Website of the Day - Miles Hilton-Barber

A truly inspirational individual. Miles Hilton-Barber is Blind, but (with the help of Storm Smith) has undertaken adventures that most of us with sight would never dare. In particular, his microlighting achievements are remarkable. Miles is a popular motivational speaker who has an incredible attitude and zest for life.
LINK

Website of the Day - Nick's Micropages

A true "classic" is Nick's Micropages. It is chock-full of microlighting stories, adventures, forums, classifieds, etc. It's the "Craigslist" of the UK microlight scene. I love all the articles, but one of my favorites is the biography of Eppo Harbrink Numan, who made a gallant and successful effort to fly his microlight trike solo across the Atlantic Ocean in 1990. Check out his story and the rest of the site...you won't be dissapointed ;)

 

Video of the Day - Why We Fly

LAST DAY TO ENTER EAA's VIDEO CONTEST - Today September 30, 2007

Sorry for the late notice, but EAA's Air Venture Video Competition ends tonight at Midnight. There is still time to take your favorite video from your collection and submit it for consideration. They don't say what the "prize" is for the competition..but I imagine it is something to do with having the video displayed on their site or at the Museum.

Check out the LINK to the contest rules:

Weekend Getaway - with a BRS and a side of strobes...

After almost a year and a half, today was the day that I was going to make down to Rob Rollison's place in Bloomfield, Indiana (Shawnee Airport, 1I3) to pickup my BRS 1050 softpack for N912Q.

I took off this morning at 10am from Trikepilot Ranch in Sawyer, Michigan and had gorgeous 75 degree weather, light 10mph winds at my tail, and 10 podcasts of "CarTalk" on my iphone to keep me busy during the flat stretches.

In SW Michigan we have gorgeous rivers and trees and Lake Michigan. In NW Indiana (and SW Illinois) we have FLAT FLAT FLAT... hence the need for a little audio diversion. Nevertheless, with no phones, no noise, and no one to talk to... it was a great time to let my brain take a rest from the stress of daily life.

With the tailwind I made the 238 mile journey in about two hours and twenty minutes, averaging about 93mph ground speed most of the way. Not bad for 4200 RPM and 3.5gph burn on the 912s. I dropped down on the deck for most of the central Indiana route, checking out the wheat harvest that is going on almost everywhere this week in the Farm Belt.

When I arrived at Shawnee, Rob Caya was waiting for me as he had driven down Thursday to book another marathon weekend of flight training with Allistair Wilson of Astratrike. Rob is advancing rapidly and I'm hoping he'll solo this weekend!?! He's already bought a slick Quantum 912 (white) and we're eager to get him back up to Trikepilot Ranch before the winter.

A great bit of lunch (had a "Manhattan".. which I learned is a Turkey sandwich on White Bread with lots of white gravy on top?), we went back to Shawnee to meet Chris Bailey from AirplaneGear who set me up with a new Skybright Quad Strobe kit as well as my BRS bits. The strobe has top and bottom circular white strobes, with two wingtip combo lights. The tip lights have red/green position, rear facing white LED position markers, and flashing white strobes. I saw these on John Keith's GT450 and they ROCK. When we came back to Trikepilot Ranch on our way to Cushing this summer it was about twenty minutes past sunset and John looked like a Christmas Tree he was so bright. Perfect for the hard-to-see trike in the brave new world of GA flying!

It was getting on 4:30 and I knew I had a headwind.. so I said my "goodbyes" and headed North. It was another blissful flight, with light winds, the sun setting on my port side and nothing but the harvesters and my daydreams to pass the time. Once again I arrived to Trikepilot Ranch just around 8:00 with the sun having just gone below the water line of Lake Michigan. Gorgeous.

I'll be posting photos of how the BRS 1050 softpack installation works out for me. This is my second softpack install, but last one was a bit smaller and I had some other details to work out. Likewise, I'll be doing a "how to" on the strobe installation, particularly how to make brackets to hold the wingtip units.

