July 2007

02.07.2007: Aargh! I had to cancel my flight across the Harbour Bridge and the Sydney Opera.

When we arrived at Camden Airport the METAR reported 20 knots wind and 30 - 35 knots gust, and the TAF said that this would last for the whole day. For the coast they predicted even stronger winds, so I cancelled my flight. Flying in the mountains and along the coast at 500 ft under such conditions just does not make sense. Unfortunately the rental company misplaced my phone number, so they could not call me to let me know. At least they had not the slightest problem with the cancellation.

I had planned to fly to the Blue Mountains with Martin, a colleague from Siemens Switzerland, who is also working on the project, and then to the City doing the Harbour Bridge turn. As Camden is half way to the Blue Mountains we went there non the less, just with the car. At 1000 m it was 5 °C and really windy, so at least the weather forecast was right. It also remained windy for the whole day, so canceling was the right decision.

03.07.2007: During the flight back from Sydney to Zurich I had a lot of time to look into the avionics issue again. I am still not decided whether a conventional analogue six-pack or a Dynon EFIS is the right way to go. The one thing that makes me undecided is the readability of the instruments under poor lighting conditions, like bright sun from the side or the back, coupled with wearing sun-glasses. The large canopy probably does not help here. If I have difficulty reading the GPS I don't care as much, as I anyway fly with a map and do not have to look at the GPS continuously, but the primary flight instruments are a different issue. I might have to arrange to go flying with a Dynon equipped SportCruiser in August before making a final decision. One option would be to have an analogue six-pack on the pilot side and a Dynon 180 on the right side, primarily as an engine monitoring system, but also as a backup for the analogue instruments.

What I have definitely decided is to install an auto pilot. One option would be the TruTrack ADI Pilot II, which includes a heading/track and altitude hold autopilot in the attitude indicator (only if analogue six-pack is selected), the other option would be the TruTrack DigiFlight II, again with heading/track and altitude hold functions. Compared to all the other autopilots I looked at the TruTrack units offer the most functionality for the money, coupled with a very simple and intuitive user interface.

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