… or perhaps it’s complete?
We’ve been having some unusually wet weather here in Texas the last few weeks. The good news is that it is filling up the lakes and aquifers, and subsequently the water supply, after a severe drought and some of the lowest levels in the last 50 years. Unfortunately, it makes for lousy flying conditions. One of the VAF members had a very fitting acronym - GPS, Grumpy Pilot Syndrome.
We have managed to put about 20 hours on the cylinders now with five this past weekend. We flew up to see my mom for an afternoon lunch visit on Saturday and a trip to the coast with Johnica flight and to meet an RV10 flyer out of Oklahoma City in Palacios. CHTs are still running a little high, but that should resolve itself as we get some more hours on it.
Once again, I was hailing the virtues of an instrument ticket on Saturday, even though we didn’t actually need it. We woke up to fog and low ceilings. As the morning progressed, the ceilings and visibility were steadily improving, but it was still IFR conditions. We decided that our safety threshold had been met around noon, so we motored out to the airport. As we took off, the ceilings in Corsicana had gone broken from overcast - yep still improving. When we arrived at our destination, it was perfectly clear. Of course, by the time the weather actually cleared, it was too late in the day to start the trip. Since we were capable of getting down with the lower minimums earlier, we didn’t have to scrub the trip.
After munching on shrimp and walking on the beach Sunday, we left Palacios in 65 degree weather. We returned home to 40 degrees and winds gusting to 30 knots as a cold front passed through earlier than expected. We ended up getting a local IFR clearance from Austin to get down through the clouds instead of bumping along below them for a hundred miles or so. Johnica flight aborted (smartly I might add) their landing at Breakaway as those 30 knot gusts were a crosswind on their 30 foot runway. We delivered the fried shrimp from the Outrigger Grill from Palacios to the tower, and then took Johnica flight home. We were rewarded with coffee and hot chocolate.
Over the last several months, we have been seeing some ‘leans’ from the EFIS at times. It indicates that we are in a shallow bank when flying straight and level, and it does correct itself with some time. The symptom has been occurring more frequently, and while not a significant safety issue at this time due to the relatively small error, it isn’t helpful when in the soup. While flying home Saturday on a leisurely flight, it happened to us again. This time, it lasted long enough that we were able to record the demo. Scott shot the file off to Grand Rapids on Monday, and Carlos was back with a response a few hours later. The data showed that the roll gyro is off by 1.2-1.5 degrees. A replacement AHRS should be on the way shortly, which we will swap out and send our current one back.
