December 29th

We got up early and flew to Auburn for breakfast, then back to Lincoln.  We'd talked about going further afield, but both of us had other stuff to do, so we went home.

I was on call, so I check work a few times, and checked the brakes on the van - they don't seem to be dragging or anything, so I used my longassed tube to tighten the bolts up, and called it done :o)

December 28th

The correct brake pads had come in for the van, so I installed them.  Interestingly the passenger side pads were a lot more worn than the driver's side.  I'm guessing there was a sticky piston, and I'm hoping that me pressing them back in will have fixed that, but I'll check the wear in a few weeks.

December 25th

Happy winter solstice festival of your choosing.

Still the cloudbase was low, until the wind was gusting 26mph, then it cleared out.  Oh well.

We watched "Tomb Raider".

December 24th

I was off, but the cloudbase never went up far enough to fly :o(

December 23rd

The cloud was still too low to fly, but I went to the airport and helped Randy repitch his new prop - he was only getting 4800rpm static and a test flight showed him just above 5000rpm on climbout.  We took out about a degree of pitch, and it's hitting just over 5000rpm static, so we're expecting that to be around 5300rpm on climbout.

I stood around and chatted to John in our hangar for a while, then headed home.

December 22nd

The cloudbase was too low to fly, so I started in on changing the brake pads on the van.  I got it jacked up on one side, but couldn't shift the caliper bolts, so I ended up with it on stands and used the jack to loosen the bolts.  I got the pistons pressed back in and the caliper off,  then found that I'd ordered the wrong brake pads - I thought I had the South African brakes, but it seems I have the Audi brakes.  Bugger.  I got to put everything back together having achieved nothing.

December 16th

The forecast was for rain, so I gave up on flying and ran some errands.  When it started actually raining, I was in the garage putting the DRZ back together.  I fired it up and let it warm up for a little bit, then turned it off and called that done.

December 15th

I'd been talking to Mike Duncan at Sunshine Flyers up in Auburn, and he'd told me they were having an open house thingy for Xmas, so Chris and I met at Auburn and attended.  We spent a lot of time talking to people about the gyros, and while he was flying their helicopter instructor, I ended up being interviewed for some local TV station - I didn't get their name :o(

I flew back and did a couple of circuits, then helped John, Frank and Frankie a bit with bolting the tail on to his RV6 - they're starting to look at painting the parts, and I have little arms so can get in the various little access panels to hold nuts and bolts and stuff.

December 12th

We went to the EAA Xmas dinner, and a good time was had by all.  I kept being dragged out to talk to people about the gyroplane (which is why I call it a "hello-copter").

December 9th

The radiator has been leaking for a while on the Jeep, and as I didn't do it that long ago, I chased up the manufacturer and they sent me a new one.  That arrived in the week, so we changed that over.  It only took a few hours, but like I said to Vic, I don't want to get good at this.  I'm hoping this is the last time we ever have to do it.

In the evening I played my stupid Wordscapes game on my tablet - they have a tournament thing over the weekends, and I was running in 2nd place, but about 25% behind the leader.  He didn't seem to be playing, as he had such a large lead, so I thought I'd try and catch up - he started playing about an hour before the tournament ended, but by then I was in the zone and catching up well.  I took the lead with 4 minutes to go and ended up winning.  Yay, 4,000 coins rather than 2,000.  They're not actually worth anything, but you can use them to buy hints in the game.  I think I probably ruined his weekend :o)

December 8th

Randy called me in the morning to say he'd soloed his gyroplane, and it went just fine :o)

I went over to the airport, dropped a gas can full of fuel by the gyro, then went to cook lunch for the EAA presentation - the last time we barbecue this year :o)

Chris came over from Cameron Park and had lunch, and when everything was packed up, we went for a little flight - over the Feather River, along the Bear Creek to Camp Far West Lake - we toddled along the river heading towards Auburn for a little bit, then headed back - me to Lincoln and Chris to Cameron Park.

December 5th

I took the cover off the oil filter on the DRZ, to find the O ring looking decidedly the worse for wear.  I replaced that, cleaned everything and put it back together then started the engine again.  It doesn't look like it's leaking anywhere, but there's a lot of oil to clean off from the various leaks and so on.  I think this might be the end of the problems with the DRZ - now I just need to clean and degrease everything and put it all back together.  Finally.

December 4th

I put in an extra (just under a) litre of oil into the DRZ, and started it up.  There was a lot of oil leaking out of the oil filter cover, so I turned it off again, and now I'll wait for the oil to drain down again.

December 3rd

I buttoned up the engine on the DRZ and put in a liter of (stupidly expensive) oil.  I'll leave it overnight to see if there's any obvious leaks.

December 2nd

We went to the airport early and flew to Auburn in the cold.  Randy and Ken in Randy's gyroplane, Bruce and Sally in their Cardinal (I taxied past them without recognising it, because of the new paint job - that's going to take some getting used to) and Scott in his RV-8.  Chris flew his gyro over from Placerville, and Jack drove up.  We all sat around and had breakfast, then flew back to Lincoln.  Chris was going up with Scott in the RV, and I took some pictures of Bruce and his grandson for a newspaper article about him and his 100th Young Eagles flight :o)

December 1st

A new month, so here are the solar stats:

Power billed

Power generated

I started the day cooking breakfast for about 25 of my closest friends at the airport.  It was a miserable day, driving over, but it brightened up quite quickly.  It was still pretty windy though, so I ended up standing around chatting a lot.  Randy and Ken did the gearbox lash check on my plane, and it's fine.

I met a new guy, Mike, who was passing through looking for Ken - he's just been to Italy to build a Magni M-16 (it took a week - they started on Monday and flew it on Friday) and he's just waiting for it to get here in a crate so he can start the paperwork process.

I went home and drained the oil out of the DRZ.  I say oil - it was mostly gas, and there was far too much of it.  I think there might be a leak in there, too, as it's been dripping out for a while, but I don't want to think about having to take the engine apart to fix that just yet.

November 25th

The DRZ hadn't hydrolocked again, so I put the rest of the fuel in the gas tank and left it to see if I've finally fixed the problem.

Chris had suggested going flying, so we threw everything in the van and headed to Lincoln, where the visibility was bugger all due to low clouds.  Chris had taken off from Placerville, hoping it would get better, but it didn't, so he went to Auburn to wait for a bit.  I finished up a bit of safety wiring, then got the plane out and warmed it up so I could start running in the new pre-rotator belts.  Imagine me sitting in front of the hangar running the rotor up and down for 15 minutes or so.  When I wasn't getting the bendix engaging any more, I stopped the engine and texted Chris to say it was starting to brighten up.  He left Auburn, and we waxed the rotors while waiting, but he gave up as the low cloud we'd been seeing was heading towards him.  We took the plane out for a couple of circuits, and the first one had the bendix engaging a bit, but the second one was much better.  We were pretty close to clouds, so we stopped and put the plane away and headed to lunch.  Of course it was glorious when we left the restaurant, but headed home.

The DRZ doesn't seem to be hydrolocked again yet.  I'm still leery about draining the oil and putting everything back together just yet, but this does seem promising.

November 24th

I fought and struggled and got the carb back in the DRZ, and with Vic's help put the rear subframe back on (I'd unbolted it to get more space for the carb, but it didn't help at all).  We got the gas out of the engine, and left it with a little gas to see if that's fixed the problem.

November 23rd

I took a look at the carb for the DRZ, and discovered I can blow through the new float valve.  I can't blow through the old float valve, so I replaced the dried out O ring with a Viton one, and put it all back together.

November 22nd

Today was Thanksgiving.  We did our usual turkey dinner, and Jen came over in the evening for pie.

