So There I Was...

....on my first post-engine inspection flight. The plan was to stay within
gliding distance of the field, "just in case", so I launched, made a wide
circle of the field, while climbing to 3,000' AGL. When on what was more or
less an extended crosswind, I made a descending 135 degree left turn and
called "Cartersville traffic, Experimental NXXX 2 miles southeast, inbound
on the 45 into the downwind for 19" (or something like that).

And the guy who'd been giving position reports from a different zip code
"NXXYY 30 miles North, inbound" responds on the radio and says "NXXYY is on
a 9 mile straight in, doing 180 knots". I look down and am clipping along
at 170 knots and am a mile from entering the downwind. That's very fast for
me in that relative position to the field, but I was dumping the altitude
I'd held in reserve since it was a post-maintenance flight. As I turn
downwind and announce, a C-172, which I know to be an instructor with
several students announces that he's departing and dawdles onto the runway.
So I extend for spacing from him and call my base turn.

Of course, the guy who was on the 180 knot straight in comes back with "You
understand there is an aircraft on short final"... I'd been looking for him,
and there he was, above my visual horizon, and on the other side of the 300'
hills that are a couple of miles North of the field. So I say "Yep", turn
final, and as I'm crossing the threshold, he announces "Meridian NXXYY is
going around".

Which leads to the age old question... Was there a better approach I should
have taken? My sense is that per the FAR's (altitude being the key factor),
I had precedence for landing. Also, my sense is that he was the one who was
smoking along all the way to short final and he could have meshed with the
existing traffic (me) if he'd pulled the throttle back a bit. Instead, he
probably burned an extra 5 gallons of Jet A on his go-around...

Yeah, I know... I'm hard headed too, but I don't see where flying a faster
airplane and calling a long, long, straight in approach means the other
aircraft in and around the field need to defer to you... Heck, my airplane
is faster than 90% of the GA fleet, and I'd never do that intentionally.

Oh, yeah. The post-maintenance flight went well. I had a surprising
experience once and that has made me pretty cautious on post-maintenance
flights.

KB