What's all this brown color? (T-minus 7)

EdFred

Taxi to Parking
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Charts arrived from Sporty's today. Lots of em. 15 of them in all. That doesn't count the 3 of the 6 that I subscribe to. So I have 18 VFR sectional charts and 5 AFD's needed for this trip. I open up some of the western sectionals - and see a color I've never seen on a sectional before - BROWN! What is this brown color?!?! Quite a contrast from the light green color us flat landers are used to. Of the 4 sectionals I normally use, there is only 2 colors - light green and blue.

One week to go. Now I'm gettin excited!

I'm also expecting to take enough pictures to fill an entire CD.
 
N2212R said:
What is this brown color?!?!

Dark brown means you can be hypoxic at 5000 AGL and still run into cumulo granite and not be anywhere near the top.

Also clearance delivery will laugh at you if you request flight following at 5500. I actually heard someone do that one day at COS (6184MSL)

N2212R said:
Quite a contrast from the light green color us flat landers are used to. Of the 4 sectionals I normally use, there is only 2 colors - light green and blue.

I forgot sectionals have green and blue. The local chart is varying shades of brown.

Go have fun and enjoy the trip. Post pictures when you get back.
 
fgcason said:
Also clearance delivery will laugh at you if you request flight following at 5500. I actually heard someone do that one day at COS (6184MSL)


LOL. No worries of me doing that. Since I'm not flying OVER all the mountain ridges what's the best way to file the VFR route of flight. When I'm not going to be flying to any navaids? Example - from Farmington to La Junta, I'll be flying ESE until I hit the Rio Grande, then follow that N to Mt Blanca, then through the pass to La Junta. Or just file it that way?
 
N2212R said:
LOL. No worries of me doing that. Since I'm not flying OVER all the mountain ridges what's the best way to file the VFR route of flight. When I'm not going to be flying to any navaids? Example - from Farmington to La Junta, I'll be flying ESE until I hit the Rio Grande, then follow that N to Mt Blanca, then through the pass to La Junta. Or just file it that way?

Actually, I'd file it just that way. The purpose is to give them a starting place to look, I'm sure the FSS guys can put it in any way you want. If not, you don't have to be on a VFR flight plan to get flight following.
 
Joe Williams said:
Actually, I'd file it just that way. The purpose is to give them a starting place to look, I'm sure the FSS guys can put it in any way you want. If not, you don't have to be on a VFR flight plan to get flight following.

I'm not expecting to get flight following while flying below the tops of the mountains. Hence the VFR flight plan. I'm going to have to remember to close it to.
 
I love the smell of new charts...I'll bet a whole boatload of charts like that smells awesome!

I actually like the brown better...makes it easier to read stuff on the sectional, IMHO. The New York Sectional seems way harder to read, being all green.
 
Green is boring. Flying 200 miles at 2000agl without going around something? What's the fun in that?? :D
 
Brian Austin said:
Green is boring. Flying 200 miles at 2000agl without going around something? What's the fun in that?? :D

Well, you can always read a book :goofy:
 
Brian Austin said:
Green is boring. Flying 200 miles at 2000agl without going around something? What's the fun in that?? :D

Oh, I'm looking forward to flying some valleys, and doing some real navigation and pilotage. Here in MI, all you have to do is fly E or W and you will hit big water. Not hard to get lost. You knew that though.
 
N2212R said:
Oh, I'm looking forward to flying some valleys, and doing some real navigation and pilotage. Here in MI, all you have to do is fly E or W and you will hit big water. Not hard to get lost.
Up until six years ago, I was a neighbor in GRR. I know MI pretty well. ;)
 
N2212R said:
Since I'm not flying OVER all the mountain ridges what's the best way to file the VFR route of flight. When I'm not going to be flying to any navaids? Example - from Farmington to La Junta, I'll be flying ESE until I hit the Rio Grande, then follow that N to Mt Blanca, then through the pass to La Junta. Or just file it that way?

IMO, file it generally like that. Details as needed (heading from Farmington and intercept the river where exactly and name the pass for them)

FWIW: I file what I'm going to do. Navaid information as far as possible then I fill up the comments section if I have to with known local positions (marked towns etc) then "over the hill, down the river, between the rocks." For significant locations on a route, I have given lat/long and/or navaid fixes even though I was flying too low to actually receive the signals. It's a significant defined point on the chart laid out on the search crews table, not a useable signal in the plane to navigate with. I don't get excessive but I do make sure they know where to look for me. Remember that if you go down one valley over, there are billions of little tiny ravines where some hiker might find you 30 years from now.

Fly what you file. Leave your routing information with someone at home who's expecting your phone call at no later than xx:xx. Carry survival gear. Be a wimp.
 
fgcason said:
Navaid information as far as possible then I fill up the comments section if I have to with known local positions (marked towns etc) then "over the hill, down the river, between the rocks."

