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BFM this

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Posts posted by BFM this

  1. It depends. With a full-up HUD like the T-38C, I'd be as likely as not to forget to turn the MFD on during a given sortie.

    In the A-10, the HUD is still pretty damn useful, till you start flying instruments. Then you realize why it's not a primary reference: all the nav data is down on the panel. I had to break my HUD habit like the crack addict that I was.

    The most useful thing I've found about a HUD (aside from weapons delivery) is that you can nail level flight or desent angles (IE 3 degrees for a precision approach). Flying around VMC, I'll snap my scan to my HUD to get the vector back on the horizon--beats the hell out of scanning your VSI (lags), altimeter (also lags), etc...

    Oh, yeah, always recover on the round dials. (foot stomp) Esp at night. Y'know, incase they don't get that beaten into your cranium from the start. Life might suck for the moment or two that it takes for you to dig that nugget out of your clue bag.

    I'm just sayin...

  2. For all those that insist that this airplane cannot overcome the awesome force that this treadmill puts on an airplane, riddle me this:

    If the airplane isn't moving (hasn't achieved any forward vector), how fast is the conveyor moving?

    Airplane speed = 0

    Conveyor speed = 0

    Airplane speed = rotation speed in one direction

    Conveyor speed = rotation speed in the other direction.

    Wheels = rotation speed times 2

    [ 29. November 2005, 21:10: Message edited by: BFM this ]

  3. Originally posted by BigIron:

    Think of the whole escalator or moving walkway in an airport, then try walking in the opposite direction on that escalator or moving walkway...

    But that depends on my feet (thrust) interacting with said walkway (conveyor). If we separate those two conflicts of interest, say by putting on roller blades and strapping a rotax engine and prop to my back, I could run up and down those moving walkways all day. The only difference being that in one direction , I'd be moving at 10 mph, while my wheels would be spinning 8 mph, and in the other direction I'd move 10 mph while my rollerblade wheels spun at 12 mph.
  4. More too the point: those that regularly use the parking brake in a Cessna 172 know that yes, it will keep the plane from rolling all over the parking ramp, but plenty of embarrased pilots out there can attest that said parking brake will not prevent taxi and even take off.

    Take the parking brake off, and you could get that hypothetical conveyor moving at mach-snot with a tailwind and a running start, you're still not going to prevent that plane from achieving takeoff velocity. At least until the rubber separates from the wheels, the rims disintegrate and it all comes cartwheeling to an end.

  5. The author of the above question has either come up with a very debatable riddle or has a mental model of airplane thrust that is the same as automobile thrust.

    A conveyor could not keep a thrust producing craft from achieving a forward vector. Only tie down chains anchored behind the conveyor could do that. (Unless it was an AIR conveyor (windtunnel)) USMCAW has it there. The conveyor control is moving a speed, not as a function of friction (not mentioned). The only thing that a conveyor could accomplish would be to make the rotational velocity of the wheels twice that of the airplane's velocity.

    Makes me wonder if the author wasn't writing a riddle a la "which way would a rooster's egg roll off the farmhouse roof?": IE that a pilot should know that takeoff speed is achieved independent of wheel rotation (watch your nosewheel limiting speed during a SEGo with a tailwind).

    [ 29. November 2005, 08:18: Message edited by: BFM this ]

  6. Originally posted by Revolution 17:

    ...What about Low? Got any low alt. Stories?...

    I don't even want to go there. The best you can do is tie that record.

    Gives me the willies just talking about it...

    Although I'll admit, I have a "friend" that used to "fly skydivers" and I have a pic of him doing a "go-around" if anyone has web space for "upload". DISREGARD: see my profile.

    (Edited for hypocrisy)

    (edited for photobucket)

    [ 22. November 2005, 11:42: Message edited by: BFM this ]

  7. Originally posted by waxgoblin:

    I had a 5 until I called the people who were shit-talking california "rednecks." o well, was worth it.

    There you go, you've got another 5 vote from me. But just don't piss me off in the future, because I can't take it back.
  8. I got rid of my ranking: nothing more than a BS popularity contest. If you want to know who knows their shit and who's full of shit, read the posts for about a week.

    Rereading some of my earlier posts, the reason I got rid of my ranking is because I couldn't stuff my own (sts) ballot container with one star votes.

    I also don't like not being able to change ratings: some folks came off as complete tools when they first showed up, but have since reformed, but I can't change my rating to reflect. Baseops.net: suggestions?

  9. OK, reading through my above rants, I find them lacking one important item: a point.

    That would be this: my ejection seat is not license to be ignorant or unnecc abusive of my airframe. Lack of an ejection seat is not designed to be extra motivation to learn minutia about various systems. If any multy place aviator thinks they are more motivated to know every nook and cranny of their airframe than I, I say BS. Airplanes do not routinely explode or fall apart. Stupid pilot tricks will always ruin your day, I agree.

    If you wanted to wax philosophical about it, yes, your lack of handles means that you are expected to bring that airframe home or die trying. HVAA: High Value Air Asset. You don't come home means that a force multiplier just went away. (I'm cosidering airlift to be a ground-force multiplier) Really big deal. Me on the other hand, maybe I am supposed to press my mission or eject trying. My airframe doesn't come home, yeah that still sucks (esp for me :eek: )...

    But I am way to inexperienced in this game to have my philosophy taken seriously anyway. That's the only thing I know for sure.

