Just like how I was always in awe of @Victork2 and his mechanical abilities..and @schurem with his outdoors projects..I’m amazed you can do all that and not hurl.
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When I got my acro rating the instructor never pushed for performance. It was all about recovery from bad situations and stay safe. The polishing of the maneuvers was for another day. It was fun, but I rather enjoyed following a VFR or IFR flightplan, trying to fly it as close to the plan as possible. Reading about how you follow a plan of maneuvers makes me think that’s what I was missing from the acro lessons… Anyway, watching you fly is great fun! More, please!
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Thanks. But the rulebook is like 60 pages. I swear it is way less complicated than karate or sheep farming. I know this because I know what my fellow acrobats do and we compare acro to our other jobs and hobbies. But take any new information and it will always seem unbelievably complex. Humor me while I give an example:
A girl comes into our 767 flight deck and sees a terrifying array of switches and instruments and circuit breakers. And they are everywhere. We even have what looks like a flight engineers panel. (We know nothing about what it does but it helps add to the intimidation
). “How can you possibly learn all that?”, she says. “How do you learn your house?”, I reply. “Huh?” “Well take all of those light switches and put them in one place. That’s this (light panel). Now your thermostat and ceiling fans. That’s this. (A/C and bleed panel). Plus your washer, dryer, dishwasher, garage, your stereos, remote and TV. Taken altogether, your house is way more complex but your controls are scattered throughout the house so the complexity is masked by the lack of concentration.” “You’re right. You guys are idiots just like the rest of us!” “Exactly!”
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Such a good video of Shotokan kata. I did Shotokan for around 10 years. What you are taught is when you punch or block to exhale through your core as it tenses your stomach muscles. This adds strength to the punch or block and anchors your stance.
The shout he makes is a kiai. The swishing is the sound of feet and the karateka’s gi which is heavy cotton. We used to use two weights of gi.
The lighter one when you were working hard became drenched and in a 90 minute training session I used to find would give me sores as it would rub whenever you were doing kumate or sparring.
The heavier one which is in the video is much nicer as it doesn’t cling to the skin, but is heavier.
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I’m posting this just so you can enjoy the fine, throaty notes that can only come from a pair of P&W radials. This was the first DC-3 arrival I’ve ever had the pleasure of witnessing at Blairstown.
Turn the volume way up for the DC-3 part then way off for the short Pitts part.
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Nice!!
Are you landing on the same runway as the -3, in the end of the vid?
Yep. 25. 60’ wide (I think) and 3000’ long.
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Funny how the size perspective changes things.
The -3 looks like it’s hugging the trees coming down, but in your approach you have plenty clearance and end up lower over the threshold.
I don’t know, maybe the -3 was lower on short final to keep the angle and speed low?
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I come in much steeper. I would also clear the trees higher if I came straight in. But the angled final has me over taller trees on the hill. We don’t have a VASI but if we did he was pretty well on it. He may have ducked slightly near the end. He hit the 3rd centerline so maybe 800’ down. Not bad given that he only can afford to fly once a month. The “$100 hamburger” becomes a “$2000 hamburger” in that thing.
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It looks like the DC-3 gently says goodbye to the ground when she lifts off.
I did notice an absence of you saying “Dakka-Dakka-Dakka, check six check six” as you got into the perfect firing solution on your friends aircraft. 
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Nice video, Eric!
First I was a bit surprised about what sounds like a relatively high RPM to me during your approach, but then I looked up the Pitts’ glide ratio and I think I get it.
Edit: Also I had never heard of that plane that you flew formation with. Nice little aircraft.
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Always at idle on approach. It’s probably doing around 700RPM with the windmill. Most of what you are hearing is the wind around the wires and fuselage in the sideslip. Most GA planes descend at around 400’/minute on approach. The Pitts is two or three times that—close to a small helicopter autorotating. I could tell that Michael wasn’t keen on the formation idea. That’s why I kept it short.
His is a nice machine. It’s the second Sonex he has built. He recently replaced the pos Aero-V (VW Beetle) engine with a Rotax. He even went to a week-long Rotax maintenance school in Florida. An engineer by trade, he is very meticulous.
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Oh, ok, so I totally misinterpreted that sound.
I assumed that you would leave the throttle above idle because the Pitts glides so badly (6:1 or something? I have even seen numbers stated as low as 5:1 which I don’t want to believe because that would be almost like a Space Shuttle), but you just make your approach steeper to compensate for the immense drag of those wings.
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I approach in a slip so that I can see. It has that added benefit that if the motor quits and I misjudged a little low, I can kick out the slip and extend the glide.
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20 hours in an economy class seat to fly direct to London or NYC from the east coast of Australia - nope, just nope.
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I’m thinking that they are going to have an issue with people getting DVT’s on those flights. They are going to have to encourage people to move around the cabin and give them enough legroom to stretch out a bit.
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As far back as 2007/08 QANTAS were showing in-flight videos with a range of seated exercises designed to minimise the risk of DVT.
I am thinking that they (and their lawyers) would claim that this meets their ‘duty of care’ if it came to lawsuits.
Even though I got to fly business class for work as a civvy I would still rather have that two or three hour layover that I had in Bangkok, Singapore or LA. Heck give me a C-130 or C-17 cabin over cattle class any day.
You jest @BeachAV8R , but you would love that, wouldnt you?
Funny how they went all out to make the thing as light as possible, but hail up a whole bicycle to help the guy power it. You’d think leaving frame and wheels on the ground would save a couple pounds..
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They’d still need some kind of contraption for the guy to sit on that can absorb all the force, which would probably turn out to be very similar to a bicycle.
These things usually require professional athlete power levels to barely keep flying, so us mere mortals may not actually find the experience all that enjoyable. 
When I flew to Australia in 2009, I packed a bunch of Heparin shots for prophylaxis.
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