The Hangar - 2014-01-13 (page 3 of 3)

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6:08 PM

@abelenky ...one has numbers on it, the other doesn't.

user image

> Ever wondered how the US Air Force cleans its planes? Here's one way: They use a giant shower on a runway—or a planewash if you must. Here you can see it cleaning the salt accumulated on a Lockheed Martin WC-130 Hercules after flying through storms over the Gulf of Mexico. (Gizmodo)

lmfao!!

trying to promote Aviation.SE at Flightaware: flightaware.com/squawks/view/1/recently/new/39376/…

3

upvote!

done :)

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> This Long-Exposure Shot of a Boeing 757 Taking Off Looks Like a Runway in the Sky

6:22 PM

i... i guess? it looks like a time-lapse of an airplane. since when are centerline lights red? ;P

@egid Since you've got 1000 feet or less to stop before you're in the overrun :-)

!!teachmetofly

Otto the Autopilot

Lesson #34: Don't kill yourself to save the plane. The plane is there to save the pilot.

!!tell SentryRaven lesson 4

Otto the Autopilot

@SentryRaven Lesson #4: Push forward: buildings get bigger. Pull back: buildings get smaller. Pull back harder: buildings get bigger again.

6:24 PM

"Shiny side up. Rubber side dow. Aircraft, pilot, and passengers all in reusable condition."

:D

Good evening, all!

evening!

ohai

Photos of Mumbai's new $890m airport

@DannyBeckett related to #34: "The insurance company owns the airplane."

6:32 PM

I'll add that, cheers :p

bot's restarting now...

!!tell egid lesson 44

Otto the Autopilot

@egid Lesson #44: The insurance company owns the airplane.

!!teachmetofly

Otto the Autopilot

Lesson #30: Never fly in the same cockpit with someone braver than you.

Just to summarize, you have programmed this bot to dish out the most common phrases flight instructors have ever said?

@SentryRaven The discussion is here: meta.aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/186/… - it's about 4 people's suggestions

The bot does other neat stuff too, like:

!!weather LPL

Otto the Autopilot

6:38 PM

LPL/EGGP: Liverpool John Lennon Airport • Observed: 18 mins ago • Wind: 140°/SE @ 14kts • Visibility: 6.21mi/9.99km • Clouds: Few @ 2,000ft; Scattered @ 3,000ft • Temperature: 7.0°C/45°F • Dewpoint: 4.0°C/39°F • Pressure: 29.41" Hg/996mb • Conditions: VFR

Does he also query by ICAO code?

yup

!!weather kjfk

Otto the Autopilot

JFK/KJFK: John F Kennedy International Airport • Observed: 48 mins ago • Wind: 170°/S @ 12kts; gusts @ 20kts • Visibility: 10.0mi/16.09km • Clouds: Few @ 12,000ft; Scattered @ 16,000ft; Broken @ 23,000ft • Temperature: 8.9°C/48°F • Dewpoint: 3.9°C/39°F • Pressure: 30.07" Hg/1,018mb • Conditions: VFR

Can he also obtain a forecast?

there's also !!metar xxx and !!taf xxx

6:39 PM

@SentryRaven I think !!taf works now

!!taf kjfk

Otto the Autopilot

KJFK 131734Z 1318/1424 17014KT P6SM BKN250
FM140400 19010KT P6SM SCT040 SCT080 BKN150
FM141200 20008KT 6SM -SHRA SCT015 BKN035 OVC050
FM141500 23007KT 3SM -RA BR OVC010
FM142000 28006KT P6SM BKN030

so far, there's no translated (English) TAF command

Nifty... I am impressed...

!!taf EDLW

Otto the Autopilot

TAF EDLW 131700Z 1318/1418 18006KT 9999 SCT030

there's a full list of command suggestions here: meta.aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/156/…

6:40 PM

oh sure ask him for hard things like non-US fields! :P

feel free to add some

@SentryRaven Thanks :) brb....

Well, international audience here, so he should be able to dish out some international infos. I am not asking him to speak with a British accent...

The command list already looks quite good.

@SentryRaven Apparently the international coverage is "spotty" aside from major fields that airlines use - something about ADDS not having all of the minor/GA airports around the world. @PatoSáinz gripes about it all the time 'cuz he's a whiner :-)

Well, let's see how small we can go...

