onetrack

I've seen an Audi with HOWDI for a numberplate!

Ahhh .. O.K., I get the picture now. I did read post #5 in it's entirety, but I couldn't fully grasp the section shape of the extrusions in the diagrams in post #5.

The last diagram makes it very clear, and I now understand what you were explaining in the first two sentences of post #5.

It looks good - but being a picky kind of bloke - aren't the keyway cutouts in the extrusions substantially weakening the strength of the extrusion? - as compared to, say an all-welded design?

Woo-Hooo! I just love cheap and fast build designs! Is that Tek screws I can see in the above diagram! If not, why not??

It's important to find out the exact engine oil temperature. Utilise a measuring device that is known and proven to be accurate.

It's important that you measure the actual oil temperature, not the metal it's in contact with. You can have oil that is hotter than the surrounding metal, when the engine is working hard and under temperature duress.

Ayecapt is right onto it, many gauges are just "indicators", their accuracy is suspect, often at each end of the dial.

Dinosaur oils start to break down and have reduced lubrication ability over 121 deg C (250 deg F ). Its lubricity drops rapidly for every 5.5 deg C (10 deg F) increase above 121 deg C (250 deg F). At 132 deg C (270 deg F) it's lost 55% of its lubricity.

Synthetic oils can go 28 deg C (50 deg F) higher than dinosaur oils before they start to lose their lubricity. However, this still means that at 149 deg C (300 deg F), synthetic oil is also starting to lose its lubricity.

It's also important to remember that engine operating clearances continue to increase with increased temperatures.

As a result, very high engine temperatures can increase bearing clearances substantially, to the point where the bearing-to-journal gap is big enough to create a hammering effect, that worsens an already poor lubrication scenario.

Air-cooled engines run hotter than water cooled engines overall, and it's important to ensure cooling fins are perfectly clean and airflow isn't obstructed or reduced in any way.

Have you sent out the obligatory 10,000 emails a day, offering a stunning deal, too good to miss? Remember, all you need from them, is their bank account details and passwords!

They're not really workshop benches. They're actually the wingbox and wing carry-through, combined to produce added strength. He's just setting up a diversion to fool the snoopers and copycats.

In the 1970's, where my parents house was located on the Ashfield/Bassendean (W.A.) border, we had a pretty good view of Perth airport from a high point of the Swan River escarpment.

I can recall watching a couple of Wedgies soaring around the East side of the airport, fairly regularly, reaching some pretty substantial heights, probably 1500' or more.

However, I don't recall any birdstrikes involving Wedgies around Perth, so something must assist them to avoid aircraft - and I'd hazard a guess that their incredible eyesight possibly alerts them to aircraft heading their way.

Bex - Are a serious number of robots involved in this new, faster, and reduced-number-of-tools, build process??

Here they're building new Jeeps in Toledo with a staggering array of robots. Then they let the workers assemble the electrics. That's the main reason Jeeps are still a total POS, despite the "rah-rah" video presentation.

Eagle thinks to himself - "Geez, this is great! They're thoughtful enough to deliver the meals to me in the air, now!!" LOL

If the bugger sank those talons into your leg, you wouldn't stand a chance! Their talon grip is phenomenal!

I can remember the old man telling us about hunting 'roos in an old '28 Dodge tourer, around 1932-33, on the huge plains around the Upper Murchison in W.A.

They shot a 'roo - and one of the blokes was bent over the carcass, getting ready to skin it - when a huge Wedgie dropped out of the sky, and badly gashed the blokes leg, as it made a grab for the 'roo!!

I've actually reared a Wedgie from a chick when we accidentally knocked down its nest when contract clearing with dozers in the '70's. A truly amazing bird - the SIL named him "Samson", after the strongman in the Bible.

He had all the dogs and cats number - they ran and hid any time he took a stroll - which he like to do frequently (we lived on 5 acres on the outskirts of a small country town in W.A.)

Soon, he had full feathers, and he'd run up and down the yard practising his flying skills, with outstretched wings. His wingspan was impressive.

