Saturday Flying

The weather forecast was for it to be 10 or 12 degrees cooler today so we went flying this morning.  The forecast showed no wind in the morning so I took along Pluma to trim it out.  It is going to be a great indoor flyer.

I got in about 10 flights before we headed home.  There was only one other flyer out today and four people stopped by to watch.  I ended up getting in ten flights, four of which I videoed with the Soloshot II.  I also managed to plug in the battery backward and burned up one of my transmitters.  A new one is on the way but I am going to have plenty of programming to do when it gets here.

After I unloaded  we were sitting on the deck relaxing and looking at this picture Vera had taken of the vine maples.  We have been trying to figure out if the leaves turning is from the heat or the dry weather.

We also have been puzzling over what is causing the fir trees to die.  There doesn't seem to be any pattern to it, ones right next to a dead one will look great.

Thursday and Friday

Thursday morning we ran down and picked up my new left lens at Kaiser, it is sure nice not seeing that scratch now.  After a quick stop at Safeway we headed home before it got hot.  The rest of the day was spent where it was air conditioned, either working on the Trimotor's other two dummy engines or on the computer.  I have been enjoying the best batch of oatmeal raisin cookies the last couple of days.  I told Vera that it ranked right up there with the cocoa mounds she makes, but not to make them too often because I can not walk by without having one or two.

Friday was another day to stay around the air conditioning.  About noon I realized I hadn't watered, after I finished I wandered around taking some pictures.  I was taking pictures of the water lily when this Dragon's Blood Sedum above caught my eye.

The basket I got for Vera is doing well and the plants in it have grown quite a bit.  I have been doing pretty good about feeding them once a month.

The parrots beak that Mik, Michelle and James got Vera is on it's third blooming.  I made good headway on the dummy engines the last two days.  One has it's first coat of paint and the other is at the sanding stage.

Working and walking

James was coming up to work for me today so I ran to town for some sawzall blades at Bredfield's.  When I left after getting the mail, I pulled up to the intersection by city hall and James drove by, talk about timing!  James stopped at the lower house and discovered the lock was broken.  I had enough stuff in my drawers that we could go down and change all the locks.  James is working on changing the front deadbolt.

The storm this winter that wiped out our gutter also damaged the TV antenna.  We haven't used it since we got Dish Network so I had James take it down today, also Vera is much happier when I don't climb up on things.

After he got it down I had him pack it over by the trailer.  I got the sawzall so he could cut it and the one from the shop that fell down last year into small pieces that would go in the garbage can.  When he finished that I had him cut up an old aluminum door frame to add to the pile.  By the time we were done with that it was getting pretty hot and James had some things to do at home so we called it a day.

After dinner Vera asked if I wanted to go for a walk on our trails.  It was really pleasant out there and I got to look over some new routes to fly my quad.  This evening I changed out the battery in the Fokker Triplane that failed yesterday.

More Flying

Today looked like the coolest day of the week, so I decided to go flying.  I had a great day and made 15 flights.  A childhood friend and neighbor Kay and her husband Rich stopped by to watch and we had a great time visiting with them.  Rich has flown full sized and built models when he was young so I showed him modern radio gear and models.

While Kay and Rich were there this Bell 47 flew into the Toledo airport.  If you watched MASH, this is what they used on the show to fly in the wounded.

A while later a pair of these Air Force transports flew by, they are surprisingly quiet.  By four it was getting pretty warm so I packed up and we headed home via Betty's for a deluxe hamburger.

A lazy Sunday and a busy Monday

Sunday:
After the big day of flying we were a little too tired for church.  I cloned a new hard drive for Vera's laptop and installed it.  Then I started to head for the shop when I realized the flowers needed watering.  When I finally got to the shop I pulled the Fokker Triplane apart to repair the battery which wouldn't take a charge after the second flight Saturday.  It turned out one cell was bad, but I had the exact replacement that I had salvaged out of a cordless screwdriver.  Then I added some more down thrust to the outboard motors of the Trimotor, it wants to climb under full power.  This evening I put two flights on the racing quad flying out on the trails.  I had left the camera in the motor home, when I went out to get it was fairly dark and all the solar lights were on.  These digital cameras do a great job in low light, I ended up wandering around and took a half a dozen pictures in the dark.

Today:

Vera was going to a birthday breakfast for one of the ladies in her bible study group this morning so I decided to go up and spray the flying field.  It is getting to the point that all we are mowing up there is the dandelions.  If you let them grow they can punch holes in the planes' covering.

When I finished and got the mower all loaded I got the Sabach 342 out and put in 3 flights before heading home.  Of course I had to stop at Betty's for a chocolate peanut butter milkshake.  I cleaned up the spray equipment and put it away before doing a little maintenance on the Sukhoi.  Some how I had lost the wing hold down screws and of course they were metric.  I was just about to tap the blind nuts out to 8-32 when I found a box of metric plastic screws and there was a 4 MM just the right length in it.  I got my normal two flights with the quad tonight and tried a couple of new routes out through the tree rather than following the trails.  That was lots of fun!

