Dr. O
Pattern Altitude
I have been flying for a long time and mostly my own planes.
I have always been fanatical about maintenance so one of the issues I have not had has been a flat tire while flying.
So now, I can scratch that off my bucket list.
Taxi out to the active and about half way there the plane acts sluggish and pulls to the right.
Darn, I think, a stuck brake - except I use differential engine thrust to turn, not brakes.
I stop and pump the brakes, set the parking brake and release it, wiggle the nose wheel while applying a bit of forward throttle and the plane clearly does not want to roll.
At this point a stray spurt of O2 must have made it to a crucial neuron and the light came on.
Sure enough the right main was down on the rim with a complete tear of the sidewall and a broken rim.
So there I was on a sunny Sunday blocking the taxiway to the active. Sweet, just sweet.
But there is hope. The FBO is there and he has (somewhere) a main wheel off an Arrow that will fit. He goes and finds, pumps it up, lies on the ground and we change the wheel assembly and taxi back - carefully not touching the brake as the caliper is dangling. He goes to pick up his grandchildren for church only a little late.
A used wheel assembly is ordered today to the tune of a half an AMU - well that and a new tire and tube and labor (sigh) So at this point flight is costing me roughly a $1000 an hour Gawd I love owning an airplane.
The fracture across the wheel rim is old with only a tiny spot of bright metal showing where it held on to the very last. The even brighter spot is that it did not fail during touch down. Could have gotten interesting .
I have always been fanatical about maintenance so one of the issues I have not had has been a flat tire while flying.
So now, I can scratch that off my bucket list.
Taxi out to the active and about half way there the plane acts sluggish and pulls to the right.
Darn, I think, a stuck brake - except I use differential engine thrust to turn, not brakes.
I stop and pump the brakes, set the parking brake and release it, wiggle the nose wheel while applying a bit of forward throttle and the plane clearly does not want to roll.
At this point a stray spurt of O2 must have made it to a crucial neuron and the light came on.
Sure enough the right main was down on the rim with a complete tear of the sidewall and a broken rim.
So there I was on a sunny Sunday blocking the taxiway to the active. Sweet, just sweet.
But there is hope. The FBO is there and he has (somewhere) a main wheel off an Arrow that will fit. He goes and finds, pumps it up, lies on the ground and we change the wheel assembly and taxi back - carefully not touching the brake as the caliper is dangling. He goes to pick up his grandchildren for church only a little late.
A used wheel assembly is ordered today to the tune of a half an AMU - well that and a new tire and tube and labor (sigh) So at this point flight is costing me roughly a $1000 an hour Gawd I love owning an airplane.
The fracture across the wheel rim is old with only a tiny spot of bright metal showing where it held on to the very last. The even brighter spot is that it did not fail during touch down. Could have gotten interesting .
