The weeks sure go by fast!

Saturday we went flying at Toledo again.  Our friend Horty had a couple of new planes he wanted me to test fly.  The old timer on the right looks like it has a gas engine but it is powered by an electric motor hidden under the dummy gas engine.  It flew great after a small adjustment to the elevator.  The Ultra Stick had a bad aileron servo so it didn't get flown.  I got a bunch of flights on the Pilatus Porter and the Convergence today.  Today's high was only 47 degrees but the wind was light so it was fairly comfortable if you were dressed right, which I was!

Toward the end of the day the sun was hitting Mt St Helens so I had to take a couple of pictures.

This is Mt St Helens at almost maximum zoom on the camera, there is quite a bit of snow up there.

I have been working on a storage area in the shop.  I had an old drawing table in this corner with a ton of things piled on it.  I couldn't get to anything so I decided to build in some shelving.  As I was cleaning it out I found three kits I had forgotten I had.  When I finally got the table uncovered I started tearing it apart only to discover it was put together with spiral nails that refused to come out.  I ended up sawing it up and burning it.  I have all the shelves built now and I hung the bi-fold door today, of course I wasn't paying attention and put it in upside down the first time!  If things go right tomorrow I will get the sheetrock hung.  Time sure flies by, last week on Monday I got my blog caught up,  here it is a week later and I am having to do the same thing.

Flying at Toledo

When we got to the flying field this morning Mt St Helens had the sun highlighting the clouds so I hopped out and took some pictures before getting my planes out.

I took the Pilatus Porter out for it's maiden flight today.  It flew great, just a couple of clicks of aileron and elevator trim was all it took and it was flying straight and level.  I put about four flights on it.  I also made six flights with the Convergence and I am getting use to it.

We had a pretty good turn out of flyers, I counted eight flyers which I thought was pretty good considering the high today was 48 degrees and it was windy all day.

Pilatus Porter

On Sunday I got the wing tip covered, it turned out I had done one so I just had to do the one Vera pointed out.  I also got the Hitec receiver hooked up and everything programmed.  I ended up watching both football games so I never got the rudder glued in.

Monday:  I did some more cleanup of the pruning debris and limbs the snow had brought down.  It was a really nice day, I was able to set at the Dolan's fire pit when I let Sam out and enjoy the sunshine.  I called Barry while Sam was playing in the woods, he had just gotten back from a six day trip to Southern Arizona with some friends.  As we were eating dinner I noticed the solar lights were on after all the sunshine so I got up and took this picture.  I went out this evening and got the trim ironed onto the rudder.  Getting the pieces cut out took quite a while as I had to use a french curve to lay them out and get both sides the same.  I never did get it glued in so that will be Tuesday's job.

Almost done!

I made good headway on the Pilatus Porter Friday and today.  It is almost done, I just have to glue the rudder in and cover the wing tips.  I was showing Vera my progress and she pointed out that the wing tips had not been covered to me.  Both jobs should only take a few minutes on Sunday (Famous Last Words) and I will have it ready to fly next week if the weather is good.  Friday I got the HD camera system all mounted on the hexacopter.  When I went to check it out and read the instructions a little further I learned it would not work with my monitor so a new one with an HDMI input is on the way.

My Christmas Present Arrives

I had a 9:10 appointment for an eye examine this morning.  It went great and I was called in about 9:00.  I had noticed the eye chart was blurry when my eye pressures were checked last month plus the airplanes have not been as clear when I go flying.  Dr Berger found that there was a prescription change in the left eye so I ordered new lens.  After the appointment we did some shopping at Fred Meyer and Office Depot.  By the time we finished shopping it was close enough to noon that we went to Applebee's for lunch.  It was a nice relaxing lunch, they weren't crowded and we had a very friendly server.  Thank You Sam and the Dolans for the gift card.

