New Home at York KTHV

Moved plane to KTHV, York PA on Saturday August 26. Sort of my first solo cross country in my cub, but I had CFI Tom Henry "instructing" in the back seat for extra safety and confidence. Tom is a CFI/A&P that works mostly out of Clearview Airpark (K2W2) in Maryland. His interesting background is that he flew a cub pulling banners at the beach for many years. 

My landing at York was OK, with a little bounce, but safe.  Beautiful day with very little wind. The cross county flight was fun--pretty much flew a straight line from Carroll County over Lake Marburg (east of Hanover, PA) toward the stacks at the Gladfelter Paper Mill in Spring Grove, turned north over the Pigeon Hill, crossing almost directly over my home on Lake Pahagaco entering the York pattern from the west. 

I have worked with six different CFI's..I recommend all of them highly qualified and valuable resources:

Joe Gauvreau..Bowie MD 9 hrs
Dana Holladay..Jacksonville, FL 3.5 hrs
Ron Dillard..Lebanon, TN 3.5 hrs.
Dave Myers..York, PA 2.0 hrs
Damian DelGaizo..Andover, NJ 1.8 hrs
Tom Henry, Clearview, MD 0.8 hrs.

Would have been cheaper and probably easier working with only one, but finding time and weather was a challenge..and it was difficult to get people to travel and fly in my plane--so I traveled to them..but learned different points of view in five different planes that I think gave me very well rounded and rich experience. 60 wheel landings with Joe, 42 three point landings with others. Time in Decathlon, Citabria, Sport Cub, and Super Cub.

York (PA) Airport is only 3 miles from my home, and my plan had always been to hangar there, and a hangar became available in August.  Many of the hangars at York are almost new and very modern--however, my hangar is part of the structure moved here from another airport---the galvanized steel structure is more than 50 years old and is showing it's age with lots of rust. Let's call the hangar "vintage" but adequte. I worked on the sliding doors, lubricating the rollers and adjusting them so they would not hang up. I applied considerable steel epoxy to some of the steel channel that had rust damage.  Upgraded the overhead lights to high output LED's and moved in some of my supplies and tools.  This is Sierra Charlie's new home!

Notice that I added the Ichthys "Christian Sign of the Fish" decal. More info on the Christian Symbol   As a Christian Chaplain, it important to me that people know my identity as a Christian.

Here is a bit of history about the York Airport. Note for years it served a both an airport and a motorsports drag racing facility.  http://www.york-aviation.com/airport-info/history/

KTHV would be even better if we could use the wide grass area in between the runway and taxiway--perfect for tail wheel planes, but, one can see that a big rock quarry is next to the airport and the area is subject to sinkholes. My grass strip practice will be at one or more of several nice fields not far away. 

I completely agree that grass strips are best for tail wheels, especially when you are inexperienced. (Easier on tires too!) But, sometimes, if you need a hangar, close to home, a paved runway is your only practical choice.  But if you must land on pavement, seek out a wide long runway..it gives you room to recover from small mistakes.

I made my first true solo flight in a Tail Wheel Plane and my first in Sierra Charlie on September 15. (My workload in my business is heavy the first week of the month and the weather was not what I wanted earlier.  I was trying to avoid too much crosswind.)  Sierra Charlie is almost a different plane without the 160-180 pound passenger. Wow! The plane is a "hot rod"!  Climb rate was amazing--as is the responsiveness of the controls--the Cubcrafters Sport Cub is truly a remarkable plane--compared to a Super Cub with two people, the Sport Cub with just the pilot will outperform the Super Cub and is easier to fly once you get used to how responsive the controls are. (I think the light weight, modern aileron design and vortex generators on the wings makes a difference. And, Sierra Charlie has an extra 10 horsepower over a "stock" 0-200 Continental.) My landing was not as "pretty" as I would have liked, but it was safe without a hop---with God's assistance i am sure!

