Just another nice day over the Mojave

WARNING! This post does not contain any political diatribe, personal
castigations, or off-topics musings.

The weather over the north end of California's share of the Mojave
Desert was once again in the severe clear category. A Mooney departed to the
south from Inyokern Airport (IYK) just as I pulled through the security gate
by the hangars.
Gentle breezes swung the weathervane to and fro. If there were any
thermals burping off the pavement, I couldn't tell. The ridgeline of the
Sierra was stark against the blue sky blotted by vague hints of cloud vapor
30 or 40 miles to the north. A high pressure mass had settled in and the
atmosphere was flat and stable.
I preflighted the rental C-150G in its hangar and tucked my stuff into
little nooks and crannies. The owner had recently clamped a Garmin-196 to
the yoke and I spent some time poking buttons on a totally unfamiliar
gadget. Maybe 45 minutes after I pulled through the gate, I pulled on the
starter handle -- nothing happened. Ah, yes, master switch ON. The prop
turned twice as many rotations as I remembered it usually did. Ah, yes, mag
switch ON. Three blades and the little engine that can, was.
The devil is in the details. I sat there and let the Hobbs spin while I
reread the checklist, again. I know I had read it before I tried the first
start. Hrumph!
On my side of the hold short line, I did the pre-takeoff list twice just
to punish myself. I did a traffic call for takeoff, ess-turned and checked
the pattern for traffic, rolled out to the center line and pushed the
throttle to the firewall.
I need to back up and mention that I hadn't flown the 150 for several
months. I'd been flying 172SPs out of the Edward AFB Aeroclub. I was acutely
aware of the confines of the cabin already. What I totally forgot was the
huge difference between the 180hp, fuel injected, psuedo rocket engines in
the 172SP and the little bitty thing on the front of the 150G that was
struggling to drag me forward.
I'd done a density altitude calc and knew about where I was supposed to
be airborne before the intersection of runway 02-20. Airspeed indicator
crept up to 40MPH(not knots here), then 45. At the intersection I'd have
another 7,000 feet of runway in front of me. There's 50, gentle tug back on
the yoke and the nose raised a few inches. At 55, the airplane flew away
from the ground. Waiting, waiting, still flying, I crossed the intersection
at 60MPH and 100 feet up. I need to accelerate to at least 70 to start a
climb.
At 200 feet, I was at 75MPH and climbing at about 200 FPM, then 300.
Beyond the runnway and 500 feet up, I did a 90left 45right to clear the
pattern and made a sweeping climbing turn to head east.
Joshua Approach cleared me unrestricted through R-2506, the low approach
corridor leading to the Naval Air Warfare Center at China Lake and gave me a
5000 or above for the main SUA of R-2505. I wanted lower -- 5K is about
double the altitude of my house which is about 1/2 miles inside the
boundary. I'd wanted to so some pictures. Not approved. During the week, I
could probably have talked China Control (they own the airspace during
normal working hours) into letting me go lower.
I headed back west and then south. No place to go in particular. Just
remember how to fly the 150. Flight Following reports from Joshua were about
20 minutes apart and only one dealt with 33X (me), so I turned on the
Garmin-196 to play with it.
I had to change from my sunglasses to regular glasses to read the
display. I'd read there is some control over backlighting and contrast, but
I didn't have the book with me and couldn't find it intuitively.
Basic GPS operation was, on the other hand, pretty intuitive to me. The last
person that flew had it set for up is north. I prefer the little plane
thingy to point up and have the track line up with it. That I couldn't
intuit, either.
I played with the psuedo-panel page for a while. I suppose if you had a
panel failure on the airplane, you could use that feature, but I didn't get
comfortable with the update lag in the brief time I flew with it.
CalCity airport was busy with meat-missles so I stayed well to the west.
I've proably offended a number of the residents of this newsgroup with that.
So flame me. Skydiving is not on my list of things to do, ever.
With the exception of five minutes crossing over Red Rock Canyon both
ways, the flight was delightfully smooth. Over the canyon the air was four
stages below mild turbulence -- maybe a one on the ten-scale. According to
the Garmin-196, I had no crosswind drift with the HI and the GPS heading on
the same number.
On the way home I had not heard a single peep on 122.8 of any traffic at
IYK so I decided to try something I'd never done before. There in front of
me, ten miles away, I was lined up exactly with runway 02. I keyed the mike
and announced my intentions to do a straight-in approach.
Maybe I'll try it again someday -- after I look at the geometry, and
what altitudes you should have at what distances. But this time I was way
too high and way too fast. When It was apparent I could NOT make that
landing, I sidestepped into a right downwind for 20 at pattern altitude and
made an unevenful landing.
It may have been easier if the two-box VASI had been in operation, but
all I had was my personal visual perception and it had no history.
Oh, yeah, I did go through the landing check list and did use the carb
heat.
It was a good day to fly over the Mojave, this day.

Casey Wilson
Freelance Writer and Photographer