Microlight History

Early Microlighting in the UK, circa 1980's

Video of the Day - Microlight Basics

I'VE QUIT FLYING ULTRALIGHT TRIKES!!

Yes my friends, the day has finally come... I'VE QUIT FLYING ULTRALIGHT TRIKES FOR GOOD. That's it, done, finito, all over, never again! WTF? you say??

Well, the truth is... my little baby has become a big girl today and earned her N-number. American Quik #1 has finally been given her driver's license and stamped with "N912Q".

The process was actually incredibly painless. My DAR, Tom Milton, from Lansing Airport, was kind enough to drive up to the Trikepilot Flying Ranch today and complete my inspection and sign-off the paperwork.

The whole procedure took about an hour, including a bit of discussion over the FAR details and the recent modifications to the airspace restriction regs. All in all, it was a no-brainer once I had followed all the preparatory steps outlined in the EAA handbook:

1) Stamped and installed my placard to the base frame of the trike where it could be seen;
2) Applied my "N912Q" in 3" letters as well as my "Experimental" graphics in 2" letters;
3) Double-checked that all other warning and instrument and guage decals were in place;
4) Had my Weight and Balance completed along with my FAA Registration card and my engine/airframe logbook (from P&M);

Tom gave my machine a once-over, checked all the paperwork, and then signed my logs. A $400 check for time and travel and it was official. As soon as I have my Mode-C altitude encoding transponder I'll be seeing you guys at O'Hare Airport! ;)

Good luck to everyone else getting it done... it's a load off the shoulders.

Cold Weather Flying Gear - Part Deux! Thanks Rob Caya!!

My good pal Rob Caya keeps lobbing me underhand pitches... he sent me a link to this awesome site that specializes in selling action gear for outdoor sports (flying and motorcycles and snowmobiles, etc.)

Check out particularly their GERBER heated clothing line!

LINK

Sneak Peek! ... Is THIS the new Quik MkIII Dashboard?

From the secret testing grounds near Wiltshire England come these un-verified photos of what appears to be the NEW dashboard arrangement for the P&M Quik MkIII. While we cannot reveal our source, it seems that the dash has grown taller, wider, and a bit more squared-off at the edges, so as to accommodate a full-sized GPS right below the FlyDat.

We will keep you informed as we know more...

Website of the Day - SportAviationCenter.com

Today's feature is Sport Aviation Center from Samanth Moore out of Carson City, NV. She has an extremely informative site, with information about her background, the process of obtaining flight instruction, and some clever multimedia. Looks like there is terrific geographic terrain for sightseeing as well, should one want to take a visit for fun or instruction. Her prices are all clearly available as well as further details about the packages she offers.

I noticed that in her video (below) she's using a bar-mounted switch box with at least three mini cameras. I'm not sure of her setup, so I hope she will join us and provide some details? It reminds me a bit of my multicamera setup that I used in the video Jitka's Big Adventure, which was four bullet cameras, a home made switcher and remote pan and tilt mechanism. See the whole rig HERE.

From her site:
Samantha Moore has been flying since 1981. She started hang gliding and
quickly became a recognized personality in the competition circles.
After placing in the top five in several international events, Samantha
began flying powered trikes. She became an instructor because she
wanted to share her love for flight with others.

Thailand has an incredibly strong Aviation community

Juan Amestoy has joined us from Thailand, and Wayne Bezner Kerr has done some flying in Thailand before... I'm waiting to hear from Eddie Smith, who practically lives down there full time now. So, I decided to do a little research and I discovered that Thailand has a VERY strong Aviation and Microlight community. They seem to favor "clubs" over just open airports, which may be a way of supporting the maintenance and costs of the fields... (Juan?) With such incredible scenery, great food, and warm weather... mark me down for a trip to Thailand!

Check out the Thai Flying Club main page for more info!

LINK

INDIAN SUMMER - TAKING THE WEEKEND OFF TO GO FLYING!