!!weather EDGS

The hard one is gonna be !!airport - I still don't think we have a handle on where to get that data from :-)

Otto the Autopilot

6:43 PM

SGE/EDGS: Siegerland Airport • Observed: 23 mins ago • Wind: 210°/SSW @ 7kts • Visibility: 2.49mi/4.01km • Clouds: Broken @ 200ft • Temperature: 3.0°C/37°F • Dewpoint: 3.0°C/37°F • Pressure: 29.82" Hg/1,010mb • Conditions: LIFR

!!airport EDFQ

Otto the Autopilot

@SentryRaven That didn't make much sense. Use the !!/help command to learn more.

Quick question though, why is pressure given in Altimeters for a European airport? Could you give both, inHg and hPa?

!!/help

Otto the Autopilot

@SentryRaven Information on interacting with me can be found at this page

Nevermind my last question.... I am blind..

7:37 PM

@egid aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/986/… has me wondering, do you still do the "tennis ball in the exhaust" or other simple preflight sabotage items to see if students are actually checking stuff on a preflight? I only know one instructor at NFI who does that stuff.

8:02 PM

!!weather KMYF

Otto the Autopilot

MYF/KMYF: Montgomery Field • Observed: 10 mins ago • Wind: 0°/N @ 0kts • Visibility: 10.0mi/16.09km • Clouds: Clear • Temperature: 25.0°C/77°F • Dewpoint: -9.4°C/15°F • Pressure: 30.26" Hg/1,025mb • Conditions: VFR

@voretaq7 I do not. Crap like that seems risky unless the aircraft is going into an inspection right after (which is how UND does preflight competitions).

Anyway, I got out of the primary instruction game as much as I could... I'm a better instrument instructor mostly because it's the stuff that I enjoy teaching more.

I do get the reasons behind it, but I just think that seeing what a student does is as simple as watching them

@egid See I'm a fan of it but only if you know what you've sabotaged - as the instructor you walk out to the plane and go right to the taped-over static port or the tennis ball in the cooling fins, or whatever. It seems like a great way to empirically show the student "This is why you look!"

of course the most dangerous things I had to deal with in preflight were a flat nosewheel (new tube too. Grr. Argh.) and a bird that decided my tailcone was a good nesting site (and was none-too-happy about me trying to evict her)

@voretaq7 Yeah, but even if you know - one distraction, and your clever plan becomes a hazard.

i had a bird nesting in my left horizontal tail

8:18 PM

@egid true - it's definitely something that requires extra care on the instructor's part.

the control lock fixes the elevator nose-down, and grummans have exposed lightening holes on the tail

so there was a nice 2.5" birdhouse door back there

had to pop the elevator off and unstuff the entire surface

it's now covered in speed tape

i only noticed because there was straw poking out

that's not an area i had previously expected to ever find anything... i'd always been told birds & insects tended to like cowlings (warmth, etc)

A bird tried to build a nest inside the pitot tube of an airplane I was going to fly. Though, the likelihood of successfully completing a nest inside the tube seems so infinitesimal that I suspect it was deliberate avian sabotage.

2

@voretaq7 congrats on reaching the 3k rep mark. Just gave it the last push :-)

@egid I was absolutely shocked by how quickly those little bastards could build a nest.

@BretCopeland our local mud wasps nest in my fuel drains

heh

bah 2972

8:25 PM

@voretaq7 oh, um, wonderful. I imagine that makes preflight more exciting.

i was hoping to beat @voretaq7 to 3k :P

@BretCopeland I carry pipecleaners now. And during bug season I fabricated drain plugs out of pipe cleaners to keep the little bastards out of there.

@egid Fist one to 100k wins. Then we shut down the site.

5

only the under-wing sumps though, not the fuel strainer (for reasons surpassing my understanding)

@BretCopeland ~~LEEEEEEEEEROYYYYYYYYYY JENKINS!~~ JONNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN SKEET!

@egid, sorry for letting @voretaq7 win, I was not aware of the close draw. For the 100k race you'll start at an equal 3002 points. Congrats on the 3k mark :-)

8:36 PM

@DeltaLima it doesn't matter, @lnafziger has a head start on us, and he's jet-powered :P

I know, life is unfair. I don't even have wings (but I can keep an eye on y'all)

:P

9:03 PM

Hey, don't talk about me in vain! ;-)

And I got a late start in the private beta, lol.