I've never encountered an animal so utterly devoid of emotions. Cats will purr and meow, and dogs will wag their tail and anticipate your moves - but an eagle just stares at you with those unblinking eyes and swallows meat and bones placed in front of it, without expressing any emotion. They can swallow a big chop bone whole, they must have the digestive system of a snake.

Samson learnt to fly and used to perch on the big above-ground water main over the road from the house, just eyeballing any motorists passing by - probably checking to see if the contents of the cars contained suitable prey!

Then one day he flew off and never returned! I trust he found a good life and a mate somewhere, and that some cranky farmer didn't shoot him out of the sky.

Wedgies were declared vermin in W.A. for many years, because they were deemed a major threat to lambs.

Then the W.A. Ag Dept did some research and found that the Wedgies diet and nests contained very little by way of lamb meat or bones, and that the majority of Wedgies dined on rabbits and small marsupials.

So the "Vermin" classification was lifted, and Wedgies are now protected, like many W.A. native birds - even crows and ravens!

This important instructor witness' line has been extracted from the AAT case that Kaz linked to, above ....

"Further, through belief in his (Sadri's) own ability, gained through years of successful business practice, and in applying a business process to the art of flying and the act of aircraft ownership, he has a level of self confidence with regards to aviation, far in excess of his true capacity, given his very low level of actual aviation experience."

Right there, you've got the most succinct and accurate opinion that you could ever hear - from a highly experienced Navy air arm instructor - that this bloke is an arrogant corporate type, used to getting his own way in everything - and he's merely an (aviation) accident looking for a place to happen - particularly if in charge of the Diamond twin, that he currently owns.

The bottom line is, we could be faced with the old situation here - exactly as in the Hempel case - whereby CASA can cancel a blokes licence - but if he's the type to just merely consider that that cancellation is just a petty annoyance - he'll keep on flying regardless, anyway - at great risk to all others in the aviation industry. This bloke is a Tatar, they consider themselves a law unto themselves.

have a read, the gov is really only chasing big business not smaller retailers

Seeing as the SMH article is from August last year - the saying, is - "a week is a long time in politics".

Hockey and Abbott are essentially history, and so are a lot of their schemes. Turnbull is an unknown, and facing an election shortly - and the Govts decisions during the rest of 2016 and into 2017 could produce a lot of changes.

Re the 2nd saying ..... the arrangements to implement and collect the GST on all online transactions is going to take years, and will need a lot of Chinese companies to support it ...... "Good luck with that, Pal!"

Since when has this been in place? And how does the ATO extract the GST from the above-mentioned overseas-based companies? These corporates won't install procedures to apply tax and remit it, without being re-imbursed for their effort.

Tax collection for a foreign Govt, is a cost burden they have to transfer onto their buyers or sellers, so how does that work out?

That's a Beriev BE-200 Altair - and what is even more amazing about the takeoff - is realising the hull is full of water upon liftoff!!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beriev_Be-200

I'd love to see the W.A. Govt get their act together, and lease a couple of these for the major fires we regularly have here. We could have saved a lot of money and heartache, if we'd had them recently.

Note to Aussies - Get your smaller overseas purchases done before 1st July 2017, as the Federal Govt has initiated a plan to abolish the under-$1000 GST exemption on imports, and collect GST on all imported items from the above date.

There's been an agreement put in place between all State Treasurers, the Federal Treasurer, and the ATO to put systems into place to collect the GST on all small purchases, and the public servants are currently working on the regulatory details and procedures.

http://www.gizmodo.com.au/2015/08/all-goods-bought-overseas-to-incur-10-per-cent-gst-charge/

However, the nuts-and-bolts of the scheme are yet to be finalised. There's a slight problem involved in getting overseas suppliers to comply with AU tax requirements.

It's virtually impossible for the Govt to insist on overseas-based companies to become registered for Australian GST collection.

The only way they can tax small items is by stopping every parcel and examining its contents, and extracting the tax from you, before you collect it.

You can well imagine what this will do to parcel times - and the cost of instituting this regime is going to be a thorn in the side of the economics for the profitability of collecting the GST on a myriad of small items.

