That's awesome Cam! I've been too busy to get much personal flying done lately too. You went back to my roots! I used to fly Beech-18s and Learjets out of Henry County (so long ago it has had about four name changes since then) and I sure miss Barnstormer's Grill!

I'm off work next weekend (for a change!)... if you want to do some more flying maybe we can meet somewhere.

Keith

Hey guys! Boy have I missed y’all!

Some non-flying news, we had a baby boy in March! He’s such a great kid, we’re truly blessed.

I originally wanted to try and get him up in the air as early as possible (just a pattern for the memory and photo-op), but momma informed me that she wanted to wait a few months so I decided to bring the plane down for some deferred improvements I’d been planning.

I moved my oil cooler to the firewall and installed my pmags as well as some minor maintenance to my exhaust and baffling.







All this work started in June. In July I started a new assignment for work which ended up being much busier than I had anticipated. Plus, did you know that babies go to bed ridiculously early at night? Long story short, I gave up my weekends at the hangar to spend more time with my son and the airplane languished, half-done, for a long time. A looooong time.

I took a week off of work last month and got the mods all finished up, and yesterday I completed a shakedown flight in the pattern.

It’s been busy so I shed my forum presence for a while. And then when it calmed down a bit I wanted to get the Racer back in the air before I got back on the line.

During the flight I noticed my compass was leaking so I have a rebuild kit on the way for it. If it’s not one thing, it’s another!



Anyways, I’m glad to be back and catch up with everyone! We’ll get some pics of the kiddo flying soon!

Hey Welcome Back!

Fly that thing up here to Murfreesboro for a visit!

Edit: oh yeah! congrats on the little one!

CamTom12 wrote:Plus, did you know that babies go to bed ridiculously early at night? Long story short, I gave up my weekends at the hangar to spend more time with my son and the airplane languished, half-done, for a long time. A looooong time.

Bro. Welcome to parenthood. Now add another one. The chaos feels like it might as well be 3.

Heading to the hangar once a week requires the equivalent of the Falcon Heavy to escape the gravity of the kids/home life. I used to fly and make videos, now I transfer turds from the little potty into the big toilet.

Zzz wrote:...now I transfer turds from the little potty into the big toilet.

I was luckily not drinking anything when I read this comment..would've definitely needed a keyboard towel..

kg wrote:Hey Welcome Back!

Fly that thing up here to Murfreesboro for a visit!

Edit: oh yeah! congrats on the little one!

Will do! I’ve got a couple little more things to tie up and then it’ll be back to flying for fun!

Zzz wrote:

CamTom12 wrote:Plus, did you know that babies go to bed ridiculously early at night? Long story short, I gave up my weekends at the hangar to spend more time with my son and the airplane languished, half-done, for a long time. A looooong time.

Bro. Welcome to parenthood. Now add another one. The chaos feels like it might as well be 3.

Heading to the hangar once a week requires the equivalent of the Falcon Heavy to escape the gravity of the kids/home life. I used to fly and make videos, now I transfer turds from the little potty into the big toilet.

Ha! I do spend a surprising amount of time emptying the diaper pail, but no direct turd transfers yet.

Welcome back Cam. Good to see you're still kicking. And welcome to parenthood! Its awesome. Once they are old enough to start pulling the flight controls makes it even more fun!

A1Skinner wrote:Welcome back Cam. Good to see you're still kicking. And welcome to parenthood! Its awesome. Once they are old enough to start pulling the flight controls makes it even more fun!

Thanks!

I’m very much looking forward to that!!

losbright1 wrote:

Zzz wrote:...now I transfer turds from the little potty into the big toilet.

I was luckily not drinking anything when I read this comment..would've definitely needed a keyboard towel..

Sick’o here....sure miss turd transfers from cloth diapers...that said...yesterday offered my youngest daughter a trade...as in I’ll trade you anything you want if I can have the grandson Lincoln...now 9 months old...spent three weeks with Link-ah-bink in September. First time in my life that I haven’t wanted to return home...

m_moyle wrote:

losbright1 wrote:

Zzz wrote:...now I transfer turds from the little potty into the big toilet.

I was luckily not drinking anything when I read this comment..would've definitely needed a keyboard towel..

Sick’o here....sure miss turd transfers from cloth diapers...that said...yesterday offered my youngest daughter a trade...as in I’ll trade you anything you want if I can have the grandson Lincoln...now 9 months old...spent three weeks with Link-ah-bink in September. First time in my life that I haven’t wanted to return home...

Don't get me wrong, Mark. I love being a dad. I love transferring turds. I love a huge poop-filled-diaper-in-the-public-restroom challenge. I'm good at it.

It's easy to get a little bitter when you never get a break from it, and life, work, money, hobbies all take a back seat and even suffer a bit. I'd rather be a grandpa!

Fixed the compass. $12 kit saved some money for sure. Pretty easy fix, once you get your spouse past the idea of a Tupperware full of kerosene in the living room, hahaha.

Fixed!


Old parts:


The diaphragm was definitely the problem.

Glad to see you posting again Cam! Congratulations on the kiddo. Your approaching the stage where they start to become enjoyable. [emoji6]

Thanks, Whee!

On another note, high oil temps are a thing of the past.













OATs were ~55 deg F.

Looks like great viz out of your bird

Tom,

I know you are excited about having lowered your oil temps but..... try to get closer to 180F, that will burn the moisture out and help prevent rust inside the engine.

Kurt

PS, love the picture with the "little one", priceless!

G44 wrote:Tom,

I know you are excited about having lowered your oil temps but..... try to get closer to 180F, that will burn the moisture out and help prevent rust inside the engine.

Kurt

PS, love the picture with the "little one", priceless!

I agree, Kurt! I need to block the cooler some. I’ve got my aluminum tape in the car, ready for my next flight!

I’m pretty curious how much I’ll need to block to get 180.

I'm glad you got the temps under control Cam.

well you do get through the time of shoveling poop, then they turn into teenagers and really take you time and money.

My son is 17 and is starting ground school now.

Cool

Love this thread . Has it all, flying, family, living life. Ain’t it great!
And on the kiddos, started both boys in the cockpit. Soloed both and one has the bug as bad as me , He’s 35, The other thinks golf is a real sport!

Thanks, Flyrite!

Went buzzing around today for a 1.9. Nothing important: just got some fuel, almost landed to visit a friend that turned out not to be home, checked out a field that I got permission to land in, looked for some river bars, then came home!



Last time I got fuel here I got stung on the ear by a wasp. Apparently they were building nests under the ladder rungs.


A couple of pictures demonstrating the view. I love this plane!




Bars were too muddy and too populated over here.




Running lean with the pmags


I’m now having the opposite issue with oil temps, but very happy to be dealing with that! I made a makeshift block to experiment with size. Turns out I was way off. I added a bunch of layers of aluminum tape at my fuel up stop. This size hole got me to 190 degrees. OATs were 40-45. Opening is normally 4”.


I’m going to make something much cleaner that’ll slide in place, with some adjustment available from fully closed to probably 3/4 or so.