@lnafziger quiet, jet jockey :-P

I had a flight instructor who used to put a bolt or a piece of safety wire under the engine cowling to see if the student noticed it laying there.

(on the ground under the cowling, that is)

@lnafziger that's actually a pretty cool idea

No safety aspect about forgetting it, but it could be important. :)

@roe Has anyone ever told you that you look like Daniel Negreanu? :)

@voretaq7 Congrats on 3k!

@lnafziger it's all @DeltaLima's fault :)

9:07 PM

@lnafziger see, I like that a lot

that's clever and low-risk

...and you only have to worry if the student comes back and says "I found these two bolts on the ground under the plane...."

hahah

@voretaq7 The funny thing is, one of her students came in after a flight and said "Hey, what's this bolt?" "I don't know, where did you find it?" "Under the engine after I parked."

Turned out to be an engine mount bold that had fallen off after he parked.

!!teachmetofly

Otto the Autopilot

Lesson #10: A superior pilot is one who uses his superior judgement so that he does not have to use his superior skills.

9:10 PM

@lnafziger ... "at least it fell off after the flight" ?

who can tell when bug stomps are?

user image

my instructor actually had the tail tiedown of a Cessna depart the aircraft in flight - presumably because it was overloaded at some point while performing its normal duties as a tiedown point, and the trauma and vibration of flying around was just all too much for it.

@voretaq7 at my old flight school, we had to stick curved steel strips around the tiedowns because so many students would tail strike on soft field takeoffs

at least one of the guard strips got shaved off within the next, oh, 1000 hours

hopefully it made its suicide leap while the plane was over one of the local practice areas (over water) rather than into someone's back yard - though to my knowledge they never heard from said tiedown again....

@egid . . . a tad aggressive, are they?!

yeah. also i think one of the (former) CFIs made a game of dragging the tail

he was an idiot and got fired

9:14 PM

I'm trying to envision tail-striking in the cherokee, and I can't come up with a situation in which I would do so that wouldn't be immediately followed by a stall and a thud....

heh

that initial hop off the ground into ground effect is very much at a "NO! NO! I DON'T WANNA FLY! LEAVE ME ALONE!" point in the wing's generation of lift :P

a stall, a thud, and then the landing gear legs popping out the top of the wing.

@egid ...I'm not sure you'd even get high enough for that honestly - though it's cold out right now so maybe...

it's only about a 2-second difference between that and "OK I'll climb now" though

I've always felt that the gear on Cherokees was the weakest part of an otherwise tank-like design

9:19 PM

@egid could be worse - could have that spindly little stick of a nose gear like Grummans :-)

I don't approve of the actual metal bits linking the rudder & nose gear though -- whoever came up with that idea should be smacked around a bit.

hey now, my nose gear is a SAINT

@egid OK, aside from this (hideously expensive) ignition switch what else do I need to order from Aircraft Spruce? :P

ram mount?

;P

@egid I never use mine :-x

new towbar!

three cases of oil!

9:24 PM

@egid ...I should get a new towbar actually! (i've got the crappy one that doesn't lock)

haha the two pegs that go in the two points on the nose strut?

that thing is the worst

@egid yeah, they're bent a little, but they don't have the spring-lock that goes UNDER the two points on the strut so it pops out any time you try to turn it

<clicky-clicky> $45 bucks later :P

meh, ok there's no way I'm getting this order up over $500 unless I order my shiny new horizon gyro now, and I'll bite that bullet at annual as originally planned :P

@egid Congrats to you on the 3k too!

@egid the worst are the two-piece towbars. The stupid lock pin doesn't always seat, and then you go to pull the plane forward and the tow bar comes apart and you land on your ass :P

@lnafziger yay thanks

9:29 PM

(now I'll admit I was laughing hysterically when I got up, but it still hurt :P)

@voretaq7 Yeah, after the flight. The instructor didn't know what it was either, so she took it to the mechanic. "Where did you find that?" "Under the airplane." "Hmm... c'mon."