Here is a link to a video I took today.  Flying the trails

A great day of flying!

Boy did I sleep good last night, about 8 hours and I was feeling great the morning.  I got the motor home all loaded yesterday so we left right after I had my breakfast.  The weather was great all day, little to no wind and temperatures from 65 to 70.

They were hauling skydivers up with a helicopter this morning because the cloud cover was pretty low.

When the clouds cleared off this afternoon they started using the airplane.

I had painted up a new propeller for the Corsair and used it all day.  The yellow tips show up good on the ground but I can't really see them when it is flying.  I decided to save it for special occasions so I put the old one back on for the last flight today.

These are the planes I flew today.  I ended up making sixteen flights before the day was over.  I had put the one dummy engine that is finished on the Ford Trimotor and I was surprised how well I could see it in the air.  I also had programmed differential throttles in the transmitter so I can use the outboard motors to help turn it on the ground.  I was surprised how well it worked, I have it setup so I have to hold a spring loaded switch to activate it when I am taxiing and there is no chance of accidentally using it in the air.  We came home on the Westside Hwy. and I saw several buildings I would like pictures of so we may be taking that route again next time.

Catching up again!

Monday the 18th.
After a day of rest on Sunday, I went down this morning to get a starter but NAPA had to get one from the Longview store and it wouldn't be here until Noon.  I got the Blazer moved into the carport, jacked up and the starter out before they called to let us know it was there.  I had a little trouble getting the starter out, when it decided to come out, it fell and hit me in the glasses and scratched the left lens.  That was probably a good thing because it would have hit me in the eye if I didn't have glasses on.  I forgot to mention that on Saturday as we went through Chehalis the Blazer got a little noisier, the muffler had broken!  I ordered a new one when I went down to pick up the starter.  It took a little while to get the starter hooked to the wiring and wiggled into position and just a few minutes to put the final bolts in.  I hooked the battery back up and it started better than it has for a long time.  After dinner I went out to pull the muffler and discovered the tail pipe was bad also.  I went down to order one and the closest one was in Philadelphia.  I decided to have one made tomorrow in Longview.

Tuesday the 19th.
We headed down to Longview early to see about getting the tail pipe made.  NAPA had recommended  EQ Exhaust and they said it could be done this afternoon.  The next stop was Kaiser to order a new lens for my glasses.  Then we went to Walmart to pick up some supplies Marie needed.  After a stop at Fred Meyer for a few things we went by the muffler shop, they had the tail pipe done and it only cost twenty dollars!  We were back home about noon and I started putting the muffler and tail pipe on.  It went pretty good and it is much quieter now.

Wednesday the 20th.
When I went to check my emails this morning I couldn't connect to the Internet!  I booted it several times and finally called Century Link repair service.  The tech and I went round and round with the modem and he finally decided it had failed, I ended up ordering a new one. After Vera's bible study this morning we took Marie's supplies up to her.  Her door was locked when we got there but Vera found her in the beauty shop getting a perm.  We didn't figure she would like her picture taken with all those curlers so we unloaded and headed home.  The Blazer ran and sounded great the whole trip.  This evening I went out and put some fake windows on the Trimotor.

Thursday the 21st.
Vera had a dental appointment this morning, after it we stopped at Home Depot for the parts to repair the back gutter that got hit by a limb this winter.  We got talking to a guy who does continuous gutters and I ended up putting all the parts back and scheduling the job with him for Friday.  I got the rest of the windows on the Trimotor this evening.

Friday the 22nd.

Elite Renovators was here at eight this morning.  I had a great time watching the gutter being made.

They are putting up the back gutter in this picture.  They sure make it look easy, I would have been days doing it.

Fifty feet of gutter takes a little space to turn around, they had to go out onto the driveway to turn this one.

While they were doing the down spouts I noticed this deer standing in the orchard watching and I got several pictures of it.  While they were doing the front UPS dropped off the new modem, it had a letter with it that said not to hook it up until 8:00 PM on the 22nd.  I started on it at 8:10 and the job went great, I got all the usernames and passwords right the first time.  The house looks much better now, the gutters match the window frames and it really seemed to brighten the appearance.  They were nice guys, I gave them a tour of the shop when they finished and had a good time answering their questions.

Cora's party and our big adventure!

We were up early and left for Cora's party a little after seven.  We wanted to avoid the Tacoma area so we took the back way through Yelm, Puyallup, Renton and then 405 to Lynnwood.  The trip up went pretty good with only a couple wrong turns.  We had time before the party so I could stop at the hobby shop and pick up a few things.  It wasn't long after we met Jackie and Chris at Wilcox park that Vera had Cora feeding her a bottle.

I was next in line to hold her, her hand is sure a lot smaller than mine but she has a good grip when holding onto my finger.

It looks like Bev is enjoying being a grandma.  Vera and I had worn her out before everyone else showed up so they had a hard time getting her awake.

