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Just got through reading (rereading, actually) Mr. Ploude’s comprehensive explaination of all things tail wheel. The book is generously illustrated with “stick” airplane drawings and well worth your time if you fly such machines, and as a tailwheel instructor, I like to consider the opinions of...

Brand new SR22t. Flew from Livenomore to Monterey. Warm and pleasant weather. Just thought I’d jot down my impressions - The airplane was very slick, with a modern metallic maroon and silver paint and fancy scissor doors. The interior was like a new Lexus combined with a Falcon 7X. The pilot’s...

Having recently read McCullough's biography of the Wright bros., I thought I'd get a slightly different perspective of the key players during the dawn of powered flight. Orville and Wilber notwithstanding, Glenn Curtiss was argueably more responsible for the proliferation of airplanes, the...

Great first chapter about a DC-4 with a runaway prop halfway between Hawaii and the mainland. Then the author takes us way back to when airplanes were very primitive - and dangerous. Doubly so, when the terrain over which they're flown is mostly jungle with hungry critters strewn about the...

Presently on the NY Times bestsellers list, I received this volume as a gift. This well written and illustrated biography will acquaint readers with the dogged work ethic, attention to detail, study habits and the step by stumbled-step of Wilbur and Orville attempting to do what was then...

Well researched account Dolittle's raid on Japan. So many thing went wrong that it's a miracle it went as well as it did. For one thing - the ship convoy was sighted by a sampan and forced the flight to leave the USS Hornet well short of their plans...some 800 east Japan. Strong headwinds, poor...

Looking at an airplane to buy that has a 1997 vintage TCM factory reman with only 130...since then (IO-520). In addition to borescoping the cylinders and oil analysis, is there anything one can check to make sure they're not going to get stuck with premature overhaul?

Anybody flown one?

One of the only positive sides to spending way to much time googling away is that I occasionally come across things like the Silence Twister. Whereas most LSAs look like recreational vehicle meets hang glider, the Twister looks just right. Don't think there are any in the U.S.....yet. Poke...

And was...somewhat underwhelmed. Sure, the real Spirit of St. Louis, the Wright flyer and lots of space related hardware were on display, but after the EAA Museum, it was a letdown. I found it odd the way the museum had such a grandiose display of Amelia Earhart replete with Vega replica, and...

Was the mission for your first airplane what you thought it was going to be before you bought it? What do you know now about how you actually use the airplane vs. the way you thought you would? I ask these silly questions because I want an airplane...mostly for fun, but wouldn't mind traveling...

In the summer of 1981, with about 650hrs, I worked as a copilot/mechanic for an outfit in Anchorage, Alaska. Flew a recently surplus Navy C-117 or R4D-8 and a Curtiss C-46. To be fair, I was about 85% mechanic and 15% copilot. Mostly, we flew fish - fresh salmon, from King Salmon to Anchorage...

I'm still about ten pages from finishing but I've enjoyed every page. Deakin, with whom some will be familiar because of his well founded seminars on LOP engine operation, is a 35,000hr pilot who's flown a lot of airplanes that really require a pilot aboard. Beech 18s, Curtis C-46s, to name a...

Great narrative by the man himself who first flew and subsequently help develop the X-15. North American's winged rocket ship ultimately went almost mach 7 and over 360,000ft. Crossfield was an engineer and it was his careful methods that prevented what might have been more fatalities. He...

Very interesting read, not only for Bonanza pilots. John Eckalbar guides the reader through some interesting aerodynamics: Did you know a V35 has an overall skin friction coefficient that falls between a P-38 and a Lear 25? Me neither. He goes on to discuss stability...and how it relates to...

I'm on a quest to find the nicest flying general aviation light plane. It isn't about how fast or what the airplane will carry, I'm interested in the lightest, silkiest, dreamiest most resonsive and well harmonized flight controls. Opinions? Some of mine are - Pitts Special, Beechcraft T-34...

Last week, I got a chance to fly a friend's Stinson L-5. I had flown it before, but only from the back seat. From the front seat it's much different. Good different. For those unfamiliar, the L-5 is Stinson/Vultee's answer to the (WWII) military request for a utility/liason airplane with STOL...

Just about anyone who has trained in or taught in tailwheel airplanes knows of the dreaded porpoising that can happen, especially when practicing wheel landings with a bit of extra speed. You know the drill, your student (or you) don't quite arrest the sink rate enough before the mains touch...