby generator wired into the house and have power and heat for now. Expect much knocking on the door for flasks filling with hot water as the night progresses. We will see what the morning brings......

No probs with canned deicers. What used to be a problem back in the day was putting lots of fairy liquid in the washer bottle to help it clean the glass and prevent it freezing. The main ingredient of any detergent is salt (in marketing speak.. lets pull the wool over your eyes... amniotic surfactant) and that rots the bodywork.

Oh dear. A moped or 50cc motorcycle driven on l plates in the UK shall not have a design speed of more than 31mph. M in your zeal to pontificate your expertise, you have broken a major rule of this forum in that you are encouraging breaking the law. Your knowledge is not unique, nor is it particularly showing any particular or unique expertise, but it does show a lack of respect to the aims of this forum and to the ideals that its members subscribe. That is to give the best advice available, to the widest audience that may contribute, or just look in from time to time; all of course, within the law of the land. Privately, we may occasionally hit 150mph on a secluded stretch of road, but never ever broadcast it here. I do hope you delete your post.