How do you file a flight plan in that way? Every flight plan I've ever filed, I've filed over the phone with a briefer. The only other way I know of to file is online. Is there a place where you can actually hand the flight plan to someone and say "File this"?
 
NickDBrennan said:
How do you file a flight plan in that way? Every flight plan I've ever filed, I've filed over the phone with a briefer. The only other way I know of to file is online. Is there a place where you can actually hand the flight plan to someone and say "File this"?

On the phone, just tell him where you are going if there are no navaids available. "I'm following I-64 NE to Morgantown, then I-68 over to Cumberland, then THS, LNS, PNE" would have described the last trip I took though I didn't file it that way because I had nav-aids available. I didn't use the nav-aids, but they were there for descriptive purposes. Lacking them, that's what I would have told the dude on the phone. I'm hoping there's a way to put them in that way, because some of my upcoming shorter trips will have a route that pretty much consists of "flying down the beach till we get there."
 
NickDBrennan said:
How do you file a flight plan in that way? Every flight plan I've ever filed, I've filed over the phone with a briefer. The only other way I know of to file is online. Is there a place where you can actually hand the flight plan to someone and say "File this"?

Yep, just visit your flight service station for a face to face briefing
 
NickDBrennan said:
How do you file a flight plan in that way? Every flight plan I've ever filed, I've filed over the phone with a briefer. The only other way I know of to file is online. Is there a place where you can actually hand the flight plan to someone and say "File this"?

I've done it over the phone. Obviously I didn't give them a 10 paragraph entry and kilept it to the bare facts which I do anyway but they would (at least they use to) take what I give them and verify my weird routing so they at least paid attention while I was yakking. I've updated flight plans in the air with no problem. "The pass I filed for is filled with clouds, I'm going through the pass to the north at this location xx yy...then back south via the river to podunkville then on course as filed." I've gotten a few strange do-huh-what?!?! comments at first but I've never been yelled at for doing it.

Walk in FSS stations are/were the greatest. You could walk in, talk to briefers in person, they showed you the current WX charts right there on the spot, got whatever information you asked for and took whatever plan you gave them. You could hand them the lyrics to Puff the Magic Dragon and they'd take it though they probably wouldn't put that in your flight plan since it's nonsense. Nicest places and people on the Earth. It's a crying shame they're closing those stations in the name of maximized profitability margins or reduced expenses or whatever the current game of the day is.

I've never filed online. Can you put the comments in you want or is it limited to xxx characters or just canned entries?
 
N2212R said:
Charts arrived from Sporty's today. Lots of em. 15 of them in all. That doesn't count the 3 of the 6 that I subscribe to. So I have 18 VFR sectional charts and 5 AFD's needed for this trip. I open up some of the western sectionals - and see a color I've never seen on a sectional before - BROWN! What is this brown color?!?! Quite a contrast from the light green color us flat landers are used to. Of the 4 sectionals I normally use, there is only 2 colors - light green and blue.

One week to go. Now I'm gettin excited!

I'm also expecting to take enough pictures to fill an entire CD.

You have light green?
 
We have a good bit of green on our charts in SOCAL. But most of that green is really brown - desert.
 
Brian Austin said:
Green is boring. Flying 200 miles at 2000agl without going around something? What's the fun in that?? :D

If you're 2000agl, you only have to go around towers, birds, or other aircraft.... :)
 
Besides the brown color, there are a few other differences that you'll find on your trip out here:

Learning to fly in the midwest where magnetic variation was a couple degrees, I didn't pay much attention to it other than to get through my written and flight plan on the check ride. Magnetic Variation will be 16 degrees more westerly by the time you get to the west coast. This does some interesting things to runway alignments in Facilities Directories & charts...compare your home base 9D9 with Belingham, WA (BLI). 36 is depicted straightup at 9D9...so is 34 at BLI. Seemed strange to me at first. Winds aloft are in true so don't be surprised if the wind isn't quite where you thought it was.

Again, in the midwest there wasn't a lot of difference between AGL & MSL...maybe 400 ft, so I didn't fully appreciate it. .TAFs and ATIS report ceilings in AGL vs MSL...a beautiful thing when base elevations are 5000' MSL. 3000' Broken is 8000 MSL. I was confused at first when I had planned to fly at 8500' and saw a TAF along my route with a reported overcast at 4000'...duh, still some room.

Winds blowing over the mountains produce waves that you'll find well out into the high plains areas and the valleys between the mountain ranges out here. Expect to see fairly pronounced airspeed oscillations as you run into rising and descending columns of air even well away from the mountains. I thought I had engine problems the first time I ran into this. A constant power setting would result in regular airspeed oscillations of plus and minus 20kts in periods of a few minutes. You'll be busy adjusting the power to maintain an altitude. You might see this for an hour as you are approaching the higher terrain. Accepting some small altitude deviation can make this a bit less trying.

You'll enjoy the tremendous geographic diversity along your route. A lot of it will be spectacular scenery, some of it...well, geographically diverse
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Safe flight!
 
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