December 1982 - American Bonanza Society

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News and Views _______ _
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ECONOMICAL LORAN C
Dear ABS :
With th e increasing interest in the
use of Loran C in aircraft came a
special project that became very
exciting to me. As the price of aircraft
Loran units is around S8,000.00, we
decided to try a marine unit. The unit
we chose was a II Morrow Model
502BR, which works very well in an
aircraft according to the manufacturer.
At $1 ,695.00, it represents quite a
savings even though it is not to be
used for primary navigation in an
aircraft. It does make an affordable VFR
substitute DME and RNA V .
The wood floor in the Bonanza is the
perfect place to mount the temporary
mounting rack. The rack folds down flat
when the Loran is not in place. The
power is acquired from the cigarette
lighter jack. The antenna used with this
unit is a standard stainless steel
communications whip that has been
around for years.
The installation was done for Mr.
Don Schiff, ABS # 11753, in his C-33A.
We flew the unit and compared the
readings with his permanently installed
equipment. The accuracy and
performance was incredible. The 48
waypoints can be recorded in the
storage by latitude / longitude (from
published data), or by flying over them
and entering the position at that time.
The unit reads bearing and distance to
a waypoint, your ground track in
degrees magnetic, your ground speed
and your time to the way point. Due to
the physical size of the unit the floor
mounting in the Bonanza is necessary.
Visibility and availability while flying is
very adequate.
Until the Loran C units become more
affordable the marine units offer a very
inexpensive alternative for the VFR pilot
that likes bells and whistles.
Jerry Gordon
Avionics Manager
Santa Barbara Aviation
INADVERTENT RETRACTIONS
Dear ABS:
Your comments on inadvertent
retrac tion s in the October Newsletter
brought to mind some thing s I have
learned .
It has long been said that there are
only two types of pilots - those who
have landed wheels up and those who
will. I am a " who have" type; an
inadvertent wheels instead of flaps.
I have a J Model - it has a bank of
piano hinge switches that includes the
landing gear and flaps. The flaps can
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be retracted with the index finger while
the wheels takes two or more fingers
(this " trick of the trade" was published
in the Newsletter four or five years ago).
So, for those of us who have the
earlier aircraft with the similar switch
problem this should be a back up
safety procedure:
1) Get off the runway and stop
before retracting flaps.
2) Use only the index finger to
retract th e fl aps.
Thi s discussion of flap switch
operation reminds me of another
problem I experienced. I had just about
given up using flaps on landing. I bled
them down on base and final but
invariably when I went to stop their
down travel I moved the switch thru the
off position to the up position . On short
final I found myself screwing around
with the flaps instead of flying the
airplane.
Recently I flew in the right seat of
my aircraft following some work on the
autopilot. The test pilot ran the flaps
down about half way and stopped their
down travel by returning the flap switch
to the off position, but with a difference.
He had slipped his thumb half over on
the next switch so that when he moved
th e flap switch back up he stopped it
on line with the other switches. What a
simple tri ck - but what a good one. I
now use flaps.
One other landing gear reminder that
seems worthwhile. I have mounted on
the deck above my instrument panel a
red light, hooked in parallel with the
gear warning horn. It is at eye level (or
as near as it can be without being on
the windshield). It is bright - it flashes
whenever the gear warning horn blows.
So now when I land wheels up I'll have
to ignore both the horn and a flashing
red light mounted directly in my line of
sight (I am sure it can be ignored but it
will be harder th an with the horn alone).
Clyde Brooks
ABS #10212
american bonanza society
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