The Rain Returns

The weather forecasts were right, it was raining this morning.  I went to "Coffee with the Pastor" and had my usual hot chocolate.  Lots of discussion today, some serious and some funny.  I did some work on the Pitts getting the wings lined up.  The top wing is one degree different that the lower wing so I will have to make some adjustments.  We picked up Whoopers for dinner at Burger King, we went down to Lions Pride park and watched the river while we ate.

Flying Thursday

The forecast for today was just like Wednesday's and rain is forecast for Friday so we went flying again today.  I had another great day putting in about a dozen flights before it got too warm.  It was 86 at three when we headed home.  The air conditioning at home sure felt good.

Wednesday Flying and James' Birthday

Tuesday 9-26-17 I spent the day charging batteries for a day of flying Wednesday.  There was a beautiful moon tonight when I came in from the motor home after the last batteries were charged so I got the camera and went back out for some pictures.  They turned out great and this one got lots of likes on Facebook.

Wednesday 9-27-17 Vera had bible study so I headed up to the field early.  It was a little foggy when I first arrived but it cleared up fairly quickly while I was unloading.  I got the first flight on my new P-51 Old Crow before the other guys showed up.  It flew great and I put four flights on it before the day was over.

I had another great day of flying the P-39.  One of the guys had a GPS tracker and we put it in the plane to see how fast it goes.  I was sure surprised when it read 106 MPH.

Mt Rainier looked nice with a fresh coat of snow but it will not last long in the 85 degree temperatures we had today.

I headed home from flying about three so I could order and pickup pizza for James' birthday tonight.  Time sure flies by fast, he is twenty years old.  He is turning into a great young man with a fantastic smile.

Michelle is playing a recording of a friend's five year old counting that was hilarious.

As James was leaving I snapped a picture that turned out great.

Shopping and Building

Right after breakfast this morning we went to Longview shopping.  The first stop was Fred Meyer for my favorite cereal.  Then we went to the Sportsmans Warehouse and I got a new pair of shoes.  The ones I have been wearing started hurting my toes.  We stocked up for the next week at Safeway and headed home with a stop at the Post Office.  One of those rare occasions when there was no mail.  I spent most of the rest of the day working on the Pitts and got the lower wing joined and mounted along with doing some hinging on the elevator.  I spent the evening watching YouTube videos and getting caught up with the blog.  It seems like I am always having to get caught up.

Princess Cora

Jackie sent me some pictures today of Cora playing dress up, she wanted to be a Princess.  She is so darn cute.

I was stuffed up this morning so we didn't go to church and I didn't accomplish much until this evening.  James came by and watched football with me until he had to go down for a JAL thing.  This evening I finally made it to the shop.  I checked out the servos I am using for the Pitts and got the ones for elevator and rudder installed.

Holding Jordon

We made a mail run today and then went to a garage sale up Spirit Lake Hwy, one of the few we have gone to this year.  I found a flashlight and Vera found some knitting needles.  From there we  went up to take a look at the progress on Debbie and Josh's new shop.  After Debbie had shown us what had been done we went in and visited for a few minutes and I got to hold Jordon while Debbie took care of a couple of things.

This evening I got the motor mount installed on the Pitts.  Slow but sure I am getting things done on it.

The sky was beautiful today!

We went to Toledo and flew today.  I got three really nice flight on the P-39.  I also got to try out the shocks I added to the landing gear of the Pilatus Porter.  They worked as I had hoped and cut the bounce on landing way down.

Steve and Doug put in several glider flights today and there were lots of thermals.  This is Steve's ASW 28 coming in for a landing.

Steve is getting the ASW 28 off the runway.  I may have to put my ASW 17 back together so I can play with them.  We had a good turn out today, I counted nine flyers.

The sky was beautiful all day, this is our field's magnetic tree with the clouds behind it.  If you fly over by that tree it seems to attract your airplane and there have been a number of them in it.

Another view of the clouds, I am looking Southwest from the flying field.

More Pitts

I made good headway on the Pitts today.  The cockpit is almost done, it took me a while to figure out what the white box was, after much searching online it turned out to be the canopy lock.  A bunch more searching and I found a good picture of it so I could print out the black and red decal that goes on it.  Once that was done, I installed the rear instrument panel and pilot.

This is a picture of Cora playing that Jackie sent me yesterday.

New Projects

Monday I started on my new project, a Pitts S-2B. The carbon fiber I ordered for reinforcements came and I got the first four pieces installed but not completely glued.  Today I mounted the landing gear and added an epoxy chopped fiberglass mix to parts of the landing gear reinforcements.

James and Dalton came up today and we installed a new rear wiper blade assembly on his Subaru.  We also figured out what was going on with a warning light that was on.  James wanted to run the radio controlled truck the last couple of times he has been here but the batteries were not charged.  I had them charged today so he and Dalton could run it.  I caught Dalton doing a pretty good wheelie in this picture.

This evening I went out to the shop, did some more work on the Pitts and got out my project for the Sanderson Field Radio Control Flyers Winter Build Challenge.  I built the P-39 last year, but I did not get it done in time.  The Skylane is lot simpler build so I shouldn't have any problem finishing it in time.

