asa wrote:

StillLearning wrote:No beautiful pictures like some of you guys.
I flew a Husky A1-C 180 from KGWS to KSTP yesterday. Lifted off from 5900' in western Colorado at around 7:15, heading north east toward the continental divide I was going mid 140's or more over the ground, but smooth. As I got close to the pass I had chosen, about 12,200, I had climbed to 13,500 and my ground speed steadily increased. When I got to where I could see the other side of the pass, I could see wind driven snow rolling off the other side. At that point I was thinking I should have gone around the mountains, I'll admit I was quite nervous about the thrashing I thought I would get. My ground speed in level flight over the pass was 163, a mere 50 or so mph more than this thing normally does. Turns out that I didn't get thrashed, just some bumps and a few minor down drafts. The pass has a 12,900' peak on one side and the other rises up to 14,000 plus a couple miles to the south, the wind was right on my tail, the turbulence was not much worse than any other time I had crossed there.
I dropped down to 11,500 out over the plains, but it was still a little bumpy, so I dropped down to 9,500 where it was silky smooth all the way to nearly South Dakota. I was seeing ground speeds ranging from mid 130's to high 150's the whole way. I got gas in Oneill Nebraska where it was gusting to 20 but straight down the runway. KSTP was reporting gusting winds well beyond my crosswind ability even on the crosswind runway. At one point I think it was 50 degrees off the runway with gusts into the high 20's, so I was in no hurry to get moving and took a fairly long break. The Taf was saying it was supposed to be 8kts at 220 at 4:00, so I left KONL about 1:15. On that leg I went to 7500 where I found perfectly smooth air and even higher ground speeds, I think I averaged mid 150's for about 2 hours, at one point seeing the over the ground speed in level flight at 172, with lots of time in the mid 160's.
Dropping below the class B, I lost most of my tailwind and picked up a some unpleasantness at 2000' for the last 20 miles. KSTP was reporting 12 gusting 20 from 160 to 230, I requested 27 and was expecting to do a go around, but managed to do a very nice landing in a plane I have about 18 hours in. I think I caught the wind direction and gusts just perfectly, it didn't seem too difficult. All in I covered about 830 miles in 5:45. Not bad at 20"-2350rpm, going the other way in December it took me over 9 hours running it hard.
I never expected smooth air with 40 to 50mph tailwinds, certainly not for nearly the entire cross country trip.

Funny timing - I spoke to you on the radio. I purchased a Scout yesterday near Sioux Falls and was ferrying it back to Boulder. At one point I heard you call out that you were descending out of 9000' and I was thinking "why the hell is a husky at 9k out here?" but I simply asked what the winds were like up there. I flew 6 hours at 500 AGL to keep my ground speed somewhat respectable. It's a small world - you were the only plane I heard on the radio for quite some time. Beautiful day to be out flying!

G44 wrote:I think some was pod and some props. Kurt (faster Husky) has MT Ultra prop and Kent (slower Husky) has Hartzell Trailblazer. From what others have said pod slows it 2-3 mph so that is about 4-5mph for the prop.
And besides, mom likes me best.

Flying Dave wrote:

G44 wrote:I think some was pod and some props. Kurt (faster Husky) has MT Ultra prop and Kent (slower Husky) has Hartzell Trailblazer. From what others have said pod slows it 2-3 mph so that is about 4-5mph for the prop.
And besides, mom likes me best.

And here we go.... Again.... lol


Nice pics btw...

pilotryan wrote: Since the 185 is still, you know, a bunch of parts and a data plate...