Saturday August 29 I flew up to Apex Airpark (S42) in Silverdale, near Seattle, to visit a friend. On rollout the nosewheel developed a severe shimmy. The rudder pedals vibrated like an air hammer. Friends reported seeing the nosewheel shimmy 45 degrees. The effect was similar to driving on a seriously washboarded gravel road. I've experienced slight shimmies in the past, but was always able to stop them by pulling back on the yoke. This time I wasn't moving fast enough to lift the nosewheel off the pavement, and the shimmy continued unabated until the plane was almost stopped. With this massive vibration I was afraid to apply the brakes. Fortunately the 2500 foot runway left more than enough room to coast to a stop.

Once the shimmy ceased everything returned to normal except for particles of metal and part of a rivet that appeared on the rug.

Before taking off Sunday I inspected the nosewheel as carefully as possible given that two men couldn't budge 2469R from its parking spot in the grass. It took quite a blast to free Romeo from the indentations it had made in the moist earth overnight. (The airport grounds are regularly watered.) I taxiied halfway up the taxiway and back to check for anomalies. On takeoff and the subsequent landing at HIO I used the soft field routine to minimize stress on the nosewheel.

The next week I had the shimmy damper rebuilt. It appears to have been low on fluid for some time. As to the bits of metal that appeared on the carpet, the consensus considers these to be leftovers from previous work on the aircraft.

Sunday September 6 I flew down to North Bend (OTH) on the Oregon coast. The excuse was a fly-in and small airshow.
Below: Oil slick on the Oregon coast? (seaweed)

Above: Sandy beaches on the Oregon coast.
The apparent scimitar shape of the propeller is an artifact of the SLR camera's shutter curtain.

Monday I flew up to Tacoma Narrows in Washington. While preflighting Romeo, a veteran mechanic (IA) on vacation from California wandered by. He made a number of interesting observations about the condition of N2469R. He noticed a possible undocumented repair to the airframe near the bottom of the fuselage just aft of the rear window. He noted irregularities in the rivets suggesting the repair. The repair appears to have been properly made. He also noted inferior rivet work on a brand new Cessna parked nearby. Unfortunately he didn't have any business cards to give out - I'd love to have him work on my plane if I pass by his shop.
Tacoma Narrows (TIW) is located at the south tip of a peninsula nearly 300 feet above the adjacent water. Fox Island is in the foreground in the above picture, TIW is in the middle of the picture. You don't want to get too far below the glide path.

As I approached the airport the active runway was changed from 17 to 35 due to shifting winds at 15 knots. The geographical configuration suggested interesting wind effects, so I instituted plan B: keep slightly high and hot to guard against a sudden downdraft, then slow down a few feet above the runway where a sudden downdraft can't hurt you. Don't worry about using up some of the runway, there's plenty left. Even so, I made the 2300' midfield turnoff abeam the tower without strain.

The eaterie located just below the tower is excellent but slightly pricey. An $8 order of shrimp was in reality a modest appetizer, so I ordered a hamburger for my first meal of the day. A local Bonanza pilot afforded excellent hangar talk on the patio during the warm late afternoon. He recounted a tale of how he lost control of his plane after wandering into a cloud at night. That experience inspired him to get his instrument ticket forthwith.

On the way back I retraced my path over Olympia and down Interstate-5 at an altitude of 3000 feet. 3000 feet, 2300 RPM and 23 inches MP, lean to peak with 100LL avgas in the low compression O-470R seems to be a sweet spot for N2469R. This gives 71% power with fuel burn and true airspeed near book values, CHT in the middle of the green (350-375 deg. F), oil temp 160-180 deg. F, and it "sounds good". 3000 feet allows ATC to see me between Seattle and Hillsboro. That altitude is high enough to clear Portland's West Hills flying VFR, yet low enough to enjoy the view. I flew without autopilot to get some practice sticking to an altitude. It did require close attention to the altimeter to maintain altitude in the presence of afternoon updrafts and downdrafts. A distraction can result in a gain or loss of a few hundred feet. The winds at Hillsboro were interesting when I landed (310 at 17 knots gusting to 24), so I didn't worry about the A6 turnoff.

