Flying Adventures

I started GA training at Caloundra in early 1990, in a Cessna 172. Found the instructors to be arrogant young white shirts with epaulets, not really interested in training, just wanting to build up hours until they could go commercial. Flying wide circuits and long powered approaches, no real skill involved....

Then after 12 hrs of that deadshit boring sort of flying I went to try ultralights and was immediately hooked! Really dedicated instructors and intensive training; they reckoned if your shirt wasn’t sticking to your back then you didn’t get your money’s worth. Always idle power from the start of base leg and aiming at a touchdown spot, so really had to get the feel of descent rates. At that time the closest ultralight training was at Kooralbyn, nearly three hours away, and I was single-parenting most of the time, so only got to do a couple of days training every several months, so slow progress catching up each time, but stayed with it. Finally got my full Cross-country pilot certificate in ’93.

Nov ’90 - I bought my first aircraft, the Beaver RX28, in Victoria. Trailered it home to my workshop and started extensive work on it. Changed from the Rotax 227 to a 477 engine. Steerable nosewheel and differential brakes. Small cargo area for lightweight camping gear. Water bag slung underneath. Added extra fuel tanks for long range travel. Two 20 litre jerry cans with quick connect fittings so I could carry them to a service station. So 58 litres altogether, @ 11 litres/hr so 5 hrs endurance for long distance touring. This 95.10 category in Australia allows 300 kg all up weight. The aircraft structure was more than adequate and flight performance with the 447 engine dramatic, a delight to fly! Excellent results!

The great little Beaver, a delight to fly, fully enclosed with room for camping gear

Jul ’93 - Built the hangar at Kilcoy airfield.

A 40 metre long T-hangar with bays for 5 aircraft. Very sturdy, with excellent large doors that I hand-made, and still fit after 31 years.

Dec ’93 - Did first flight in the Beaver. Then flew and flew and flew that delightful little aircraft. 1,000 hrs in all. Never a 2-stroke problem.

 

Sept ’95 - I was ready for extensive travel, so flew it to Birdsville and Back.

Camped at Birdsville Races

 Sept ’96 - Flew the Beaver to Birdsville again

Jul ’97 --.Flew the Beaver to the Centre. eagerbeavergoestotherealcentre.blogspot.com

Camped at Central Mt Stuart

 

Apr ’98 - Flew the Beaver to Mt Hopeless and the Birdsville track.

That's the little pimple named Mt Hopeless

 

Oct ’98 - Bought Beaver RX550 in Victoria, flew it home, and worked to convert it to twin engine.

After an enormous amount of work, the Twin-Engine Beaver. Two 447’s push-pull.

The idea was to have redundant safety over tiger country.

Turns out that push-pull was not a good idea - 

The airflow from the front prop interferes with the pusher prop behind,

And the variable thrust from the pusher prop upsets the setting of the puller prop.

Set either prop fine enough to fly on one engine, and then it's too fine form twin cruise.

Set both to optimum for cruise and then too course to fly one one.

Terrible efficiency, 25 L/hr for 50 kts.....

And terrible noise level due difficult to synchronize both engines.....

Jul ’00 - Flew the twin engine to Longreach.

Oct ’00 – Hit a power line at Blackall while attempting to land on a road to get fuel. Aircraft total loss but me only a broken ankle. Sure glad that I had built in a very strong protection cage under and over the pilot. Good riddance to that project.....

 

 

 Jan ’02 - Started designing and building the High Clearance Trail Bike (HCTB).

Full size mock-up

                                                         

After a lot of head-scratching design and effort, the final result.

An even stronger pilot cage this time, just about indestructible.

Wings and tail fold for loading in a trailer.

Excellent result!

http://trailbiketosouthaustralia.blogspot.com/

Apr ’03 - Ferried a Bantam ultralight to Cape York for John Armbrost.

Apr ’04 - Hans and I repaired a bent 701 from Nimbin for Gene.

Sep ’04 - Helped Hans repair his 701, also bent at Nimbin.

 

Jan ’05 - Started building my Savannah.

An excellent kit to build, all holes pre-punched and mostly line up.

