After 41 hours on the tach, N6359V and I have returned to San Jose following my trip to EAA's Airventure. Here are some notes about both the trip and the show which may interest some of you who could not attend or who just wonder about a coupe's high-altitude long-distance performance:
* My '65 Alon weighs 974 lbs empty. For the trip, my full
fuel gross weight was 1325 lbs. I have a 75 hour SMOH C-90
and a 7148 prop. Navigation was primarily pilotage plus
using a Garmin GPS-195. Through the mountains I followed the
airways (VOR navigation) for additional safety. Prior to the
trip I installed a Precise Flight Standby Vacuum System to
provide redundancy for the flight instruments.
* My first leg from San Jose to Reno included an IFR climb
through the usual west coast morning overcast and a gradual
climb to 11,000 for the portion of the trip over Donner
Pass. Due to the spacing between available fuel stops and
for personal comfort I flew 180-250 nautical mile legs.
Approximately 500 miles were flown on top of broken to
overcast layers for a smoother ride.
* By segmenting the trip into legs where I flew out of the
highest altitude airports between 6:30am and 11:00am I
minimized density altitude problems. I arrived at my final
destinations for the day by 2:00pm and would have had to be
very careful if I had to go-around, because some of the
Montana airports had field elevations of over 6800 feet and
temperature was approximately 85F - that's around a 10,000
ft density altitude.
* In order to avoid below IFR minimums weather on my return
I had to take a detour through Rapid City which required
half an hour at 12,500 ft. 59V was not happy there; at
2:00pm the 30F above standard temperature meant no margin
for error. I did some ridge soaring to get up to altitude,
but on the other side of the ridge I had to hold the nose up
at climb attitude at 60 kts to minimize sink.
* All cruising was done at 2475 RPM with a freshly
calibrated tach and calibrated oil temperature gauge. Where
terrain permitted, I climbed at 72-75 kts; in many places I
had to climb at 60 kts to clear terrain. Leaning was done
for max RPM then just barely on the rich side of smooth
running. Fuel consumption was 5.2 GPH. 59V used 2 QTS of
oil for the trip (oil temp ran about 190 max during climbs
in the afternoon at high altitude).
* I took the route through Reno, Salt Lake City, Rawlins,
and Fort Dodge because it was the shortest - only a hundred
miles or so more than the great-circle route. The Alon
performed well at altitude. Winds were forecast less than 20
knots for all segments and the GPS registered 83 kts to 117
kts at 9,500 to 11,500 ft cruising altitude (I generally
flight-plan 92 kts).
* The accessories I was most grateful to have were:
-- My Bose headset which reduced noise to jet levels.
-- An AM/FM portable and music switcher for entertainment.
-- A vernier mixture control made adjustment so easy.
-- A dacron pile seat cover kept the vinyl seat cool.
-- A stick-on sunshade kept cabin temperatures very
comfortable.
-- The GPS-195 moving map which made navigation so simple.
* On the Monday before the show I showed up at Burlington,
WI just in time to receive an excellent briefing by Syd
Cohen on formation flying into Oshkosh. Being #5 in the
trail of 'coupes from Burlington to Oshkosh was the most fun
of the entire trip. Due to the congestion we were re-routed
once around a holding pattern at Rush Lake; I lost sight of
the railroad track we were supposed to pick up (after going
around the lake) as well as 'coupes 1-4 who had gone ahead
because another aircraft had slipped into line ahead of me;
fortunately I led 'coupes #6 and #7 to the proper runway.
* The show was great. Everyone who owns an aircraft has got
to do it at least once. Manufacturers exhibits, forums, the
afternoon airshow, homebuilts and other unusual aircraft,
and the museum (air conditioned) were the highlights. I came
home with some goodies, more aviation knowledge, and a real
appreciation for my Alon.
* I answered the question by controllers "what kind of
aircraft is that? ECHO-ROMEO-CHARLIE-OSCAR?" about twenty
times during the trip.
I enjoyed meeting a really great bunch of 'coupers and look
forward to doing it again sometime.
David Smoler | __ | San Jose, CA
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Alon A-2 | \____/ | N6359V
s/n A35 () () () based at RHV
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