PA31 review from PA31 pilot

[out 769]

Since there is no more up vote button on ASIM forums, let me use my words.

Thank you very much for the professional review!

I wish there were more aircraft reviews by actual pilots.

[Gregg_Seipp 565]

 

 

I'll also add a vote for the Navajo. I'm afraid the Skymaster has been bumped as my favorite Carenado aircraft and the Navajo has taken it's place. It's funny because I didn't particularly care for either aircraft in the real world, lol.

 

Now that's interesting.  Why not and what was your favorite?  The reason I ask is I often wonder how airplanes in the sim translate to RW airplanes.  I've only flown 4 RW...3 high wing Cessna and 1 low wing piper (well...one was a Warrior and the other was an Archer but I honestly couldn't tell the difference when flying them.)  I have to say, flying the A2A 182 is downright boring but I really liked the RW 182.  So, either I'm getting used to faster beefier airplanes or something is lost in the sim.

[ramprat 8]

I'd like to know if a real world pilot of the Navajo would ever run the engines lean of peak to squeak out a little more economy? I'm actually not fond of the LOP idea because I've seen holes in pistons from running too lean but I know a lot of real world operators are doing it nowdays and apparently the engines are not suffering any significant damage. I've been playing with a ferry attempt between Half Moon Bay and Honolulu, I haven't actually flown it yet but I've departed and climbed to altitude with ASN doing the weather a couple times, then aborted when I realized I wasn't going to make it. According to the GTN's fuel planning page I could make it if 1) I choose the right day where I have a stiff tailwind, and 2) if I lean to 25° LOP which gives me something like 22 GPH total at 24,000'. Otherwise I'll be needing a ferry tank it would appear :smile:

 

I'll also add a vote for the Navajo. I'm afraid the Skymaster has been bumped as my favorite Carenado aircraft and the Navajo has taken it's place. It's funny because I didn't particularly care for either aircraft in the real world, lol.

 

BTW. for the slaved HSI just drag the aircraft.cfg into Notepad and find the following:

 

[direction_indicators]

direction_indicator.0=1,0

 

Change the last zero to "3"

 

EDIT: Oops I meant [direction_indicators] rather than [turn_indicators], fixed.

Thank you Jim!

[Jim Robinson 122]

Thank you Jim!

 

I think I had that wrong actually. At least I tried it and it didn't work, my gyro still drifted! :smile:

 

What I should have said was change the "1" to a "3"

 

before:

[direction_indicators]

direction_indicator.0=1,0

 

after:

[direction_indicators]

direction_indicator.0=3,0

 

I apologize for that error, hope I didn't cause anyone too much grief, lol. It appears to work this time :blush:

 

 

 

Now that's interesting.  Why not and what was your favorite?  The reason I ask is I often wonder how airplanes in the sim translate to RW airplanes.  I've only flown 4 RW...3 high wing Cessna and 1 low wing piper (well...one was a Warrior and the other was an Archer but I honestly couldn't tell the difference when flying them.)  I have to say, flying the A2A 182 is downright boring but I really liked the RW 182.  So, either I'm getting used to faster beefier airplanes or something is lost in the sim.

 

Hi Gregg, you may have taken me too seriously, as PIC I've flown 150s and 172s and that's it. Just a personal preference is all, I don't have any real world experiences with either the Navajo or the Skymaster except maybe walking around a few of them on the ramp. I was an A&P so I suppose I was influenced by other mechanics I worked with and it seemed everyone had something derogatory to say about the "Mix-Master", it was a "337" which oddly enough was also the official FAA form for major repair or alteration so we always had fun with that, lol. The Navajo was simply a Piper and that was just a Ford/Chevy thing. :smile:

[ramprat 8]

The Navajo was simply a Piper and that was just a Ford/Chevy thing.

 

Hi JIm,

I  get the impression you weren't impressed with Piper.  What was your favorite?  Cessna?  Beechcraft?  I didn't work on them and therefore didn't see the details that you  saw.  I wouild be interested in your opinion.