  10. OK, lets hear some data. I'll lead off:

    Sioux city (UA232) wasn't a result of turbine wear from temps, it was an undetected hairline crack, the results of which are still calculated to be astronomical, but after the fact the mods to the hyd system were made nonetheless.

    While I was in Okinawa, every SOP temp limit that came down the pike (down to 935 at one point) was an attempt to stem the flow of engines into the MX supply system, a system which gave those engines back at half the rate they went in. Made FMC rates kind of tough to make if everyone was flying around at "morale speed".

    What we did fear was things like gearbox or prop failures, one of which occured in the unit I was in during a det to Brisbane.

    Likewise, it sent a chill down everyone's spine on one flight I was on when the FE picked the scrabble board up off of the throttle quadrant, set it on my table and said: "OK, #3 gearbox oil pressure is 0, my checks are done, sir, lets go ahead and CAGE THREE" Yeah, there were chunks on the plug when we landed.

    Someone who makes a living borescoping engines can refute me on this, but turbines, even ones that have been ridden hard (sts), don't typically frag.

  11. boom,

    No clue, maybe Hoser's got something more.

    I can tell you that as part of A-10 TOLD, if we don't get a certain expected fan speed on the rwy, the wheels never come up-->back to MX.

    There is a system monitor that MX uses which I preflight for certain show-stopper codes, but they told us it tracks all sorts of parameters.

  12. Originally posted by LJ Driver:

    Fighters have ejection seats too, so when your engine throws a blade you can punch. Heavy boys need to be slightly more cognizant of turbine wear.

    OK, I'll bite, why am I willing to bet a ride up the rails on my ignorance of turbine wear? Why are "Heavy boys" more concerned about this when they will typically loose 25-33% of thier engines when one throws a blade whereas fighters will loose btw 50-100% of thiers. I won't go into the percentage of time I spend "enroute" vs down in the weeds savagely beating my throttle stops to death.

    Do tell.

    Having crossed a pond or two in the Herc, I'll wager that the reason "Heavy boys" are more cognizant of things like turbine life vs TIT is because around the 6th hour the conversation gets driven to that level from boredom and the incessant "can't we push it up?". Not because anyones got anything more riding on the question.

    Xtndrboom, you're on to something there: at least locally we climb and cruise at reduced ITT settings for turbine wear. But we also have override switches just in case (theres the derating)-->would prob torch the remaining motor, but it will get us back home if we lost the first one in a critical (high/hot/heavy) situation.

  13. cb03,

    With my limited experience (still in the B-course) I could wax poetic on the Hog, but the first image that came to my mind while reading this thread was: allthingsjeep_1871_11033153 Unfortunately it doesn't come in A-10 flavor, but the message is the same.

    We really could start a whole new thread on the topic a la Jeff Foxworthy: You might be a Hog driver if...

    Speed jokes aside, it flies like a 4X4, and is every bit as fun.

    Others here could give a more accurate mission statement, but I was a big fan of the A-1 skyraders in Vietnam, so the Sandy mission was a big draw for me.

  14. Saw a Marine Herk on approach here at DM last weekend. Slick outside of 1 and 4, I thought: must be a new J out on a weekend trainer.

    I didn't see it by base ops. Then, taxiing back on Monday I saw it was not a J and it was parked at the boneyard hangar.

    ...

  15. Originally posted by Bender:

    Anyone want to time share a T-37?

    At around $300/hour in fuel plus (ROT) three times your fuel cost in mx cost per hour...

    I'd love to have a tweet but even if they gave them away for free I don't think I could afford the care and feeding. Even shared.

  16. Originally posted by Vandal905:

    ...All was going well until I moved from the jump seat behind the co-pilot to the back as we were doing approches...

    Don't knock him too hard, blkafnav. I learned early on in the Herc how valuable a view of the horizon could be.

    In the approach pattern at Cherry Pt, my instructor is perched at the window behind the co-pilot and I'm not doing so hot. I-Nav goes to the back, I start feeling better. I-Nav comes back, and I start feeling myself turn green again. I guarded my view of the outside world, as limited as it was, pretty fiercely after I got qual'd.

    I took that lesson with me later on when I might have a new student, or just giving someone a ride in a plane. I'd tell them that as soon as they started feeling queesy, #1: tell me, and #2, look at the horizon--don't look down at thier lap unless they intended to puke there.

  17. Early December morning tailwheel instruction ride in a Citabria. The heat outlet is at the firewall and airflow isn't the greatest, so my bud in the front has the heat cranked full up and my feet are still going numb in the back: he's baking.

    Stud also fails to fill me in on the fact that he pulled a pizza delivery shift the night before and has all of two hours sleep, a Mt Dew and bag of chips in him.

    Two patterns later at a grass strip (beautiful, *smooth* day, mind you) base to final turn, I see him squirm in his seat a little, something muffled and unreadable over the ICS, followed by his hands going up in the air stick-up style. Then the sweet aroma of undigested Mt Dew wafts back to my seat. I full stopped so that he could settle down a bit.

  18. Another hit you'll take is having a car sit in storage with the warranty clock running out.

    I agree with you, Ken, regardless of how you play the depreciation game, buying and selling cars always costs the consumer: the most money-wise move is always to drive a car for 10-15 years or until the wheels fall off.

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