Admin

I don't suppose you want to send him my way do you - a free trip never goes astray

Redair - it seems the best time to catch me is at 3:08 in the morning as I was in a different mood then - moderation is hard as the mood you are in at the time can influence a decision and we are all human. A nice reply will always get me on side but any attack using verbal diarrhoea will always make me dig the heels in. :big_grin:

Thread has been reopened - reread the thread in a different mood and thought I may have made a mistake but please take it easy as we do need to encourage both genders here in the forums! :big_grin: besides there are a lot of jokes being made about the male gender in the laughter forum that it can be said that it goes both ways.

My recommendation is

Option 1 - get nothing for the first 2 to 3 hrs. Settle in and make sure you enjoy it first and then all you will need to get is a BAK (Basic Aeronautical Knowledge book). Also a Log Book

Option 2 - get a copy of a BAK now and start reading it. Also a Log Book

Your test will be based on everything in the BAK so the sooner you can start reading it the better but you don't want to get one unless you are sure you are going to enjoy flying. There are different authors of the BAK and if you intend to go on to your PPL then the best (in my opinion) PPL book is Bob Tait's but if makes references to his version of the BAK - something to think about when choosing the BAK.

A headset is only a "nice to have" so your not swapping spit with other students but not necessary. If you do want one then don't go out and buy an expensive one yet - wait and see what your needs are first i.e. how much flying you do. Naturally the Recreational Flying headset is the best cheap one (I am biased though) and you can read the review done on them here from the Reviews menu.

When you get your Certificate then you will need to spend the money for navigation tools like a wiz wheel, protractor, ruler, timer (your watch will do), pencils and maps. A kneeboard is also a "nice to have" but remember the room you have in your aircraft. A trifold kneeboard is good as you put your wiz wheel in the middle, your flight plan on one side and flick it over for your map. But then again a clip board can suffice - did I say pencils, you can never have to many of them.

Good luck and remember to enjoy every moment.

Last year I replaced all the windows in my house with those expensive double-pane energy-efficient kind. Yesterday, I got a call from the contractor who installed them. He was complaining that the windows had been installed a whole year ago and I hadn't paid for them yet.

Now just because I'm blonde doesn't mean that I am automatically stupid. So I told him just exactly what his fast-talking sales guy had told ME last year, namely, that in just ONE YEAR these windows would pay for themselves! "Helllooooo! !" (I told him). "It's been a year!"

There was only silence at the other end of the line, so I finally just hung up...he hasn't called back, probably too embarrassed about forgetting the guarantee they made me. Bet he won't underestimate my intelligence again.

This has been troubling me all night so I thought I would let everyone know how serious I take security of these forums and your personal information.

Every night some software that I have randomly selects 5 users and does a security check on them. It uses a point score and alerts me if it doesn't come up to 10/10 - anything below 6/10 I will delete them immediately, anything between 6/10 and 9/10 get a please explain PM. No doubt some forum members who have received a please explain can vouch for this.

Every IP address is checked for its location. If an IP address location isn't around the location that has been placed in the location field of the user then a bell rings and further analysis happens to ascertain its validity such as ISP name (Optus, Bigpond etc are ok). One user recently was suspended because their IP address was from Sydney yet their location was in Brisbane. I then phoned the user with the phone number that they provided in their registration and found it was a fax machine - USER SUSPENDED until some true identity is ascertained. The user complained to some RA Board Members but lucky another user was able to vouch for the person so the suspension was lifted.

If two people log in to the forums from the same computer I am sent a warning email. This is investigated to find out why and if needed a phone call is made to find out more. if things don't add up then DELETE. Naturally members like Matt/Kazz, David/Marilyn, Darren/Emma etc ring bells but we know they are partners, husband/wife etc but every other one is investigated. Like all the security that is used in this website can be vouched for by those members that have received a please explain.

What I can't protect is any email address that a user puts in a post in these forums:

1. Announcements/NOTAMS

2. The Recreational Flying Flyin

3. Aircraft ADs & ANs List

4. Kit Building

The above forums are unlocked and Public - the posts in those forums can be viewed by the public and therefore by spam robots etc that search the internet for email addresses. All other forums are locked to viewing by the public but any email address placed in a post in the other forums should still be considered as being made public.

All user's ISPs are checked and non known ISPs like Optus, Bigpond etc are checked that they don't offer the use of a free email address. If they do then the user is advised that we don't allow the use of free email address providers. However, in just a few cases where the user has had no other alternative and we have ascertained without any doubt the true identity of the user then we have allowed it - but as I said there are just a couple.

