Antique Automobile Club of America Fall Meet
Pat and I attended the AACA fall meet this past weekend. Last year I was there as a judge and was busy working. This year since it was Pat’s first year I decided not to judge and just enjoy the show with Pat.
If you enjoy old, old cars Hershey PA is the place to be in early October each year for this meet and car show. It is exciting to see a car that is 100 years old, but at this show you can see numerous cars that are 100 plus years old. We saw at least 5 or 6 that dated back in the late 1800s. And they were still running!
The Car Corral was our first stop on Friday morning. This is a show in itself. If you are a serious buyer you should be able to find something that fits your taste and budget in the Car Corral. Hyman LTD had numerous cars there for sale and one the one that really caught my attention was a 1941 Chrysler Thunderbolt (pictured above) for sale for a mere 1.3 million. A car that until this show I had only seen on TV shows. I did see one car in the corral that I wanted to drive home and it was within my budget. It was this little red three wheeler. It looked like a Morgan but I do not think it was one. Pat and I would look good cruising the streets, me in the Lomax and her in this.
After the Car Corral we spent a lot of time in the large flea market. I believe you could buy enough parts there to build a complete car and drive it home. Pats favorite car of the weekend was this Fascination Car that we saw on the grounds of the flea market. My favorite car/motorcycle within the flea market was this old rusted motorcycle, a 1911 Reading Standard. Check out the price tag on this old rusty thing. Another interesting car on the flea market grounds was this NanoCar that was built by some vocational school students at Cumberland Perry Area Vocational Technical School. You start it with a cell phone by sending it a text message – but no texting while driving. It is powered by an electric engine. With a biodiesel generator used to charge the batteries. The body is literally a Dodge Durango that the students sliced in half and narrowed to fit their car.
After we walked and walked the flea market it was time to go back to our motor home and unload all of the stuff we purchased and take a little break. Our evening out was spent at the AACA Museum looking at what else more cars and motorcycles. The museum has a great motorcycle collection.
Early Saturday morning we were off to the big car show. And what a show it was. My favorites were the three wheel cars and motorcycles. Yes I have a thing for three wheel vehicles whether they are a car or a motorcycle with a side car, I just like them. We saw what is perhaps the world’s smallest motorcycle with a side car, a Skat Kitty. I could put this little thing in the trunk of my Lomax and use it instead of a spare tire. One that was most interesting was this Trihawk by Harley Davidson.
Here is what I could find online about this vehicle:
The Trihawk was originally envisioned by Lou Richards, and further design and development was accomplished by a core group including Bob McKee, David Stollery, Dick Kleber and Bill Mozon. The Trihawk was first manufactured in 1982 by Design Lab, Inc. at a facility in Mokena, Illinois. After completing a preproduction run of 10-12 units, manufacturing and sales were moved to a new facility in Dana Point, California under the new moniker of Hawk Vehicles, Inc. where full production began in 1983. Production ceased at the end of 1985, after company interests were purchased by Harley Davidson. Between 90 and 100 units were produced.
The vehicle is powered by a 4-cylinder, air cooled 1,299cc boxer engine that drives the front wheels. The engine and transmission came from the Citroën GSA. Suspension components were utilized from the Renault R5 (Le Car) whereas Honda was the choice for the dash board instruments. Due to its extremely low centre of gravity and wide front track, the Trihawk was capable of attaining upwards of 1G force during skid pad testing, matching the Corvette and Countach of the day.
If you enjoy 3 wheel vehicles and want to read more about them I am starting a three wheel owners group dedicated to 3 wheelers – Three Wheel Association or TWA. Please contact me for more information.
It was a busy two days but enjoyable.
Automotive Appraisals & Motorcycle Appraisals
In addition to conducting aircraft appraisals Flymall is proud to offer automotive appraisals on:
Classic cars
Antique cars
Custom cars
Street Rods
Hot Rods
Historic cars
Fire trucks
Motorcycles
Three Wheel vehicles
Microcars
And more.
Our rates are as follows:
Regular appraisal $150.00 – usually 4 to 6 pages including pictures.
