You are so good at AAR… 
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Hi all, I’ve started from Durban, South Africa (FALE) in the freeware KingAir 350B using X-Plane 10.
First leg a night flight to Madagascar (FMSD)
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@chipwich which Embraer is that?
…still angry that there is no good Citation X for X-plane11 so looking for alternatives.
OK all well at FL200, heading north up Madagascar towards Antananarivo VOR TNV, then across the ocean to Praslin Airport FSPP, but I suspect I’ll need to put down in the Seychelles as fuel will be running short…
My last permitted posting as a newbie, so hopefully meet some of you at YPXM.
Hope the beers stay cool in the hold…
Ok (edit) made it to the Seychelles from Madagascar: all of 1363nm plus. Lost my transponder en route, but made it with 1/4 tank to spare! I just love the Beech KingAir 350B!! BTW this is a freeware aircraft I downloaded a few years back - no 3D but it flies like a dream. I started out at FL300 but a 10kt headwind so I descended to FL160 and found a 10kt sort-of tailwind to help me along.
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It’s the Carenado Phenom 300 for P3Dv4, but it’s pretty much a mixed bag. It’s beautifully rendered and most of the systems work as they should. But I have issues with the FPL functionality, or lack thereof, in their Prodigy G1000. For sure I’m not the only one. There is a mod to replace the NAV part of the MFD with the GTN 750. I’ve done this and it’s so much more intuitive. You can also save flight plans in the GTN’s catalog and share them across equipment (aircraft).
https://www.avsim.com/forums/topic/510981-carenado-phenom-300-with-gtn-750/
I see in X-Plane, Carenado is beginning to convert aircraft to give you the option of running LR’s G1000 instead. IMO, it’s better in the places that matter to me.
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Leg 07 - Jackson Hole, Wyoming to Burlington, Washington (KJAC - KBVS)
Route for today. Weather is pretty much the same at both ends. 2800 over which stretches to about 14 thousand. Smooth air on top. Possible icing above 6 thousand.
Another day, another 9 kegs of delicious craft beer to be hauled to the far reaches of civilization. Hmmm, I wonder if those placards on the tip tanks are really descriptive, or merely marketing effort?
See ya. Wouldn’t want to be ya.
With full fuel and kegs we are 2 lbs under MTOW. If all goes to plan, we should have an hour of fuel remaining at our destination.
Losing a bet at the bar last night cost us our fighter pilot moustaches.
…but not our attitudes. “I feel the need. The need for f—ing speed!”
And off we were. 599 kmls remaining, which should take just under two hours. Need to watch N1 next time.
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Holy cow this thing climbs. Whoa mule. I said whoa.
Time to get out the POH and enlighten ourselves as to some of the critical systems. What’s this, a cabin pressure warning? Sim paused. Oh yeah, book says bleed on, altitude set to 6k, rate set to auto. Glad we caught that one when we did. A knowing look is shared between the crew. Not making this up.
A little while later checking the GTN’s fuel planner.
And one of the 3 WX feeds.
Tinkering with the GTN’s VCALC utility. Combined with the excellent Sperry autopilot/FD, we hit all of our waypoints pretty much on planned altitude during the descent and approach.
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One of my favorite moments in flying is during the descent, when the aircraft passes from blue sky into a fluffy cloud bath. Sometimes it is sudden, but at others one feels as if in a slow dissolve.
We will be in IMC from here to less than 5 miles from our destination. Fingers crossed that all of the digital magic works.
Todays approach.
Eventually terra firma returns to view. We are well into our approach.
The GTN’s terrain avoidance features are greatly appreciated. What is the George Michael song, Faith?
Skagit Regional is a welcome sight and the home base of our Air Hauler operation.
The mighty loggerhead is pleased at our work! I’m pleased that the engineers at Garmin and Sperry are so gifted.
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Great report. That’s a legit-exciting RNAV approach. Gotta love approach plates that have all those contour gradients on them.
