yellow thangs that flew yesterday

charleskieffner · 09-21-2006, 04:28 AM

all this occurred within 15 minutes of each other. lambo's and grummans are pretty rare here in this area. widgeon was totally restored ground up in vancouver. owner also has one of the cleanest RYANS i have ever seen. it hurts your eyes its so shiney. lambo was right next to me at light reving the hell out of it. as soon as traffic allowed him some clean air ,he let that thing rip down scottsdale road. sounded very very strong.

widgeon13 · 09-21-2006, 04:45 AM

spent many enjoyable hours flying w/ my father-in-law in his widgeon. He is now gone as well as his beautiful mistress, but I have many fond memories. A fantastic aircraft. He had owned his since early 4o's and actually took delivery from Leroy Grumman down on LI, NY

Great pic, is the widgeon at Scottsdale airport?

charleskieffner · 09-21-2006, 04:54 AM

widgeon is in super secret stealth bunker guarded by evil trolls w/big guns in grey building in background. his name is john schwamm from alaska. ie. senator schwamm's son. great guy and has crashed hard flying and had lots of skin grafts. great pilot and funnier than hell. real normal laid back guy very unlike alot of pompous *********s who live here. has honor and distinction of "PUNCHING OUT" like on the floor, a disorderly peon here who thought he ran the airport. guy touched johns nose during meeting here that was rather loud. well johns nose was grafted back on after plane crash and he took great offense and DECKED THE GUY! no charges were filed.

its NEVER DULL HERE AT SKYRANCH!

charleskieffner · 09-21-2006, 04:55 AM

heres our ruptured duck.......aka la MALLARD!

charleskieffner · 09-21-2006, 04:59 AM

Keith Perry · 09-21-2006, 05:12 AM

Wow!! Come on Powerball!!

Jim Richards · 09-21-2006, 05:18 AM

Beauty!

charleskieffner · 09-21-2006, 07:08 AM

just talked to john minutes ago. widgeon left vancouver yesterday, had tail wind, had her going 200KNOTS. used a little over 200 gallons av gas, vancouver to skyranch.

just found out our ruptured duck is up in vancouver due to FAA A.D. due to CHALK AIRLINES CRASH w/fatalities in miami florida harbour. INTERGRANULAR CORROSION on wing spar. ie. where wing meets fuselage. bummer.

304065 · 09-21-2006, 07:17 AM

Chuck, I have about a dozen hours as SIC in a G44. That looks like a really nice one. No Rangers anymore, McKinnon?

There is a poirpose mode with the super Widgeon conversions that is related to the CG-- when you are on the step, there is a particular airspeed range that you MUST transition through quickly or the a/c will develop an unrecoverable poirpose that will have her standing on the nose in a few oscillations. . . this has given rise to the old aphorism:

"If you can not kill yourself in a Widgeon you can not kill yourself in anything."

Thanks for the photo, made my Thursday.

charleskieffner · 09-21-2006, 07:35 AM

john who owns the plane has flown since he was a kid. many many hours flying. he currently has 6000 hrs total flight time on widgeon since ground up resto.

working here for last 8 years, having dad who was a pilot, crashing(hard ground loop) in DORNIER -27 with my friend and boss, working at GARRETT PHX/LA flight lines,makes me really look at pilots abilities. i would rather hang my a$$ on my 1983 HUSQVARNA BAJA WINNING 500 XC and pin the throttle thru the dezert, than fly with 99.999999% of pilots. i am more comfortable doing that and running my 911 at PIR at mach warp speed, than flying with idiots. have seen one too many crashes here, and watched 2 men burn to death in experimental right in front of my eyes, with fire extinguisher in hand doing nothing to quench flames. i made a DAMN BIG MISTAKE THAT FATEFUL DAY, i came into work early!!!!!

flying is inherently dangerous! bottomline. and owning and maintaining a plane IS a FULL TIME JOB! with no room for error. failure in my line of work is NOT AN OPTION.

we carry this mantra over to dirt bikes 4 wheel drives porsches boats anything we play with and we dont break down or have too many failures. I LIKE IT THAT WAY! i wanna get old and spend all of my kids inheritance! LOL!

Joeaksa · 09-21-2006, 08:46 AM

Chuck,

Looks very nice! Need to get my rear home so I can play with the toys with you guys!

Joe A

charleskieffner · 09-21-2006, 08:59 AM

joe where the hell are you? are you off galavanting with SOF'S mercs? are you helping the thai's DO THE COUP? rescueing DAMSALS IN DISTRESS? or just doing your regular gig SLAYING DRAGONS???? LOL!

yep with the 118 temps a non fond memory, all the birds come back to roost and play. get your bunns back here and lets go raise hell! its racing time again. buddies M3 motor just about back in car. gots to go test it for him!!!! LOL! our 928 almost done also( ROADTRIP-ROADTRIP-subliminal-ROADTRIP)!