Regular appraisal completed at our office $100.00.
Car Show appraisal $75.00
Pre-accident appraisal $150.00
Pre-purchase appraisal $250.00
Diminished value appraisal $250.00
Appraisal for bankruptcy $150.00
Visit our Wheels N Wings section of our site for more details.
Two DC Airports Open Pet ‘Pit Stop’ Areas
Two Washington, DC area airports have opened pet relief areas giving animals a place to go to the bathroom before getting on an airplane. The two fenced-in indoor areas at Washington’s Dulles airport have fake fire hydrants, artificial turf, and plastic baggies so that owners can clean up after their pets. They also have a flushing system and ventilation to keep things sanitary. Radio station WTOP reports that there are outdoor areas at both Dulles and Washington Reagan International Airport.
Federal regulations require “service animal relief areas” for animals like guide dogs who accompany their owners of flights, but the areas are open to all pets traveling with their families.
Airplane Upset Recovery Training Aid
FAA pdf on Airplane Upset Recovery Training (25 mb file)
‘Get out of Dodge’ with CDR
A rarely used, but important tool available for General Aviation aircraft flying out of busy airports is CDR (Coded Departure Routes). Knowing that CDRs exist, knowing how to file a flight plan requesting them, and how to use a CDR if assigned, can save you minutes (sometimes hours) of sitting on the ground when there is bad weather along your route of flight.
What are CDRs?
CDRs are preplanned routes of flights that can be issued to pilots when thunderstorms, turbulence, or traffic constraints preclude ATC from issuing the standard routing between the airport pairs. These preplanned routes have special 8-letter identifiers (such as MDWTEBC6 ) where the first three letters are the departure airport ID, and the next three letters are the arrival airport ID, and the last two letters are for specifying which specific CDR route is to be used between the two airports. Thus the origin of the name CDR (Coded Departure Routes).
By giving a controller the ability to assign a preplanned CDR, coordination between ATC facilities and the flight crew is simplified. This can save time and avoid possible mistakes. This is done simply by assigning an 8-character clearance versus a lengthy reroute with all the Airway, VOR and intersections.
For more information on CDRs click here
Light Sport Aircraft
Flymall.org is pleased to announce that we have joined forces with another aircraft dealer and we can now offer our customers new and used Light Sport Aircraft. These include Tecnam, Piper, Cessna, Remos, and Czech Sport Aircraft. You can deal directly with us and receive the Flymall personal touch throughout the purchase process. We are looking forward to assisting you with your Light Sport Aircraft purchase. Blue skies and tailwinds.
Can a flight instructor teach judgment?
Click here for our featured aircraft this month
There is an old aviation saying: “Good judgment comes from experience and experience comes from bad judgment”. And another well known quote that is found in numerous FAA manuals goes like this: “A superior pilot uses his superior judgment to avoid those situations which require the use of superior skill”. But how do we get that “Good or superior judgment”? The FAA does not tell us flight instructors how to teach judgment. However FAA manuals do define pilot judgment as the mental process by which the pilot recognizes, analyzes, and evaluates information regarding himself/herself, the aircraft, and the external environment. And they go on to say that good pilot judgment can be developed as part of a flight-crew training program. But the FAA does not mention anything on how to teach judgment, more so good judgment. The FAA does say that the best way to learn good judgment is through flying.
A quote from FAA-P- 8740, Pilot Prerogatives: “You don’t have to fly every day to be good – to be sharp – but you do have to fly and to practice often. Practice makes better pilots. What is needed, then, is to gain exposure to flying in small, digestible chunks, and to effectively evaluate this experience. This is how judgment is developed.” As an instructor it is easier to fine tune a student’s flying skills than to teach them good judgment.
Words like sound, good, critical, poor, best, professional are often used to describe what kind of judgment a pilot has or should have. The FAA explains (in very good detail) what can impair our judgment or what can have an adverse effect on our judgment. Designated Pilot Examiners use judgment when conducting a check ride. We as pilots are even taught that good judgment is so critical to flying safely.