November 20th

I spoke to Randy about the plane's annual again, and there are still a couple of things he needs to do (gearbox lash and teeter bolt runout), but he's talking about deferring those (as it's an Experimental, it's not required to do everything).  I'm hoping I can grab Ken soon and do them just to get them off my list of things to do.  It sounds like the paperwork is all being done (but I have to sign the stuff I did) and I'm hoping it'll be reasonable weather on Friday so I can meet him and get that all finished up.  I'm also hoping to start wearing in the new pre-rotator belts, so that'll probably mean flying :o)

November 19th

I spoke to Randy, and the annual is going fine.  Not done yet, but he had a couple of questions that I (hopefully) answered.  He was having problems getting the spark plugs out for the compression test, so I pointed him to the spark plug socket I have in my toolbox, and that was all solved.

November 18th

As I couldn't get anything done at the airport, I spent the day cleaning the hot tub and firing that up for the winter.  I even got the water tested.

November 17th

I plugged the speedo cable back in on the van (it seems to have slid down, so I had to get under the front and fiddle with it).  I went to the airport and finished my preparation stuff for the annual (hopefully Randy can get it done next week), then stood around and talked for a while.

In the evening, we watched "Alpha", and Tilly enjoyed it most of all.

November 11th

I went to the airport and met Ken, and we (well, mostly he) got the oil tank all back together.  He also injected grease into the rotor bearings.  I put oil in, and ran the engine to get oil pressure, and hopefully all the bubbles out of the cooling system, did some safety wiring, then went home.

November 10th

I went to the airport and cooked lunch for the EAA crew, then went and got the oil filter off the plane.  I still couldn't get the oil tank together, so I left it for the day and went home.

November 9th

I went to the airport and started the plane to get the oil warm then drained the oil out.  I took the tank apart (per the maintenance schedule) to find that there was nothing collected in the bottom, but I couldn't get it back together properly (it's a lot of parts that need to be held together at once).  I also couldn't get the oil filter off with Ken's wrench, so I'll wait until I have my strap wrench.  I also changed the coolant. 

It's getting closer to having everything all done, and hopefully Randy can get it inspected next week when he gets back from Mexico.

In the evening, I changed the oil in the Jeep.

November 8th

I struggled and struggled and got the carb off the DRZ.  I was then too pissed off with it to work on it, so I went and cut the grass and threw out a load of the hay for the guinea pigs that they don't like.

When Vic got home, she said the "check engine" light was on.  Great.  I plugged in the ODBII reader, and found it was a problem with the evaporation system.  The gas cap wasn't on tight.

November 7th

I decided to look at the DRZ - it didn't look like the carb was leaking, so I put more gas in the tank, and then it was leaking.  The engine's back to being hydrolocked with gas again.  I think the float in the carb doesn't necessarily float any more.

November 6th

I went to the airport and started working on the plane.  I got the pre-rotator flex cable and the bendix all apart and cleaned, then back together.

November 5th

I've taken the week off to get stuff done, so obviously I had a teleconference at work I needed to join at around 11:30 - I didn't want to get into anything before this, so I just played Warcraft and caught up on Last Week Tonight.

I changed the spark plugs on the van.  I was thinking I'd do the brake pads, too, but I think I really need a hand with that to stop me going insane trying to hold the calipers and get the pads out.  I then started in on the DRZ - it took me a while, but I replaced the float needle stuff, to hopefully stop the engine filling up with gas (again).  I've left it with a little gas in the tank and the petcock on "Prime", so if it's going to fill up with gas yet again, it'll do it quickly and I hopefully won't have too much to do to get in there again.  Yay.

November 4th

I went over to the airport to meet Chris, and we flew to Half Moon Bay via the Marin headlands, just North of the Golden Gate bridge.  I took a bunch of pictures - basically just pointing the camera in the right direction and pushing the button as I sure couldn't see the screen.  It was fairly pleasant until we got over the ocean, when it got really cold, really fast.  We had hoped to fly back up the bay, but air traffic didn't get back to us to say we could, so we flew back the way we came.  Well, I say that, we went straight over Sacramento International at ~3000' (per Norcal approach), which was nice :o)

November 3rd

I started the day at the airport cooking breakfast for 20 or so of my closest friends.

After that, I changed the pre-rotator belts on the plane, and left the propeller loose as I didn't bring safety wire to put it back together.

November 1st

A new month, so here are the solar stats:

Power billed

Power generated

October 30th

Cosmos, the cuy (meat guinea pig), has been at UC Davis for the weekend.  He had his foot injured in an accident at his regular vet, and has been fighting an infection since then.  Vic asked me to talk to the doctor from UC Davis, as she wanted my opinion.  He has an antibiotic resistant infection in the only foot he doesn't have bad arthritis in, and they've been giving him injections of antibiotics twice a day.  He's obese, because he's a food breed, and is designed to get fat, quickly, so the possibility of amputating his foot is a problem because he'll just stop moving entirely.  They were talking about debriding the infection out of his foot, and at the same time taking a culture so they can figure out if whatever's eating one of the bones in there is the infection or cancer.  At this point, we decided to call it a day, as this would be a risky proposition in a young regular guinea pig - in a 4.5 year old cuy, it's very unlikely that he'll survive the surgery and the post-treatment (regular bandage changes and antibiotic injections - possibly for months).  We figure he had about a year of life left (we were originally told cuys lived 3 years, but as time goes by, more and more are getting better health care, so the estimate now is 5-6 years), and it seemed wrong for his to be miserable for a quarter of it, assuming everything went well.  We've donated the body so they can figure out what happened here.

October 28th

I went out to the airport and met Chris and Ken - after lunch, Chris and I went for a short flight together before he headed back to Placerville.  It was OK, I guess, but several fires in the area meant the visibility was crap and everything smells of burning.

October 27th

After pottering around in the house all morning, I went to the airfield and finished installing the strobe light on the mast.  I also replaced the blown fuse, and then took the plane out for a flight.  The annual is due at the end of the month, so I'm trying to get some flying in before I have to stop and do maintenance.

October 24th

I found that the DRZ is still leaking gas into the engine, so that suggests that the float O ring also needs replacing.  Joy.  I'll just order a whole carb rebuild kit and be done with it. Hopefully.

October 21st

I pottered around the house for most of the morning - I've put the DRZ back together while I wait for the oil change kits to arrive, hopefully that'll be early next week.  I went to the airfield and got the new mast strobe figured out, but managed to blow a little tiny fuse doing that.  After that, I took the plane out and did some circuits, then some other practice manoeuvres - I've been thinking my speed control sucks recently :o)

October 20th

I started the day cooking pancakes at the LRAA display day (for the last time this year - we expect the weather to suck from here on out).  I'd taken the Magni out, and Randy brought his M-16, and Ken brought his M-24 out and parked next to me.  After we'd packed everything away, I took Jim up for a quick flight, then took Randy's wife up to fly over Folsom Lake (he doesn't have his license yet).  That's 2 people off my list of people who want to fly - I don't think I'm keeping up with additions to the list at the moment :o)

October 17th

The new fuel tap for the DRZ arrived, so I installed that and left the tank with some gas in it to make sure it isn't leaking.  The oil change kits haven't shipped yet :o(

October 14th

The weather forecast is for high, gusty wind, so I decided to do some maintenance on vehicles.  I started off replacing the alternator and powered steering belts on the van, and that was actually easier than I'd thought, once I figured everything out - it's a lot easier to take the silencer off that try and work around it.

We then went out and got a party pack of viton O rings and went to lunch, and when we got home I started in on the DRZ.  I couldn't get any of the O rings to seal the fuel tap, so I've just ordered a new tap, but I think I've got one sorted for the carb.  Taking the carb out and putting it back in was a real trial, but it's done now.  I took the spark plug out and turned the engine over to (hopefully) blow all the gas in the engine all over the garage.  I've ordered an oil change kit (it's an olde-worlde dirtbike style oil filter, rather than a spin-on, so there are a bunch of O rings in there that need replacing, too).