Saturday September 12 I flew down to Prineville Oregon, 11 nm east of Redmond, for an EAA fly-in. A dozen or so friendly pilots were in attendance. As the afternoon wore on a distraught girl drove up. Her pregnant collie had fallen off the back of a flat bed truck she was driving, and she was unable to find her. This was just the excuse the FBO needed for an afternoon flight, so up they went. Unfortunately, they did not sight the dog.

Attendance was light, so I decided to return to Hillsboro instead of camping overnight. Forest fires in the region had left light smoke in the valleys, preventing me from following Highway 20 as I flew into the sunset. If the engine had failed I would have had to land on a forest service road. It might have been wiser to fly up the east side of the Cascades and down the Gorge, but the flight would have been longer. Flying is a series of safety compromises.

Sunday I flew to the (in)famous Flying M Ranch (OR05) in Yamhill Oregon. Flying M has been on my mind since last summer during ground school. I've visited it twice by road, and flew past it twice to take pictures. Calculating aircraft performance required for safe landings and takeoffs were among the exercises I performed in ground school, and later when considering which airplane to buy. Many of my flights into shorter strips were preparation for Flying M. There is one major difference between my previous landings and Flying M - if you have to do a go around, you'd better do it soon, and get it right. A Bellanca Viking pilot didn't, and people died. Recently a 65 horsepower Taylorcraft with two people landed long, attempted a go around, stalled out and ended up in the trees. Fortunately there were no serious injuries.

For a change of pace, I decided to find Flying M this time without any electronic filgerkarb. I flew over Hogg lake and set a course of 210 degrees for the 9 miles to Flying M. I announced my intentions on the Common Traffic Frequency. After several minutes' flying I saw a Skywagon taking off from the airstrip. A plane landing a few minutes earlier mentioned he was was flying an extended downwind. That seemed a reasonable decision.

I circled to to the west to descend to pattern altitude. Before the flight I was concerned I might not be able to spot the ledge at the east end of the runway (mentioned elsewhere). To my relief there was a threshold marking. I decided to fly around a hill southeast of the strip before turning base. The 3-d effects of the terrain I was overflying added to the excitement. On final I rather appreciated N2469R's barn door flaps which allowed a nice safe approach over the trees.

This is the first time I've landed on anything other than a paved strip. Touchdown was uneventful except for the noise of tires on gravel. I hardly touched the brakes as I had plenty of runway left. Indeed, I had to use a bit of power to taxi to a parking spot on the grass.

After breakfast I signed the airstrip log book and took some pictures. I also inspected the runup pad at the west end of the strip for loose gravel. I decided I would keep the plane pointed slightly to the right of the strip during runup, and start the takeoff roll on the grass to the right. On takeoff I advanced the throttle slowly until I built up speed. All this was designed to minimize nicking of the propeller. This is one situation where the extra takeoff performance of my Skylane came in handy. Even with the slow throttle up I was off the ground in plenty of time. I climbed out straight ahead at Vy+10. Subsequent examination revealed no new nicks in the prop.

An interesting place to fly into.

Afterwards I flew into Country Squire airport near Estacada. The picture below was taken from the taxiway. Mt. Hood is in the distance. Contrary to the diagram in the Flight Guide, the taxiway now runs the full length of the runway.

Tuesday I got fed up debugging Windows 98 and decided flight was the appropriate cure. I flew down to Independence (7S5) for lunch at Annie's Airport Cafe. I recorded the cockpit sounds on a Sony DAT (Digital Audio Tape) recorder for later analysis.

During lunch a local Ercoupe owner and I chatted. Before WWII the Ercoupe was designed as a stall-proof spin-proof plane with no rudder pedals. The Ercoupe has attained cult status and a loyal following. Recently the owner bought a new towbar with a removable linchpin. The linchpin separated from the towbar and disappeared in the baggage compartment. After a flight with the whereabouts of the linchpin unknown, the pilot became paranoid and searched for the missing piece. He located it near the flight controls. If it had wedged there he might have had an interesting flight.

On the way back to HIO I passed about a mile west of the Newberg omni just as one of HAI's 172 trainers was reporting passing it. He was told to report right base for Runway 30, and I was told to report reaching left base. After some looking I saw him, a tiny speck in the sky. When I reported turning base Tower asked me to rock my wings, which I did. Again she asked me to rock my wings. Apparently she had the other plane in sight, not me. I saw the 172 approach and started a 360 turn as I reported a bit of paranoia. She cleared me for Runway 2. The other plane landed on 30. I made sure to land and hold short of the runway intersection, just in case.