@voretaq7 my tow bar locking pin is on my airplane keychain

@voretaq7 They walked out to the 152 and grabbed the prop and moved the entire engine from side to side.

it's dual purpose, lets me know for sure the mags are off

@egid good way to make sure you don't attach the tow bar with the mags hot :)

9:30 PM

@voretaq7 Turns out that the wrong bolts had been installed (they were slightly too long) so when they were torqued down they had been bottomed out and weren't tight against the engine. Vibration took care of the rest.

@lnafziger <applause>

@voretaq7 Scary.. Mechanic said that it was 1-2 flights from having the entire engine depart the airframe.... And the CG kind of sucks after that happens!

@Pondlife Congrats on 2k!

@lnafziger A condition in which I would seriously consider jumping out of an airplane (it is no longer "perfectly good", or even "remotely serviceable as a glider" at that point)

@voretaq7 Well, unless you fly around with your parachute just in case... ;-)

@lnafziger ...still think I like my chances better without the airframe :-)

I've got the battery and a couple of quarts of oil behind me - even if I crawled on the glareshield I'm not sure I could get the nose down :P

9:33 PM

Don't know if you guys noticed, but we are up to 328 views/day (it's been hovering right around 200 forever)!

@lnafziger Hah, no, that's a first. Heard twice that I look like edward norton in american history x though.

@lnafziger Thanks! I was surprised to get access to mod tools, I thought that was 10K. Is that a beta thing?

@roe Yeah, I was thinking that too, lol.

@Pondlife aviation.stackexchange.com/privileges

everything is lower in beta

@Pondlife Those are the defaults.... As sites get bigger and have more people, they raise the minimums.

9:34 PM

@lnafziger also 8 Q/day now

@voretaq7 Yes, I found that page but most of my Stack experience is on SO and there it's 10K

@lnafziger Makes sense, good to know

@voretaq7 Yeah, but we have been close to that... 7.8 or 7.9 or something.

@lnafziger we were down around 6 over the holidays. we've rebounded admirably.

yeah, it was sub-6 for a bit

@voretaq7 Yeah, we were 17 before the holidays, lol.

9:36 PM

flightaware.com/squawks/view/1/recently/new/39376/… woo +9 so far

Do they have any graphs that show the history of those stats?

@lnafziger yeah but that was also based on all the first-day questions :)

@egid I updated the circle to land question, good catch! I just hope my updated answer is correct :-)

@lnafziger yes, but they're not public (it's part of the mod tools suite)

@voretaq7 Ahh, that bites!

9:37 PM

on SF we disclose "probably more than we're supposed to" about those stats by talking about year-over-year or month-to-month trends :)

@Pondlife nice, I'll take a look. I was pretty sure it was the airport, but didn't have anything to back it up, so I just commented ;)

@egid I commented on your flight aware post for ya. :)

@voretaq7 Ummm...

@voretaq7 "as long as you stay in visual contact with the airport and within the protected airspace ... you're unlikely to hit anything," I don't like the "unlikely" bit... You have guaranteed obstacle clearance under those conditions.

(I missed that before I gave you the up-vote, lol.)

9

A: Are you required to have constant view of the runway when circling?

A "circle-to-land" maneuver is basically a low-altitude traffic pattern - albeit one that you arrived at by being guided in on some instrument approach. The magic that makes this low (and possibly abbreviated) pattern possible is that the runway ends at airports with circling approaches have prot...

@lnafziger you're guaranteed to have obstacle clearance, that doesn't mean you're not going to smack into the tower or a hangar :)

the only time you're guaranteed not to hit anything is when the airplane is tied down. (no promises about other things not hitting you though.)

@voretaq7 If you are at (or above) your MDA and within the protected area, you are guaranteed not to hit a tower or hangar. :)

And you can't leave minimums until you are in a position to land. :)

@lnafziger true, but I don't like to make definitive statements with known holes (engineer :) - the FAA is guaranteeing you that nothing (they know of) will be in that protected area, but that's all they can guarantee you. You're on your own for the "not running into things" bit :)

9:50 PM

@voretaq7 Well, that is true for every chart in existence though.... Seems an odd disclaimer in this situation. If there is a new tower, it should be NOTAM'd and then the minimums raised.

@voretaq7 Anyway, just my 2 cents.

