Mona and a faulty SR20

The Sunday morning did not start off well as far as the weather was concerned. A sky completely obscured with dark, low clouds and areas of heavy rain greeted me as I travelled up the M61 towards Blackpool.

I'd booked a four hour slot to fly the SR20 and,as it was a last minute cancellation, I hadn't really planned where to go. The west coast of the country was forecast to see the clouds lift and the rain ease later in the afternoon, and as my slot began at 1pm, I was hopeful the conditions would be good for flying.

This post is just to show that sometimes things do not work correctly with the new technology airplanes. I've written before about the Cirrus and problems with the Primary Flight Dispaly (PFD), but these latest problems were slightly different. I started the engine and all looked well. The PFD was in good shape and so I taxied out and took off. In the turn after departure, the HSI began flicking between a big red X and normal operation, eventually sticking with the X. This time the attitude indicator was working fine, but no HSI is inconvenient. It's not essential, but when you are hiring such an aircraft, you want everything to work.

After landing at Mona airfield on Anglesey I was hopeful the system would "snap out of it" and work again, but it was not to be, with my big red X still in place. I had a cup of coffee before leaving for home, but as I was cruising at 5000 feet over the island of Anglesey, I got a yellow caution bar on the MFD to say the cylinder head temperature of no 3 was up over 450 degrees Celius. This was not good, but it soon turned red and hit 500 degrees! You have to assume this warning is for real and so I turned the plane towards Mona again, ready to land and investigate. I also pushed the mixture control to full rich to provide more cooling in the cylinders, reduced power and increased airspeed by pointing the nose down and descending. These actions did not produce any change in the indicated cylinder temperature, but as suddenly as the warning had appeared, it disappeared! It seemed to be an instrument fault and so I headed off to Blackpool with just my big red X over the HSI.

There were no further failures, but the problems with this particular Cirrus are becoming concerning, and my confidence in it has been shaken. If you are going to fly a long distance in challenging conditions, you have to be confident in your airplane. Until the problems have been solved, I will not fly G-GCDB on any serious trip.

It looks good but my confidence in it has been tested recently

1946 Auster at Mona

Cessna Sectors

I had a good flying day on Saturday September 1st, starting the month with four sectors in the Cessna C172SP that is based at City Airport Manchester. It's better known as Barton to those of us who fly from its grass runways.

After adding 90 litres of fuel, I set off down the low level route towards NANTI and turned right, on track to today’s first destination of Welshpool. It’s been a few years since I last landed at this picturesque little airfield surrounded by hills. The hard runway has been extended and is easily spotted, just beyond the town it is named after. I positioned to the west of the aerodrome and descended to circuit height, turning left downwind for runway 22. The approach was good until short final when there was turbulence off the hills. I added power but still had a couple of bounces before the aircraft settled. Not a good landing and not a good start. It just goes to show that however many times you’ve done it before, you are only as good as your last landing.

Walking to the office, I signed in and paid the £12 landing fee. There was a Robinson R22 on a training sortie and the odd Cessna here and there, but otherwise it was fairly quiet. A Tomahawk taxied past me as I checked my fuel and oil and started the engine ready to head off over the Welsh hills to Caernarfon. If the conditions are suitable this hop over Wales is great. Today there were scattered Cumulus with tops at 4000 feet, so I climbed to 5000 feet and took a direct GPS course to Caernarfon. Visibility was excellent, although the ground speed suffered due to the south westerly wind. As I approached the coast the cloud cover increased but I was easily able to descend to 1300 feet for the approach to runway 20, left hand. The wind was stronger here and was reported as 220 degrees at 17kts. Not wanting to repeat the last landing, I concentrated hard and put the Cessna down nicely this time. Confidence had been restored!

View to my left

View ahead

View to my right

As I enjoyed the very nice soup of the day in Caernarfon’s cafe, I pondered where to go next. Being a member of the Lancashire Aero Club gives me free landings at many northern England aerodromes, including Caernarfon and Sleap, in Shropshire. Saving money is always welcome so Sleap would be the next place to visit. I calculated I would have enough fuel for this leg but more would be needed on next landing. Back tracking runway 20 and lining up for departure, I set 10 degrees of flap. This was not really required but I thought I’d see how quickly the Cessna would get airborne in the strong wind that was still blowing. The plane flew itself off at 55 kts in what appeared like three hundred metres!

The route back over the hills was now blocked by heavier cloud cover, so I headed up the coast and was going to take that way, past Hawarden to Sleap. But on reaching Conway I could see a clear path towards Sleap and so turned directly on track at 3000 feet. It was a little bumpy at times, but not bad. I was soon positioning downwind left for runway 23 at the lovely airfield of Sleap. Another good landing was followed by a further pick up of 40 litres of fuel, before settling down with a coffee and newspaper in the busy club restaurant. There was a lot of flying talk and even a presentation to someone, in fact everything that used to be good about Barton in past years, but what now is missing. Sleap’s a great place to spend an hour.

The last leg home took me west of Whitchurch and up the low level route. Instead of turning for Barton at Warrington, I carried on at 1200 feet to Leigh Flash, climbing up to 2500 feet when clear of Manchester’s airspace. I was enjoying myself too much to go home yet! Eventually, I turned G-EA onto a course that would take us home and spotted the Ski Run and the Salford City Reds stadium in the distance. A right hand circuit to make another good landing on runway 27L rounded off the day. I got to Barton at 10am that morning and left at 6:30pm, adding just over four hours to my logbook. The ‘summer’ is coming to an end and hopefully the Indian summer is about to begin.