|
Vol. 4, No.
7 DECEMBER 2011
|
| FROM
THE EDITOR
|
|
Everything We Expect
for Christmas!
Well, here we are in December. This is my third
issue of Bits and Pieces, and I hope you'll enjoy it. We
seem to be getting everything we typically expect for
Christmastime. My local ski hill opened up the last week
in November. Snow and cold rain causes activity at most
small airports to slow down. Christmas
isn't far away, so it may be too late to be hinting for
all those nice aviation-related gifts but ShopEAA.com
isn't a bad link to paste somewhere on the bathroom
mirror. Read
more
|
|
 |
| JOURNALIST
DALE GOLDHAWK GETS INVOLVED WITH MUSEUM ISSUE |
|
The number of signatures on
the Canadian Air & Space Museum petition has grown
more than seven times since we reported it as topping a
thousand in October. The strengthening support for the
museum may be due in some measure to the pugnacious
investigative style of Canadian journalist Dale
Goldhawk. In a series of interviews with both sides of
the debate televised on the Rogers TV program Goldhawk
Live and subsequently with Liberal Party interim leader
Bob Rae, Goldhawk discussed the eviction of the Canadian
Air & Space Museum. Read
more
|
|
 |
|
FLYING IN QUEBEC
|
|
Many North American pilots
are surprised to learn that French is frequently used as
a radiotelephony language for aeronautical
communications in Quebec. It’s falsely assumed that
English is the only permitted language in aviation.
International Civil Aviation Organization regulations,
however, allow considerable latitude for local languages
to be used around the world, and while English is the
norm for international traffic, French is widely used in
Quebec and other areas of the world. Read
more
|
|
|
|
SATURDAY MORNING DAY
CARE!
|
|
If you're like me, you
really enjoy the airport restaurant on a Saturday
morning, a nice greasy breakfast, lashings of coffee,
and good company. Our ritual is to push all the square
tables together in a long row that keeps getting longer
as people show up. There's always something to talk
about, a favourite destination, a chat about the
politics at the airport, some exchange of information
about a technical issue. Read
more
|
|
|
| MILITARY
DEMO TEAMS ANNOUNCE 2012 SCHEDULES
|
It's
not even the holidays yet, but the U.S. Air Force
Thunderbirds, the Navy's Blue Angels, and the Army's
Golden Knights are already thinking of spring. The three
demonstration teams recently released their updated 2012
schedules and chances are they will be flying or
performing somewhere near you. The Canadian Snowbirds
have three new pilots, the RAF Red Arrows have resumed
training after an accident last month, and the Malaysian
air force has a new team that flies the EXTRA 300L.
Read
more |
 |
|
| WHITHER
ADS-B (IN CANADA)? |
| Okay,
maybe whither is an old word. Maybe a more current term
might be "ADS-B, wassup?" Will automatic
dependent surveillance-broadcast (ADS-B) be causing
concern among the low-altitude GA pilot throng in
Canada, or can we relax? The implementation of 406
megahertz emergency locator transmitters (ELT`s) is
still causing stress among the GA fleet. Much has been
written about it, and the expense is an extra burden.
What's the impact of ADS-B on the GA owner-pilot? Read
more |
|
| THE
JOHNSTON SPECIAL - PART 2 |
| Stanley
N. Johnston died on August 20, 1998, at the age of just
over 100 years. During his lifetime, he scratchbuilt six
airplanes, the first in the 1920s and the last in the
late '60s. His last aircraft, the Johnston Special, has
come into my possession, and a long restoration process
has begun. In this article, I'll describe how this
happened. Read
Part 2 | Part
1 |
 |
|
| FOKKER
D.VII HIDDEN AWAY IN THE EASTERN TOWNSHIPS |
| A
real jewel can be found just 45 minutes east of
Montreal. There's a beautiful Fokker D.VII at the Brome
County Historical Society Museum in Knowlton, Quebec. It
was captured at the end of World War I and shipped to
the small lakeside village in the Eastern Townships,
where it has been housed at the museum. It's one of only
seven in existence, and believed to be the only one in
its original condition. Read
more |
 |
|
| CLIFF-SIDE
HELICOPTER RESCUE NAMED BEST FOR 2011 |
| A
Canadian helicopter rescue crew from British Columbia
has won the Cormorant Trophy for Helicopter Rescue.
Flying an AgustaWestland CH-149 Cormorant, which is part
of the Canadian forces, the crew plucked a stranded
hiker from the steep side of Hat Mountain in Cyprus
Provincial Park, British Columbia last December. The
rescue was a race against an approaching storm and
featured challenges such as hovering in a small
geographic bowl with the rotor blades meters from the
cliff face. Read
more |
 |
|
| CANADIAN
ULTRALIGHT AEROPLANES VS. U.S. ULTRALIGHT VEHICLES |
| There's
a lot of confusion in Canada about our ultralight
regulations mainly because a lot of what we read about
ultralights originates in the United States where the
rules are significantly different. Rules vary in Europe
and other countries around the world as well, but we'll
stick to the United States for this comparison. Read
more |
|
| FROM
THE ARCHIVES |
Sport
Aviation, February 1959
The Original Bits and Pieces
The joy of building and finally flying your own
aircraft seems as new and fresh reading it today as it
was 52 years ago when Bob Chisholm of Goderich, Ontario,
built a Baby Ace, which he called Bits and Pieces.
Our newsletter was named in his honour. It was only the
second homebuilt aircraft in Canada to be certified. Read
the article
|
 |
|
| AVIATION
WORDS |
Airport
- Aerodrome - Airfield - What's the difference?
This month's word is
actually several words relating to the same place. Did
you know that an aerodrome was first used as the name
for an aircraft? Samuel Langley coined the term
"aerodrome" after "hippodrome", the
latter meaning a course or race for horses. Greek
chariot races were held in a hippodrome. Langley decided
to call his aircraft the Langley Aerodrome, and then
Alexander Graham Bell adopted the term for his Aerial
Experiment Association aircraft. In 1909, Silver
Dart-the first Canadian aircraft to fly- was called
Aerodrome 4. Read
more
|
|
|
| MULTIMEDIA |
Sirocket
Twin-Jet Ultralight
It's called the Sirocket and it looks and flies like
the name implies. Called a single-seat deregulated (SSDR)
aircraft in the UK, the modified Sirocco microlight
features two twin Jetcat P200SX large scale model
turbines, each producing 52 pounds of thrust. Builder
Dave Stephens has almost eliminated the wing dihedral
and shortened them by 8 feet. Its first flight reached
nearly 60 knots, but aileron flex prevented an attempt
at the max speed of 80. Watch
the video
|
|
|
|
A
Look Back and the View Ahead
EAA President/CEO Rod Hightower sat down this week
for a 10-minute chat regarding where EAA stands at the
close of 2011, what challenges are ahead for GA in 2012,
and other things ranging from the coming Eagle Flights
program to what to look for at Oshkosh next summer.
Watch
the video here
|
|
|
|
WEBINARS
|
All About Magnetos
Maintenance expert and EAA Sport Aviation columnist Mike
Busch, A&P/IA, presents an informational webinar about magnetos,
including how they work, functions of key components, failure modes,
preventive maintenance, preflight and in-flight mag checks,
high-altitude misfire causes and cures, troubleshooting ignition
problems, and more.
All webinars begin at 7 p.m. CST unless
otherwise noted, and they require registration. To find
out more about upcoming EAA webinars and to register, visit the webinars
page.
EAA gratefully acknowledges the
support of Aircraft Spruce and Specialty Co. for its generous
sponsorship of the webinar programs.
|
|
 |