@lnafziger "there's that word again, 'should'...." :-) I won't object to you editing it if you want though

I live in a world where everything that should be done rarely is, and all the things that MUST NOT be done frequently are - some people say I'm a pessimist, I say "Nobody can read and follow simple directions!"

!!lesson

Otto the Autopilot

Lesson #20: The only time you have too much fuel is when you're on fire.

Love it

@OttotheAutopilot Stop spoiling my fireworks show Otto!

!!lesson

Otto the Autopilot

9:52 PM

Lesson #21: When one engine fails on a twin-engine airplane you always have enough power left to get you to the scene of the crash.

hah, I like that one :)

I also love the fact that my TSA question has -2 (total) on the question and +2 on the answer, lol.

Seems a bit contradictory.

@lnafziger we just hate the TSA and anything that mentions them :P

I still have mixed feelings about trying to maintain that list personally - it seems like it changes hourly depending on who your screener is and whether the "threat level" is polka-dot, pinstripe, or plaid

@voretaq7 True, but we could have notes about particular items that seem to cause problems... That some airlines allow it and some don't, etc.... It would grow over time and keep getting better and better as people contributed to it.

@voretaq7 That's what I was envisioning anyway... Reality might be different, lol.

@voretaq7 I just added an answer to the meta post on it though and deleted the question.

@lnafziger Questions like that are the C++ Book Question of their respective sites

(we have one on Server Fault - FreeBSD performance tuning)

I only object to them a little bit on principle - they can be really useful, I just know I wouldn't volunteer to maintain the list :-)

@lnafziger also, why are my nail clippers banned?! <grumble>

10:20 PM

can anyone see a question here? aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/1007/… (am I missing something?)

A question in the sense of a post? Or in the sense of "What the heck is he trying to ask?"

I think he's trying to ask "In the real world, if my ~~flying deathtrap's~~ helicopter's engine fails and I have to do an autorotation am I likely to survive?"

I think he's asking "if I follow this simpler way of thinking about an autorotation, will I likely survive?"

Very odd....

@voretaq7 Nice answer to the fuel sender question

I guess you're also due an <applause> on the 3k!

@DannyBeckett I figured it would be a good idea to point out that the fuel senders aren't anything magical :)

10:35 PM

lol, on the subject of magic... I read this today: clientsfromhell.net/post/72087884439/…

@DannyBeckett Haha, very nice

Okay guys, headed home from work. Have fun!

seeya!

Anonymous

@voretaq7 lol

you are a whiner :p

@DannyBeckett I'll go you one better - I tried to educate someone on SuperUser. No matter how bad the client is they can't be worse than trying that :P

@DannyBeckett ...though that client may be close.

10:41 PM

that site, on the whole, is awesome

I like notalwaysright.com

yeah that's another good one

thedailywtf.com is awesome if you're a programmer

Anonymous

1

Q: Is it possible to "pimp up your aircraft" with an audio system?

Can aircraft be modified to have an enormous audio system, like the ones in cars? Has the FAA got any regulations on this (or maybe on in-cabin maximum noise volume?), would power be a limitation for the audio system?

faa aircraft-design

Anonymous

positive numbers again

Anonymous

:)

10:43 PM

DOWNVOOOOOOOTE

lol

@PatoSáinz If you ask one about putting airbags into the landing gear so you can bounce the plane with the bass I'll downvote you into SuperUser territory :)

2

aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/1007/… got edited with a question

Anonymous

@DannyBeckett lol fucking rude

Anonymous

@voretaq7 that's fucking cool! i'll ask SU

Chile's volcanic ash is fucking rude too

Anonymous

10:53 PM

:)

lol

Anonymous

@voretaq7 i think i'll substitute the copilot spot with a dj booth

Anonymous

and turn the plane into an hybrid plane hovercraft

!!weather VNLK

Otto the Autopilot

@DannyBeckett No data could be found within the last 24 hours for LUA/VNLK! Check you typed the correct 3-letter IATA or 4-letter ICAO airport code.

11:11 PM

@egid Up to +14 now! :)

> Heard over NY Center at night, in the early 90s, "I'm SOOOO High". Center "A/C calling Center, say numbers?" Response "I'm not that high" [link]

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Jan '1413

The Hangar

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