Old Koreelah

...Wish I knew what temperatures it really got to then.

 

Remove your tappet covers and the colour of the head metal will give you a fair idea; someone on here posted the temperature required to "cook" the oil, so I guess the colour of oil baked onto the metal might be a rough guide.

...an oil leak on the filter of a Rotax 912, from under the hose clamp that was used to attach the lock wire. It seems the hose clamp may have caused a small dent in the filter which caused a fatigue crack to develop. 

 

Interesting. I've been accused of being anal for installing a hose clamp and lock wire on my oil filter.

It makes me feel better, but I never thought it could cause an oil leak.

...one way to lessen the uplift is to have something on the wing, just ahead of the deepest section, to stall the wings lift...

 

Good idea. I've seen a length of timber used for the purpose.

My next design will allow me to retract the wheels to sit the aeroplane on the ground, greatly reducing lift in storms.

... One good volcano eruption or asteroid strike will do more damage in a few minutes than humans have done in the last 400 years!

 

It might be a bit deep and meaningful , but don't get caught up in the MEDIA hype. 

 

I've said that more than once, but we'd be stupid to expect salvation from nature.

Time we curbed our pollution.

Please don’t confuse overpopulation and pollution, very real problems, with human induced climate change, which is a political device. Humans will not significantly change the climate, for good or ill....

 

That's the crux of our disagreement, PM. I've discussed this with lots of people who cannot conceive of tiny little humans making a difference to the climate.

The same thinking was once applied to hunting the American Bison; in a few decades it went from herds of millions to the brink of extinction.  The passenger pigeon went from flocks blocking out the sun to total extinction in a few short years.

The atmosphere has been massively changed by much smaller critters than humans; tiny microbes once filled it with the oxygen we depend on. 

Can you not conceive of any impact when billions of people are using machines to pour several different greenhouse-enhancing gases into our atmosphere?

I can't fault my three plated steel Screw It pegs; simple, light and reliable, but a bluddy lot of work on hard ground.

Requires proper rope and proper knots, but you save the weight of carrying a hammer.

Very recent research has shown that most atmospheric moisture comes from vegetation, mainly trees, and not evaporation from the oceans. Those charts we were shown at school, with water rising from the sea and turning into clouds, were wrong...

 

That would surprise me, PM. Do you have a link to that research?

I recall reading, in the early days of radar mapping our oceans, that huge areas of very warm tropical seas lost so much to evaporation that the drop in surface level was measurable.

 

 

...so loss of trees is even more important than we thought.

 

So it's even more stupid that LNP governments have watered down laws to stop land clearing.

David Packham is a scientist who in the past worked with CSIRO as a bushfire researcher.

 

He recently told the ABC that the current fires were not due to climate change and that the former Fire Chief group were being bankrolled by Tim Flannery...

 

Crickey, I didn't know Tim Flannery was in the financial league of the Minerals Council, coal lobby, etc.

Turbs the rest of your post is well known good advice.

Given the dire lack of feed and price of hay, it might be cost effective to run an electric tape along many roadsides; apply an 80k limit. Cattle do an excellent job of fuel-reduction. 

...NPWS have their own paid fire fighters. When it started to get a bit big our Tas Fire volunteers got contacted and they had a couple of dozers making a fire break, when the NPWS people announced that it was getting close to knock off time and they had a big drive home, so ordered our guys off site and locked the gate behind them...

 

As soon as dedicated volunteers get some sort of payment the dynamic starts to shift, eventually corrupting their priorities. Does payment improve their performance? Can this country afford the push by paid firefighter unions to displace volunteers?

That's just one of the reason we should have an open inquiry into this fire season.

Another reason is to investigate the role played in these fires by roadside grass. I suspect that a large proportion of fires start next to roads; the best firebreaks may be well-grazed roadsides. Finding a way to make it much easier for farmers to "graze the long paddock" might be a very cost-effective fire management strategy.

No dispute from the GROUND but that's not what I have been saying, its the AIR to AIR visibility that  has an impact on safety.

 

I totally agree, Skip. From the tower, the controller noticed the wig wags at least ten miles; we were only about two thousand feet higher, so the angle would have been similar to air-to-air. Can't comment on whether they'd be easier to see against distant ground or sky.

I also agree that cheaper wingtip strobes like mine are not as noticeable as I'd like, but are sure better than nothing.

In the air aircraft to aircraft ?????

 

From the frontal quadrant I believe decent wig wags are more noticeable than my Kuntzelman wingtip strobes, which would not be as bright as GA strobes, as Turbs points out.

On a club run, an air traffic controller reported seeing the wig wags on an approaching Sling from at least ten miles; he noticed the similar, but fixed LL of a Bristell much later.

Strobes are far more effective and landing lights as well but the landing lights are often big users of electrical power and get hot if left on on the ground . These are never going to befitted to most U/L's. "Piddling " little lights are not very effective, and probably not worth running the wires through the wing to. Nev

 

Nev I agree that some "piddling" little lights are ineffective, but rapid advances in LEDs mean even our little aeroplanes can have bright lights. My wingtip strobes, a Wig wags and landing lights draw so little power that I tend to leave them on.

