Visiting Tedderfield, home of The Airplane Factory

My trip to The Airplane Factory in pics. Wow, the factory in Johannesburg is pumping with over 200 airplanes flying or in production and more on order. My planes 400 hour service was like the pitt-stop at a Grand Prix with parts and covers coming off, the leather seats being treated, fine-tuning and spark splugs being changed and a huge checklist of regulatory maintenance checks being done.

Mainenance guys Dan and Nic with Airplane Factory Director Jean giving ZDL its checks.

Me en route to Johannesburg, home of The Airplane Factory

Passing by the mountains half-way

My daughter is teaching English in South Korea and this is what her kids came up with

Nic at The Aiplane Factory working on ZDL

New Slings in production at The Aiplane Factory

One of the reasons I love my Slings - designed and made in South Africa by a great team of incredible guys!

Dan working an an IS motor upgrade from Rotax

Not sure these lines are straight but he was giving it a bash

Not enough room in the hangars for all the planes, so there's a parking lot. I think I counted over 15 planes at the Factory

ZDLs tail inspection cover comes off to check the cabling and connector rods

This is what my prop hub looks like under the nose cone

ZDLs wheel nuts get checked and the tyres pumped - about the only rime it's possible to get to the valves to inflate them

Tea-break and the grease-monkeys sit on the wall

Dan checking my software and audio warning signals for the CAA inspection

Piet, the CAA Inspector makes the trip to Tedderfield to look over my plane for its addition to the flight school register as a training plane

Stefan, another of the factory's handsome guys who are working in the aviation industry

The Airplane Factory Director, Jean, is hands-on and brilliant when it comes to trouble-shooting.. making an adjustment to my seat catch mechanism.

The flight home showed how brown the winter grass is looking. Due to a gathering storm and winds I had to divert and re-route my jounrey home via Newcastle, Eshowe and the coast back to Virginia

The haze nearer the coast was bad and several airports were declared IMC - instrument meteorological conditions and not suitable for landing due to the poor visibility

I cam across patches of cloud which I had to circumnavigate to get through to the coast

Darkness fell and after the 3 hour flight I had to dim the computer EFIS screens which became too bright and landed in the dark after 6pm, mission accomplished.

Tracking my flight back from Johannesburg

Was quite a day today with the CAA arriving to inspect my plane in Johannesburg for training purposes and then getting back to Durban with the south-wester that was brewing a storm, the weather changing en route. I had to divert from my routing to Ladysmith and Pietermaritburg to route instead to Eshowe then getting to the coast around Tugela and come down the coast to Virginia. The clouds were rolling in and by the time I got to the coast the clouds were down to 500ft, so if you have a look at the tracking of my plane you will see I actually overshot the coast and had to head back in from the sea to reach the coastline.

 

I flew up yesterday so that the plane's 400 hour service and annual inspection could be completed in time for the CAA inspection and for me to get home before it got too dark. As it was, I only got to leave Johannesburg at 3pm and landed in the dark at 6pm. Richards Bay had already been declared IMC but I requested a 500 ft routing in on a cross-country flight and the visibility improved along the coast as I transited through King Shaka airspace to Virginia. I will load more pics tomorrow.

Upgrading the sound

After our power failure in the plane last year, I believed it was time to upgrade our headsets to the latest LightSpeed Zulu PFX headsets with bluetooth connectivity. This allows you to connect and operate your cell phone independently of the aircraft’s radio and power systems and hear yourself think above the noise of the engine. The headsets which arrived yesterday on order from the States are the company's newest generation headsets to hit the market. They are equipped with advanced noise cancelling technology that can also map the auditory landscape within the ear cap to assess and use the information to fine tune noise cancellation and audio responses.

With the free FlightLink app on my iPhone or iPad I can also record the conversations between pilot and the Air Traffic Controller and play them back or store them in my iTunes library for later retrieval. One can enable the Voice Clarity function which improves the quality of incoming calls from ATC by boosting frequencies common in human speech while reducing those that are not. Yay! for technological advances. I am looking forward to using them on my flight to Johannesburg on Monday to take ZDL up for its 400 hour service and annual inspection. 

Slings Rock!

This must be one of the greatest Sling pics I have seen.. taken by the Sling USA factory team flying north and east from their home base in Torrance, California, up through Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, and South Dakota to Oshkosh in Wyoming, for the world's biggest annual airshow where The Airplane Factory will once again be exhibiting. Mount Rushmore in South Dakota is home to the National Memorial of Presidents which is visited by 3 million tourists each year (compared to the 10 mil that visit the whole of South Africa annually) and it's rare to catch a glimpse of the Presidents by air!

The Sling USA team fly over Mount Rushmore, South Dakota

National Memorial of Presidents in South Dakota, USA

Commercial Pilot's Licence start

I took the next step towards a Commercial Pilot's Licence by registering for 2 Com exams - Air Law and Meteorology, today. 

I will write these in August and hope to do 2 exams a month until completed. I am doing this simultaneously with my NPL Instructor's training, so if I can get though the training and exams should have both by year end possibly.

Sunday training

Great pic of me flying in the right seat, taking off from Virginia Airport to go to Ballito and Isithebe up the North Coast where I did some circuit training for my Instrcutor's rating today. Thanks Trevor Viljoen for the photo. 