On the way home we stopped at the Post Office and there was my Christmas present a Connex Prosight HD camera system for the hexacopter.  The picture shows the 6000 Mah battery I use to power the hexacopter and the Prosight receiver with it's five antennas.

I cleaned off the table in the computer room and got the camera, transmitter and transmitter antenna installed this evening.  Tomorrow I have to mount the receiver to the monitor and solder the power leads for the transmitter.  Then I will be watching for a break in the weather so I can test fly it.

Cora, Porter and finally caught up

This is a picture of Jackie and Cora that Jackie posted.  Cora is really growing and getting around by herself now.

I made great headway on the Porter today, I got the wings on and all the wiring hooked up.  I decided to put a Futaba receiver in it.  After several hours of programming, I even had the manual out, I decided it would not do what I wanted so I will change to one of my Hitec transmitters.  After two days of editing pictures and writing blog entries I am finally caught.  I don't know if it was the snow or the cold weather but I had no desire to write in the blog.  I thought about it every night, but I always found something else to do.  I am glad we take lots of pictures, they sure help me to recall what went on each day.

A late update, I downloaded the pictures on the camera and there was one from the 17th of my new cold weather hat that came just in time for the weather warming up.  The bad weather kept it from being delivered for several days.

While making this update, I noticed a picture of Sam from when I went over and let him out Tuesday.  He found a limb buried in the snow and had a great time breaking it apart.

Still cold and still catching up!

Vera took this picture of our oak tree with the sun shining on it this morning.  Sunday the 15th we went to church, there was a much better attendance than last Sunday after the freezing rain when only one person showed up.  Our internet connection acted up this weekend so I had a service call scheduled for today. I got a message from Pastor Pam this morning that she needed another DVD of her service.  I burned a new copy and after the service call was finished I took it down to her.  I helped her set up a You Tube account and got the upload started.  I worked on the Porter all afternoon and got most of the linkage hooked up.

A nice sunny cold day

I worked outside today, I got the chainsaw and cut up some of the trees that were leaning.  They had caused one of the cedars to lean over and I wanted to save it.  It was still leaning after I got the maples off it, so I will hook a winch onto it and pull it up.

I also cut up the half of our native dogwood tree that split where the arrow is from the weight of the snow.

When I finished working, I wandered around taking pictures of the house and trees.

The sun shining through the maples looked kind of neat so I took several pictures of it.  It was fun getting outside and doing something.  I am getting closer to being caught up, only three more days to do.

Cora's Tablet and I am still catching up!

Jackie sent us this picture today of Cora with the play tablet we got her for Christmas, I guess she really likes it.

James left his car at our place while Dalton, Malik and him went Steelhead fishing on the South fork of the Toutle.  James is packing a bag of Cocoa Mounds that Vera made up for them to take.

They didn't catch anything, when they got back they had a contest throwing snowballs at things.

On the Facebook Toutle Town page they have been showing the icicles they have up there, the longest one posted was 49 inches.  We don't have any that long but Vera included our longest one in this picture.

Some Sunshine

I don't think we will be sitting out there any time soon!  The temperatures are staying below freezing all day so I don't think this snow will be going away for a while.

There was some sunshine today so Vera got this picture of the fir tree next to the driveway.

Vera cleaned off the porch today and I made a path to the shop.  The snow is real fluffy so it was a pretty easy job.  With any luck I will get caught up with my blogging soon.

Snow and I am still catching up!

I got up just before seven and looked out to discover it had really snowed last night.  I could see right away this was going to be a stay at home day.  It is sure nice we stocked up with groceries on Monday.

The snow had the rhododendrons bent over so I went out and did some pruning while I could reach them.  I also knocked the snow off the one that didn't need pruning.  This pink dogwood was bent over so far one year that the top was resting on our birdbath.  I was a couple of years getting it pulled slowly back into place.

 With the twenty four foot extension pole I am able to get most of the snow off of it.

I wandered out on the trails and there was were enough tree bent over that I couldn't make it down some of them.