Club Picnic

We were up early so we could go to the club picnic at Toledo.  I wanted to get plenty of flying in before the forecasted rain started.  Barry was getting ready to leave also so we got to say goodbye to him as we left.  In the picture I was getting ready for my first flight of the day before anyone else arrived.

 Wouldn't you know it, I had the wrong transmitter, then I had to bind the right one to the receiver in the plane.  That first flight took quite a while to complete but it went fine.

I flew everything except the red white and black foam plane today.  The P-39 flew great the one flight I put on it, the wind started blowing pretty hard and I didn't want to risk another flight on it.

I brought up four planes to sell today, I ended up selling the white, blue and red Bonanza and the blue and yellow RV-9.  It was raining pretty good by the time we had the picnic and we ended up eating in the building.  I had gotten loaded while they were cooking so we left right after things were cleaned up.  I watched the Seahawks game and Sunday Night Football after we got home.

Barry's 70th.

Barry's 70th birthday was last week, he let me know they would be spending Saturday night here so I got a birthday pizza party arranged with all the family that could make it.  Dianne, Steve, Rielee and the twins came.  The girls were playing video games so I went back to get a couple of pictures.  Ava is putting a lot of body English into her driving.

I don't know what Harper is celebrating but they were sure having fun.

Cathy and Bob were there also.  We had lots of pizza so everyone got all they wanted.  We had a good time visiting and hearing about the big party Mona is planning in Arizona.

Flying Friday

I went to "Coffee with the Pastor"  this morning, it is held on Fridays now.  I didn't want to head up to the field too early as it was pretty cold out.  It was pretty nice by the time we got there and we had a good turn out of flyers before the day was over.

After my last flight of the day on the P-39 I stopped it so St Helens was behind it and took some ground level pictures.  By 3:00 it was getting pretty warm so I packed up and we went home.

Working on the 4 Wheeler and Jordon's visit

Yesterday James said we needed to get the 4 wheeler going and he would come up today and help.  We got the right front axle all done before we quit and went to talk to Debbie and Jordon.

Debbie had stopped by to visit until her friend Kyla got home.  Jordon was wide awake the whole time and we had a great time holding him.

It was a lot of fun getting caught up with what Debbie had been doing.  I spent the evening watching Thursday night football.

Flying at Toledo and home

Vera's bible study was canceled today so we ran down to Kaiser for my blood test.  We made a quick stop at Safeway and headed home to go flying.

There was one other member at the field when we got there so I didn't have to open the gate.  Here I am taking the P-39 off to the first flight of the day.  I am liking it more every time I fly it.

I am checking the retracts after the flight.

After we got home I put in a flight on Pluma to see if I wanted to sell it.

It flies great in the tight area around our place so I decided to keep it.

James came by a little later, his check engine light came on when he started it today and then went out.  We checked a couple of things but there was nothing obviously wrong.

Church and Football

We went to church this morning and I videoed parts of the service.  After church I watched football, surfed the web and finished the plane I was working on yesterday.

Garage Sales, Drags and Rain

We went to a tailgate sale at the Silver Lake Grange this morning.  I didn't get anything, but Vera found a candy dish she liked.  I ran into another retiree from the Fibre and we visited for a few minutes.  We headed back to Castle Rock to get the mail but noticed a sign for a "Huge Sale" on the Tower Road.  After several "You are almost there" signs we finally got to it.  It was a big disappointment, a couple of card tables of stuff and some junk on the lawn.  We were so far up the Tower Road that we decided to go on to the Spirit Lake Hwy.  It come out right by the Riverdale Raceway so we stopped in to look around.  They have an eighth mile drag strip and there were some neat looking rigs.  The Water Bug was the first one to catch our eye.

Mighty Mouse looked pretty awesome and sounded good also.

 It was a little unusual to meet a dragster driving the other way on the road.

Vera took this one because a friend of ours has his shop name Schap's on the right rear fender.  After we left there we finally made it to the post office and picked up the mail.  On the way home we stopped at a garage sale in North Castle Rock and ran into a lady who had driven all the way out Tower to the Huge Sale also, she was not impressed either.  After lunch I washed the Mitsubishi, Blazer and the motor home.  I had just finished when the rain started, so far we have gotten a tenth of an inch.

This evening I went out and almost got the Sunday modification finished.  I should be ready for a test flight the next time I go flying.  James left Dalton here while he did a video for JAL, Dalton and Vera watched Made in America until James got back, then they went to see IT.

Flying at Toledo

I made a few changes to the P-39 on Thursday, I modified the battery mount so I could move the battery back and cure the nose heavy condition.  I also added a restriction in the air line for the retracts to slow them down when they go up.  I got the new main gear doors finished and mounted something I really wanted done because the wheels looked funny without covers.  I got the batteries charged while watching the Thursday night football game and I was happy when the Chiefs won, something I didn't expect.  We were up fairly early this morning and I took this picture of the P-39 on the bench at Toledo at about 8:30.  The moving of the battery backwards really made the plane fly a lot better, I was using full flaps on landing and I think it is the best landing plane I have.  I still need to slow the retract cycle down some, but other than that it is a great plane and I will be flying it for a long time.

There were a few more people today, the weather was great, not too hot, very little wind all day and no smoke.