 

Thanks,

 

Bill

[Jim Robinson 122]

It was never that I wasn't impressed with Piper, I mean it was an airplane, I was thrilled to be occupying the same general area whether it was Cessna, Piper, or a Navion! I was probably about 25 and didn't really have a reason to like one over another much beyond paint schemes anyway. I always liked Cessna but I did see some things on Pipers later on that seemed better thought out or less crude, I'll admit that now, lol. Really though I guess there just weren't many Pipers around, almost everything was Cessna where I hung out. I remember a Cherokee 180 that had just a couple hundred hours on it sitting there rotting away full of mice in a hangar for years at a time - that's about the only one I remember other than the tourists. We found 14 lbs of bucking bars in the left wingtip of a Seneca at annual once, we figured that must have been one that was built on a Friday afternoon .

 

There was a Beech A36TC that I took care of for a few years. The guy bought it new and I think it was about 6 yrs old at the time. He flew it a couple times a month and it was always my job to get it out the day before he wanted to leave and clean it off, drain the sumps, run it, cycle the prop, give it a quick once-over, etc. The guy must have paid the h*ll outta my boss for it because he'd let me spend half a day out there fussing over that airplane and normally he was screaming like a banshee whenever I fussed with something. We (the FBO I worked for) did the annuals on it too and the guy I worked for would take me out for a "test flight" in it every chance we got. Everything was perfect on that airplane, no grime, not even the slightest hint of surface corrosion on the inside skins, no wear and tear from 1000 other mechanics, she had the sexiest gear actuator pushrods I've ever seen! I loved everything about that airplane so I guess if I had a favorite that would be it.

 

I left the FBO after several years and first went to work for a crop duster and then later I got into heli-logging/lifting machines so I sorta lost touch with the GA fixed wing scene early on and never got back in regrettably.

[ramprat 8]

Interesting story Jim.  I love talking with others who were part of GA back when it was alive and well.  What part of the country did you work in?  I worked in Sacramento, Yuba City, and Redding, CA.

[Jim Robinson 122]

I was in the Idaho panhandle for the most part Bill, I did mobile stuff on helicopters here, there, and everywhere though. I see you're from Colorado, I went to A&P school at Jeffco in the early 80s. I  feel really lucky I got to see the old Stapleton airport in all it's glory. Wonderful times! :smile:

[ramprat 8]

I was in the Idaho panhandle for the most part Bill, I did mobile stuff on helicopters here, there, and everywhere though. I see you're from Colorado, I went to A&P school at Jeffco in the early 80s. I  feel really lucky I got to see the old Stapleton airport in all it's glory. Wonderful times! :smile:

I agree.  I flew out of Stapleton back in the late 60's when I worked for United.  I flew right seat on DC-6's and 7's.  Ahhh, the good old days when it wasn't considered an oil leak if it wasn't dripping off the tail.

[acdelta57 4]

I'd like to know if a real world pilot of the Navajo would ever run the engines lean of peak to squeak out a little more economy? I'm actually not fond of the LOP idea because I've seen holes in pistons from running too lean but I know a lot of real world operators are doing it nowdays and apparently the engines are not suffering any significant damage. I've been playing with a ferry attempt between Half Moon Bay and Honolulu, I haven't actually flown it yet but I've departed and climbed to altitude with ASN doing the weather a couple times, then aborted when I realized I wasn't going to make it. According to the GTN's fuel planning page I could make it if 1) I choose the right day where I have a stiff tailwind, and 2) if I lean to 25° LOP which gives me something like 22 GPH total at 24,000'. Otherwise I'll be needing a ferry tank it would appear :smile:

 

I'll also add a vote for the Navajo. I'm afraid the Skymaster has been bumped as my favorite Carenado aircraft and the Navajo has taken it's place. It's funny because I didn't particularly care for either aircraft in the real world, lol.

 

BTW. for the slaved HSI just drag the aircraft.cfg into Notepad and find the following:

 

[direction_indicators]

direction_indicator.0=1,0

 

Change the last zero to "3"

 

Change the 1 to a 3

 

before:

[direction_indicators]

direction_indicator.0=1,0

 

after:

[direction_indicators]

direction_indicator.0=3,0

 

EDIT: I fixed it again, sorry for the confusion :blush:

Thank you for the fix for the HSI-

And to answer your question about LOP, our procedure was once cruise altitude was reached, we would lean to 75 degrees below peak EGT. Typical cruise setting was 26" 2300RPM and 75 cool of peak to yield about 150 kts IAS. To accomplish this simply begin leaning the engines until the rise in EGT becomes a fall ( do not go to fast or you may shut off the engine!) Once that temperature is determined the peak, increase mixture until it cools to 75 below.

