Entry 1: January 31, 2013

 

Today I began the last series of flights I plan to make in my trusty old FS9. I bought this copy of FS9 in 2007 after I essentially wore my first one I bought in 2003 out. Disk 4 is getting tried and is scratched from the in-and-outs of nearly daily flights, and as much as I have resisted FSX the time has come for me to start spending more time there.

 

The around the world flight will be my first non-commerial aircraft flight since 2006, when I did one in a Eugene Heyart Turbo Otter. That one took 28 days of flying, all in real time and in real weather. Several times I had to deviate from my flight plan because of weather, simulated conflict (in countries where real conflict was occuring at the time) and one substantial crash. I choose the AFG King Air 300 (no mods) this time because I have just finished compiling 21 different North Amercian liveries for the aircraft in one package and want to try them all out. As before my start and end will be Fresno, California (KFAT). Todays flight is a meer hop compared to what will be coming up, Fresno to Port Hardy, Canada, only 940 nm. Weather out of Fresno looked nice at my 8:18AM departure, as I now cruise over Northern California an hour and a half into my flight I can see this trip will be bitter sweet. When it's over FS9 will be retired, but this trip will be remembered.

 

If you are interested in the whole 194 mb (zipped) 21 livery compilation for the AFG King Air (complete aircraft) it can be found here:

 

http://www.filefacto...6t1kr/KA300.zip

 

Thanks for those liveries go to Sean Doran, John Hoopes, Joerg Zeitschael, Rui Cristina and Seigfried Schaffer, Joe Zerilli, and Todd Disrud.

 

Make a full backup of your FS9 setup (or keep it installed). For the days you get sick of OOM's, framerate issues, and system lockups at leas you'll have something stable to return to until you get your head together. Most simmers run both especially if they've put allot into FS9.

As to the OP: good luck, and I hope this is not going to be too painful for you (or us, for that matter).

 

I'll try to make it as painless as possible but I didn't anticipate the interest in the flight. I was thinking it would take 28-30 days of flying, all in real time and real weather.

 

 

Hello Pete,

 

I would be interested in knowing your route for this tour. I have never flown such a project and love

the king Airs, so I'd be curious to know how you plan all this. If you have time to explain...

 

Thank you.

 

Souheil

 

I'll let you know as I go along, I'll try to log each days flights as I got along. My intention is to make a flight in all 4 hemispheres of the world, and deal with real world conditions in each place I fly and react accordingly. So far this is what I have:

 

Day 1 (January 31, 2013) Today saw my departure from my home airport of Fresno-Yosemite International to Port Hardy, Canada. The 935 nm. flight took nearly 4 hours and the weather was nice. I refueled and waited another hour hoping the weather on the next leg into Anchorage would clear. It didn't. At 1300 local I departed Port Hardy to Anchorage knowing full well I'd have a hairy approach into my stop for the night. Anchorage was 10/10th covered, it was a CAT II landing all the way. I arrived at 1529 local after 990 nm. (4.4 hrs) and after what seemed like a 15 minute taxi to the GA parking area secured for the night.

 

Day 2 (February 1, 2013) I filed an IFR flight plan out of Anchorage to Adak, 1,060 nm away. This would be the first test of the fuel conservation profile that would get me through the 4th flight, from Adak to northern Japan. Anchorage was still socked in when I departed at 0930 local, with a 500 fpm climb and throttling back to 210 gallons per minute (down from 310 gpm) I achieved my cruise altitude of FL250 slowly. At FL200 I broke through the cloud base and the next three and a half hours I basked in the bright northern sunlight. The approach into Adak was uneventful and VFR all the way in. Arrival time was 1230 local, and the decisison was made to secure the aircraft and make the 1,610 nm. flight from Adak to Nakashibetsu, Japan (RJCN) in the morning. With the success of the fuel conservation program I would be able to make this first big jump with enough fuel to divert if needed, but just barely.