So how do we teach good judgment? When examining this question in the various FAA manuals we find that the FAA does give some clues on teaching good judgment. Judgment goes hand-in-hand with decision making and experience is also used when discussing judgment. So perhaps the key the teaching judgment (good judgment) is to give your students the necessary tools and skills so that they demonstrate “good” decision making skills, and through their good decision making skills they will gain experience at their own comfort level.
Pilots can relate to real life stories or experiences from other pilots. There is nothing better than to learn from others mistakes. So when teaching judgment I find that it is best to give real life examples or scenarios. Share with your students your experiences. A good discussion to assist in teaching judgment is a talk about early fuel stops and weather delays. Years ago I was told a story about an airline captain on a flight from the west coast to New York. As the flight neared the Ohio area the talk on the frequency was about a line of storms and that there would be a delay of about an hour getting into New York. ATC was giving holding instructions to pilots and most said that they had enough fuel to hold for over an hour so hold they would. This particular captain had “be there, done that” and he decided to land short of New York and take on fuel. After landing and refueling he arrived up at altitude only to hear on the frequency that the other flights that decided to hold were getting low on fuel and had to land ASAP for fuel. Our captain displayed good judgment, he evaluated the weather and the amount of traffic on the frequency and with all of that information he knew it was best to land early and get fuel. As it turns out his flight was one of the first into KJFK (the delay ended up being more than 2 hours). Perhaps his good judgment was because of his experience. So back to our question of teaching judgment, we can give our students tools to assist them in their decision making process and thus they will be gaining experience. And it is their experience that will give them good judgment. We as flight instructors may not teach judgment directly however we teach decision making and it is through decision making and experience that pilots learn judgment (good judgment).
Help you sell your aircraft
Flymall has a new campaign to help you sell your aircraft. Flymall pays for all advertising, responds to all inquires, prequalifies all potential buyers and sends you only qualified/serious buyers. You will be responsible for demoing the aircraft. Flymall is only acting as an advertising agency therefore we will not be able to demo the aircraft. We are able to meet a buyer and show them the aircraft in the hangar or at your tie down, however we will not be able to fly the aircraft.
Our fee for this service is $900.00. There is a $450.00 fee due at the signing of our agreement and the balance of $450.00 is due when the aircraft is sold. On average it will cost between $300.00 and $600.00 to sell an aircraft. We will sign a broker agreement for 120 days. At the end of the 120 days if the aircraft has not sold we can revisit our options and depending on the situation there may be an additional fee to continue listing the aircraft.
Day Trip Ideas
Flymall.org has launched a new section on our website called “DayTripper”. It is full of day trip and/or flyout ideas. It uses the same program used for our aircraft inventory you can use the “Search Aircraft” box in the upper right corner and use key words to find an idea. You can type in “flyout” and all of the flyout ideas will be displayed. If you plan to be at an airport and you want to know what there is to do there you can type in the airport name or identifier to see what we have available. We are also adding local places to eat or for catering for each airport listed in our database. You can also search for ideas by the city or town name. There are also non flying day trip ideas, just enter your topic of interest to see what we have listed, for example type in “trains” and you will find several day trip ideas for the train enthusiasts. If you like driving or bicycling type in “covered bridge, tour, drive, driving, cruise, cars, automotive, motorcycle, or cycling and I have a covered bridge tour idea – we will be adding more driving tours or scenic drives . There are also some unusual vacation ideas listed, for example we have an underwater hotel in Florida. We also have several hiking and/or bicycling trail finders that allow you to search for a hiking or bicycle trail near you. For most we have a link for the local weather and forecast (aviation and non aviation weather is available via the link). We plan to have the weather available for all daytripper events. We are still building the database, so this is a work in progress – keep checking back to see what has been added. If you have an idea please email us, you can email us directly from the daytripper section of this site.
Ferry Pilot Services
For aircraft delivery or ferry pilot services contact www.theferrypilot.com. They offer services throughout the U.S., Canada, the Bahamas, Puerto Rico and the Caribbean!
