Landing at King Shaka International in Boeing 737-800

Cockpit view of the trip from OR Tambo to Durban in a Boeing 737-800.

Having just passed my PPL exams and only 100 flying hours, it was an incredible experience to join the Kulula crew in the Boeing 737 we flew in back to Durban on Thursday. We had just delivered our Sling back to The Airplane Factory for it's 100 hour service and some adjustments and had to fly the commercial route back to Durban. Thanks guys for making my day!! Almost incredible how this huge machine stays in the air.. everything seemed like in slow motion.

Follow the link here for the YouTube video clip of our landing at King Shaka International in Durban.

Over we go....

James takes Llewellyn for a flip (literally) - watch the short video clip of the aileron roll in ZDL. Click on the link.

Visit to The Airplane Factory

Llewellyn and Dave fly Red Rocket ZDL up to Johannesburg

ZDL's Dave with James Pitman of The Airplane Factory while maintenance guy Daniel looks agog at the list of repairs, maintenance and improvements we presented him with. Daniel promised us top service though and was more than happy to tackle the job.

James and Nicci arrived to pay a visit in IFR

James took Lllewellyn for 3 barrel rolls - wow, this plane really can do it!

Daniel takles some finishing work on the factory's newest Sling off the production line

The mountains around van Reenen's Pass on the way up from Durban

What a way to spend the public holiday on Wednesday. We were up early and off in the Red Rocket on our forst adventure together beyond the neighbouring airfields. We were soon feeling confident of the routing, the frequencies and able to take in the magnificent scenery as we winged our way from Virginia to Tedderfield. The guys at The Airplane Factory were hard at work on the holiday and it was great to see the machinery swining into place getting new Slings out to happy customers and keeping older customers equally enthralled. What incredible enthusiasm and passion from everyone we encountered at the factory. Keep this up guys. It is amazing to hear that Sling # 82 and possibly # 83 has been sold.!!!

And over we go...

Just a quick posting of the pic taken by Andrew from The Airplane Factory as James takes Llewellyn for a flip roll in our Red Rocket. You must see the video clip of the world spinning. Will post more pics of the crew and the video on YouTube when I get home tomorrow.

PPL Flight Test passed!!!



Final Flight Test today with Chief Flying Instructor Keith Charlesworth

Instrument flying under the "foggles" with Instructor Kyle

Beautiful clear day and view over KZN inland

I did my final lesson under "foggles" today completing my 15 hours of additional training to convert my NPL licence to PPL. This gives me the flexibility of flying a slightly heavier aeroplane, including the Sling with the additional fuel tank connected. The additional fuel tank pushes the Sling from a 600km to a 700kg mauw weight plane requiring the higher licence. The "foggles" were required for 5 hours of simulated cloud flying with reference to instruments only, a requirement for training PPL pilots.

The flight test with the Chief Flying Officer of Ayre Aviation Centre in Durban went smoothly and took a total of 2,8 hours. This included filing a flight plan and doing a dual cross country all of which too up my whole day from 8am to 4pm today.

Fuel Shortage

I am still puzzled (see Dec story) by the short-delivery of fuel from the petrol stations where I get my mogas (95 unleaded car petrol from the same stations you fill up your car) for my aeroplane. Not getting any consistent quantity of fuel in my container, I brought it inside to check my measurements with a measuring jug. This proved that my original lines on the petrol container were more or less correct and that I am being short-changed when I refill the container.

The exception was Saturday when my container was again fiulled up to the line... it almost seems that the measuring device the petrol stations use depends on the weather or air pressure, so that when the QNH is lower you get more fuel? Is this possible? How do the petrol station's bowser dispensers work and does air pressure affect the accuracy of these?

I have asked Wendy Knowler of East Coast Radio's Consumer Watch to investigate, as at R11 a litre, a 2l shortage on every 25l fuel sold means about R25 per car tankful of petrol consumers are being overcharged nationwide (when the weather is good?) Does the sunny-day filling up of your tank subsidise those who fill up on a rainy day?

North coast visit

Llewellyn has started his PPL licence too in our Red Rocket and passed his first exam, Principles of Flight, on Friday. So this morning we went for a little flight up the north coast and to put in practice some of the things he has been learning.

Having fun with the conversion

For my PPL conversion I need 5 hours solo, so I set off on a flight to Pietermaritzburg filing my first flight plan for the trip. From Maritzburg, I then did my cross-country navigation exercise to Richmond, then Fredenheim, Margate and back to Virginia. I preceded the flight also with an hour and a half instrumentation lesson under the "foggles" notching up an impressive 4,6 hours flying time. This leaves me just short of 2 hours to complete my PPL time and then my flight test.

The Red Rocket has also notched up 97 hours so I need to get to Johannesburg for its 100 hour service... all coming up at me so fast.

Conversion on the Yellow Submarine

I did a dirty today and swopped with Marc (3rd photo) and did my conversion to type Z236 on his Savannah ETD, while he did a conversion on my Sling... it was pretty cool though as this is the first other plane I have flown since getting my NPL licence on the Sling.

Our NPL instructor Brad did the conversion (middle photo) and Marc and I each did 5 landings at Virginia. Marc's plane flew well although I was seriously missing the flood of information available on the MGL efis in the Sling as well as the comfortable speed of my Red Rocket. At least we have converted one more pilot to the Sling. Marc's ETD yellow submarine will be coming with us on our expedition to the Cape in April, so it's good that we are both rated to fly each other's planes.