Wow!

When did this happen? I probably flew right over the area on Monday Aug 5th
on the way back from OSH.

jerry

"Jim Weir" wrote in message
...
Well, kids, I learned a few lessons from this Oshkosh that the previous 31
hadn't taught me...


1. Gail went to Oshkosh in a $50,000 Cessna 182 and returned home in a
$450,000
Greyhound.

2. A cylinder with less than 300 hours on it since the best engine shop
in
Northern California inspected, overhauled, chromed, then replaced all
moving
parts with new CAN and WILL crack in two with absolutely no forewarning.

3. Oil pours out of a cracked cylinder at a fairly rapid rate.
Fortunately,
the engine shakes so hard that it isn't rocket science to figure that you
have
to shut the sucker off before all the oil blows out the hole.

4. Hanna WY may not be the end of the world, but you can see it from
there.

5. There are no airports on the Continental Divide between Medicine Bow
and
Rawlins WY, a distance of some 50 miles. Hanna is roughly halfway between
the
two.

6. God bless the kids of Hanna, who took the old dirt strip that had been
there
thirty years ago and maintained it as a mile-long drag strip at 7000 MSL.
The
cows on the runway are a particularly bucolic touch.

7. It is possible to do a field removal and replacement of a cylinder
with
little more than a bent screwdriver and a busted crescent wrench borrowed
from a
mechanic in Rawlins. (Well, that and cylinder base wrenches and a torque
wrench...but damned little else.) It takes three full days out in the
field to
change a jug...one day to pull all the small baffle-induction-exhaust
parts, one
day to pull the jug itself and take it back to the shop, and one day to
reinstall a serviceable jug. Some day I'm going to meet the b@$!@&d at
Continental that designed the pushrod tubes and "discuss" the design with
him.

8. It makes it a little more difficult when the wind blows at a steady
twenty
to thirty knots and you are out in the open field for three days doing
this
operation, but it builds character. You know the work day is over when
the late
afternoon thunderstorm is bouncing the airplane around to the point where
the
wrench won't stay on the nut. Besides, on the top of the highest point
for
twenty miles in any direction in an open field during a thunderstorm is
.... ummm
... interesting.

9. It is also interesting to drive the old airport beater diesel truck
the 40
miles of mountain roads from Rawlins to Hanna only to find that you left
the
7/8" spark plug wrench on the workbench in Rawlins.


10. This world has some absolutely wonderful people in it. In no
particular
order they a

Kevin and Roxy Bell, Zacharia and Stephanie. Owners of Hanna
Unintentional Airport. They came out at least once a day to see if there
was
anything they could do or help with.

Deputy Sheriff Jack Lowrance (interesting last name, eh? ... aren't
coincidences God's little jokes?). Drove us from Hanna to Rawlins and
wouldn't
leave until we had all our stuff arranged and taken care of.

Dwight and ?Bonnie? France, France Flying Service, Rawlins WY. Loaned
us the airport truck, let us pester the mechanic, ordered our cylinder,
and
charged us practically nothing for the trouble except the actual cost of
the
parts.

Bill the Mechanic, FFS, Rawlins WY. Loaned us any tool we wanted, no
questions asked, let me use the Continental Overhaul manual, and
alternately
patted me on the back and kicked my butt until the job got done.

Dave Winder, Mechanic In Training, FFS, Rawlins WY. Mechanic in
training only because he is six months short of the 30 months necessary to
take
the A&P exam. If anybody in this ng, ANYBODY wants a mechanic that knows
more
about airplanes than 99% of the mechanics in the world, works his ass off
under
conditions that most of us would sit around waiting for better times, and
in
general is one hell of a worker, I'm sure David would appreciate hearing
from
you. From scratch, Dave and I started at 1 pm to replace the cylinder,
and by 4
pm we had it run up, cowled, and ready to depart. Remember, this is out
in the
TALL tules under primitive conditions, with only the tools we remembered
to
take.


If you EVER meet ANY of these folks, I'd appreciate it if you would give
them my
regards and buy them a beer for me. They are what makes aviation go.


Anyway, 2004 was an Oshkosh that will go into my scrapbook for a long,
long
time.

Good to be back home.


Jim






Jim Weir (A&P/IA, CFI, & other good alphabet soup)
VP Eng RST Pres. Cyberchapter EAA Tech. Counselor
http://www.rst-engr.com