October 13th

I started the day at the airport, cleaning up all the oil residue from the leaky banjo bolt.  I tightened that up a bit (the factory doesn't have a torque setting for it), then went and did 45 minutes of circuits (so as to be close to the runway in case of a failure) - everything was fine.  I then cooked lunch before the EAA presentation - we'd originally been having a tank from the 747 fire tanker pilots, but they've been sent home, so Scott talked about flying the Lear 60.  After that I took the plane out for an hour of just flying around.  When I got home, I went to look at a fuel leak Vic had spotted on the DRZ.  Oh dear - an O ring in the petrol tap has dried out and died, and that's let fuel flow through to the carb, where an O ring by the needle has dried out, and that's let fuel in to the engine to the point where the cylinder is full of gas.  It's probably leaked through to the oil, too, so I'll need to change that.

October 7th

I didn't sleep well, so I spent the morning catching up on TV - luckily it's too windy for me to have flown anyway.  Research suggests that there are 2 different oil pressure senders - one imperial (expensive) and one metric (very expensive), but that the threads are similar enough that either can be mounted until you tighten it up - the wrong one will either not tighten up properly, or will tear the thread out of the oil pump.  When Vic got back from running around, we went to the airport so I could see which one is on my engine.  There was a puddle of oil under the rear of the plane, where the oil hose from the tank to the heat exchanger was leaking because the banjo bolt was finger tight.  Luckily Ken was around, so I showed him, and we agreed the best thing to do was tighten it up, burp the engine and start it to see if that was the entire problem.  I was - I immediately got ~60psi.  Interestingly, it's also put the oil level in the tank back to normal, so the oil had drained out of the system into the tank by the time I had thought to check the level.  Oh well.  Now I need to clean everything up, and bring a (I think) 24mm socket and find the torque specification and tighten it up correctly, then I'll mark it with paint to see if it loosens up (I can then easily check all the banjos in a pre-flight).

In the evening, we watched "Solo".  It's not a bad movie by itself, but I'm not sure it needed to be part of Star Wars.

October 6th

We started the day at the airport, getting everything set up for the Young Eagles event.  Vic was doing the ground crew stuff, and I was flying.  I pre-flighted the plane, brought it over and attended the pilot's briefing.  Erika, one of the organisers, suggested she go up with me to see what the gyro was like "for the kids", so we went out and did a quick circuit - she wasn't feeling like doing anything exciting, but at least I got to figure out where I should land to use the Golf taxiway back to the transient area where we were based.  After that I took a couple of kids up, but when I was going out for the 4th time, the oil pressure wouldn't come up above ~5PSI.  I shut the engine down and called it for the rest of the day.  The local wisdom is that it's the pressure sensor, rather than an actual pressure problem, but I wasn't taking any chances and pushed it back to the hangar.  The odd thing is that there's too much oil in the tank, making me think that there's a blockage somewhere in one of the lines.

After everything was packed away, we went home and I sulked for the rest of the day.

October 3rd

I had the day off (having worked on Sunday), so I went to the airport and installed an extra strobe on the Magni.  I then went to fly it with John, but found the fuel consumption probe reporting crazy numbers.  We flew anyway, and when I got back, I disconnected the strobe and everything's back to being normal.  As I was in Lincoln anyway, I went to the EAA board meeting.

October 1st

A new month, so here are the solar stats.

Power billed

Power generated

September 30th

I was working the Australia shift today, so I went to the airport, flew a bit, then went home and worked.  Yay.

September 29th

I went over to the airfield and pulled the plane's instrument panel apart again, so I could solder in the ADS-B out connection to the right wire (I wasn't sure which one I'd needed, so I'd soldered wire to both pins on the serial connector).  Having got that done, I went for a short flight, then requested the FAA performance report.  It works, but it's an older version of the link protocol, so it won't work for the controlled airspace requirement.  Still, it's cost me ~$50, rather than the >$1200 a compliant system'll end up costing me.  For the moment, I'm going to leave it and see what happens after the rule comes in to effect in 2020.  It's not like I fly in controlled airspace anyway (I don't have the endorsement for that yet).

September 28th

We went to the airport with Jen, so I could take her out in the gyroplane and make a nice landing.  We flew over to the Titan 1 missile silos (that I've recently found the location of) and back again, and I think that's a decent enough little circuit to fly the kids on for the Young Eagles event - I figure it's about 15-20 minutes air time, and then there's the getting in, taxying etc.

My landing was judged a 9.7.

September 26th

I was covering our Australian support dude, so I didn't have to start work until 14:00.  I went to the airport and took the plane out for a quick flight, then came home.

September 25th

We went over to the airport and waxed the rotors on the plane.  That's not a euphemism :o)  Sadly it was too dark in the hangar to do the wiring work I wanted to look into, so I'll probably hit that at the weekend.

September 23rd

After getting some work done, I went out and bought some metric hardware at Orchard Supply because they're having a going out of business sale, then went over to the airport.  I had intended to get some work done on the plane, but ended up just flying it for a bit then going home to get some work done.

September 22nd

I got up early and got some work done (I was on call) before waving yo Vic (off to her mother's for the weekend) and headed over to the airport.  I put gas in the plane before going and working on the EAA hangar doors.  We were putting in insulation, but wanted the weatherstripping on the bottom done first.  I did the weatherstripping on the North door while others started cutting the foam sheets, then went to fly Randy's 9 year old daughter in the gyro while they got that door done.  Randy doesn't have his gyro endorsement yet, but has bought Don's old Magni, and doesn't want his daughter to have to wait to try flying in a gyro.  We waited a stupid length of time for everybody to sort themselves out so we could get on the runway, then went out in a large circle, with turns and slow flying and stuff.  She was a little worried about doing steep turns at first, but we worked up to that and she really enjoyed them.  We got back just before Randy was due to go out for his flying lesson, so he could see I hadn't killed her, but Don was running a little late.  We were chatting when Scott came and asked me to come and talk to the scholarship committee about putting stuff on the web.  Done.  When that was over, we went back to the hangar, where the first door wasn't finished yet, so I sorted out the weatherstripping on the South door, then helped with the projector screen mount.  Eventually we got to the South door, and got that all finished up.  I chatted to Chris about his gyro for a little bit, then headed home to get some work done.

September 20th

I went and lifted the tank on the DRZ (which means removing the seat and radiator side panels... jeez) and found the vacuum hose that had come off the carb.  The end was all stretched out, so it wasn't likely it'd stay when put back on, so I trimmed it off a little bit and reinstalled it.  Here's hoping it stays there, but with the larger Clarke tank, the tap is lower than stock, meaning the hose is possibly a little tighter than it should be.  Still, it's been like that for ~10 years, so meh.

September 19th

So I set off for the EAA meeting on the motorcycle, as Vic had the van to carry stuff for her employee picnic.  After stopping for gas, I got on the freeway, and shortly ended up on the hard shoulder, as it felt like it had run out of gas.  I fiddled with the choke, the gas cap and the gas tap (turn it to "reserve"), and got it started again.  It then stopped again, and I applied my massive intellect to the problem and decided the vacuum hose that opens the gas tap when the engine's running was split or something.  Sure enough, it started and ran on "prime", and I got to the airfield.  When I got there, I found the vacuum hose was completely missing.  Well, that'd be it.

I cooked about 40 burgers, and we had an interesting presentation on the RQ-4 drone that they fly out of Beale.  I was sitting by John Tate, who used to fly them too - he had to stop when he couldn't pass the USAF medical (to fly a drone with a mouse and keyboard), so he retired to fly 787s for United.

September 18th

We watched "Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom".  It was a movie.

September 16th

Yesterday I'd been talking to Tom, an EAA member, at the pancake breakfast, and his 79 year old mother-in law who's visiting from Scotland.  She was very interested in the gyro, and I said I'd be happy to take her up before she goes home early next month.  So I called them this morning and suggested we meet at Lincoln.  I pulled the plane out, we had a quick pre-flight briefing, then went out and flew over Tom's house, over to the West to go over the crashed airplane sculpture, then back to Lincoln - just short of an hour, all told.  She was really impressed.  She's walking the Great Wall of China next year for her 80th birthday :o)

I took the gyro over to Marysville and back, but the wind seemed to be getting gustier, so I called it a day at that.