That CABIN ALT warning and the Lear brings back bad memories of that Paine Stewart accident.
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Dang…that’s respectable!
Whoa!
Dude…I’m just impressed you didn’t get an FSX crash…! Awesome!
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That was my first thought too.
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Yes, I did not miss the irony, may the crew and passengers of N47BA RIP. The annunciator panel lit up at around 14k, with the cabin pressure around 9.5. So, I don’t think that the cabin pressure rose above 10k. I wonder of the Payne Stewart crew had some complicating factors?
To be sure, I’m learning the Lear by pushing buttons, and referring to the excellent manual when something breaks. The fuel panel is another item that shouldn’t be overlooked. And it took me a while to realize that VS is set by a bug on the VSI, not the pitch up/down wheel on the AP panel. Now, if I could get the 8 Track deck to work we could travel in style!
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Our ride home from Christmas Island has arrived in YPXM… 
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Snark, get yourself outta here you scamp
I suppose those last words could be worse, although I suppose that’s what you get for springing surprises on people flying around the world… What for again?
Ah yeah, Christmas Island. Fortunately I know a guy that knows a guy, that most likely knew a living human being, because here so far away from home I find my Bell 407.
Well ‘my’ as in, I bought it on a whim for video operations back at Spadaro but it’s here, and functional .I hope. Best get moving, nobody looks happy to see a hungover dutchman around here. Can’t fault em though.
camera’s and floats, everything we need for this journey!
The cockpit doesn’t hold many surprises, I’ve managed to knock down some time in a relative of this beast. Though I quite fancy those digital gauges. It has something very Star Trekkie going on.
I gently flip some switches until the annunciator panel makes a little more sense, although that blaring horn when you flip the battery switch was the first to extinguish 
. Soon enough the starter accepts my commands, some fuel gets introduced and the FADEC pretty much does all the engine work for me. I give it a minute to stabilize and roll up the throttle to full power, I fully intent not to touch it until touchdown… Promise!
I head towards WICC, I called around and someone with a paintbucket is willing to bring this baby up to company standards. Might as well make some money on this side of the world whilst we are here anyway eeh?
\
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Some dramatic action shots for the viewers at home to enjoy. Let me introduce mountain Mc mountainface to you. It might come as a surprise or perhaps a shock to some that this is actually a mountain or a vulcano. Nobody knows, nor do we know it’s real name until the one that I’ve just given it.
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I’ve done the science and it has a collapsed bit in the middle, that means it’s either a glacier or a caldera. The latter is when a vulcano leaves a relationship and the latter is when they make baby vulcano’s. Now it’s time to head over towards those lakes in the distance. As you can see I properly prepared and scienced this mission, aren’t you proud of dropping me off @BeachAV8R?
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Safe and sound on the ground. Became a victim of the weird XP-10 weather rendering, a cloud that I could see through turned into some sort of dense fog, I was less then 30ft from the ground and still couldn’t see it!
Turned the weather to CAVOK and landed! Time to get this beauty kitted out for company business!
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My first mainland Australia leg was a leisurely low-altitude cruise from Coffs Harbour (YCFS) to Brisbane (YBBN) up the coast.
I enjoyed the Baron enough to hire another one from YCFS after delivering the first one here.
This trip looked to be quite relaxing - daytime, a coastline to follow, plenty of airports if I ran into an issue and while it wasn’t sunny, the weather was okay.
I was a little bit disappointed that Australia’s Gold Coast wasn’t giving me the sun it is known for but despite the haze the weather made for relatively easy flying.
My route took me to Brisbane via Ballina and Gold Coast.
I also checked out Byron Bay from the air - I went surfing there once years ago. Good fun. I wasn’t missing out on any surf today, though - the seas were calm.
I arrived to Brisbane after an uneventful but rather pleasant flight - it was nice to just take off, look outside and meander along the coast rather than fighting high winds in full IFR in the night over water.
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