 

Dillon and Madtun, I know about having FS9 loaded, when I bought this new laptop in September I had to take it to a computer store to have all of my FS9 goodies transfered, over 560GB, including 80 custom sceneries I have made for myself. I have at last cound over 700 aircraft, real clouds, water, new ground textures, land classes for all the places I like to fly and traffic enhancements. But the thing is I have two VA's that have been primarily FS9 based and I need to bow to progress to satisfy my pilots and staff. It may take me anothr 9 years as it has with FS9 to get my FSX where I want it but the new laptop runs it with good scenery levels and frame rates, so the switch can be made without too much disappointment. FS9 is like the high school girlfriend, lots of fun but something you tend to outgrow (here comes all the dialog form those who married their HS GF's now).

This is extremely interesting to read, and I'm really looking forward for the next log entry!

 

 

Day 3 ( February 2, 2013) Sunrise in Adak was set for 9:28 AM so by 8AM I was hard at work with the fuel computer, dotting the “I’s” and crossing the “T’s”. At 1,606.3 nm. GPS distance (FS9 NavLog) it would be the longest planned single leg flight, and would be a test of economy and endurance. The NavLog Computer said the flight would take 5 hours and 12 minutes and use 3,838 lbs of fuel. That was no good, the King Air only carried 3,610 lbs. I checked the current weather between Adak and northern Japan and saw that it was mostly clear, but a cold front was due across the Kamchatka Peninsula later in the day. I was hoping to beat it at least into my safe zone, which was about 1,000 nm from Adak, and still have at least 2,000 lbs of fuel left.

 

About 20 minutes before sunrise I fired up the King Air, ran the engines for 20 minutes to get them good and warm and let the cabin warm up as well. The overnight temp in Adak was a chilly 14 degrees, it was still below freezing but at least the light snow overnight had stopped. After the 20 minute warm up the engines were shut down and the aircraft refueled nearly to over flowing. It was then towed out to the runway 36 threshold (this owing to the fact that Adak does not a default GA parking space in FS9) and once aboard the engines were restarted. In less than 2 minutes I was rocketing down the frozen runway at Adak, and at lift off the aircraft had used 33.5 lbs. of precious fuel. At an ascent rate of only 500 feet per minute I flew the runway heading until I had reached 2,000’, then flipped on my GPS nav and turned west towards Japan. I set the fuel consumption at 200 lbs. per engine, burning 400 lbs. per hour (a gallon a minute) on the climb out and cruise. I managed to maintain 170 KIAS on the climb out and once I reached FL250 I was cruising at close to 200 KIAS.

 

I had the relative safety of the Aleutian Islands for about the first 300 miles, albeit uninhabited but survivable if an emergency occurred. But 2 hours into the flight I crossed the date line and turned away from American soil, soil I wouldn’t be seeing again for maybe a month. I settled back, had a sandwich, took pictures of the emptiness of the northern Pacific, checked my fuel usage figures, then rechecked them again. I was doing wonderfully, there was only a negligible headwind and by the time I was handed off to Tokyo Center I was 100% sure I was going to make it. I passed within 150 nm of the Kamchatka Peninsula, and of Petropavlosk-Kamchatskiy, Russia. I wondered aloud if they were looking at me with their radar, this lone tiny plane out in the Pacific. I wondered if soon I’d have a MiG come take a look at me, and I hoped if so that pilot would have more restraint than Major Gennadi Osipovic did in September, 1983 when KAL Flight 007 passed this way.

 

When I was handed off to Petropavlosk Center with 700 nm to go I had 2,150 lbs of fuel onboard, more than enough to complete the flight to Nakashibetsu and then some, so I opened up my bottle of Martinelli’s Cider and celebrated.

 

I had just finished my second sandwich when the aircraft was slammed hard to the left and began yawing. I did a quick check and noticed that my ground speed had been drastically reduced, by more than 100 knots! That cold front had caught me, and now with Japan nearly in sight and 40% of my fuel remaining I was being pushed to a crawling 150 knots GS.