September 15th

I started the day helping cook breakfast for 31 visitors at the display day.  After I put the plane away, Tom, John and I took John's Bonanza down to Livermore to take part in a formation flypast at a veterans event.

September 14th

Jen came over and we went to the airport and took the plane out for a bit.  After a couple of crappy landings (need more practice with a passenger, methinks) we went and gt dinner.

September 11th

I went out to the airfield and took the plane out.  When I got back, Randy was tinkering with his gyro, so we talked until we were sick of getting bitten by mosquitoes.

September 9th

I dug out a couple of sprinklers that had been leaking - looked like the problem was just the roots around them that were bending them out of the way.  We also painted a lot of rocks for Victoria's Employee Picnic thing that's going on in a week or so - I just primed them, so the visitors can immediately throw paint at them.

September 8th

I went over to the airport to cook lunch before we had a presentation on model rocketry.  After the meeting, there was a chat about the scholarship programme, which I sat in on.  After that, I took the Magni out for a bimble around the area, then went home.

September 3rd

It's Labo(u)r Day, when Americans celebrate the progress of the unions (5 day working weeks, holidays - they still don't have paid vacation and healthcare for all yet...) by going shopping.

I went to the airport, and having texted Randy before I left, I waited for him to get there before we went up for a flight - he's wanted to go in the gyro for ages, but Ken sold it to me before he got his chance :o)

After that, I headed home and got some work done :o(

September 2nd

We went out and got breakfast, then went to the BMW dealer and took a used i3 for a test drive - we've talked about getting one to replace the Jeep, and I wanted to see the intelligent cruise control, which is, indeed, intelligent.  Vic wasn't used to the one pedal driving (lift off the throttle completely, and it'll start regenerative braking), but we're sure that's something she'd get used to - assuming she doesn't use the cruise control to get everywhere :o)  Interestingly the Tesla has profiles for drivers, so we could turn that off for her, and on for me.

In the afternoon I went out to the airport and took the Magni out again.  I wandered around over by Camp Far West Lake, and the lake seems to be pretty low at the moment, as do the rivers leading in to it.

September 1st

It's a new month, so here are the solar stats:

Power billed

Power generated

I went to the airport and cooked breakfast for ~20 of my closest friends, then met CJ, Gwen, Vic and Jazebra so I could take CJ up in the Magni.  Despite the poor visibility, she seemed to enjoy it - we didn't stay out too long as obviously everybody was waiting for us.

After everybody left, I pottered around chatting to people, getting in the way of others and so on until it was time to head home.

August 31st

I went out to the airport and washed the Magni, then took it out for a potter around.  The sky seems to be getting smokier again :o(

August 30th

I took the van in for a service - it's all OK, but apparently needs a new serpentine belt.  I'll have to figure out which one exactly this needs, and I'll do the powered steering belt at the same time, as it'll have to come off anyway.

August 29th

I went over to the airfield and washed the Magni, then took the dash out to see if I could plug the ADS-B receiver in to the GPS directly.  It doesn't have the right connector to do that, so I put in back in the storage pouch in the back seat and took it out for a bit.  The sky's pretty clear, so we have 2 farmers burning their fields :o(

August 28th

I've taken a few days off to do something other than work.  I went over to the airport, and ended up helping Bob put his golf cart extension on - it now has 4 seats instead of 2 and needs heavier springs.

I then took the Magni out for an hour or so, pottering around testing the ADS-B In - it seems to work just fine, and sees traffic before I do :o)  The sky's started to clear up with the wind we've been having, and that's also helping keep the temperature down a bit.

August 26th

I went over to the airport to test out the ADS-B in doohickey that's finally arrived.  I couldn't get it to work, so after flying for a while, I took the GPS unit out and went home.  Updating the GPS' software got it to connect to the ADS-B receiver, so hopefully I can test that again and it'll work.

August 25th

I went over to the airport and took the plane out - it was hazy again, so I just did some circuits until Chris arrived and Ken got back from Cameron Park.  Having put everything away, we went and got lunch, then I went home and changed out some more sprinkler heads in the back garden.  Now I need to dig out some sprinklers to replace the barrels.

August 24th

It's Friday, which, as I worked on Sunday to cover APAC, means Saturday.  I ended up going over to the airport and taking the plane out for some circuits - the sky's all hazy again, so I didn't go out and do anything else.

August 22nd

I had the day off, and pottered around the house waiting for something to be delivered.  It wasn't.

August 19th

Today was National Aviation Day, so I went over to the airport and took the Magni out for a bit.  I had been planning to fly around the Sutter Buttes, but having got there, I realised that time was getting on and headed back.  Once on the ground, I found that it's easy to adjust the rudder pedals, so I've brought those closer to me, to hopefully make the seating position a little better.  I filled it up with gas, then headed home to start work as I'm covering our guy in Australia today.

August 18th

It was a busy day - I started out getting the Magni out, then cooking breakfast at the LRAA display day.  Vic came over towards the end, and we took the plane out over Folsom Lake to see the early Vanagon meet up there.

We then headed back to Lincoln, and after a go-around caused by a Mooney not looking to see us on finals when he pulled on to the runway, landed and put the plane away.  We then headed home, picked up Tilly and headed to Folsom in the van.

We were there for a couple of hours until Tilly was tired, then headed home.  We ended up watching "It's Complicated" while Tilly shuffled around trying to get comfortable.

August 15th

We went to the airport for the EAA membership meeting, where I got to cook before the presentation on the trip to Oshkosh.

August 12th

I wasted most of the day, but I did go to the airport.  I took the dash on the plane apart, and worked on installing a DSub-9 connector to interface the transponder with a Garmin GPS puck to hopefully get ADS-B out.  It all seems to work, but I need to test it with an ADS-B in receiver.

After that, I took the plane out for an hour or so.

August 11th

I started the day taking the gyro out in the smoke - I was hoping to fly before it got really bad, but the visibility was awful.  I did a few manoeuvres, then headed over to the river to see if things were better there.  They weren't, but I could smell the burning from the fires.  After a vertical descent, I found an inversion layer at ~750', when I got cold - that's not helping with the smoke.  There was  another guy out there, so we circled around each other at a respectful distance, and then I headed back to Lincoln.  The wind had got up to almost 10mph down the runway, so I managed to land at 13mph groundspeed :o)

I cooked lunch for ~30 people - Scott sold the last lunch I was cooking for myself on 3 occasions, so I ended up with a piece of bacon and a cookie - I couldn't be bothered to get another frozen burger out and start cooking again.

I went home, where we had an early dinner and watched "Rampage" and a series of 80s pop-culture moments mashed into a movie - "Ready Player One" :o)

August 5th

As the wind got up overnight and blew a lot of the smoke and ash away, I got up on the roof and washed the solar panels while waiting for Russ and Deeps to arrive.  Once they got here, we loaded Mum and Dad's luggage in their car, and headed to the airport so I could take Russ out in the gyro.  As it was pretty busy, I did a big circle and rejoined the circuit to let others get out, and when we landed, Russ said he hadn't minded the circuit level stuff, so we went out and did another circuit. 

Shortly after we got back, they headed back to Los Angeles with Mum and Dad.  I decided to go out and do some circuits while waiting for Chris to get over from Cameron Park, as he had a guy coming to look at his Sportcopter gyroplane.  Chris arrived as I taxied up, so I did one long circuit, then parked the gyro so I could help fix the rotor speed sensor and strobe while waiting.  The guy finally arrived and looked at the Sportcopter for a long time, but it looks like he's bargain hunting rather than seriously looking.

When he left, I left Chris getting loaded up to fly his Ercoupe back to Cameron Park in the resurgent smoke and headed home, where we watched some TV and had an early night.

August 4th

I started the day at the airport cooking breakfast for 20 of my closest friends.  I then took Mum up in the gyro again, so Dad could video the takeoff.  The smoke in the air is worse than ever, so we just did a big circle and came and rejoined the circuit and landed.