No doubt, some high level public servant is currently working on some scheme that throws the burden of proving the actual purchase cost, onto you, the buyer - by making you provide an invoice for the value of the goods, prior to collection of your parcel.

The whole scheme is fraught with problems - not the least, the economics of collecting the GST on multiple millions of imported small items annually - and it does appear likely the start date may be pushed back. Hopefully, forever. It's already bad enough, coping with the current poor AUD$ exchange rate, without having GST added to everything under $1000.

That's a great achievement, mate! You're obviously stoked. It can only get better, from here on in.

But it would be built in the finest low-cost factory in China, using the cheapest subcontractors and suppliers, and utilising all the stolen plans! In addition, airworthiness certification would be arranged at low cost! What's with the concern?

Or the Boing 787 Dreadliner!

I can't wait for the Chinese knockoff A320 AiieeBus!

Now on the other hand, if someone were to point out to the Government how a complete overhaul of CASA would save them hundreds of millions of dollars, the overhaul will start tomorrow.

They are looking to save a dollar on every single item of Govt expenditure, like we haven't seen for decades.

It's surprising sometimes, what an email to your local member, or to the minister for aviation, can achieve. Particularly one which points out where big savings can be made, by whittling the useless dead wood from CASA.

Bring it on! Nothing could be finer than CASA getting a good double dose of the salts that it dishes out to every pilot/aircraft owner/aircraft operator, that it sets itself upon, with its overbearing righteousness.

Yes, the find and the whole deal is a little curious. A bloke who is a blogger - and who claims to be carrying out a private investigation into the MH370 loss - goes to Mozambique - and within days of landing there, just happens to find an aviation component, that COULD have come from a B777, floating around, just offshore. You're right, it doesn't look like its been in the water for a week - let alone nearly 2 yrs.

Unfortunately, being the old cynic that I am - I smell a great big, SELF-PROMOTING SCAM.

The media is reporting that an aircraft component with the words "no step" on it, has been discovered on a sandbank in the Mozambique Channel, which runs between Mozambique and Madagascar.

Aviation experts have tentatively identified it from photos, as quite likely being part of the horizontal stab from a B777.

http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/debris-from-missing-mh370-found-7478351

As there's only one B777 currently missing in the Southern Hemisphere, then it appears this find, if proven to be a B777 horizontal stab section, will perhaps add a little more info to the MH370 puzzle.

One interesting aside to the story, is that Martin Dolan has been quoted as saying, that if the search for MH370 concludes in July as planned, without MH370 being found - then the inescapable conclusion is that the aircraft was glided from its last-reported, engine-flame-out position - and that could only have been done on purpose, by a very much alive pilot, carrying out a specific, very-remote-ditching, plan.

I'd quite happily rattle a tin to collect up a few hundred thousand dollars, to finance sending every Nigerian into space on a one-way rocket. What a bunch of oxygen thieves they are, as a nation.

Read a cyclist blokes blog once, relating his travels from the top of Africa to the bottom, on his bike.

He summarised by saying that the entire experience left him with the overwhelming opinion, that every single black African was out to continously scam every single white person that they encountered.

Admittedly, nearly all Africans suffer from constant grinding poverty - but the fact remains that in Africa, every black leader they elect, only rules to scam every other person in the nation and rob the country blind.

Here's a Cessna 310Q, former rego VH-FYZ, owned by Goldfields Air Services, that crash-landed in the Great Victoria Desert in 1993.

The flight was originally planned between the Aboriginal community of Tjuntjuntjara in the Great Victoria Desert, to Warburton. The crash site is in the Gibson Desert.

https://thelandy.files.wordpress.com/2014/08/dsc_4469.jpg

The crash cause was fuel starvation because the pilot didn't fully understand the complex fuel valving and pumping system setup between the main and auxiliary tanks.

Pilot and all pax survived the crash landing, but all with back injuries. The engines and other useful accessories were stripped out of the wreck by GAS, and the frame was abandoned.

The wreck is accessible from the Connie Sue Highway, if you feel like driving the 680kms of this 4WD-only, "Highway", between Warburton and Rawlinna.

Here's the ATSB report ...

https://www.atsb.gov.au/media/4432781/ASOR199300002.PDF