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Re: This is why I own my 170!

Posted: Fri Dec 01, 2017 4:19 pm
by Pdogace
Thanks for the open invite KG! Next time we will hit you up. I did do a local sightseeing flight in Nashville one day so that would have been fun to swing in and say hi.

Gahorn, YES 4.5 hours in a 170 is a LOOOONNNGGGG leg and no, no one one board was in diapers. :roll: However, as with everything in aviation, we do have a plan B and plan C. Flying with young kids is a whole different animal than flying with adults. Plan B was that we were going to stop about an hour south of ATL, let everyone get their wiggles out and top off and head on to our final destination. However we had a 25kt tailwind that day so we had a decision to make. Push on and go non stop or stop. Stopping ALWAYS takes 1 to 2 hours extra. I don’t think we can stop and it not take a least an hour with kids. Everything takes longer with little ones it is just a fact of life. So, if we stop, the trip takes 5.5 to 6.5 hours total time. In kid time that’s a looonnngggg time. So we decided to push on. I have not talked about plan C yet so if you have a weak stomach quit reading now. Plan C is we have these really cool, high quality, pee bags that i found on Sporty’s. Turns out Amazon sells them a lot cheaper. I think they are called Travel John. Anyway you go in it and it turns to gel and has a double seal on them. Yes, I can hear the peanut gallery now, we have used them on previous trips with kids. They work great for boys, don’t know about girls firsthand, but they are designed for both sexes. Anyway on this entire trip we did not use them at all. They only person that complained was my wife. :D We all know how that goes. Anyway that is way too much info but anyone else with kids might Find it helpful. The day we flew home was 5.5 hours in the air with a fuel stop so the whole thing took 7 hours plus drive time to and from the airport. It was a looonnnggg day but would not trade the memories for anything.

Fly safe

Re: This is why I own my 170!

Posted: Fri Dec 01, 2017 8:07 pm
by 170C
Anytime we find a 25kt tailwind in a Cessna its difficult to leave it for a stop unless its absolutely necessary :mrgreen: I'll second KG's invitation. Murfreesboro is a nice airport to stop in for fuel, a visit or other. Come see us!

Re: This is why I own my 170!

Posted: Fri Dec 01, 2017 8:59 pm
by DaveF
Great story, reminds me of many trips with the kids. I routinely flew six-hour legs in the T210 to reduce the number of one-hour fuel stops. Took me a while, but I eventually learned to put aside my goal-orientation and enjoy the rest stops.

Re: This is why I own my 170!

Posted: Fri Dec 01, 2017 9:14 pm
by GAHorn
A tailwind is hard to refuse but it likely is still there after the fuel stop. Jamie and I usually plan 3-hour legs with a fuel/lunch stop. She packs a picnic lunch and we eat while taking a break during refueling. The total flying time when heading on long cross country trips still equal about 6-flight-hours over a 7-1/2 to 8-hour day... not a hard day after that kind of planning.
We've found that adds immeasureably to the pleasure of the trip and relieves me of low-fuel worries (landing with over an hour's fuel is a comfort, especially when little airports have fuel-pump issues)... and relieves us both from bladder-pressure warning-lights. :P

Re: This is why I own my 170!

Posted: Tue Dec 05, 2017 9:18 pm
by Ryan Smith
I figured I’d add a recent story here as well.

I’m sure most are familiar with my connection with the 170 that I fly. My grandfather purchased the airplane shortly after I was born, and my father ended up with it when he passed away. We kept the airplane through 2008 when I was unmotivated to finish my private, and my parents were sick of a large expense each month for something my mother didn’t much care for and my father lost interest in. Up to Buffalo, NY she went, but in late 2012, she came back. My sole reason for learning to fly (I am currently 35 hours shy of ATP minimum requirements) was to be able to fly that airplane again, vowing never again to take her for granted. My sentimental connection to the airplane, to put it mildly, is immeasurably strong. The airplane is currently owned by a very close family friend, and I have the good fortune to have total access to the airplane both for creating the owner revenue with flight instruction and for personal pleasure. Zenda, my wife, and I are simply biding our time until we are owners of the airplane again. Zenda even tells others that it’s really my airplane; she’s a really good sport at my being a non-equity partner in the old girl.