As Dad's hurt his back and didn't want to try and get in the gyro, we went home and waited for Russ and Deeps to arrive so we could meet them for dinner.

August 2nd

We went to the casino to eat at the buffet until we felt uncomfortably full.

August 1st

It's a new month, so here are the stats:

Power generated

Power billed

July 31st

We went to the last Downtown Roseville Tuesday night thing, where we looked at the old cars and waited a long time for hot dogs.

July 30th

After work, Dad and I replaced a bunch of sprinkler heads, just to see if we can cover more of the dead earth that's the back garden.  The sky is still gray from the Carr fire.

July 29th

We started the day at the airport, where I took Mum up in the Magni.  The visibility is getting worse, so we didn't do much more than just fly around in a big circle.

Dad and I went back later to help Chris put the rotors on his gyroplane.  He then taxied it around, including some faster runs down the runway with the rotors spinning.  It looked like he lifted the front wheel a couple of times :o)

July 28th

Dad and I started the day going to the airport and taking the Magni for a flight.  Thanks to the Carr fire, visibility is pretty awful.  We had talked about flying with Mum after an early(ish) dinner, but decided against it.

July 27th

After work (well, I left a few minutes early because the plane was early) I went and collected Mum and Dad from Sacramento airport.

July 25th

I went over to the airport to help Chris put his Sportcopter into the hangar - he wants to use our 6000' runway (with lots of runoff in all directions) for practice for a couple of weeks, rather than the ~3600' runway at Cameron Park (with lots of houses in all directions).

July 23rd

Rich, the guy who bought the Flightstar, asked me to meet him at Marysville, so rather than drive, I flew the Magni over there.  It was pretty windy - the the point where I had to stop the plane at the end of the runway and wait for the rotor to spin down.  Anyway, we went through a few things (it was too windy to do anything useful in the Flightstar), then I flew back to Lincoln.

July 22nd

It was a really hot day, so other than replacing the sprinkler valve again, I stayed in.

July 21st

I started the day at the airport, where we were cooking breakfast at the LRAA's historic aircraft day.  We use that to try and get people in to the airport, and to raise money for the scholarship programme.  Anyway, a bunch of people were heading out to Oshkosh, so I got the gyroplane out, Ken got his gyroplane out and John got his Citabria out.

We ended up cooking over 40 breakfasts before putting everything away.  I then went and changed the spark plugs and cleaned the air filter, before taking it out for an hour or so of pottering around.  There was a guy in a Piper Cub and we flew around each other for a while.

On the way home, I picked up the parts to replace the bad valve, and when I got home I swapped that in.  It takes a couple of hours for the glue to dry, but when I turned the water back on, the new valve body leaks at the top, so I get to cut that back out and do it all again.

July 20th

We've had a wet, swampy area in the garden for a while, and I've made no progress in figuring out where the water's coming from - digging down a little ways usually ends up in dry clay.  Anyways, Vic started digging around the sprinkler, and it's not obviously leaking - the stupid thing is it shouldn't matter anyway, as the valve shuts it off.  I took the sprinkler apart, and watched the water level inside rising.  I turned off the water, and the level stopped rising.  I then figured out the valve's not shutting properly any more, so I cut that out, and left the water off for the night.

July 15th

After futzing around the house for most of the morning (including checking the refrigerant pressure in the AC in the van and cutting the oil filter for the plane apart to check that it's pretty clean), we went over to the airfield and took the Magni out.  I've stuck one of the camera mounts to the mast, and while there is some jelly effect, it's not terrible.  The tablet, stuck to the glovebox in the back didn't work out though - Vic couldn't read it.  Oh well, you can't win 'em all.  At least both headsets worked OK.

July 14th

I started the day kind of early doing some work on the EAA website, then headed to the airport.  I flew a little, then cooked lunch before the 3D printing presentation.  After the presentation, I went and cleaned and waxed the plane - the rotors still have some rough spots, so could do with waxing again, I reckon.

July 13th

After a pretty busy week at work (a cow-orker's been out the whole week), I went to Harbor Freight and got a compression tester (and a free LED work light - there's always something) and headed to the airport.  I changed the oil filter (now I had the strap wrench I needed) and checked the magnetic pickup in the engine, but couldn't get the spark plug socket on, as it's pretty tight in there.  Oh well... hopefully I'll see Ken over the weekend and see what he has.  After that, I took the plane out for a few circuits to make sure there were no leaks.  Doesn't look like there were.

July 12th

I'd managed to catch the drinking tube on my Camelbak in the garage, and when I filled it up to go for my bicycle ride, the bladder was folded under.  I didn't realise until I was ~2 miles from home that I didn't have as much water as I usually have.  I ended up rationing myself, but still ran out ~1 mile from home.  Doh.

July 10th

We watched "A Quiet Place".  Not so quiet after all, what with Tilly clicking around, drinking and whining at the monsters.

July 8th

I had intended to go to the airport and fiddle with things, but in the end it was too hot by the time I'd finished running around, so I didn't.

July 7th

I started the day at the airport, cooking lunch for 25 or so of my closest friends.  After that, I had been aiming to go over to Marysville to fly to Sutter for their open hangar day / lunch with Rick in the Flightstar.  I was trying to decide whether to drive or fly (the gyro isn't something you can tie down like a fixed wing) when Rick texted to say he was going to drive instead.  After talking to Brad about his Little Wing, I was preflighting the Magni to fly over to Sutter and see what was going on when Bruce wandered over to say he'd flown to Sutter and there was nothing going on there.  OK, I finished my preflight and just pottered around for an hour, then went back and drained the oil.  I forgot my oil wrench, so I couldn't change the oil filter, but I did change the fuel filter.  I'll go back tomorrow and continue servicing things so I have a starting point to work from.

I did start watching "It" with Vic, but I really wasn't enjoying jump scare after jump scare, so I left her to it :o)

July 4th

Today's Independence Day, when Americans celebrate leaving the Empire by going shopping.

We spent it working on projects around the house until it got too hot to do anything :o)

In the evening, Tilly alternated between shouting at the fireworks and cowering under the bed from them.

July 1st

A new month, so here are the solar stats:

Power billed

Power generated

Ken was getting his wife to drop him at Lodi on her way past, so he could pick up Jamie's new gyroplane.  We'd talked about me meeting him down there, so I got to the airport early, pre-flighted the Magni and put gas in it, then found that he'd got there a lot earlier than we'd anticipated.  Fine - I flew over to Cameron Park and met him and Don there, where we took pictures of the 3 Magnis together, then eventually headed home - Don came along for a ride, so we did a lap of Folsom Lake so he could (hopefully) shoot some video from his gyro, then when he headed back, we headed off back to Lincoln.  Ken was flying a fair bit faster than me, so he showed up first, but the pattern was pretty busy, so that was probably for the best.

In the evening, we watched the end of the Hobbit movie(s).

June 30th

We started the day going over to the airport so Vic could fly with Steve in the N3N biplane.  Other than high g manoeuvres, she seems to have enjoyed it :o)  We then took the Magni out - this is the first time I've flown it with a passenger (Ken just shooting video doesn't count, as he's a pilot).  That went well enough, too - she noticed the lack of turbulence, even though it was the middle of a ~100F day and we were flying over brown fields.

In the evening, we started watching the Tolkien edition of the Hobbit movies (it cuts out most of the stuff that's just not in the book).

June 28th

I went over to the airport and took the gyroplane out.  I did a couple of full stop landings (so I can practice the pre-rotation stuff), then went and flew over the house.  This time Vic came out and waved at me.  Apparently it's not too loud at ~900' and 4300rpm :o)  I went back to the airport, and got in quietly while a couple of Cessnas were bickering about seeing each other / cutting each other off in the pattern.