A back-door is purposely left open at a x% hack difficulty level. If anyone tries to hack into the forums they will find that back-door but they are then led up a garden path. While they are being led up the garden path an application is collecting as much information about them as possible and then sent to me. The back-door is then slammed shut but I can then try and find out who tried to hack in. This has only happened once in the 3 years the forums have been operating.

There are a couple of suspect forum members that are watched (I know who they really are but they have tried to be anon) and an application tracks their movements in the forums whenever they visit them. I don't want to stop people from using the forums especially for the safety learning aspect but I need to protect the honest members.

These forums use paid for professional software so their security integrity is always being checked. Forums that use software like phpBB are very dangerous when it comes to protecting your information. phpBB is the most hacked software in the world. For example one aviation forums that use phpBB recently locked their forums that only registered users can read all the posts in a thread and guests can only read the first post of the thread. I am not registered in those forums (I won't register in any phpBB forum unless I use my laptop which doesn't have any personal information and only my hotmail email address anywhere on it) but I easily hacked into their forums and I am able to read every post that is made. I looked at phpBB for these forums but when I tested them I found that a person of my knowledge could hack into them pretty easily in various places.

When you go to some web sites they have software that will look into your computer and harvest any email address that they can find. For example find out yourself how protected your PC is by:

Firstly a warning - be careful in this area of your computer and don't change anything

1. Click Start - Run

2. In the popup box enter regedit - click OK

3. In the window that opens click Edit and then Find from the menu bar

4. Enter your email address or even a part of it in the find box and click Find Next

If it finds your email address then there you have it - don't forget to exit out of that window WITHOUT CHANGING ANYTHING. Your email address can be stored in many places on your computer.

Everyone here that has had a problem with their password will confirm that even I am unable to find out what your password is - I can change it but I can't read it as it is one way encryption like also your email address. What one way encryption is, is that abc is changed through code to end up being stored like xyz. When you put your password in the software doesn't read your password and checks it but it applies the same code to what you have entered and then compares the result with what has been stored i.e. it applies the code to your abc entry to get xyz and then checks that the stored value is also xyz. Here is an example of an encryption procedure in Visual basic that I wrote for an old application that I developed encrypting a text value into a numerical value (I now use alphanumeric):

On Error GoTo HandleErr

Dim N As Integer

Dim countn As Integer

Dim letter As String

Dim lockn As String

N = 1

If ID = "" Then

MsgBox "This error is ""Fatal"" No 6.", vbCritical + vbOKOnly, "Fatal Error - 6"

StandardError Err, Err.Description, "FATAL ERROR - 6"

DoCmd.Quit acQuitSaveNone

End If

If Len(ID)

countn = Len(ID)

lockn = 21659

Do Until N = countn + 1

letter = Mid(ID, N, 1)

lockn = Val(lockn) * (CLng(Asc(letter)) * DatePart("m", Date))

If Len(lockn) > 12 Then lockn = Right(Fix(lockn * 0.21659), 12)

lockn = Val(lockn) * (CLng(Asc(letter)) * (DatePart("yyyy", Date) * 0.0001))

If Len(lockn) > 12 Then lockn = Right(Fix(lockn * 0.12198), 12)

N = N + 1

Loop

If DLookup("Key1", "USysAccessKey") = "235147427207" And _

DLookup("Key2", "USysAccessKey", "ID=" & DatePart("m", Date)) = lockn Then

CheckUnlockCodeMonthly = True

Else

CheckUnlockCodeMonthly = False

End If

The ID value is say your password.

If your password is less then 8 characters it adds the words Caitlin Emily to your password and then changes the ID text

It then counts the number of characters in your password as this will be used to perform that number of iterations of the code.

It also remembers a secret number - in this case 21659

It also looks up the date of registration as it is also a variable

it then loops some code the number of times that equals the number of characters in the newly created ID

Each time the number of characters in the looping code is greater then 12 then it drops off the last number - when it drops off it is gone for good so the number keeps changing.

At the end of the many number of times it loops it then checks the number that it has got to with the number that is stored in the database (key2 in this case) and says True if they match and lets you in. If it says False then it doesn't let you in. To find out what your password really is then you would need to know what that number is that was dropped off every single time it went through an iteration. If I put [email protected] with a registration date of Feb 2008 into the above code the email address is stored as 011595338260 or if I put the same email address in but with a registration date of Mar 2008 then 829021357492 is stored in the database.

There are also so many more different security things implemented like a time limit between PMs, number of PMs sent within a set time that I am notified on immediately that anything untoward happens plus many more other security things that I won't mention (for security reasons offcourse) but a lot of my time is spent on security ensuring that you, your information and these forums are so strongly protected and I am always looking for new ways to even protect them further. However, security is an ever evolving thing and I can never guarantee 101% that some breach may ever happen hence why in the registration rules it says to always consider the information as public - this is just to cover myself.