 

 

 

I requested a decent to FL180 hoping to get out of the jet stream, but once I reached that altitude I was still bucking an 80 knot header. I had 150 nm left and fuel was burning fast, so I requested a further decent to 12,000 feet. Once there I was still 50 nm out and still fighting a 65 knot head wind, but I had enough fuel to make it comfortably now. Shortly afterward I began my ATC guided approach into Nakashibetsu, and at 12:25 PM local (plus one day) I touched down on the frozen runway and taxied to the terminal. I was so glad to see that frozen 6,500’ runway after 7 hours. At shut down I had a total of 740 lbs. of fuel, just 100 gallons. It would have been enough for maybe another 150 nm with that 100 knot headwind, losing the altitude probably helped save the trip.

 

I was now convinced that under the right circumstances I could squeeze 1,800 nm out of the King Air, something that would be useful once I reached central Asia and parts of Africa. But that is still weeks away, lots of things can happen between now and then, and I reminded myself of my own crash in 2006 in a Turbo Otter in a Malaysian storm on my last around the world flight. But tonight, I dine on sushi and drink a cold Sapporo Beer, and talk about last night’s earthquake with some locals before heading off to a warm bed.

Edited February 9, 201313 yr by firehawk44
Images removed. Far exceeded 400KB weight limit.

Tomorrow ( February 4th, local Japan time) I will be flying from Nakashibetsu to Kagoshima, the length of Japan and through some of the highest traffic areas in Asia. AI Traffic will be set at 100%.

Chapeau! Congratulation!

Just coming in from RPLL Manila to ZJSY Sanya on my this winter RTW. Perhaps we'll meet in China...

Harald, actually tomorrows flight plan has been amended with a final short hop from Kagoshima to Naha. I'll be stopping in Taiwan and Hong Kong but after that I'll be working my way to Auckland. Hope to be there by Saturday the 9th (local date). Here's the current plan for the next few days:

 

 

Woah. If you're intending to continue that flight east, keep in mind that the flight from Easter Island to the South America coast is over 2000 miles. Pray for strong tailwinds.

 

Hook

If you're intending to continue that flight east, keep in mind that the flight from Easter Island to the South America coast is over 2000 miles. Pray for strong tailwinds.

Hook

 

And that might be a good place to ditch FS9 and switch to FSX... <---just kidding

Great post Pete... I've enjoyed reading your progress.

 

Cheers

RJ

 

Gotta love this hobby

LOL, not going east guys, heading west...

 

 

 

This is tentative at this point but this would essentially be the next two and a half to three weeks. I'm looking at this trip now taking about five weeks if..IF I fly every day. We shall see.

Something else I might need to clarify, I am flying this real time, real weather. When I say real weather, I make my flights generally in the day time Pacific US time, so that might make it nighttime in say, Japan, but I fly it in the daytime with the correct date and time of day dialed in. So the weather conditions may wind up being 12 hours off of what is really happening. Like this evening's flight, Nakashibetsu's weather was happening "now" (Saturday) but the time I dialed in was their local time for Sunday morning there. Confused? Simply, the current weather where the trip takes me will be real but it will only be current to my time zone, not the dialed in time in the area I'm flying in.

Pete,

 

Thanks for the updates, and good luck to you on your RTW flight! Please keep posting your flights and associated commentary!

 

Hate to see you leave the FS 9 fold, but I understand your reasons.

 

Have fun!

 

Alan :p0504:

Alan, who knows what will happen. I do plan on doing an RTW in FSX this summer, depending on which was more entertaining I may be back. Right now I'm trying to figure out how to get from Capetown to Morocco without getting the plane shot up.

Be quietest straight up the middle, really.

Harald, actually tomorrows flight plan has been amended with a final short hop from Kagoshima to Naha. I'll be stopping in Taiwan and Hong Kong but after that I'll be working my way to Auckland. Hope to be there by Saturday the 9th (local date). Here's the current plan for the next few days:

 

 

Hi Pete, this is quite a similar route I came from Auckland to Manila in the opposite direction some days ago. I have to say that I use a "private" B727, so it's some more comfortable with fuel capacity etc. so that I decided to take a loop to McMurdo before, coming over from Southern America. Your tour encourages me to try it with a smaller plane next time. Good luck for the next legs!

BTW, Manila Airport is very impressive!

Harald