This is how the house looked from the driveway.

We ended up with six inches.

Still catching up and a little excitement today!

There was still snow this morning, you don't see any tire tracks yet because the Blazer has not moved since Friday.

About 10:45 I got a text from Dianne that I was missing the excitement.  Des was coming home and slide off the driveway.  She said that she put on the brakes, all four wheels locked up, the steering wheel locked and lights and a buzzer went off leaving her with no control.  Sounds like the ABS system might have a fault.  There was a stump that the bumper got hung up on so they couldn't pull it straight backwards to get it out.  Parker brought his pickup down and they hooked a block and one line to it so they could pull it sideways off the stump.

Steve was able to chainsaw off the stump after they moved it a little.  It didn't look like there was much damage, a few dents was all I saw.  Our trip to Kaiser for my dental cleaning and some grocery shopping went good and we were home before dark.

More catching up, Freezing rain

1-8-2017  The freezing rain they had predicted came down last night and boy was it slick out.

I walked out to the driveway and it was all ice covered, the shiny tracks were really slick.  I thought maybe they were just wet until I reached down and touched them.

Michelle got Vera Snow Trax for Christmas a couple of years ago.  There were two pair in the package so Vera gave me one set, they are the only reason I could get around outside.  We decided to skip church today since the roads were so slick.

I got the servos mounted in the Porter tonight.  It was really an awkward place to work, one hand in the door and one in the windshield.  I had to make up a special short drill bit so I could make the mounting holes.

I am way behind now!

1-6-2017 The cold weather is pretty apparent at the ponds and the little falls in the bigger pond has built up quite a bit of ice.  I went to town for the first time in a couple of days and there was a letter from Marie that she needed some supplies.  The forecast didn't sound too good for the weekend and I had a dental appointment on Monday so we decided since it was a nice day we would do it right away.  It was a nice sunny day, the traffic wasn't too heavy so we had a nice trip, plus we were able to get everything she needed in one stop.  Marie was in a good mood and we had a nice visit.  She asked us what Mik's title was and that really threw us a curve until we figured out she wanted umpire.

1-7-2017 I took some pictures of the pond about noon, where the water bubbles up out of the rock was completely frozen over.

The pond was frozen over as well,

I was looking at things on the computer about four when Vera told me it was snowing.  It came down like crazy for a little while and we ended up with about a half an inch.

Pond, Hexacopter and Moon

One of the first things I noticed this morning was the ponds were icing up.  Just before lunch I went out and took pictures of them, then I went in and had a fried bacon and egg lunch that Vera had fixed.  Boy did it taste good!

I covered the bottom of one wing for the Pilatus Porter this afternoon.  When I took a break from covering I finished up the hexacopter, I had been putting a new flight controller in it to replace the one that was temperature sensitive.  After I figured out how to arm it, I did a test flight in the driveway.  It worked great and today was a good test because it never got above freezing.

I went back to the shop for a while this evening and got the hinges glued into one aileron of the Porter.  On the way into the house I saw the moon was really bright, so I got the camera and used the moon scene setting to get some pretty good pictures.  I was dressed warmer this time so I took more pictures but it turned out the first picture tonight was the best one and I liked it better than yesterday's so I included it here.

Another cold day

After breakfast I got both vehicles thawed out so I could go to the Vault and Vera could go to bible study.  Later when I had gotten back home I noticed these 24 birds feeding in the driveway.  I got the rest of the flaps and ailerons covered with the red today.  I took a break for dinner and ended up ordering my 2016 blog book before going back out to the shop.

I got the first set of hinges glued in this evening.  This kit came with the best hinges I have gotten in quite a while, normally I end up replacing the ones that come with kits with the Dubro hinges I prefer.

As I was coming in from the shop I noticed the moon was really bright in the clear cold air so I got the camera and took a couple of pictures.  I might have taken more if it hadn't have been 22 degrees out there.