So in short - SECURITY OF THESE FORUMS IS ALWAYS AT THE UTMOST OF MY CONCERN!

As it turns out, the the factory had removed the slipper clutch at the buyers request.

The main objective of the clutch from a buyer's point of view is that the engine doesn't have to be rebuilt if there is a prop strike. The CT's prop is so close to the front wheel and high enough that for a prop strike to occur would mean substantial damage would have occurred to the front wheel assembly and engine mount. This in itself would be cause of an insurance claim. If having to claim on insurance then you might as well get an engine build out of it as well.

Spin - I would think that it is just coincidence or somewhere else you have been to on the internet.

The email addresses are stored in a database and are encrypted - in other words an email address of [email protected] is stored in the database as something like "gxsj56hgfk678dm5jf7". This encryption is based on a group of characters that I personally created and no one in the world, even my own wife, know what those characters are. Software on the server takes your email address and then applies a formula to it using my encryption characters that are stored in a different place.

Furthermore the forum software doesn't make any calls on your email address to the front end (the screen) but rather pushes information out through the mail server based only on any threads that you have subscribed to - in other words information is pushed through and not pulled out to ascertain any email address information. I don't allow forum members to email each other as that would mean initiating the pulling out of an email address which could then be open to exploits. This is why I am looking into the recreational flying email addresses.

As most people that have been here for some time would know I am so hell bent on security so i am sure it can simply be that you have gone to some website that has got your email address by looking into your computer and then on-sold it to spamming companies - it only takes one site and bang, your email address is known everywhere. Forums that offer emailing facilities are a security risk, phpBB forums are a security risk, cookies are a security risk and much much more. Your email address is stored on your computer in many places like favourites for webmail, internet history etc.

I already have a range of analogue gauges but can also get the glass stuff - I've gotta get this darn shop going - can someone give me some hours of their own day

G'day Guys

have a look here: http://www.recreationalflying.com/forum/showthread.php?t=4073

The things to note are:

1. Make sure in your user settings that you are using the Enhanced Interface (My Settings from the dark blue horizontal menu - My Control Panel - Edit Options from the left side menu - at the bottom there is Message Editor Interface).

2. Use the Post Reply button at the bottom of the thread

3. Write your text as you would for a normal post

4. Click on the Paper Clip button in the menu just above where you type your text

5. Click the Browse button to find the picture on your hard disk and double click it

6. Click the upload button and wait till it gets uploaded

7. Close the picture upload window

8. Click Submit Reply to submit your post.

Notes:

1. Images must be 150k or less - to shrink file size open the image in Windows Paint and resize the image to a lower % until the image file is 150k or less.

2. Images that can be uploaded can only be of the types:

bmp 150.0 KB

gif 150.0 KB

jpe 150.0 KB

jpeg 150.0 KB

jpg 150.0 KB

png 150.0 KB

psd 150.0 KB

Hope this helps!

(you beat me Ross)

These pictures of some interesting airstrips were sent to me by a forum member:

Ross - Eltham is right next door to me - why didn't you drop in for a coffee?????

Darin - the Recreational Flying Echuca Flyin is happening on that weekend so if possible perhaps you may want to try and get him to come along - if he is available on the Sat Evening he could be a special guest and give a talk.

here are some images that Bruce Stark was kind enough to send me of Tecnam's answer to the Cessna Skycatcher - this is a very nice looking aircraft:

I have been told by the wife that I have to clean up the shed and make some room for her hobbies - here is a picture of the shed:

Hi Ian

Instead of emailing it why don't you upload it into the Downloads section of the website for all to see.

Also, any of the woods that are available from Wicks Aircraft Supply http://www.wicksaircraft.com I can get for you.

Completely brag away mate - well done, it will be a day that you will always remember even more then when you get your certificate which is just around the corner for you - each day is an adventure!

I cracked up and haven't stopped since.

Shirley?As in Shirley you're not serious.

I like Light Sport Aircraft. Works for me.

 

Fair enough LSA doesn't mean anything to the lay, but if Light Sport Aircraft still doesn't give them an idea of what you're talking about, English isn't their

 

preferred language.

Words would always fail me to congratulate someone passing their test and join the ranks of being a Recreational Flyer but WELL DONE and so many congratulations

Thanks Ian, you reminded me. I was wanting to speak to you about getting a warranty replacement for the faulty Composiclean I purchased at Avalon last February. The bottle is now empty

Australia has one of the strictest consumer guarantee acts in the world so I am betting you would have a good chance.