Thrust reverser on a PA32

Unit74

Unit74

Final Approach
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Unit74
So what is the worst headwind you have ever experienced? I wish I would have grabbed a screenshot, but TAS at 140 kts and a GS of 96 kts had controllers laughing at me.

“Say type Aircraft”.....

PA32T

“ OK. That’s what we have on the stick. Just wanted to confirm you weren’t a warrior.”

Thanks. Feels like it right now.
 
How is that even possible? Take off in Arizona towards SoCal and land in Colorado.....
 
I have no sympathy for your GS of 96kts. It was somewhere over New England, with a GS of 45 knots, that I decided it was time to move up from my 180hp 172.
 
Katamarino said:
I have no sympathy for your GS of 96kts. It was somewhere over New England, with a GS of 45 knots, that I decided it was time to move up from my 180hp 172.
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Worst I've has was 45-50kts in the Mooney, which dropped me to about 105kts. Slow, but not terrible. That headwind would be horrible in a 172/Cherokee.
 
I think our GS was around 50kts. Took 3.5 hours to get from FRG-MTN in a 172

OF3r6eh.jpg
 
I think 80 kt headwind is the worst I've had. 100 kt tailwind is the best I've had.
 
I saw 689 GS a couple weeks ago. Controllers seemed impressed.
 
Some years back over NYC I brought a 172 to a "hover" at 7500'. ATC indicated 6kts GS. Naturally that was more intentional, though, than those chugging into a headwind trying to maintain cruise.
 
In normal operation, I've had a C-172R down to around 75kts GS running full-out, so something like a 35-40kt headwind. Traffic on the turnpike were definitely beating me, even semi trucks. I've had doing negative GS while practicing slow flight during primary training with roughly 35kts of headwind. Of course the instructor and I were doing it just to see if we could.
 
Katamarino said:
I have no sympathy for your GS of 96kts. It was somewhere over New England, with a GS of 45 knots, that I decided it was time to move up from my 180hp 172.
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I recently took a rented 172N/180 up to KSMX from KMYF and was fighting a nasty headwind the whole way.. my GS at the start of the trip was okay... around 107 or so, but by the time I crossed the Sepulveda pass and up towards the SLO area I was doing about 80 over the ground. That was brutal. Still faster than driving.. but it really makes you appreciate faster machines

On the way back at least I had GS up around 150 knots.. which was the fastest GS I'd ever seen in a 172
 
I had an 2004 SR20 G2, flying from Maryland to Texas in the spring of 2011 (with gas stops). At one point I am flying over I81 and watching the trucks pass me. 80 knots on the nose, 135 KTAS, left me a GS of 55 knots.
It was rather depressing....

Tim
 
SoonerAviator said:
I've had doing negative GS while practicing slow flight during primary training with roughly 35kts of headwind.
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Yeah that was a (dumb) game we would play with friends right after our PPL.. go up on a windy day and see who could get the GS to zero and keep it there. Actually really brings you "in tune" with the plane and making tiny corrections to heading and power to keep the GS at zero.. I think the best I could ever do was hold it at around 2-3 knots
 
tspear said:
I had an 2004 SR20 G2, flying from Maryland to Texas in the spring of 2011 (with gas stops). At one point I am flying over I81 and watching the trucks pass me. 80 knots on the nose, 135 KTAS, left me a GS of 55 knots.
It was rather depressing....
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I often wonder what people who have slower planes do on days like this... do they just not fly that day? A Cherokee 140 trueing out around 93-97 knots will basically be stationary in a situation like that
 
Tantalum said:
I often wonder what people who have slower planes do on days like this... do they just not fly that day? A Cherokee 140 trueing out around 93-97 knots will basically be stationary in a situation like that
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They would say, screw the meeting! Turn around and fly the other way and set a ground speed record :D

Tim
 
Katamarino said:
The problem is you then have to wait for the weather to change in order to get home, or land and taxi along the interstate!
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Well on that trip, from memory, I flew to Texas on a Monday for a Wed meeting, flew home Thursday and had 40knot head wind the whole way. It was a loooooong flight.

Tim
 
jsstevens said:
And by sailing you mean “the art of getting cold and wet while slowly going nowhere at great expense?”
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Pretty much. Sailing is generally either boring or scary

Sailing in the bay here in San Diego is not bad.. usually get a 5-10 knot breeze, good enough to get a small 20 footer moving

But I think the days of the 3-4 day races are behind me. Getting tossed around in your bunk at 4AM perpetually wet and damp has lots its appeal!!
 