Back at Caddyshack I transferred the audio recording to the computer. I connected the SPDIF output from the digital tape recorder to the digital input on the Creative Sound Blaster Live digital connector. The sound quit when I attempted to transfer my recording to computer. Time for more debugging. (A new driver fixed the problem.)

After making the transfer using an old fashioned analog connection, I processed the sound to determine the actual RPM when the tachometer read 2300 and 2200 RPM. The tach read 25 RPM low at 2300, about 1 per cent low. I also checked max RPM during takeoff; it was very close to the correct 2600 RPM.

I saved a recording of a typical Skylane N2469R takeoff in RealAudio format for those with big subwoofers and an ear for airplane noise. Some 66 seconds into the recording the engine sound wavers as the plane lifts off. Interference between the direct engine noise and its reflection from the receding runway would explain this effect.

Two days later I embarked on another flight whose purpose was to visit a number of new (to me) airports. The first two stops were at Lebanon (S30) and Creswell Hobby (77S). The landings at Lebanon and Creswell were uneventful except for a NORDO (No Radio) plane that made a low approach underneath me at Creswell. After Arlington and Oshkosh I'm pretty much used to this sort of thing. My next destination was Cottage Grove and lunch at the Village Green Restaurant.

During the climbout from Creswell the cylinder head temp gauge started to fluctuate. The gauge never went above normal, but the fluctuation meant I could not be certain of the engine's condition. There was a slight possibility potentially serious problem in the engine was affecting the reading. I turned back to Hillsboro, climbed to 4500 feet, and picked up radar flight following just in case. After an uneventful flight back to Hillsboro I landed with a reported 11 knot direct crosswind, but I had no difficulty landing and making the 1260 foot A6 turnoff. Shortly afterwards the active runway was changed, Hillsboro knots are not as windy as Oshkosh knots. The erratic CHT readings were caused by a worn out temperature probe. Perhaps the nosewheel shimmy at Apex wore out the probe.

The last weekend in September was Indian Summer. The Beaverton Chapter of the Oregon Pilots Association had a "Poker Run" Saturday. Planes stop at Aurora, Corvallis, McMinville and Scappoose to pick up cards to make their poker hand. The group then converges at Eddie Rickenbacker's and the hands are played. A low fog caressed many of the valleys Friday night. Saturday morning I repeatedly dialed DTC DUATS (Direct Unattended Automatic Terminal System) to see if the fog was burning off as forecast. Each time Flitesoft reported some of the airports still fogged in, so I stayed home. Eventually I recognized DTC was not providing timely weather reports. I called up the weather reports (METAR) on the Internet and discovered the airports on the Poker Run had been VFR for some time. But by now it was too late to stop at all the airports to pick up cards at each one and get back to Hillsboro in time for the game. Considering the comments weather providers make about the Internet not being reliably up to date, I was disappointed that the weather on DTC DUATS was also stale. I also tried to access GTE DUATS but my GTE phone line never seems to get a good connection into GET DUATS.

I tried everything safely and economically possible to save time. I even cut through Salem's air space (with permission), and flew over Cornelius Pass to save time between the lower valley and Scappoose. I even located Caddyshack. But I was till too late for the poker game.

Sunday I decided to "make hay while the sun shines". More precisely, I decided to enjoy some seriously VFR weather before the monsoon arriveth. (Which it did the next week!) I flew an epic flight plan and landed at 11 airports. Normally the coast is fogged in in the morning, so the original flight plan entailed flying down the valley to Roseburg, flying up the coast in the afternoon when the fog would be burned off. Sunday the coast was clear early in the morning, so I flipped the route of my flight plan. This way I would visit the coast airports before the winds picked up.

The first stop was a return to the Flying M ranch for their excellent Sunday breakfast. Again I used dead reckoning from Hoag lake to navigate to the Ranch. I arrived within a fraction of a mile of the strip, an unremarkable achievement considering the flight segment was only 9 miles. This time I decided to "cut the corner" instead of flying around the hill southeast of the strip before turning base. As a result I was a bit hot on final. I did not have to add much power to reach a parking spot near the end of the runway. Neither did I have to use brakes to slow down, so it wasn't a bad landing, just not what I had intended. In the future I'll go around that hill. The real disappointment was the DAT recorder, which chewed up its batteries and went INOP on approach. Landing on gravel makes a unique grinding noise which I wanted to capture on tape.