While my mother was very supportive of my father’s aviation endeavors as a hobby and is very supportive of mine both as a hobby and vocationally (she’s not a fan of aerobatics, but I’m working on that), she herself isn’t much of a fan of GA flying anymore. She’s been flying once in the last decade, and that was in the 170 the day of my private check ride. I’ve conned my father into flying a few times, and since I have his logbook, I’ve been (unbeknownst to him) giving him dual each time I get him in the left seat. My wife, on the other hand, is as enamored as one can be without actually wanting to be a pilot. She loves aviation, loves the 170 - to the extent that she even commissioned a birthday cake bearing 56D’s likeness for my 30th birthday - and has been my biggest supporter in my aviation endeavors. I can easily say that without her love and support, my dreams would still be sprites racing around my subconscious, and I wouldn’t be where I am today.

She’s recently been upgraded to “sugar mama” status, having graduated, with distinction, with an MBA from Embry-Riddle. She’s in the veterinary field, but Embry-Riddle meshed the easiest with her needs and schedule. There’s the ancillary benefit of the humor of the non-aviator in the family having a degree from an aviation-centric university. Her graduation ceremony was in Dallas, and we live in central North Carolina. She was determined to walk across the stage to receive her Master’s hood, and I was all-too-happy to oblige her wish given the shiny government plastic in my pocket, and the shiny Imron-coated icon of mid-century Wichita craftsmen sitting in a hangar not three miles from our home. Even someone as much of a simpleton as I could put two and two together to figure that I could probably make something work to get us down there and back…and have an adventure doing so.

Rather than flying all the way to Dallas, we decided to fly to Shreveport, LA to stay with my mother’s side of the family. We had originally hoped to make this trip in May for one of my cousin’s wedding, but we had to take a last-minute weather cancelation and decided to fly a Honda Accord rather than a 170. This fall’s trip was much better, and watching the weather like a hawk about ten days ahead of time, the stars appeared to align perfectly with our journey. As each day grew closer, I found my mind drifting towards fantasizing about the trip. It would be Morgan’s longest trip in a GA airplane with me, and would be my longest trip with a non-pilot onboard. My mother, father, and I had made a similar trip to Coushatta, Louisiana about six months before the airplane left us temporarily, so I was somewhat familiar with the flight back and forth. The day before Thanksgiving, I was scheduled to work, so I flew 56D 100NM from my home airport to the airport where I instruct full-time in an effort to circumvent a five-hour round-trip drive in holiday traffic. Back to work on Friday, and I get a phone call from a friend in Fayetteville that wants to fly the 170 in Goldsboro to get some tailwheel currency back. Back home I go to drop my car off in the hangar Saturday, and bring the 170 back down to work to fly with him Sunday afternoon after my first instrument student was taking his checkride with Zenda. Monday and Tuesday are my normal days off, and I agreed to work through my days off so that I could help offset the demands of my being gone for an extended period of time. Lo and behold, one of our instructors that needed a tailwheel endorsement was in town working with some ATP students so I was able to work with him for a couple of days while I had the airplane down there. In between students, I loaded the airplane down with things out of my apartment that I was taking home, and I was finally free about 9PM and all but beat my student out the door to get in the airplane and fly home. I touched down just after 10PM, got my things out of the airplane, slept for a few hours, and then got up to pack and prepare. My wife, obviously being the college-educated one, was already neatly packed, and I simply needed to load the airplane with her things after I flew with a freelance student of mine that morning. She got off work around 11AM, met me at home to get a few last-minute prep items done, then we drove to the airport, where I already had the airplane by the FBO, preflighted and ready to go. While I loaded, she drove the car to the hangar, and our adventure began, in earnest.

