Go/No go decision

Dave Siciliano

Dave Siciliano

Final Approach
Joined
Feb 27, 2005
Messages
6,434
Location
Dallas, Texas
Display Name
Display name:
Dave Siciliano
I've been patiently waiting to leave Dallas for Florida and South Carolina while Mother Nature dumped all that rain and snow between here and there the last coupe days. Yesterday, a fella in Florida was asking if he made the right decision in not flying through that to get to New Orleans. Every reply he got was supportive. If you saw the weather, you'd know it was pretty bad. It inspired this response.

Best,

Dave

‘Twas the night before Christmas; And all through the sky
Not a GA plane was stirring; Not even a try!
There were AIRMETS for icing; surface to twenty;
Convective SIGMETS along the route; Challenges a plenty!

Turbulence everywhere; RADAR was red,
Yet one GA fella was thinking; ‘bout going ahead!
Shear aloft; wind howling and cry'in;
But the one fella asked friends; Should I be flyin?

One after the other shook their head no.
Each in turn said they wouldn’t go.
Neither pressurized, nor K-ice owner would go.
Even a turbine owner and instructor said no.

So the one GA fella that noodled the decision;
Got one affirmation after another—no derision.
And instead of slogging his way through the ice and the snow;
He stayed home that day waiting for Santa’s Ho! Ho! Ho!
 
It's been pretty yucky weather this Christmas. Fortunately, yesterday had a good window for flying from Pennsylvania down here to southwestern Virginia - after breaking through about a 500' thick layer on departure from Williamsport it was CAVU the rest of the trip. I haven't been outside yet, but I hear freezing rain for the morning is planned, turning into rain later. My plane probably is an icicle right now - fortunately on the ground!

Y'all be careful out there. The icing PIREPs I'm seeing don't look that pleasant.

Dave, very funny! Thanks for sharing.
 
Dave, if you wrote that yourself I'm impressed. Very nice, very entertaining.

Looks like today's weather is quite a bit better if you're headed for Florida and you could ride 60+ Kt tailwinds to boot. Any chance you'd want to get together tomorrow (I'm in Venice)?
 
Good one, Dave!

IMHO, any no-go decision is the right one. I'd rather be down here wisin'... well, you know.
 
Nice one, Dave! Enjoy your flight today--much better weather. Just survive the icy roads between home and the airport!
 
I did write that; it's public domain now if anyone has suggestions or improvements.



Great flight weather wise, but on the way to Greenville from Dallas yesterday, I lost the right engine alternator and the left engine tach. Any suggestions on where to have work done in this area? I’m at Donaldson (GYH). Stevens is on the field with Donaldson Jet Center (where I am). Also AvServ but I just don’t know anything about them. Might need to have the auto pilot looked at also.

Long flight yesterday. The AP didn’t work, so, I hand flew about six hours. Dropped off family in Winterhaven, FL, then, flew up to SC. Losing the alternator and tach on the left engine wasn’t fun; thanks for redundancy on the alternators; I still got in. Weather was supposed to be 3500 feet OVC at GYH when I was about 30 minutes out. Turned out to be just above minimums when Greer briefed me because of fog rolling in. Saw the approach lights about four hundred feet, then the threshold before the runway became visible. RADAR altimeter sounded 200 feet after breaking out, so, somewhere between 200 and 300 feet when visual. We waited two days for storms to clear before flying out. It’s nice to be hear with family now.


Best,

Dave
 
Dave, the guys at Anderson (KAND) have always been great to me and gone out of their way to help when my friend's Travel Air had a leaking fuel line going to the fuel flow gauge (mechanical). I don't know if they'll have the parts you need in stock, but it's worth giving a call over there to see if they can help. The guys at the FBO know who I am (they might remember me as the guy with the Aztec who comes in to pick up dogs frequently).

I lost the alternator on my left engine on my last dog run, we had to repair that on Wednesday night before my leaving on Thursday for Virginia. Not fun but at the redundancy is nice there as I was able to complete the trip and it was a non-event. Next month I plan on having the autopilot fixed. I'm looking forward to finally having it working after having done about 250 hours of hand flying it over the past year!

Glad you're with family now, sounds like the weather didn't make it easy!
 
Thanks for the suggestion Ted. My guys know the fellas at Stevens and we seem to be trying to work with them.
The weather actually was great for the flight yesterday except for the fog at the end. Great tail winds heading for Florida which resulted in ground speeds up to 284 knots (I took a pic of the gps). Bartow was instrument weather before I arrived, but got up to visual minimums just as I came in. At Donaldson, the METARs were for 3,500 and Flight Watch reported those 30 minutes out (because the XM weather was dated). Greer approach reported 1,400 RVR at Greer when I was being vectored into Donaldson. They reported Donaldson as 3 miles and 400 feet. Ceiling was close but vis was less than reported. Still, once below the clag, not bad. As with many times when there is fog, very little wind and perfectly smooth. Once set up, the plane came right down with little need for adjustment.

Best,

Dave
 
Dave Siciliano said:
Thanks for the suggestion Ted. My guys know the fellas at Stevens and we seem to be trying to work with them.
The weather actually was great for the flight yesterday except for the fog at the end. Great tail winds heading for Florida which resulted in ground speeds up to 284 knots (I took a pic of the gps). Bartow was instrument weather before I arrived, but got up to visual minimums just as I came in. At Donaldson, the METARs were for 3,500 and Flight Watch reported those 30 minutes out (because the XM weather was dated). Greer approach reported 1,400 RVR at Greer when I was being vectored into Donaldson. They reported Donaldson as 3 miles and 400 feet. Ceiling was close but vis was less than reported. Still, once below the clag, not bad. As with many times when there is fog, very little wind and perfectly smooth. Once set up, the plane came right down with little need for adjustment.

Best,

Dave
Click to expand...

Sorry to hear you're having all those troubles, hopefully all will be fixable with minimal cash outlay. The pitch axis on my Century III has an intermittent problem that I haven't been able to cure and that's got me thinking about maybe replacing it with something a little more current. Maybe we could get a quantity deal?:smile: JOOC, when the alternator quit (I believe yours is gear driven) did you consider shutting the affected engine down and terminating the trip early given the potential for the alternator failure to harm the engine? FWIW, I would have kept on going too.
 
While I have geared alternators, they are through clutches to prevent damage if one fails; just had the alternators replaced and they checked both clutches; so, I never thought about shutting one down (or should say, didn't thing long about it <g>). In the air, I recycled the CB, and the alt. switch. After the bad one was off for awhile, it would come back on for a short period. Sounds like it could be when it heated which makes the voltage regulator suspect. We will see Monday.

We're thinking about the Aspen system, but have the engine rebuilds scheduled this summer; that's enough for now <g>

Best,

Dave
 
Hope you get it all fixed soon, Dave! Good that you were able to complete the trip with the issues that cropped up.

Interesting mentioning of the gear-driven alternators. My instructor's brother has a Seneca II (TSIO-360s) that also have gear-driven alternators. One alternator's coupling went out, and the plane was apparently operating for some time with just one alternator (my instructor's brother didn't notice the problem). The load on that one alternator ended up breaking the coupling on the good side (at which point he noticed). Now both need to be replaced at a cost of $2000 each, for just the coupling (alternators are fine).

This thread has gotten me thinking on starting a Go/No-Go Decision thread. Might be a good idea to get some experience and ideas from others, I know I'd benefit from it.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top