[Gregg_Seipp 565]

Well, I picked it up today.  You really have to like the cockpit layout...pretty much everything is up where you can see it.  Nice touch with the gear mirror.  Most switches do seem to work, though, there is always the magic icing equipment that doesn't pull any electrical power.  Seemed like all of the important switches worked and the ones that were less important at least were there and moved.  A few were blanked out but they didn't even look to appear in the checklist so, nothing much to care about.

 

I can't say I know much what I'm doing with it yet but I took it up for a couple of short flights.  Nice views.  Flies solid. Seemed to have a slight right pull in climb...P factor? No idea what speeds, settings to use approaching the airport for the pattern or for an instrument approach.  Maybe we'll get some guidance from OP?

 

The checklist they provide looks like it came from a real world aircraft (which is nice!) but what do some of those things mean?  Mag grounding?   Does it have inboard and outboard tanks?  I did replace the Carenado GNS with other GNS.  Had to do that...just had to.

 

What else I like is that there are some resources to help us learn how to properly fly this aircraft.  All in all, I like it and I think the more I fly it I'll like it even more. 

[Jim Robinson 122]

Gear mirror? Are you seeing something happen in your gear mirror when you raise/lower the gear? The little fish eye mirror on the nacelle? Mine's broke apparently, lol.

 

Also cool is that you'll notice you'll pick up 5 kts or so in cruise when you close the cowl flaps which is something that's apparently beyond default. The cowl flaps switches can't be overridden with Ctrl+Shift+V and Ctrl+Shift+C which is also apparently the result of some internal programming.

 

I think "Mag grounding: checked" means you've switched the mag switch to off and back on briefly prior to killing the engines with the mixture controls to make sure the mags are actually grounding. I was taught to do that because that ensures the acft isn't sitting there on the ramp with a hot mag just waiting to kill someone if they grab the prop and roate it for some reason. A broken P-lead is pretty common and if you don't perform that check you'd never know it because you never kill the engine by switching off the mags.

[Gregg_Seipp 565]

 

 

Gear mirror? Are you seeing something happen in your gear mirror when you raise/lower the gear? The little fish eye mirror on the nacelle? Mine's broke apparently, lol.

 

LOL...I was going to check to see if it had a different image next time I went up. 

 

Also cool is that you'll notice you'll pick up 5 kts or so in cruise when you close the cowl flaps which is something that's apparently beyond default. The cowl flaps switches can't be overridden with Ctrl+Shift+V and Ctrl+Shift+C which is also apparently the result of some internal programming.

 

Yeah, I noticed that there's some custom code there.  I'm writing a LINDA module and it does strange things with the default commands. 

 

 

 

I think "Mag grounding: checked" means you've switched the mag switch to off and back on briefly prior to killing the engines with the mixture controls to make sure the mags are actually grounding. I was taught to do that because that ensures the acft isn't sitting there on the ramp with a hot mag just waiting to kill someone if they grab the prop and roate it for some reason. A broken P-lead is pretty common and if you don't perform that check you'd never know it because you never kill the engine by switching off the mags.

 

Thank you!

[Gregg_Seipp 565]

I found this video which shows a short flight.  You can clearly see his procedures.

 

 

He's flying a 130 KIAS final...120 over the numbers...seems fast.  Also, he doesn't bring back any power until he flares.

 

Also, found a pretty good checklist...

 

http://reocities.com/Area51/comet/8429/Checklists/PA31.pdf

 

One thing I noticed on the video.  The pilot lowers MP to 26 and then lowers his RPM to 22.  It looks like his MP rises to 29 when he does that.  Is that what happens?

[Flyfox 114]

Approaching with such a high speed is a luxury which you can only afford with long runways. Notice the very long flare; not recommended for short runways!

 

Thanks for the checklist link!