On our way to the airport, my dad called and asked if we were going to be flying over downtown High Point. Thinking of easy routing around the surface area of Greensboro’s Class C airspace, I felt that a circuitous route south would be apropos. He is a construction superintendent, and was building a new furniture showroom in downtown - prime viewing for an airplane flying under the Class C. I pulled the starter shortly before 1PM and the old girl roared to life with her all-too-familiar buttery smooth exhaust note. Warm up and mag check was good, a destination of Andrews-Murphy in far western North Carolina set, and I was pushing the throttle open and pedaling downhill on runway 27 at Air Harbor. It was really happening - our adventure was beginning!

I failed to mention the reason it took so long to pack was not that we were efficient with space…far from it. Because I don’t really live at home, per se, I just threw basically anything I thought I would need into a duffel bag that took up fully half of the baggage compartment. Morgan’s bags, an overnight bag, snacks, doodads, flight bag, blankets - you name it. I’m pretty sure that line guys at our stopovers thought we were hipster gypsy drifters traveling in our art-deco stallion, but we didn’t care. We were finally free and embarking on a trip that we’d both been looking forward to for quite some time. An initial turn due southeast from W88 to carefully intercept a 5.1NM arc from the center of GSO at 2000 feet, I soon spotted the International Home Furnishings Showroom in downtown High Point. Not knowing where my dad’s job site was exactly, I aimed for that as the most likely suspect, and Bluetoothed my phone to my A20s and called him. As I tell my students (tongue-in-cheek, naturally), “luck beats skill every time”, his job site was across the street, so he watched us fly directly overhead. A few parting words of wisdom and well wishes for our journey were exchanged, and I put my phone in airplane mode for the rest of the flight. I originally stayed at 3500 feet in order to not get hammered with headwinds, but around Statesville, I decided to start a cruise climb to 6500 to get through/over the mountains. To my utter shock, we had a THREE KNOT headwind at altitude heading almost due west. I gladly accepted my good fortune as I at my sushi lunch “par avion” gazing in wonder at the ground passing beneath us. I flew mostly compass headings, looking down at the iPad once every half hour or so, and with it being glass smooth at altitude, that was about the frequency I needed to touch the yoke. A few turns in the mountains yielded a little more comfortable passage for me, given their elevation and the remote terrain that encompassed them.

Our first destination loomed on the horizon, and the AWOS was reporting a moderate breeze straight down the runway. We were aligned with runway 26 at RHP as we came down the valley, so I called a straight-in and made a decent wheel landing; the prop ticking to a stop after 2.4 hours on the Hobbs. We taxied up to the fuel pumps, and the line guy threw some chocks under the tires and offered to fuel us up. We obliged his offer and were able to make a quick Instagram/potty/phone call break. We were on the ground about 30 minutes total and then piled back in the airplane for the second, and final leg of the day, Huntsville. We were already on the western edge of the mountain peaks, so while we were heavy again and climbing out of a higher elevation, we didn’t have any large peaks to negotiate. We climbed to 4500 feet and I asked my wife when sunset in Huntsville was. She replied 4:35, so the race to get wheels down before nightfall began. A few weeks prior, I had queried Facebook friends regarding the suitability of the airport lighting at Moontown airport for transient traffic and was advised to head to one of the county-owned airports if we were to arrive after sundown given the proximity of rising terrain around the airport. When it was apparent that we would get there early enough, I used the cell coverage around Chattanooga to advise my friend Matt that we would definitely be going to Moontown, and that we were 45 minutes or so out. He was just walking out of his job at Redstone Arsenal, so timing was good for him to get to the east side of town. Descending into the east side of Huntsville, I quickly picked the large cluster of hangars lining the entire runway, and entered a left downwind for 9. I was tired, and misjudged my altitude in my tight pattern, so 40° of flaps were in order for another wheel landing with a slight hop. We slowed down and exited the runway at the FBO and were glad to see that there were tie-down ropes provided. A nice lady stopped her vacuuming to come out and get our information, as Matt walked up and greeted us with open arms. We got our overnight bag and my flight bag out of the airplane and got in his car to spend the night in his new house that he and his wife just built. A nice dinner and visit with Matt and Amy drew to a close as the fire in their wood stove started to die down, along with our consciousness. I regained awareness of the outside world around 5AM the following morning, got ready, and hopped in the car with Matt on his way out the door; along with one off the six or eight pound cakes his mother in law made for Thanksgiving that they had no hope of ever consuming.

