Katherine & Mike » Flying

Cumberland EAA Pancake Fly In 4/26/2009

Mike — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 18:16:38 +0000

Katherine and I flew out to Cumberland Airport this past sunday for their first Pankcake breakfast of the year. They hold it every sunday, rain or shine, from April till October. Hopefully I’ll be able to make it out a couple more times this year (even if i have to drive).

Good food, friendly pilots, and lot of planes to see. Stearman, Gyrocopter, Baby Great Lakes, and other great planes.

Katherine manned the video camera and caught my 2 landings of the day and our take off from Cumberland.

Cleveland Airshow 2008

Mike — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 19:17:21 +0000

Labor Day weekend (August 30 & 31) Katherine and I went up to Cleveland to see the airshow with her family. Despite early morning clouds on Saturday the weekend turned into perfect weather for an airshow. All of the pictures are available on mbond.smugmug.com

Sean Tucker and the Collaborators put on a great show. I was most excited about seeing Sean Tucker, and he didn’t disappoint at all. That man loves to fly and it shows. After the show was over Katherine and I saw him head out again. Sunday afternoon, which was even nicer than Saturday, we saw him randomly flying around a good ways away from the airport. He must have headed out just before the blue angels went up.

Katherine really like Bob Carlton in his Sail Plane. Watching unpowered aerobatics is incredable, takes energy management to an extreme.

Jon Mohr was incredable in his stearman. His aerobatics were easily as good as Sean Tuckers, and watching him do them so low in a stock stearman is amazing.

Of course the blue angles were there as well, doing what they do. They put on a great show as well, but honestly, i’d rather watch the guys in the piston aircraft all day … I love the jets too, but there is something much more ‘magical’ about watching people who love to fly, fly their GA aircraft.

On sunday Katherine and I went back to check out all the static displays. Walk through the airplanes, see all the Nasa stuff, talk with the pilots that were around, etc … We got there around 10am, just as the planes started taking off again and got to see all the acts that we really enjoyed first thing in the morning. Its nice standing in line waiting to get inside a C-130 and watching a B-17 fly by with their huge radials.

I hope i get a chance to learn even basic aerobatics someday.

N-Number

Mike — Thu, 24 Apr 2008 11:55:55 +0000

An N-Number is the identification numbers assigned to American aircraft. Think of it as a license plate for the sky. When you make radio calls you always prefix your call with your N-Number.

This morning I reserved one for the plane I plan on building. Been trying to find a good one that wasn’t already taken for a while now. When i’m done with the plane I don’t want some random, meaningless, number painted on the side of my brand spanking new aircraft.

N325MK has been submitted to the FAA for approval. In 3 weeks or less I should find out if the FAA approves of my request and get my information. Then all I need to do is actually build the thing .

(For the uninitiated, that N-Number is read as “November 3 – 2 – 5 – Mike – Kilo”)