June 24th

After dicking around in Warcraft for a bit, I went to the airport.  The Magni wasn't leaking brake fluid, and the pressure seemed fine, so I preflighted it, pulled it out and went flying.  I had intended to do some circuits, but there were several planes appearing in the pattern, so after one touch and go, I left the circuit and went and played around elsewhere.  After just over an hour and a half, I put the plane away and went home, where I pretty much just stayed out of the heat for the rest of the day.

June 23rd

It was forecast to be a hot, windy day, so we went out to the airport pretty early to look at the brake leak on the Magni.  I thought the O rings were damaged, but Vic pointed out the brake fluid at the top of the brake caliper, which suggests that the problem was the fitting.  I tightened that all up.  We also swapped two of the brake cables out, to (hopefully) make my brake lever work more.

As it was starting to get hot, we went home to take advantage of Blizzard's free World of Warcraft weekend.

I waited for it to start cooling down (i.e. just below 100F) and went out and put the door back together in the Vanagon.  Then took it apart again to plug in the central locking wires that were getting caught and disconnected.  Twice.  Still, it's all done now :o)

June 22nd

I got up early and rode to the new owner's office in Sunnyvale.  It didn't seem to be a terrible ride down there, but there was a fair amount of filtering, which would suggest that driving would take a fair amount longer.  On the ride back, the traffic was a lot worse, and I managed to drop the bike while pottering at walking speed in traffic.  I'm not sure what happened, but I was suddenly trying to stop it falling, so I ended up unceremoniously put it down, stepped off and picked it up again.  There's a scuff on the hand guard, and I broke the mirror, but I still rode >100 miles home from there.

June 21st

The window regulators arrived for the van, and I got the driver's side installed.  It's... OK.  It stops from time to time, but GoWesty say they do that, which isn't great, I guess.

Now I just need to put the door back together.  I'm not sure that I'll bother with the passenger side just yet.

June 20th

I rode the DRZ to the EAA membership meeting, and cooked dinner for about 25 people.

The talk was about taking a motor glider from Auburn to Sun 'n Fun in Florida... it took 3 days flying to get there, and 4 to get back, which doesn't sound too bad.

June 18th

I pulled the window regulator out of the van, then looked around in the bottom of the door for the missing parts.  One of which was all mangled, so I've ordered new regulators (might as well do both) and I'll have to leave the van alone until those come in.

June 17th

On the way to the airport, the window in the van started opening, being fully open by the time I got there.  I pulled the inner stuff off, but I don't have a clue what I'm looking at, so I just put a zip tie around it to hopefully hold it closed.

I noticed that one of the wheels is leaking a little brake fluid, suggesting I didn't do the greatest job of installing the new O rings.  Despite this, I took the Magni out for just over an hour, and got bounced around a bit.  When I got back, I spoke to Tony, and he'd had the crap kicked out of him in his Just Summit and Cessna, so I felt better about it :o)

At home, I took a look at the window regulator in the van, and I need to take it out and get a look at it.  There are all manner of things that could be wrong, and some are easy to fix, and some will require a new regulator.  Bah.

June 16th

I started the day cooking pancakes at the LRAA historic aircraft day.  We didn't have a massive number of customers, but there were a fair few from outside the airport, so we're starting to make progress.

It was a bit windy to look at flying the gyroplane, so I just went home afterwards - we went to Caroline's housewarming, where we met the guy who was Michael Douglas' young body double in Ant-Man.  He's her realtor.

June 15th

After charging all night, the battery on the van was below 12v, so that's toast.  After work, I took it out and we went and got a new one.  Oh, but that was fun... the Vanagon comes with a Group 41 battery.  They're not made any more, so I went to a Group 48 last time I got a battery.  Those  were replaced by the H6 battery, which is about 1/2" too tall for the battery space.  We ended up with a Group 40R, which is a lot cheaper than the H6, but a fair bit less powerful.  Still, less powerful is better than not there, eh?

June 14th

I'd intended to go and fly the gyroplane, but the van's battery was dead.  Odd, I thought, so I put it on charge and left it.  Checking though, the battery is almost 11 years old, so it's probably had it.

June 12th

We met Jen for dinner, then went and watched "Deadpool 2".  I laughed.  I cried.  I hurled.

June 10th

I went over to the airport and took the brakes apart again, this time putting them together with some special O ring grease that Jack has - I figure the problem here was lubrication, so extra lubrication should help.  I also filled the pistons with fluid before putting them back in, and didn't press them back in until they were connected to the brake lines, so there shouldn't be air in the lower system.  Jack brought his pressure bleeder, and we used that to push fluid in from the bottom, so that looked like it was done.

Tom showed up to buy some old 2 stroke Rotax parts I have, and we spent a while chatting - enough that walking backwards and forwards to Ken's hangar (so he could also buy some manifolds that Ken has) meant I got sunburn on my head :o(

I took the gyro out for a flight - I had thought about doing some circuits, but there were already 3 planes in the pattern, so I went and pottered about elsewhere.  I came back when my head was getting sore from the helmet, so I was up around an hour.  The brakes weren't dragging when I got back, so I'm calling those fixed for now :o)

June 9th

We went to Richard and Sue's memorial service, and got out just in time to see the Ravens doing the "missing man" flypast.

We then went to the airport and looked at the brakes on the Magni.  We figured out that the pistons weren't coming out straight, and using the wheel to hold them in a little meant they came out straight and could be sorted out just fine.  One piston was, I thought, bottomed out on reinstall, and Jack ended up helping pop it out with air.  At first it wouldn't move, and it seems that it had got crooked, too.  Pushing it in a little further meant it came out OK with air.  I still need to bleed the brakes up, but other than that it's getting there :o)

June 8th

The O rings for the brakes on the Magni came in, so I went and fiddled with them for a while.  I couldn't get the pistons out very far at all, so I replaced one O ring and gave up for the moment.  I did manage to get the tyres turned over, so the other side of the tread'll get used.

June 7th

I went back to Marysville and did some more circuits with Rick.  It was a bit more windy than Tuesday, so I don't think we made any real progress.  The good news is that there may be a hangar coming up at Freedom Field, and Ray can hopefully teach him to fly properly.  I said I could help ferry the Flightstar over there, but if it were me, I'd get Ray to do it and log it as cross country training time :o)

June 5th

I went over to Marysville and did some circuits with Rick.  They're digging up the apron, so part of the taxiway is closed meaning we had to backtaxi on the runway.  Luckily it's Marysville, so it's never busy (despite there being a couple of helicopter movements - this is the busiest I've ever seen it there, outside the airshow).

June 3rd

I went to the airport fairly early, and went out in the gyroplane with Ken again.  He'd played with the brakes, but they need new O rings to stop them dragging for good.  We did an hour of full stop circuits, so I could practice the pre-rotation thing as I pull on to the runway.  I dropped Ken off, he filled in my log book, and then I took the gyro out by myself.  We'd discussed it, and Ken suggested taking off and leaving the circuit, so I could space everything out, I flew over to the house and back, and was up for 35 minutes.  Nothing was too crazy, but the brakes are dragging badly again, so I think I want to get that in hand before I fly again, as Ken's pointed out that one of the tyres is flat spotted where it couldn't spin up fast enough.  We went to lunch, then I went home for a rest.

June 2nd

I went to the airport pretty early, and Ken and I did a couple of hours in the gyroplane before stopping for breakfast at the EAA hangar - it was nice not to have to cook for everybody else, but we still got to cook our own breakfasts :o)

I stood about and chatted with people while Ken did the annual inspection on Steve's powered parachute, then we went and had a light lunch with Dick and Todd.  Ken had to do a weight and balance on Fred's plane, then we tinkered for a while with a wiring fault on Ken's plane - that all got tracked down.  Tony was having a barbecue, so we went over there for a while, then went back to the airport and took the gyro out again - flying over Tony's, then going to the North to take a picture of the amphitheatre for George, who was there for a concert.  We got back shortly before it got dark, and put the gyro away.  The brakes are dragging a bit, so that's something we need to look at, but I only have 45 minutes of dual before I can finally solo the thing.