I enjoyed a leisurely preflight, updated mine and the airplane’s logbooks, and loaded up my FO and blew through a hole in the broken layer enveloping the area, finally breaking up about 20 miles into our trip. My Stratus wasn’t telling me the information I was expecting, nor wanting to see, so after checking some weather stations ahead, I elected to shoot north not three minutes after telling my wife that there was a good chance we’d have to divert because of the rain bands that were joining up ahead of us. We beat the rain and wind into Muscle Shoals by about 10-15 minutes and waited until about 10:15 to get back in the air. Again negotiating a (much thinner) broken layer to break out on top, we were heading west with full fuel tanks, and an R/C Cola and Moon Pie, compliments of the FBO, in our cooler; onward to Bastrop, Louisiana. The lush greenery of northern Alabama quickly gave way to desolate harvested rice and cotton fields of western Alabama and northern Mississippi. Over Tupelo and a decidedly low Grenada Lake we flew, this time around 2500 feet to stay under a scattered layer and the strong wind on the nose that had decided to show up departing out of Muscle Shoals. Turbulence was manageable, but I was ready for a smoother ride, which we finally got crossing the Mississippi River into the extreme southwestern corner of Arkansas, and finally into Louisiana. Winds had picked up a little, but were mostly down the runway at 10 knots when we got into the pattern at Bastrop. After racing each other to the restroom, my wife called my Aunt, who was picking us up at the airport, and I tried to fuel the airplane…until the fuel kiosk declined my card. Thankful that Wells Fargo’s fraud department was doing their job, but a little frustrated that they didn’t see the pattern of us using our cards in every state between there and home, we were able to purchase about 20 gallons of their finest blue juice, and stick the old girl in the breeze one last time for the next few days. Seeing my luck of not having to talk to anyone or do any real navigating coming to a close, I contacted Monroe Approach as we turned west out of the pattern at Bastrop. We were quickly passed along to Shreveport Approach, and after some initial trouble establishing contact, we were in the final throes of the trip. Drawing closer to Shreveport, we were asked to maintain VFR at or above 2500 feet and then had a traffic callout at for someone 1 o’clock and 3 miles, 2000 feet, southeast bound. I had been watching the traffic, a B52 out of Barksdale, for the last few minutes, and after reporting them in sight, we were passed along to Shreveport Downtown tower with a parting caution of wake turbulence and deletion of our altitude restriction. We were the only ones in the pattern at DTN, so we were cleared to land out of a right base entry, almost over the end of runway 15 at Barksdale. I teach at an airport in close proximity to Seymour-Johnson AFB, but being THAT close (inside the surface area) on approach into an airport was very cool to me. A greaser wheel landing sealed the deal, and I was greeted to my aunt videoing our landing and subsequent taxi to the ramp, marking the end of my obligation to get the graduate to her graduation.

Not having had lunch, or breakfast really for that matter, my Aunt took us to a local family favorite establishment, Po Boy Express for a Rajun Cajun (their answer to a Philly Cheese Steak), and a trip to Counter Culture for a Humphrey (tart frozen yogurt, a layer of granola and honey, a layer of strawberries/grapes/banana slices, topped with more tart yogurt) put the finale on my palate for the day and we settled in for a nice few days with the family. My parents arrived in town Friday evening, and Morgan’s graduation was Saturday, December 2 at the Frontiers of Flight Museum at Love Field. We essentially got a free museum tour beforehand. Seeing my wife walk across the stage, particularly as one of the 8 out of about 200 that graduated with distinction - perfect 4.0 GPA - to receive her Masters hood was one of the proudest moments of my life. We quickly whisked her away to a dinner at Gloria’s in Addison, and I fell asleep on my uncle’s couch holding some of their puppies. Morgan advised me that my bedtime was long past as the rest of my family had departed for their hotel and my parents and grandmother, who were staying with this aunt and uncle with us, were already in bed. I had wanted to sneak the airplane down to 5LS9 to see Gary and Deanna Hanson, but our timeline was simply too tight, and unfortunately was not in the cards for this trip.