And a really excellent aircraft to fly, very stable and responsive.

 

Aug ’05 - Flew Savannah to  Cape York and with Hans and Bill. 

 The stories here  Flying Backwards and here No Crocs

 

            

                           Flying backwards over Cape York. 
Headwind more than 30 kts so was able to drift backwards for a mile.

Nov ’05 - I took the slats off the Savannah. First one to do that. Dramatic improvement!

Savannah aircraft originally came equipped with leading edge slats.
I flew the trip to Cape York with those slats in place.
Flew OK that way, just slow and draggy....
I had long wanted to test such an aircraft without the slats.

The improvement without those drag buckets was dramatic!

Same ability for STOL performance.
So I flew the next long trip to Tasmania without the slats.

6 kts faster and lower fuel burn for same power!

At every fuel stop I needed less fuel than Bill's Savannah with slats
and cruised faster.

When we got home both Hans and Bill removed their slats.

Full story here https://www.stolspeed.com/slats-v-s-vgs

Feb ’06 - Flew  Savannah to Tasmania with Hans and Bill.

Hans and Bill flight planning with charts, before OZ Runways electronic flight bag.

                                             Crossing Bass Strait, too much cold water....

 

Apr ’06 - Displayed VGs instead of slats at the Narromine National Fly-In,

               ICP Savannah factory had heard about my modification so sent out an engineer from Italy. 

The engineer inspected my data, and bought the first set of VGs for Savannahs,
then two months later ICP abandoned the slats and brought out their new 'VG' model.
They haven't used slats since.

May ’06 - Bought and re-built a crashed 701 with Hans.

Feb ’07 - Lengthened Hans’ 701 wings.

The Zenith 701 came with 27' (8.2m) wingspan, not optimum for STOL aircraft.
The Savannah has exactly the same airfoil but the wingspan is 29.5' (9.0m).
The 701 wing spar is stronger than the Savannah which had proven plenty strong enough.
So we modified Hans's 701 by adding 400mm (16") to each wing.

Much better STOL performance.
Story here https://www.stolspeed.com/longer-wing

Apr ’07 -  Flight to Channel Country trip.

The Channel Country after a flood.

Jul ’07 -  Lengthened Gene’s 701 wings.

Jul ’07 -  Flight to Coober Pedy trip 

                                         Crossing the Simpson Desert along the 'French Line'.

 
Sep ’07 -  Bought a Rans S-7

I was looking for the best ‘bush’ plane, so bought this tail-dragger Rans S-7,
but found that I liked the Savannah much better for ‘bush’ flying.
Story here https://www.stolspeed.com/rans-s7

Jan ’08 - Ferried John Sehestedt’s Kestrel to Horsham,V.

May ’08 - Sold the Rans S-7 and ferried it to Perth  S-7 to Perth.

Site marked out for a nuclear bomb test at Maralinga.

 

Jul ’08 Flight to the Camel Cup at Marree, SA.

Didn't look like the camels were so interested in racing....

Jul ’08 - Trip to Oshkosh, USA.

I had sent Stolspeed VGs to the Zenith company to test, but they never replied.

So it was interesting to see they had used them on the 701 horiz stab of their display 701!

They admitted that the VGs worked on the main wing as well,
But they stated that they were keeping their slats because "Slats sold well"....

Feb ’09 - Flight to Channel Country in Flood

Thompson River in flood. 

Apr ’09 - Stolspeed VGs business thriving worldwide and now carried by Aircraft Spruce in USA..

May ’09 - Flight to the Nullarbor and return coastal

Cliffs along the Nullarbor

Sep ’09 - To Birdsville in Savannah. Birdsville in Savannah

Jun ’10 - Savannah to the Centre 

Oct ’10 - Bought a wrecked Savannah from Wilcannia, and rebuilt it with Hans.
           Then sold it, but now Hans bought it back and is flying that same aircraft.

Jan ’11 - Flight to Tasmania again. Tasmania

May ’11 - Flight to the Kimberlies and Pilbara

The westernmost point of Australia

Jun ’11 - To Oshkosh again.