Ted DuPuis said:
I think 80 kt headwind is the worst I've had. 100 kt tailwind is the best I've had.
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I've seen about 200 mph on the tail, but then I was self loading cargo on a pressurized aluminum mailing tube east bound around the Aleutian Islands. GS was around 750 mph. Saw that GS last month over Japan returning from Korea, too. Same situation, self loading cargo...
 
Bill and I had a pretty nasty one on the return leg from GMU last year. We were indicating ~155kts GS at one point on the way, but knew we’d be paying the price on the way home.

IIRC we traced ~80kts GS the whole way back and we couldn't stay low due to rising terrain. Ouch!
 
During my primary training back in the '80's my instructor and I were flying a 152 doing maneuvers over our usual practice area. Winds at our altitude of 3K were forecasted to be 30 knots but we soon found out that was slightly incorrect. Instructor had me turn into the wind for some slow flight. After a couple minutes ATC called to verify we were a 152 and not a hovering helicopter. They had zero groundspeed on us. Actually our groundtrack had us flying backwards!:D
 
Tantalum said:
I often wonder what people who have slower planes do on days like this... do they just not fly that day?
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A few of the crazy ones have done stuff like take a J-3 Cub up - climb out at top speed, throttle back, stay on heading, chop power (slightly) to descend, then landed the same place they took off from without ever turning... somewhere there's a video to prove it, too.
 
About 2 weeks ago I was flying north going to MMU in my Archer II to visit my sister. Had about 150-155gs NICE! on the way back home heading south had between 65-70gs. I think this may be the slowest cruise I've ever had in a GA plane. Seemed like the auto traffic below me heading south on the NJ turnpike was going about the same speed.
 
Don't have the pic handy, but I've had 199 knots right on the friggin' nose.
 
Unit74 said:
So what is the worst headwind you have ever experienced? I wish I would have grabbed a screenshot, but TAS at 140 kts and a GS of 96 kts had controllers laughing at me.
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Crossing the mountains on a leg from GSP to TYS, I climbed from 9000 to 10,000 to reduce dodging cloud tops at sunset. 30°OAT. Per power settings, has 147 KTAS; ground speed has been 96 knots but dropped to 68 knots after leveling off at 10,000. Soon as I cleared terrain I went down to 6000, which raised groundspeed to 105 knots . . .

My trip out was 2.2 hours; going home was 4:45, and we were very glad to stand up and walk around!
 
One time down in San Antonio I believe one of the guys flying that or another F-156 Storch had a literal “slow race” down at Stinson Municipal with a Stinson L-1. Good times.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Would not have wanted to be going the other direction. That's a Litton 72 in a B-747-200 by the way.
Image 4-29-18 at 3.04 PM.jpg
 
Spike: We were taking my buddy's Fiesler to the air show at Carswell. He didn't have a radio in it at the time, so we had to be accompanied by a radio equipped escort. Our friend that was flying escort, was in his L-5. John came over from where he kept the L-5 and paired up with us after we lifted off Oliver Farms. The winds were more out of the west at that time than any other direction. We got about 3 miles west and they really picked up and started to swing to coming out of the south. John was hanging on full flaps and just above a stall and was still running away from us in the Fiesler while at max continuous power. We finally got far enough west to turn south on a long direct final into the base. John finally had to pull up the flaps and go land and take on fuel as he was down to less than a quarter tank at that point. The only way we ended up being able to make any forward progress to the south, was to climb to several thousand feet and then nose over and dive to about 2000' and repeat. When we finally landed, the tower guys had to come look at the airplane, as they couldn't belive we were so slow and not a helo or balloon.

Ended up being a fun show, but I spent Sunday morning out there doing a brake and wheel bushing overhaul on it due to having to taxi more than 2 miles on the field. The Fiesler was never designed with a need to taxi that far at one time.
 
Craig said:
Spike: ....
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Thank you SO MUCH for that; it is a remarkable story!

Where in North Texas are you hangaring these days, and what are you flying?
 
I flew a 150 backwards at a few knots once in winter winds in New England.
 
Spike: I'm not hangared anywhere really. My L-5B project is in a warehouse in long term storage until the paperwork on it can be straightened out. The Fairchild is split between the warehouse, the garage and the driveway and yard. I haven't actively flown in lots of years. I've got to resolve some things that have kept me from getting everything current. I'm hoping to be back in the air sometime next year.
 
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