The Texas sun shined bright Sunday morning, and after a cup of coffee, the family convened at Babe’s for a big lunch, and then went onward to Shreveport. We rode with my cousin Gerry and his wife Jenny, who decided that going the “old folk’s way” to Dallas sucked, and got us on I20 to get us home quicker. A requisite stop at Buc-ee’s in Terrell was in order, and after stocking up on more “stuff” we didn’t need, we got home and awaited my parents and rest of the family to get there. I took the quiet time to repack our things, and start planning the flight home. Anticipating a tailwind, I felt that we could make the eastbound journey in only one fuel stop, strategically placed in Tullahoma. We were greeted to lower weather than forecast at 7AM, with VFR weather being a scant 60 miles east of us. There were several large holes that were visible on the ride to the airport with my parents in the morning; all of which disappeared by the time the airplane was fueled and tired aired up. Morgan got us breakfast sandwiches to go at the cafe in the terminal building, and we said our goodbyes to my parents and fired the old girl up again…the second time that morning I had tried to do so with the mag keys in my pocket. Forcing myself into the zone, I called up ground for departure VFR to the northeast, and we were greeted with the news that the field had just gone IFR. Our window of weather fast closing, I requested a special VFR out, which was granted, and we hurriedly, taxied to runway 14, did our run up and, were released for departure.

Ceilings were not high, and visibility was not great, so the whole “one mile clear of clouds thing” wasn’t doing much for us. Spying a small window to climb, I seized it, and finally got on top of the layer at 1800 feet. We were given the green light to climb to 7500, and were promptly dropped from flight following about 15 miles out of Shreveport. I called my parents to let them know that we were in VMC and climbing out, telling them that I’d get flight following since my dad asked me to for the return trip, we settled into a good rhythm heading home, seeing about 30 knots on the tail. The further east we went, the more the wind shifted from a tailwind to a quartering tailwind, and our groundspeed diminished. We flew through a couple of very small rain cells in between cloud layers, and then finally saw the forecast “clear and a million” ahead of the frontal boundary. Curious about the surface conditions, I started looking at my ForeFlight and was a little shocked to see that the ADS-B weather was reporting some relatively stiff winds around 25 knots at the surface. Tuning into various weather stations along our route of flight confirmed that the surface winds, were indeed, much stouter than they were on the trip out. By the time we were nearing Tullahoma, winds at the field were reported to be in the upper teens gusting to the mid to upper twenties, between 20° and 60° off of runway heading. They were accurate, and I went from basically being fully cross-controlled, to basically no cross control several times during my flare. Finally, the wind allowed us to touch down and we were stopped within 1200 feet or so. Certainly no style points, but I’ll take it as a good end to a 3.7-hour flight and it was a pretty smooth landing; to the extent I’m not sure when the wheels actually contacted pavement.

Not unexpectedly, but still to my dismay, the Beechcraft Heritage Museum wasn’t open, and Byrd Raby’s van wasn’t outside of his hangar, either. Ole’ Pokey was presumably still nestled in Shelbyville, and Charlie Beyer’s flock in Fayetteville, so no visiting with the constituents was to occur on this trip. We borrowed a crew car, ended up at Buffalo Wild Wings for a quick lunch, and back to the airplane we went. I didn’t want to untie the airplane in the breeze, so I elected to pay the premium for full-service fuel; I have been filling that airplane up since my age was measured in single digits…I don’t like to hog all the fun all the time. Weather still looked severe clear, and the winds had shifted to being straight down runway 18, so our takeoff was a breeze, literally, and we pointed home. I called up Memphis Center while we were still in the pattern, and got flight following; climbing again to 7500 for mountain clearance. We were heavy and with a stout tailwind to start off with, the old girl wasn’t happy about making it up to 7500 in the face of several pretty stout downdrafts. We finally caught a little bit of an updraft, and made it up to 7500 feet and leveled off AND accelerated to cruise flight (woo-hoo!), and then played “hot controller” as we bounced between several Memphis Center frequencies, to Chattanooga Approach, to Atlanta Center, to Asheville Approach, back to Atlanta Center, and finally to Greensboro Approach. The afternoon sun was on our backs, so we had a nice view of the Appalachians and the terrain below. One of the neatest things I saw was a couple of wide valleys running northeast-southwest between some <200-foot ridgelines north of Chattanooga - presumably some ancient riverbed. Perhaps someone more familiar with eastern Tennessee topography, like Charlie, can explain that to me. Regardless, it was really cool to see from the air.