It is always fun visiting with Pam.

Tami brought JP by for the party.  He was really interested in the playground at the park.

Debbie took him over and he played on a whole bunch of the equipment.  Debbie spent a little time getting him to go down the slide.  We got a message from Debbie a few days ago that she had passed her State RN test!  We are sure proud of her!

When he did, he did it with no hands!

When it was time for JP to leave we had him pose with Cora for a picture.  It was great getting to see both great grand kids!

Chris and Jackie got lots of baby things for Cora.  This is a blanket that Vera knitted for her.

I had read that there was construction on I5 so we planned on going back via 405 but I made a wrong turn and ended up on I5.  Before we even got to the end of the on ramp I saw a sign that said the right three lanes were closed two miles ahead.  Luckily the on ramp lead right into an off ramp which I took.  We didn't make it to 405 then, but we had a nice tour of the West side of Lake Washington.  Actually it was much better than sitting in traffic.  After several more attempts I even got the GPS to say it couldn't calculate a route.  We finally got onto 405 and stopped at a Greek restaurant in Puyallup for dinner which was excellent.  When we got to Yelm on the way back, I called Barry and we stopped by there for a little while.  We got to meet their friend Joan who is just as funny to talk with as Pam.  When we left, the Blazer turned over once and then wouldn't start.  Barry and I tried several things with no luck, so I called AAA for a tow home.  It was 11:30 PM before the Blazer was loaded and we headed home in the wrecker.  We had a great driver, he was easy to talk to and we visited all the way home and arrived at 12:40 AM.  We had told the driver about my planes so I took him into the shop for a tour.  We ended up talking out there until 2:00 AM.  It was a good day even with the unexpected breakdown and it didn't take me long to fall asleep then we finally made it to bed. 

Spraying

After Vera got home from bible study Wednesday she noticed the water lily in our pond and took this picture of it.  I got the sprayer mounted on the tractor and we went up to spray Mrs. Herren's lawn.  A large part of it is just dandelions, if we get those taken care of we will not have to mow it much this summer.  Afterwards we went over to spray the flying field, there was some flyers there so we visited  for a while.  The farmer was cutting the hay field so I decided not to spray so the spray would not drift into the field.

Friday we went up and helped out with the field maintenance before flying.  I got the first flights on the Ford Trimotor right away.  It flies pretty good and has plenty of power.

 I was taking some pictures of the farmers loading hay bales when Steve photo bombed me waving his arms and jumping up and down.

Pluma

Well that doesn't happen too often, I finished Pluma today and test flew it twice, normally my projects seem to drag on for months!  I took off the driveway the first flight and discovered it was a little windier than I realized so it was a really short flight.  The next flight was a little later when it had calmed down and I hand launched over Gabe's lawn.  It flew pretty well after a little trimming, but it sure is slow so it will probably be great fun in the gym the next time we do it.

New Project

Sunday we made it to church on time, they have new starting time that is a half hour earlier.  I had put a reminder on the phone so we wouldn't forget, it is set to remind us for a couple of years!  They had the monthly potluck after church, lots of good food and visiting.  We have been wanting a good picture of the back deck, I stood on the bench and finally came up with one I was happy with.

This is how it looks from Vera's chair.  After we got home from church I did some more cleaning in the shop.

I had an early doctor's appointment this morning, I had a spot on my ear that had not healed right from the last appointment.  He didn't think it was anything, but he took a biopsy to be sure.  I ended up with a lot of bandages for such a small sample.  The good news is I only have to wear it one day.
After we got home the cleaning continued and by the time I quit the garbage can was pretty full.  Since I had some room I started on a new project.

This Pluma was part of the stuff I bought from Todd, the fuselage was partly built and damaged a little.  I had already repaired that so today I mounted the wings and tail.  I don't know if the bracing on the wings will show but it was a time consuming job getting the wings all lined up.  This how it looked when I quit this evening

Ready for a test flight!

During the last couple of days I got the Ford Trimotor ready for it's test flight.  I got all the controls hooked up and the radio programmed.  I changed props from the 7 x 5 to 7 x 6 and the power is up to 75 watts per pound which should be plenty of power for the type of flying I will do with it.  Since things have been disappearing in the clutter I started cleaning up the shop today.  I can see that it will take a few more days as I just got one bench about half done and did a little work on the electronics bench.

It's first time outside!

I got the Ford Tri-Motor to the point that I wanted a good picture of it so I took it out on the lawn.  I got the ailerons covered yesterday and mounted them today.  After the glue dried I hooked up the aileron linkage and got them centered.

I had the elevator and rudder servos picked out and had made mounts to fit them but do you think I could find them today!  I finally found a couple of others that fit the mounts.  They are tomorrow's job along with making up the linkage.  Then add props, the tail wheel and do a weight and balance.  I will take the dummy engine off for the first flights, then if everything goes well I will build the other two dummy engines and add the decals