It sounds like you want to see the aircraft from the ground - that's where the lights have the most visual impact BUT for safety you need to be able to see them from another aircraft AND that's just where they dont have much effect for day VFR conditions. 

 

Note; I am emphasizing day VFR conditions - lights work well in the dark & low light but the science will tell you they are just a feel good accessory (nothing wrong with that) in the sort of conditions that RAA aircraft are supposed to be operating in

 

We need to be seen and even better than wingtip strobes are wig-wags widely spaced on the wing leading edges. 

On a bright day you notice them from many miles away.

The term "dark art" comes to mind.

 

Too right, Jet. Plenty of clever people have been beaten by it.

I think sealing gaps etc is essentially playing around the edges...

 

I disagree. I've put lots of work into redesigning my cooling setup and the most dramatic improvement came after I discovered some tiny gaps I'd overlooked. After plugging them, the CHT's came down 20-odd degrees immediately.

I agree that in many cases thread drift is detrimental to the original topic. I suppose we moderators should shoulder the blame for allowing that. We should correct for Drift and get the thread back On Track by intervening and asking those involved in the drift to get back on track.

 

I note DJ's comment and hope we don't put people off this site. As one of the worst thread drifters, I will try in future to keep my posts on course. 

On on the other hand, I see that Turbs doesn't mind a bit of going off topic.

Let the record show I have agreed with something he posted!

...hypothetical discussion about the use of military personnel for purposes they weren't trained for, in operations they haven't been asked to attend...

 

 This all makes sense, but I suspect you are misrepresenting at least some of these "hypothetical discussions".

The idea of some of our military being trained to assist was mentioned, as was the concept of making use of the adaptability of some military aircraft.  Some taxpayers feel entitled to see our expensive defence assets used to actually defend us, rather than to be ever-ready to join the latest American adventure.

Why do I burr up over many of your posts? Due to what seems to be your underlying disdain for anyone but the "experts" to have any input.

These are the sort of issues which need airing, uncomfortable and messy though it might be.

As previously posted, I know farmers with mobs of experience in managing fires who used their initiative in conjunction with local RFS, only to be stymied by distant bureaucrats; the fire then got out of control and led to the expenditure of massive resources.

Our firefighters did a great job, but there were plenty of stuff-ups. That's why we need an open review.

Firefighters have input on all fires in their local areas, at State levels (where I've provided trucks for conferences from time to time) and National levels. It's routine for lessons to be learnt with that active system, and there are the Police systems for vehicle accidents and Coroner reports...

 

So all reviews are conducted "in house"?

Seems to me that you would be happy if the authorities kept control of all enquiries, lest affected members of the public get to make a contribution.

So, we should never again inquire into the causes and management of an event, because everyone already knows what happened?

That seems to be the trend in several countries, such as Phillipiines and India, where police simply shoot the suspects and everyone celebrates.

...As big as the current fires are it looks like the fire services have done an excellent job, and called in extra support where needed.

 

Nobody is disputing that. The issue is whether we can learn anything from this fire season that might be useful for the next one. I know of people from the fire front who think so. Would you deny them a hearing?

Why?

 

No one out in the real world has said there's a problem with the responses.

 

A colossal claim. What is your "real world"?

Why hold an enquiry? Because we investigate every suspicious death, every accident, every crime, in the hope we can improve our response and avoid bad things happening again.

Surely you'd like to find out why this fire season is already worse than most and how we can better manage the next one?

Let's hope that we have a full and independent inquiry into the bushfires and the response to them.

This could allow everyone with expertise and experience to have their say.

...We are all familiar with project cost "blow outs". I perceive, that this is also a mechanism by which favoured contractors get the job (somehow knowing how low they need to make their initial quote) only to get a variation which significantly changes the costs...

 

Perhaps one reason the LNP has resisted having a federal anti-corruption authority.

Leftist propaganda;

 

Rightist misinformation! 

...we need to be alert to ANY ATTEMPT to siphon off the money taxpayers put into the government banks via our income tax, excise tax on every litre of fuel we buy, GST on top of excise tax, thought bubble schemes, grants to hand over Australia to Canadian Indians by mistake, land tax, infrastructure projects which go nowhere or do nothing for election purposes...

 

Looks like we agree! I hope you also agree that our current Federal government has done quite a bit of that.

...As for your independent and impartial public service, after going through five feet of documents, I found two government departments had "made up" a safe level for dioxins, which doesn't exist in reality. They'd done it to save money. One child born without eyes so far and counting...

 

I never said our public service was perfect; just more likely to have the public good in mind than Morrison's army of "consultants" and lobbyists.

...It's interesting that you've built your comments on the back of a person's assertions based on no knowledge of whether there are even tasks available for the existing aerial equipment, let alone whether they need any more.

 

 So we the ignorant masses are not entitled to question government policy and to suggest they make full use of the expensive kit they already own?