Over southern Knoxville, we crossed, and finally into North Carolina. We soon saw the mountains dissolve into foothills, and foothills into Piedmont. I picked up downtown Winston Salem, and the old girl all but flew herself back to Air Harbor from there. Greensboro approach kept us a bit on the high side, but allowed us to cut through their airspace since they were landing and departing on runway 5, and we made straight in for runway 9. My best landing of the trip was realized at Air Harbor, which is usually where my worst landings are because flying out of there has become so automated over the majority of my life.

We quickly taxied to the hangar, I pulled the old girl in, unloaded everything into my car, made a promise to return to top her off and clean the gunk off of the cowling and bugs off of her leading edges before I go back to work Friday. I did a quick total of the time to see that the round trip was 15.5 hours, with a bit of time lost in the mad dash to Muscle Shoals for a weather stand down, but overall, about half the time it takes us normally to drive down. The flight left both Morgan and I completely fulfilled, and I’m pretty sure there’s an endorphin leak in the airplane, because we’ve both been smiling since we got home. This is the first of many family trips flying, and I’m still reliving the flight in my head.

That said, this trip has re-affirmed a few of the wishlist items I have for the airplane. While I love the airplanes that I have flown that have bigger engines, I don’t want more power/weight/complexity, but I hate venturis. I’ve read what has been written about them on here by folks that have flown hard IFR in their 170s and have forgotten more than I’ll ever know, but I like the clean look without them, and ours were installed incorrectly anyway and work poorly, at a best with two 8” venturis mounted on the port side. That said, an O-300D would be perfect for me, and what I would like to do. Also, one of the first things I do when I get the airplane, legally, is to install a set of Bartone exhaust extensions. I hate the exhaust stacks sticking out of the front of the cowling, and I hate 15 hours of flying leaving large white streaks on my otherwise clean airplane. Also, while I’ve got long arms, but my wife and mother do not, so an early 180 baggage door is on my list of goodies to really enhance the utility of the airplane to load it up…particularly when the day comes that a car seat is in the back. Finally, being IFR capable/certified would make things a lot easier for me…getting out of MVFR or gentleman’s IFR through a thin layer, or down through it would be nice.

Overall, the airplane, as has been confirmed numerous times, is a wonderful traveling machine. A little more speed and useful load would be nice, but my wife and I would both rather a 185 or 195 for that…down the road of course. This 170 will do us just fine for as long as I’m able to fly and I know it will be the first and last airplane I ever own.

Sorry for rambling, but thanks for reading. Writing is therapeutic for me. This took me long enough to write, so I’m about petered out. I’ll add a few pictures to the post as I resize them. I’m a lazy millennial and just like to upload the stuff I have on my phone. ;)

Re: This is why I own my 170!

Posted: Tue Dec 05, 2017 9:44 pm
by canav8
For God Sake, Why don't you just write a book. I fell asleep twice. Facebook wouldn't let you type that much? ...lol

Re: This is why I own my 170!

Posted: Tue Dec 05, 2017 9:46 pm
by Ryan Smith
canav8 wrote:For God Sake, Why don't you just write a book. I fell asleep twice. Facebook wouldn't let you type that much? ...lol
They do, you just keep getting banned and wouldn't get a chance to see it.

Re: This is why I own my 170!

Posted: Tue Dec 05, 2017 10:08 pm
by Bruce Fenstermacher
So your gonna clean that up and include some high res photos to Jan for the next 170 News aren't you Ryan.

Re: This is why I own my 170!

Posted: Tue Dec 05, 2017 10:35 pm
by Ryan Smith
Bruce Fenstermacher wrote:So your gonna clean that up and include some high res photos to Jan for the next 170 News aren't you Ryan.
Reading Jim McIntosh's Oshkosh write up was pretty much the genesis for writing this little exposé here. I'd be glad to accompany pictures with an edited version of this story for the 170 News.