No doubt I'm not alone... we average over 300 viewers a day on this site. Yesterday and today that number has fallen off the shelf. I can only guess it is because of this GORGEOUS weather we are having and the fact that everyone wants to get in the last of their "summer" before it is too late. It was 88 degrees in Sawyer Michigan Friday and Saturday and I put in three hours of pure bliss... flying 100 feet off the crystal clear Lake Michigan Water while skimming the beaches filled with "landlubbers" and wealthy people waving from their multi-million dollar homes on the bluffs. It just doesn't get ANY better than this. Forget the psychiatrists, drugs, alcohol, gambling, or any other vices... this IS the way for any restless spirit to get out of the trap of daily existence and be FREE!!!

Because of this self-induced hiatus, and the fact that I'm taking my kids sailing today on the big lake, I'm just giving a link to the site that inspired me to start Trikepilot.com back in 2000. It is the second of two sites by Jim McKay, the first of which was about his experience building a Quicksilver Ultralight. This one is about his "return" to the world of ultralight flying in his Trike, and how life is too short to "not" take advantage of our dreams of flight. The site remains an inspiration to me, and please take the time to visit his guestbook where you will see how he has been an inspiration to hundreds of others as well.

Enjoy the weekend and fly safe!
Spence

LINK

Flying the Falls High Definition African Adventure - Coming Soon!

From our friend, Mark Becker, in South Africa we have received notice that his latest adventure is called "Flying The Falls" and will soon be available on DVD (we'll have a full review here at Trikepilot Social). In the meantime, check out the dynamic scenery taped in High Definition... such a huge improvement over standard DV when looking at the wildlife and geography of the Nambian wetlands. Beautiful!

LINK

Best of John 'Ole' Olson - Stories from the Wild Blue Yonder

John Olson (or Ole') as he likes to be called, is an old-timer in the trike world. Having come from the Hang Glider adventures of the 1980s and 1990's, he has spent much of the last decade or so traveling up and down the west Coast and into Mexico where he has taught hundreds of students and acquired thousands of great stories. His website is LearnToHanglide.com and here is the page of his "best" stories. Keep in mind, John has a "spicy" sense of humor ;)

Enjoy!

LINK

WOW - Check out the slick new DTA "Combo"

I don't have any further info on this incredibly hot looking machine from DTA (without a front strut, just like the Voyageur). But there is a PICTURE GALLERY available and some other info.

Download Combo leaflet here (PDF)
Download full Combo Brochure here (PDF)

Prices from the factory in France including delivery are quoted as ranging from $28,700 for a Combo 503 to $46,200 for a Combo 912. Anyone had their hands on one of these yet?

Digital Photography Tutorials

This site includes tutorials on how
to acquire, interpret and process digital photographs. A great introduction for anyone who is looking to improve their aviation photography skills, as well as their post-processing editing techniques.

LINK

Website of the Day - Top 1000 Ultralight and Microlight Sights

A pretty deep catalog of links to sites about ultralights, microlights and trikes. Thanks to Rob Caya for the tip.

LINK

Microlighters in South Africa

Mark Becker turned me on to this great bulletin board from South Africa. Great way to compare points of view from a different part of the world.

LINK

Magic Trikes USA - Ace Aviation

Located in Casper, Wyoming, Magic Trikes USA was created by Dan Cooper to import, sell, and service Ace Magic Trikes throughout the United State. What I particularly like about this design is its portability (check picture above!). These are part 103 single-seat designs and a great alternative to LSA.

Ace Aviation started the design on the single seater Magic Microlight series back in 1999. It has been tested, modified and produced in India since then. Materials from Europe and America are used in the construction of the trike, air-frame and sail. The airframe tubing is certified for ultralight construction. John Penry-Evans who originally came from Wales in the UK has been involved in the aerosports industry since the 1970's. He directs all of Ace Aviation’s production work in India and together with a workforce of 18 skilled people keeps the standard of the finished product very high.

LINK