June 1st

A new month, so here are the solar stats:

Power billed

Power generated

May 31st

After work, I went to the airport and Ken and I took the gyroplane out for the first time.  After a bunch of touch and goes, we went and played around elsewhere, including flying over the house.  All in all, everything went well, so now I just have ~5 hours or so of training before I'm allowed (by the insurance company) to fly it solo.

May 30th

I'd ordered a new LED light that seemed to be incorrectly priced, and it arrived, so we installed it, and it's better than the old one :o)

May 28th

Today was Memorial Day, when Americans remember their war dead by going shopping.  I had intended to fly the Flightstar with Rick, but he couldn't get somebody to get his plane out of the locked up hangar.

May 27th

We went over to the airfield so I could take a look at the plane - I was thinking there'd be a few things to tidy up, but it all looks ready to go, from what I can tell.

I was covering for our guy in Australia, so that buggered up the rest of my day, but Ken texted me to tell me Richard and Sue had been killed in a crash in Petaluma :o(

May 26th

I had intended to go and fly with Rick in the Flightstar, but the sky was covered in big cumulus clouds, so it was going to be bumpy.  I decided against that (I'm sure he'd have gone for it, but I don't want to scare the guy just yet).

In the evening, we watched "Black Panther".

May 25th

After work, we went to Davis to watch Don's band, The Funicellos, play.  I think they sound better than the last band he was in :o)

May 24th

Ken texted to say everything's pretty much done on the Magni, so now I need to get over there and tidy stuff up.

May 23rd

Ken texted to say he was popping down tomorrow, so I went to the airport and dropped off all the parts I've accumulated for the Magni.  The new PTT switches fit without any sort of modification, and an old hair tie takes off the parking brake, so we're pretty much there :o)

May 20th

Ken had an annual inspection to do on a parachute, so I met him for lunch, then we looked at the brake bracket he'd made up.  Unfortunately it bends in use, so we ended up drilling an extra hole on the original bracket, and that looks like it'll work OK.  There isn't enough movement to take the parking brake off, so we're going to look at playing with some springs to see if we can rectify that.  The clicky pen spring I had isn't quite strong enough.

The other push to talk switch I had was also a closed switch, but Ken found on in his box 'o stuff.  It was ever so slightly too big, so I tried turning it down a bit, but it fell apart, so I'll need to order some and see what I can do with that.  Ken's away next weekend, but we think we should be able to fly it on the weekend after that.

May 19th

I dropped the modified throttle off with Ken, then went and cooked pancake breakfasts at the LRAA display day.  We had a muted turnout, but there were a couple of people who'd been at the Young Eagles event, so hopefully we can get more word of mouth turnout in future months.

Ken came over and said he thought he'd got the throttle all sorted out, so when I was done there, I went over and checked it out - it works fine, yay.  We've started tinkering with the brake lever, and need to make up a mounting bracket for that.  Sadly the toggle switch I had to use for the radio push to talk was a normally closed switch, and we needed a normally opened switch, so I'll check in my box o' stuff at home.

John had texted to see what I was doing, and came and met us at the airport to see the gyro for the first time.

After we left the airport, we went out and had an early dinner before John needed to head home.

May 18th

I went over and met Ken and we played with the throttle for the gyro.  We have a problem in that the throttle is too hard to shut, due to springs that open the throttle - those are needed to keep the carbs in sync.  We played with various things and stuff, and I took the throttle unit home and took out a stop to allow us more throttle movement, which should hopefully help by allowing us to increase the mechanical advantage.

May 17th

The parts for the Magni have come in, so I went over to the airfield and got in Ken's way while he worked on things and stuff.  We bonded a plate with a pulley to the side - we were going to use fibreglass, but Jack showed up with some carbon fibre, so we used that instead.  While we were waiting for it to dry, we went and got lunch, then did some tinkering for a while, then I went over to Cameron Park and flew for an hour with Don in his Magni.  While my upper air work was fine, I need to work on the landings a little, as I managed to touch the tail (it's OK, it has a roller for exactly this reason) a couple of times.

May 16th

I went to the EAA membership meeting, where Dubs talked about getting back into flying after a 40 year break.  It was funny, as he had a list of web sites he visited, and one of them was mine :o)  I talked to him after the presentation, and he didn't realise that was me :o)

May 15th

We went to dinner with Jen, then went and watched "Avengers: Infinity War".

May 13th

We're still waiting for parts for the gyroplane (it seems they're finished, they just aren't here), so I spent the day doing things around the house.

May 12th

I got up early and went to the airport to help with the EAA Young Eagles event.  I explained how planes work until it was time to start barbecuing, then I helped with the taking everything down and packing it away when it was all finished.  We flew 69 kids - of the 75 that had booked, 65 showed up, which is pretty good.  We've had a lot more just not show up in the past.

May 11th

Ken had texted me to say he thought we should get a new throttle unit for the conversion, as it looks like the unit takes a lot of force over time, and is wearing out.  It wasn't new when we installed it on the S-17, and that was over 10 years ago :o)  I went over to Motion Pro, as they're based in Loomis, and picked one up at lunch.  Of course, I'd decided to take the DRZ, and it was blowing a gale, making it a bit more exciting than I'd anticipated.

After work I went over to the airport to help with the setup for the Young Eagles event, but they were all pretty much done when I got there - yay!

May 10th

The rabbit had a fit of mad running around at around 04:30, and I couldn't get back to sleep so I got up and updated the EAA web site with the new newsletter.

May 9th

I'd intended to go over to Marysville to fly with Rick again, but he couldn't get the plane out of the hangar, again, so Vic and I went out and got pizza instead.

May 7th

After work, I went over to Marysville and flew some circuits with Rick in the Flightstar.

May 6th

I was on call, so after that was over, I was supposed to be going to Marysville to fly with Rick, but he got a call to say he couldn't get the plane out of the hangar, so we called that off.

May 5th

I started the day at the airport helping cook breakfast, then sat in on the board meeting.  Ken's away, so there was nothing else to do, and I went home, as I was on call.

May 1st

It's a new month, so here are the solar stats:

Power billed

Power generated

April 30th

After work I went back over to Marysville and did some more hops with Rick in the Flightstar.  We did pretty well, especially in a fairly decent crosswind (the main runway's about twice the length of the crosswind runway).  It seems he doesn't have a license (I thought he was just rusty), having flown ultralights before.  I'm going to see if Ken wants to work with him, as it's not like I can sign him off to solo.  I'm going to look out for a hangar at Lincoln for him, so I could end up ferrying the Flightstar back again :o)

April 29th

After all the fun yesterday, we tried to have a calmer day.

In the afternoon, I went over to Marysville and fixed the cut off switch for the Flightstar (it was just a disconnected wire), then did some short hops with Rick, so he can say he's at least flown his new plane :o)  It's an odd setup there, as he calls the hangar owner, and they get the plane out for him, then he calls them again when he's done and they put it away when they're good and ready.  This means it's going to spend a lot of time sitting out overnight, as we generally fly at the end of the day, when they've gone home.  I'd be looking for another hangar if it were me.

April 28th

I got up to find that the van meeting up at the Foresthill bridge had been deleted, so I asked Jason (the organiser) WTF, then rode the DRZ over to the airfield to get the hangar set up for the open day.  The plan had been for Vic to bring Tilly and the van over later, then we'd go to Foresthill.  Jason replied that his van was down, and that there wasn't much interest, so he'd called it off, so I texted Vic and said she didn't need to bring the van or Tilly.  I started cooking lunch, and people started to show up - Gwen and CJ brought grandma and the girls, and Vic showed up with Tilly, but in the Jeep - Tilly was worked up because she knew something was going on, so Vic brought her to let her we herself out.  Rick, who's bought the Flightstar, showed up and said he'd been taxying it around, and it wouldn't turn off... it looks like something unplugged one of the ground lines. Ken and I are a lot closer to getting the Magni converted - Jim's machining the throttle connection, but we've asked him to do a replacement pre-rotator lever, too, as that hits the throttle.