With fresh batteries in the DAT I flew to Pacific City State (PFC). PFC is a few blocks from the beach. The 1850 foot runway is shorter than Flying M, but PFC's approach is easier and brakes can be used confidently on the asphalt runway. PFC is within a few blocks of the beach, so parking spots are scarce. Most of the parking spots require planes to be backed in on the grass. That's not a one man job with a Skylane. There was a surprising bit of traffic at PFC. Sea gulls attempting to sun themselves on the runway were continually being chased off by planes.

When I made my landings at the coast strips Sunday, the winds were reasonable. Some of these strips are positively wicked when the winds are stronger.

My next stop was Toledo State (5S4), 5 miles ENE of Newport. That runway is 1750 feet long. Landing to the Northwest calls for a curved approach along the river bank. Cool. Unfortunately I was too busy flying the approach and landing to take pictures from the air.

The next stop was Newport (ONP). After Flying M, PFC, and Toledo State I was (to use literary licence) virtually lost on Newport's gargantuan 5400 x 150 foot runway 34 with a brisk headwind. Romeo took on 60 gallons of bargain 100LL petrol.

Next was FLorence Muni (6S2). Florence has a reputation for tricky turbulence caused by nearby sand dunes. The winds were manageable when I landed in the early afternoon. Once parked I could hear the low pitched call of a nearby raven, Further down the coast I visited Lakeside State (9S3), a 2150 foot grass strip. This was the first time I've landed at a grass strip. Landing on a grass strip means you don't hear the chirp of rubber on pavement. There's not much point greasing a landing because you'll be bouncing over undulations in the grass anyway.

Bandon State (S05) and Cape Blanco (5S6) were next. There really is a bit of white on the side of the cape. From Cape Blanco I turned east to follow a valley past Powers State (6S6) to Roseburg. I decided to skip the 2500 foor grass strip because it would have required losing some 3000 feet of altitude to land there. Afterwards I'd have to climb back up again.

The last two stops were Roseburg (RBG) and Cottage Grove (61S). Both of these are located in relatively narrow valleys for mainstream airports. Flying the pattern is interesting. Picking up the 45 degree entry to Cottage Grove's right hand pattern required maneuvering in tight quarters. Next time I'll cheat. I had a hamburger at the bowling lanes next to the airport.

By this time I'd had about enough flying for the day. For the first time in a few weeks I powered up the autopilot and let George fly me home. Seattle Center helped watch for traffic. Near Salem ATC reported "numerous targets". Sounds like a war movie, but I saw only one.

The Oregon Pilots Association has awards for pilots who have landed at 25 and 50 Oregon airports. The weather forecast predicted a possible start of the Oregon Monsoon Season later in the week. Once again I decided to make hay while the Sun shined. I planned a flight to visit six nearby Oregon airports. A low overcast hung on until late afternoon, ignoring Raindance's promises to go away by 2 p.m. local time. The crisp cool days of autumn had not arrived, and considerable haze was left over by the time I took off.

First stop was Valley View (5S9) in Estacada. 7 miles north was Sandy River (03S), a 2115 foot long turf strip. A few ultralights were parked at the strip in addition to spam cans. I next flew up the Columbia River to Cascade Locks (CZK), a 30 x 1800 foot strip near the banks of the Columbia. Departing Cascade Locks I made a climbing turn over the river on the way to the next destination, Hanel field near the city of Mt. Hood.

By this time the Sun was starting to get a bit low. Visibility landing to the west at Sandy River and Cascade Locks left something to be desired. I decided to turn back towards Portland. I checked in with Portland Approach to get flight following to Vernonia (05S). Portland Approach called out a converging plane near my altitude. I couldn't see it because it was in the sun until it passed by a half mile or so away. I crossed the Multnomah Channel and was approaching Scappoose when Portland Approach cut me loose. Shortly afterwards I heard Approach talking to a pilot who wished to practice insturment approaches to Scappoose. By the time I saw his plane he was within a mile of me, near my altitude.

Vernonia is another grass strip. A hill near the east end of the strip suggested a curved approach. The Sun was near sunset and I would have landed to the east, but the windsock indicated enough wind to suggest otherwise.