FWIW - I read this issue cover to cover. George's article(s) and Jim's story were particularly enjoyable for me. Great job to both!

Re: This is why I own my 170!

Posted: Wed Dec 06, 2017 12:10 am
by Pdogace
Sounds like a great trip!!! We too would love to have a Cessna 195 and it’s on my wishlist. But our 170 is now part of the family so not sure If I could ever part with her. As my boys get bigger, I might be forced to upgrade but that’s years in the future. That’s the longest post I have ever read. Lol Hope you guys have many more adventures!

Re: This is why I own my 170!

Posted: Wed Dec 06, 2017 2:06 pm
by GAHorn
If writing is therapeutic for you.... You must feel like Hercules! Very engaging and imaginative. Thanks for the good read!

(More, please!)

Re: This is why I own my 170!

Posted: Wed Dec 06, 2017 4:28 pm
by hilltop170
Great story Ryan! Keep up the good work, we always need quality material like this in the 170 News, with pictures, of course. And writing it right after the trip is over imparts your obvious enthusiasm and sense of accomplishment into the story that might fade a little if you wait very long.

We always talk about passing on our love of flying to the young folks. Who knows how a story like this might inspire a young person just getting started. And on the other hand, writing trip reports like this allows many folks who don't get to make these trips any more feel connected to flying through your experiences. We need to keep these folks in the fold as long as possible as well. Nicely done!

Congratulations to Morgan as well on getting her Master's Degree. You are fortunate to have found a wife that shares the love of flying and supports your new profession.

As for your comment about wanting an O300-D engine so you can have a vacuum system, now days with all the great electronics coming available, I would be looking at eliminating the vacuum altogether and going with something like the Garmin G5 or similar. Much more capable and reliable than vacuum ever was and nobody dings points for making the 170 more up to date and functional.

Re: This is why I own my 170!

Posted: Wed Dec 06, 2017 11:33 pm
by GAHorn
hilltop170 wrote:....As for your comment about wanting an O300-D engine so you can have a vacuum system, now days with all the great electronics coming available, I would be looking at eliminating the vacuum altogether and going with something like the Garmin G5 or similar. Much more capable and reliable than vacuum ever was and nobody dings points for making the 170 more up to date and functional.
I would think one would have to be enamored of a glass-cockpit installation in a Classic airplane tho'.

Re: This is why I own my 170!

Posted: Thu Dec 07, 2017 2:07 am
by hilltop170
gahorn wrote:
hilltop170 wrote:....As for your comment about wanting an O300-D engine so you can have a vacuum system, now days with all the great electronics coming available, I would be looking at eliminating the vacuum altogether and going with something like the Garmin G5 or similar. Much more capable and reliable than vacuum ever was and nobody dings points for making the 170 more up to date and functional.
I would think one would have to be enamored of a glass-cockpit installation in a Classic airplane tho'.

Well, almost nobody.

I really like mine, I remember flying raw-data IFR, not much fun. I am older and wiser now and will use every upgrade I can afford to make my job easier. And I don't think new equipment detracts from the classic appeal. As you can see, I did not get rid of the steam gauges, just scooted them over and stuck the PFD in-between. Someday the 170 will get one too, right in the middle of the panel. I think it will look good. And with ADS-B targets displayed on the screen, it will be even more functional.

Click or tap on picture to enlarge.
Runway 32 visual approach at T82, Gillespie Co. Airport, Fredericksburg, Texas in C-195
Runway 32 visual approach at T82, Gillespie Co. Airport, Fredericksburg, Texas in C-195

Re: This is why I own my 170!

Posted: Thu Dec 07, 2017 3:52 am
by c170b53
Thanks Ryan, great story. I think our quarterly master editor( :D ) will be licking his chops and giggling with glee if you send him some pics. Really there's quite a few members who never visit the forums and your story needs to be shared with them, thanks again.
Richard, I might have to sell my house to get a panel such as your plus Mary Anne might find there's something wrong with that :Dv