April 27th

Despite being windy, the weather wasn't too bad, so I went over to the airfield after work to meet Ken and Rick and fly the Flightstar to Marysville.  Rick came with me, and we pottered over there while Ken went and played in his 162.  As we were approaching, there was a guy landing on 14, but the wind was 10mph at 220, so we landed on the shorter 23 without drama.  My turn to finals turn was maybe a little aggressive, but Rick seemed to like seeing what you can do with the plane.  We tied it down (they have some weird setup there where they get your plane in and out of your hangar for you), and Ken and I took my conversion parts off, then flew back to Lincoln.  The 162 is a civilised little plane, but I'm pretty sure I'd lose interest in pottering about in it quickly.  I think it's much better suited to going places, and stuff like the autopilot helps there.

April 23rd

I met Rick at the airport after work, and showed him the pre-flight for the Flightstar, then took him out for a bit to fly it.  I think it's going to take him a little while to get used to flying it, as he's obviously used to something with a much higher nose, so he defaults to ending up in a climb at a low power setting.  I showed him some turns and the wallow before a stall and then went back and landed.  Right now, he's buying it, and we're talking about me delivering it on Saturday afternoon / evening after the open hangar day presentation at the EAA, and the possible Vanagon meeting I had hoped to go to.  We'll see what the weather's doing at the weekend.

April 22nd

I spend the day just pottering about.  I did go to the airport to see a guy from Marysville who wants to buy the Flightstar, and we've agreed to test fly it tomorrow evening.  I'm looking forward to being able to fly when I want to, rather than after the worst of the thermal activity :o)

April 21st

I headed out to the airport via the bank, where I pulled out a cashier's cheque for the Magni.  At Lincoln, I gave the cheque to Ken, then watched the LRAA presentations in their annual meeting.  After that, we peered at the Magni to figure out how we're going to convert it over so I can fly it :o)  At the moment, it sounds like I'll have a foot brake, and a twist grip throttle, but that could change.  The Magni has a 1" stick, where the Flightstar has a 7/8" - the standard motorcycle stuff is 7/8", so we're going to move over to using that to make it easier to get parts and suchlike.

I tried bending the brackets for the headlight mounts for the van using a proper brake at the airport, but the first one cracked - seems that there are different grains in some aluminium, and if you go the wrong way, it can cause this sort of thing.  I'm going to try and get some more, better stuff and try again.

I took all of my easy to remove clutter out of the Flightstar, as it sounds like Ken might have already found a buyer for it.  I'll need tools to take the conversion stuff out, and I'll do that after I'm sure I don't need to demo fly it for anybody.

When I got home, I spent some time sorting out a couple of Google Groups to do the mailings for the EAA.  It'll manage subscriptions, and have a history, and hopefully stop us getting stuff labelled as spam.

April 19th

I took the day off, and we went over the the airport to throw Vic out of a perfectly good airplane.  She seemed to enjoy it, but I don't think it's something that she wants to do regularly.

When we got home, I managed to get the grass in the back garden cut, and rotated the wheels on the Jeep (for the first time in >10,000 miles - oops).

April 18th

I went over to the airport and cooked burgers and hot dogs before the meeting.  After the meeting, we ended up painting the whole hangar floor - we're looking at a few spots (like under the plane that's parked in there) on Saturday and we're done.

April 17th

I rode over to the airport to help get everything tidied up after painting the floor, for the meeting tomorrow night.  The paint looks to be pretty solid, so we're talking about getting some painting done after the meeting, then finishing up on Saturday.

April 15th

I've been taking to Ken about his gyroplane, as he's selling it because the insurance company won't let him train in it.  The more I think about it, the more it makes sense (other than the cost, obviously), so we made a deal and I'm going to be the owner of a Magni M-16 in the next few weeks.  He's taking the Flightstar in part exchange - he'll just sell it, but it means I don't have to sell it before taking the Magni.  It's been a stressful few days while I talk myself into it, but hopefully once I start flying it, everything'll be great and worthwhile.  Mid life crisis here I come.

Other than that, I tinkered around in the house, fixing the drain on the patio cover (I think the downspout was installed poorly, so I've cut the hole bigger), hopefully in time to see it rain this evening and see that it was worth it.  I did some more work on the headlight mountings for the van, so I'll need to get those bent up at some point.

April 14th

I pottered around the house for a while in the morning, then went to the airport to cook barbecue for the EAA presentation.  After that, we shifted things away from the back wall and started painting the floor.  We ended up shifting everything further towards the front, and painting more than we'd originally intended.  I stood around taking to people until about 4pm, then went and did some tinkering on the plane before taking it out for just over an hour.  It was bumpy, so I stayed above 1200', but it was nothing too bad.  I got back and put everything away and then went home.

April 12th

After cutting the grass, I started fielding queries about Steve's gyroplane crash - he's OK.  There are only a few gyros at Lincoln, and Ken's off with his shoulder surgery, so people thought it might be me.

April 10th

In the evening, I spent a little time updating the EAA web site.  Truly, it never ends.

April 8th

I went out to the airfield and met Steve and Don, who came over from Cameron Park in his orange Magni , then Chris arrived in his Ercoupe (having followed Don until he lost him).  Then Paul arrived in his white Magni, and Don took his son up for a lesson (Paul's not ready to sit in the back seat yet).  When Don got back, Steve and I sat down with him to go through the theoretical part of our gyro endorsement, then Steve went out for his practical test.  Ken arrived, and we did the theoretical part of my endorsement, then I went out with Don while Steve did his stuff with Ken (one instructor signs you off to do the test, and the other instructor does the test).  I felt really rusty, as I haven't flown a gyro for almost 2 months, but it all came together and I passed :o)  I've been talking to insurance agencies, and they all want me to have 15 - 20 hours of instruction before soloing, so I can now learn to fly (having learned to pass the test).  I left Ken taking a friend of Steve's up for a demo flight, and went home, knackered.

April 7th

I started the day at the airfield cooking breakfast for ~15 of my closest friends while we watched "Air America".  We had planned to get some floor painting done, but the torrential rain yesterday and overnight meant there were a few leaks.  Sadly it was still wet enough that we have to wait for it all to dry out before patching it.

I went home and hit the books.

April 4th

I went along to the EAA board meeting, as I wanted to put in my 2c about volunteer stuff, and the cooking crews idea.

April 1st

A new month, so here are the stats:

Power billed

Power generated

I've found some LED lights that should work on the van, so I pulled the grille off and took one light out so I could get a look at the mounting bracket.  I've sketched out what I think I need to make to fit the lights, but I need to get some more cutting wheels to start trying to make something that'll work.  It actually doesn't look to tricky, so I'll play when the parts have come in.

I spent the rest of the day just doing odd jobs around the house - the annual inspection is now due on the Flightstar, so no flying for me tonight.

March 31st

I'm feeling a bit better, so I went to the airfield to help out with the hangar work party.  On the way, I saw Steve towing his gyro (well, at first I was "WTF is that?"), so I followed him in.  He taxied it around, but isn't ready to fly it yet.

We did a bunch of sealing around the edges of the hangar, and some insulation on the walls.

After we all got tired out, I went home and installed some new LED side marker lights on the van - they're for a Mercedes SUV, and a little smaller than the VW ones, but the mounting holes line up just fine, and they're nice and red rather than the faded pink of the old ones.

I went back to the airfield, and took the plane out for a little potter around, then went home and watched "The Last Jedi".

March 25th

Still sick, but there's light at the end of the tunnel.  I got tired of my PC constantly whining about losing the BIOS config, so I took it apart to replace the battery.  I was looking on the motherboard for the thing, only to find it on a nice little vertical holder.  It's the little things that cheer me up.

We went out and filled the van with gas, and dropped some jerry cans at the airport.  I didn't want to hang around and get everybody sick.

We watched "Atomic Blonde", so it's been a weekend of watching James McAvoy get the crap kicked out of him.