No matter how many hours dual instruction you take, it is impossible to avoid being nervous during that first "solo" flight---particularly when landing a tail dragger in a gusty crosswind. Without weight of a passenger, the elevator was more responsive than I expected and I floated a bit. (I tend to over control elevator and throttle when close to the ground.)  I still need more work on maintaining "near perfect" directional control in a crosswind---I touched down (wheel landing with tail high) straight but was drifting a little to the right in the right gusty crosswind (I increased aileron too much to move the plane from left back to center, so I was moving sideways a bit when my right wheel touched)--would have been OK on grass, but on pavement, I heard a loud chirp from one tire and it jerked me to one side a bit, but I danced on the rudders and maintained a straight ahead path to a full stop. (It took quite a bit of left rudder to offset the wind wanting to pin-wheel the tail, pointing the nose into the wind to the right---and York has big landing light fixtures on the runway edge which did get my attention during the rollout. 😉) 

So, my main focus for most of my practice will be to refine my landings and "cure" my tendency to over-control and concentrate not only on the direction of my nose, but side drift as well.  Landing a tail wheel plane on pavement requires precision.

After a bit of reflection, I decided to add a POV Camera to my equipment.  GoPro was certainly a candidate, but after Paul Bertorelli's, as always excellennt review, I ordered a Garmin Virb Ultra 30 from Aircraft Spruce. In addition to the enjoyment of watching my flights, one big advantage is that the VIRB provides G-Metrix info---so I can see my speed, heading, and altitude along with my hand and foot movement--providing valuable feedback to help improve my flying. 

So look for some video footage of an old rusty pilot's flying!

With the VIRB installed, using the audio cord provided (to allow pilot voice recording), on Friday, September 28, I took Sierra Charlie up for a test ride in challenging weather---wind from the left at about 45 degrees, with a 4 mph crosswind component---gusting to 10 mph. I felt prepared for the crosswind as I had practiced several hundred landings on my simulator--developing a "instinct" for the necessary control inputs.  (Now nearly 2000 practice landings!)

The gusts however create a challenge, particularly at York where the first part of the take off/ landing area for runway 35 is shielded by a hill on the left.  Once out of the protection of this hill- wind from the NW can change the plane's attitude quickly.

Here is a video of one take off and landing.  Made a few mistakes--all of which I identified and am working to improve.  Most importantly, the Sport Cub has surprising rudder authority---I need to avoid overcontrolling--especially with the rudder--while taking off, turning and landing. I was pleased that I had corrected my tendency to overcontrol with the elevator and throttle, my roundout and descent control has much improved.

Another change I made was to tire pressure.  There are a couple schools of thought on this issue. The pilot that sold me the plane was a student of the "low pressure reduces bounce--don't use brakes" school. (He had the 8.50 x 6.00 tires at 10 psi vs POH recommended 18 psi.) I decided that combo was good for grass, but NOT good for pavement.  My first flights with Joe were with 15 psi--wheel landings were good on pavement.  

On my flight to York, temps had dropped from the high levels of summer, and I noticed the tires were more "grippy" and tended to jerk the plane to one side when landing on one wheel. I rechecked the pressure, and because of temps now in the 60-75F range, pressure had dropped to 8 psi.   Convinced that higher pressure would make the plane more tolerant of misalignment at touchdown, I raised pressure to 18 psi.  (With higher pressure, the side grip is reduced on pavement--sort of the effect of grass with less grip.)  It worked well--no bounce.  

Here is my first video:

My practice on the sim now is with gusty cross winds and moderate to severe turbulence to train my reflexes for sudden changes requiring sudden responses. The Sport Cub is light, especially with pilot only (1100 pounds) and it gets tossed around in the wind. This can be a bit disconcerting when close to the ground unless you have extreme confidence in your instinctual control response. (Over controlling becomes much more obvious when you are 10-15 feet above the runway!) 

Note that I added an inclinometer on the left (just in front/below the throttle) to gauge the plane's pitch.  It works get well and helps to identify the sight picture at various throttle position/ speed combinations.