May ’12 – I had long dreamt of flying that scenic high desert country in the western USA.

I hoped to go and buy a used aircraft for the adventure,
but then discovered that it is necessary to have at least a green card residential permit
to be allowed to register an aircraft, no easy way around that.
So I went and bought a 103 ultralight that doesn't require registration at all.
That's not suitable for cross-country travel so bought a trailer to carry it in and
transport to various airfields to fly locally.
Also a camper van to tow and sleep in.
Worked very well, so went back three more years to do more.
Flew from more than one hundred airfields.

 Flying USA in FireFly and trailer

Kolb Firefly on the Alvord desert, SE Oregon.

Meteorite crater in  Arizona.

May ’13 - Another flight to Tassie to meet up with my daughter.

Tasman island, SE corner of Tasmania.

 Aug ’13 - To the USA again and bought a Kolb Firestar and trailer this time and a van.

Story here FireStar and trailer in USA

 

Jun ’14 - To USA to fly FireStar again.

 

Flying at 13,500ft

From Telluride airport, altitude 9,070 ft.

Jun ’14 - Helped Tony in Denver build his Savannah, we had it ready to paint in 22 days!

Aug ’15 – Back to the USA to fly the Firestar again.   Flying FireStar in USA

Flew the Mississippi River

                                                       From the headwater

    

 to the Gulf of Mexico.

Sep ’15 - Sold the FireStar and trailer and van. The end of a great USA adventure!

Apr ’16 – Tony came over from the USA and I flew him in my Savannah to N Qld and Channel Country.

Oct ’16 -  Ferried a Savannah from Atherton for Tim Powell.

Nov ’16 -  Flight to Mt Beauty and Snowy Mtns.

Aug ’17 - Flight to Arnhem Land

Airstrip on Cobourg Peninsula, right at the top of Australia.

May ’18 - Finally took the High Clearance Trailbike on a trip - HCTB in trailer to South Australia

Aug ’18 - Savannah to Birdsville Again. Flew home in one day, 8.3hrs, long cross country flight!

Jun ’19 - Flight to the Farthest Corner of OZ

                    5,200 nm, 9,666 km, 73 hrs.

Cape Leeuwin, farthest SW corner of Australia.

Jun ’19 - Flight to Adani Mine Site

Not Adani, but saw many coal mines such as this along the way.

Xxx ’20 - Prepared the Irish Savannah for sale (big job) and ferried it to Townsville.

Jan ’21 - Sold the Hi-Clearance Trail Bike and trailer.

May ‘21 – Flight along Darling River, Menindee Lakes and Kangaroo Island

At Tilpa beer garden, Darling River view.

The Murray/Darling River mouth. That's all that's left of this mighty river after irrigation, etc.

Jun ‘21 -  Flight to North Queensland.

Sunset on the longest day of the year 2022 from Sunset Tavern Karumba, NQld.

May ‘22 – Decided to fly to Western Australia to visit Shark Bay once again. Right at the opposite side of this vast country so long days over familiar country, and uncomfortable times setting up camp due to weak legs and stiff back, due to aging…. At Leonora weather forecast showed that a rain  front was moving in over the coast and liable to hang there for many days. So turned around and headed home again, via Kalgoorlie and south coast. Too long a trip over familiar scenery that I've flown several times before. At age 82, and getting older, don’t think I’ll be doing more such long trips now….

 But sure am glad that I did what I did earlier……

3,500 hrs of the best adventures.

p.s.-  You well may ask how I could afford to do so much flying. I'm certainly not rich. But I've worked hard and saved and made a couple of good investments, and most importantly live very frugally. Drive old cars to their death, live in a bachelor flat in my workshop, never eat out and seldom go to the pub. When on flying trips I camp under the wing and never pay for a bed. Most folk would consider this life-style to be deprived, but I'm fortunate in that the adventure of it all suits me just fine, wouldn't desire for more. Always do my own maintenance and aircraft building and repairs, made possible by the RAAus homebuilt category rules. Capital cost and running cost about the same as a good 4WD.

So all that flying was easily affordable.

JG

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