October 27th

It was howling a gale, so flying was out.  We cut another branch off the big shrub along the fence line, and I trimmed that into small pieces and filled the green waste bin again.

I've got a shelf in the garage that's warped by the weight of junk I store on it, so we went and got some 2x4s to brace it up - those are installed and everything's back together again.

October 26th

I went out to the airport to test fly the gyro after all the work I did a week ago left the fuel flow showing odd results, and it all ran fine.  Chris was talking about coming out to Lincoln in his new RV-6, then us flying up to Auburn, so I contacted him and we met at Auburn directly.  Vic was out and about, and drove up to meet us.  Leaving Auburn, the plane seemed to be running poorly, but it was fine when I got back to Lincoln, so I'll check that out again at some point, but it's probably something from the fuel line replacements getting in to a carb or somesuch.

October 25th

I started work on the AC fan, but it doesn't seem to want to work now.  I've ordered a replacement capacitor, and hopefully that'll fix it.

October 23rd

The last bit for the furnace fan motor rebuild showed up, so I got that all together and we put it up in the roof.  Having reinstalled it and plugged it all in, it even worked.  It might be my imagination, but it seems quieter.  Now I just need to do the AC fan motor outside.

October 20th

I went out to the airport and helped Ken balance the carbs on the plane, then took it for a test flight.  The fuel flow probes started reading a stupid high number, making me think there was maybe a leak, so I went back to the airport and landed.  Everything looked fine, making me think the problem is due to the probes getting too much vibration, so I "fixed" that, then went home.

October 19th

I went to the airport and cooked breakfast (for the last time this year) at the LRAA display day.  Randy flew over and picked up Chris, and they had the last breakfasts of the day.

A guy flew in in a Calidus, he was on his way home to Petaluma from the High Sierra fly-in, so we went and chatted to him and Randy took him to get gas.  We then went to look at Chris' gyro (that he was picking up from its annual inspection) and I immediately spotted a couple of things that needed doing.  After lunch, we sorted those out and he did a really thorough preflight before heading home.  I swapped out the vacuum hoses, and I'm assuming all the stuff I wanted to do is done.

In the evening, we watched "Men In Black: International".

October 18th

I went to the airfield and helped Randy install the ADS-B stuff on his gyroplane.  When we were done, he took it out for a little flight, and we requested the FAA test report.  That came back blank, but on the way home, I thought that maybe we needed to wait for the FAA to get all the reports back.  I re-requested the report, and it had worked just fine.

October 17th

I went back to the airfield and rebuilt the carbs on the plane with new inlet and outlets, and the diaphragms.  This was a lot less fun than it sounds.

October 16th

I went to the airport and changed out the fuel hoses on the plane.  It took a ways longer than I'd anticipated, as there are a lot of places where it's hard to get to.  Still, that's done.

I then watched a Cal Fire Chinook doing circuits for a while before cooking the burgers for the EAA meeting.

October 15th

I spent part of the day getting up in the roof and taking the furnace apart, as the motor needs to be replaced (after over 20 years).  I've got the blower unit out of the roof, now I just need to get the motor shaft off the fan blades, but at least I could get the part number to order the replacement motor.  As we don't need the air conditioning any more, and it's not cold enough for the central heating, I have a few weeks to get this all done and back together.

October 14th

Today was Columbus Day, where some Americans get to remember Christopher Columbus stumbling over the country he thought was China by going shopping.

I didn't get the day off, but I've taken the week off to get some stuff done.  Vic did get the day off, so we spent it in the garden lifting some sunk sprinklers and cutting lumps off shrubbery.

October 13th

I met Randy at the airport and flew to Auburn, where we met Vic and Chris for lunch, then flew home again.  It was air miss day, from what I could tell - there was a guy doing an against the traffic approach for Lincoln as we took off, and where he was supposed to go missed, climb and turn towards Marysville, he didn't - he flew along the runway at 300'.  Then as I approached Auburn, a red Citabria flew under me from my left - I'd assumed it was one of the instructors at Auburn, but when I got there and landed, their Citabria was parked.  Hmmm.

October 12th

We went to the airport and finished setting up, then flew kids for the Young Eagles event.  Of 69 kids who flew, I flew 7 of them.  I was one of 10 pilots, and several of the others had more than one passenger, so I'm pretty happy with that.  I flew with my newfangled ADS-B out setup running, and when I got the report from the FAA, it looks to be working just fine, especially as it was short flights at pretty low altitudes.

October 11th

After work, we went to the airfield and uninstalled the whole ADS-B out system from the plane, then made some changes and reinstalled it in a way it should work.  It looks like it's working, now I just need to fly and test it out.

October 9th

In the morning, before work, I took the replacement GPS to the airport and tested it on the plane.  It seemed to work, so I went ahead and installed it properly, when it didn't work.  I think I'll need to locate it somewhere else, so it'll need to come out again.  Joy.

October 7th

We started the day taking the rental car back, then I caught up on stuff around the house before working late.

October 6th

I started the day feeling distinctly unwell, but managed to drive home so I could cover work for a couple of hours.

October 5th

Mum and Deeps went shopping, and we tinkered around with Russ' receiver and barbecue.

In the evening, we went out to celebrate Russ' 50th birthday.

October 4th

Vic dropped me at Hertz to pick up a rental Toyota Corolla.

We drove the rental car down to Lakewood to see Russ and Deepah.  I'm not sure that I like adaptive cruise control.

October 3rd

We went and wandered around the Galleria, including the Tesla dealer :o)

October 2nd

We went to the airport and tested the GPS that's plugged in to the ADS-B box.  It's not working, so we took the whole damn thing out.  When we got home, I sent a list of the tests and results to the dealer I bought the thing from.

October 1st

A new month, so here are the stats:

Power billed

Power generated

We took the plane out again, and found it still didn't show up on the ADS-B report.  Bummer.

September 30th

We took the car to Vacaville so we could get Jelly Belly Flops for Dad.  While we were there, we looked at the outlet stores, too.