Flight to Hanna Alberta

 June 25 2022

We had a group fly to Hanna Alberta for a bag lunch in the terminal building.  Weather was another fantastic flying day with light winds out of the west.  This trip was a routing around the NW edge of Calgary then a easterly flight over Three Hills and then continuing onwards to Hanna.  Thank you to Mel, Alan, Jason, Gerald for attending.  We had great conversations that entertained the female and male pipeline patrol pilots that happened to stop to have their bag lunch at the terminal building as well.  They were thoroughly entertained by the shop talk about homebuilt airplanes, which of course dominated the lunch time conversations.

Flight for 2.4 hours

 May 23 2022

I managed to get the plane out for a flight in Southern Alberta.  This is the first flight since I relocated the CPI (Coil Pack Ignition) control panel into the instrument panel.  Everything worked like a charm once again and I was very happy with the 2.4 hour flight North and then East of the Calgary area. All temperatures and pressures stayed in the green for which I was very happy since doing my annual.  I maintained a lower RPM throughout this flight to slow down  bit an enjoy the beautiful scenery on a magnificent day for flying.  Flying north from CYBW I went directly over our house, but alas once again Adele did not look for me.  Flew north to Dixon Dam and did a few circles over the two resort locations, one of which one of my friends resides at.  No one probably saw me there either.  Next headed East and went over Three Hills where I know someone and then on to circle over a flying friends farm east of Three Hills.  From there I ventured SE over Drumheller airport and then staying west of the prison restricted airspace then to circle over another flying friends farm.  After this I headed back toward Springbank staying 25 miles north of Calgary while talking to Terminal frequency for proper clearance routing.  Then a turned South following the Lochend road procedure to CYBW.  Winds were gusting off and on from the W-NW and I landed a bit too fast with a good touch down but a long and swervy roll out.  All in all a great day for flying in temperatures from 10-14 degrees C.

Put the CPI Controller into the Panel

 January 12 2022

It was on my winter project list to install my Electronic Ignition Controller Module into the panel properly.  This has always been my intent as I was using the controller temp. attached to the lower edge of the passenger panel.  My test period went without a problem but I did not install the controller  properly as it was flying season and didn't want my plane unusable in the summer.  So I took a two day break from working on the Vision this week to do the proper install in the Q2 panel.  Weather finally warmed up after a three week extreme cold spell and I just got back out to the airport.   

My panel has a fiberglass back panel which supports individual aluminum sub panels on the forward side of the fiberglass panel.  The fiberglass panel offers good support, the only draw back is for every hole in a aluminum panel a similar hole must be cut out of the fiberglass panel as well.  This is first trial test fit onto aluminum panel.

For me the sub panel concept is ideal as the panel can be modified by disconnecting fewer instruments.

My fuse block is a swing away unit on a hinge and the SDS Electronic Ignition control head was temp hung just to the left of the fuse block and worked well for the summer testing.

I am very pleased with the final install.  Now when warmer weather comes it's time to go flying.

Flight to Fort Macloud

 October 23 2021

Two days ago I flew down to Fort Macloud to see a friend who used to own Quickie's and Dragonfly' airplanes in the past.  He now flies a Taylorcraft out of his own acreage strip just East of Fort Macloud.  I had planned on going a day earlier but we were in fereezing ice fog in the morning that didn't clear up until about 1-2 pm that day.   We had a very nice chat catching up in the airport terminal building since we had not seen each other in about 2-3 years.  Below is a capture of my flight which you can see with live history data on the aprs.fi website.

Bag Lunch to Flagstaff Airport Alberta

 September 8 2021

I put out a call for available flyers to meet at Flagstaff airport Killam Alberta and have a bag lunch together.  Lucky for me I was not alone as four others met up there.  We enjoyed a great time gabbing about everything happening in the past month.  It was great fun to get together with friends again as Covid is keeping many from getting out socializing.  Some responded not able to make it which is normal for these spur of the moment gatherings.  All were retired that showed up and it was not long before we realised a couple of hours had gone by.  Flight out in the Q2 was at 5500 ft with a tail wind giving me a kind push going 140 mph ground speed at times at a temp of 17c at altitude.  On the way out I did a circle over a farmer working his mature field in his combine, giving the opportunity to check the local wind direction from his line of dust.  Return flight was slower into a quartering head wind, but hey I am enjoying the scenery on these nice days.  The wind dropped off to very light half way home and temperature was 23c at 6500 feet.

New ADSB In and Out Installed

 September 1 2021,  

I purchased from Aircraft Spruce the ADSB U-Avionics Sky-ECHO package  with the antenna and the wireless controller box.  I installed into the aft area behind the baggage compartment fully inside of the tail cone of the plane.  I installed in a totally removable method so that should the next owner not want it I could remove it with ease.  The antenna needed a ground plane made up for it and I fabricated my usual octagon shaped aluminum plate type and mounted to a wood standoff glued to the floor.  The antenna of course can see through fiberglass like it was not even there.

Update:  After flying quite a few flights with the ADSB I am thoroughly pleased with the unit and it's operation.  Although in Canada we presently do not have 978mhz weather and notams I recently heard a company down east has about four towers working well in Ontario.  Maybe it will be spreading out across the country soon.

Presently I am able to see lots of other airplanes in the sky around me many of which I could never see in the past.  Because there are few airplanes with ADSB out in Canada yet many which have the new mode S  Transponders with Extended Squitter, I am able to see many on my tablet map.  My estimation is that I on;y see about 30% of all VFR traffic since most are using standard Mode C transponders just squaking 1200 frequency.  I do foresee that this will be a emerging market with more airplanes gettting ADSB soon.

Parked behind my hangar at Springbank airport

August 29 2021.  This is a AN2 Antonov aircraft on floats, very rare to see.  The plane was built in Poland and is in Canada under a  Special CofA it appears.  I say that because on the door it is marked EXPERIMENTAL, a little reading and that seems is the only way it can be registered in Canada.  I also read on the internet that Canada doesn't want planes in Canada that would compete against Canada's  homebuilt bush planes.  The floats and attachment hardware all appear to be brand new as they are all pristine.  The floats are made out of  fiberglass and much cost a pretty penny.  There are no water rudders on the floats so that may be an item yet to be installed or i don't know how they would steer it.  What a huge beast this plane is!

Update:  I found out the floats were custom designed by the owner with plans to market them.  They have installed inside the floats a water jet system for steering.