Cockpit view of the north coast

The Tugela River Mouth as we turned to go inland to Isithebe

The view back to the Tugela Mouth with the Lighthouse just in from the shore

Instructor Brad (right) with me at the controls having "patter" training simulating my giving a student pilot instruction

What stunning weather and beautiful coastline to be following

Umhlanga coastline comes into view as we return to Durban

More pics of the Fly-in

Here are some superb pics lifted off photographer Debbie Geldenhuys' Facebook Group, one of the organisers of the Fly-In today...

The Eagle has landed..

Final approach runway 01 Aloe Wildlife Estate, moments before touchdown

Touchdown, neatly on the main wheels and keeping the nose-wheel in the air to reduce pressure on the oleo along the grassed runway

Landing with full flaps to keep the plane speed lower on touchdown

Local aviator Muffy (left) with Dave and fellow aviator

Aloe Wildlife Estate

I just love Durban in Winter with temperatures rising to over 25c. This morning we woke up to a beautiful sunrise and not a cloud in the sky and we were off to the new Aloe Wildlife Estate for their first official fly-in. ZDL was the first aircraft to land and we were soon joined by 12 more. Debbie and Hennie, developer of the estate and future aeropark,  saw to it that we had fabulous cakes and snacks followed by a hamburger breakfast whilst her photographic club also had a field day with the aircraft taking off and landing.. expect some snappy pics to follow.

Durban in all it's glory beneath our wings

On the ground at Virginia just before departure for the fly-in

Durban City and the Harbour

On the ground at the new Aloe Wildlife Estate after a text-book landing on the good, grassed runway which is super-dry with the lack of winter rain

The aircraft lined up after landing here

One of the brighter aircraft

We met Karyn who flies this "Chipmunk" Aircraft out of Pietermaritzburg

Tail-end view of the Chipmunk taildragger aircraft

Eyes to the sky for the group of enthusiastic photographers who had a field day with the aircraft taking off and landing

On the way home with full tummies after a scrumptious breakfast

The route home takes one via Cooper's Lighthouse on the Bluff, then to the Harbour Entrance and further north along the coast to Virginia Airport

The photographic club had their funny hats and Christmas in July event at the Airfield, so Llewellyn posed with these borrowed accessories

Left and Right

I am feeling confident flying from the right as well as the left seat now and yesterday evening before sunset our CFI Brad and I did a few more manoeuvres over Durban skyye as the sun was setting including banking stalls, simulated engine failures on take-off and precautionary landings and how one would take this through with a student. Coming in to land on the beach I was thinking the plane needs a loud warning hooter and it was looking like the plane would have to be ditched in the sea if the beachgoers didn't move in time.

ZDL cockpit seen from the right side

Dave left with Brad right

Instructors and Night flight

A whirlwind day today with a sudden ad hoc inspection of the Flight School by Raasa, the administrative body delegated by the Civil Aviation Authority that looks after Part 62 aviation training organisations. That all went well, along with a decision in favour of my completing my Instructor's training in our own plane ZDL for my National Flight Instructor rating.

The Durban skyline was clear after the cold front and rain which washed away the smog

 The Raasa inspection was followed by my third Instructor's "patter" training flight, raking up 3,5 hours towards the 15 needed for the licence as well as exams.

The sun was setting over Durban as my Instructor Brad and I returned to Virginia

Feeling slightly strange sitting in the left seat but flying the plane as Brad gives me instructor "patter" training

ZDL cockpit by day

My day flight was followed by a bite to eat then a short night flight from Virginia to King Shaka International where we did a touch and go, this time with me back in the left seat

Llewellyn and I with our night lights on

The Umhlanga beachfront, pier and lighthouse by night

Approaching King Shaka runway 24 by night

GPS making inroads

Whilst navigation by map remains a part of every pilot's training, GPS based aircraft navigation and surveillance systems are becoming the norm.

Our flight school's Sling aircraft are fitted with Cape Town manufactured  MGL avionics "glass cockpit" GPS based EFIS systems which give you map and navigation data combined with full engine statistics and information management capability. The auto-pilot in ZDL is especially useful for longer flights and will take us across the Mozambique Channel to Madagascar next year.

The MGL EFIS and GPS in our aircraft

NewGen

The next generation of GPS-based aircraft technology is the "NewGen" ADS-B transponders. (Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast). This is surveillance technology to replace radar tracking of aircraft and is becoming mandatory in certain airspaces in the United States as well as Australia. Our aircraft in Durban operating in the King Shaka airspace are already required to be fitted with Mode S transponders. These send out signals which can be tracked by the conventional radar systems used in our controlled airspace by the air traffic controllers. The ADS-B equipment is a modified Mode S transponder in which each aircraft uses GPS to find it's own position, then broadcasts this position to other aircaft as well as air traffic controllers. Discussion in the States is around making this new equipment mandatory for General Aviation Aircraft and in the interim in a spreading number of controlled airspaces.

The facility for aircraft to broadcast their position and be tracked by other aircraft is intended to greatly enhance safety in the sky and in the States, where air traffic is reaching capacity loads, will enable aircraft to be routed closer together using the more reliable and accurate ADS tracking system.

Predictions are that by 2020, most aircraft will be fitted with this equipment.