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Free Fall

I

It's a shocking thing -- an awesome kind of vertigo -- gravity's sudden upset.

"I figure it's time to demonstrate spins," my flight instructor said.

She pulled the yoke back and the plane started to climb, and without further explanation she smoothly pulled power. The engine idled back. I watched the airspeed indicator start to unwind. At about 50 knots the stall warning started sounding. I tried to brace for that sudden, awful break, when the plane lurched abruptly toward the ground.

I breathed in once, twice. The plane broke so fast it almost hurt: Free of its lift, unhinged, it twisted sideways, left wing dropping far beyond the vertical. In the same moment the tail catapulted over the nose. I actually saw the earth through the top cabin windows, spinning, upside down, it's horizon curve all kinds of wrong. My mouth opened wide and without willing it I shouted out loud.


II

I was good I wasn't controlling the plane when our trusty Cessna 150 Aerobat flipped its wig. I wanted to think all my reading about spin recovery would have saved us. But in the moment, no.

It felt as though my insides had been pushed outside my body, then centrifuged; in that mad tumble I began to hear my instructor's remote and calm sounding voice: "One and a half, two, two and a half" -- with a hard thunk of rudder pedal the plane stopped spinning, then pitched forward into a dive as she thrust the yoke to the panel. Just as suddenly there was a deep g-force compression as she pulled back steady on the yoke, my whole body jammed down into my seat. In that moment I weighed 2.5 times my usual self.

The engine roared to life. And then -- we were flying straight and level.

I looked at her and she chuckled. "Let's do it again!" she cried.



III

Later, while trying to drive home, I couldn't keep from speeding. Seventy in a fifty-five zone was not fast enough. I told myself to stop the leadfoot before the cops yanked me over. This was it, I thought. This thing I just did -- that was it. I knew the razor's edge -- I had glimpsed it from the other side. It was, after all, utterly controllable. The razor could be defeated, and if she could do it, so could I. In my bones I knew this, but my head held fast a vision of my contorted agony in that moment of uncontrolled descent.

My bones knew victory, but my brain was vying for defeat: Have you have lost your ever-loving mind? That was stupid! You should know better than that! You could get killed!

But my bones weren't knocking -- they knew.

Above: Barb MacLeod pilots N4951A with then owner Max Bell in the right hand seat counting down altitude. Barb is counting the spins. That is Bergstrom Airbase below them before it became Austin Bergstrom International Airport

Fire, Metal, Saws, Wood

V

It was a tough core. At one time I'd had three, but I'd sold them for a pittance. The first one I'd disassembled came apart with relative ease, almost as though it had been pulled from a running car for an overhaul. I had reasons:

"I'll never fly again."

"I'll never build a plane."

"I'll be too busy."

I sold the Corvair cores and moved hundreds of miles. I spent 10 years doing other things. I was happily devoted to those other things -- my causes and other people's causes. Family things, motorcycle things, kart racing things. We got horses. We were riding. I loved that. Cantering on a fast horse sets the heart free. So for a birthday present for my wife, we flew to Scotland, to the eastern Highlands. Parts of The Queen and Outlander were filmed there. It was during that ride through the Scottish Highlands -- for 6 days and 135 miles -- where I found myself being again. It just clicked. Nothing had been wasted those 10 years. It was all good. But I needed to focus inward again. I was used up, outwardly. I had to reject the incessant and ruinous buying of shit from Amazon. Reject the consumerism that was rotting the core of my person. Stop drinking every night. It was time to do the work. And I give thanks to my wife, my borrowed highland pony 'Maverick', and 135 miles of walking, trotting, and cantering. The scenery was absolutely breathtaking -- riding past farm, over hill, dale, past castles, barley waving in the wind, through rainstorm chill, whipping winds, distilleries, ruins, through the Queen's own estate of Balmoral; crossing river and stream on horseback, staying the night at The House on the Mark. Sitting in Prince Harry's own chair at dinner. Looking at a red mailbox said to have been used by a prince to beg a woman's forgiveness. Without even realizing, it was a decision made without actually deciding. Back in the US, it was a simple announcement in bed: "I'm going to build my plane."

"No you're not."

Silence.

"Actually, I am."

"No, you're not."

But my wife saw what it meant. She had horses. I supported her horses. I wanted flight -- she could bring herself. Barely. Maybe. Building and flying -- it scared her. One day she just looked over at me and said "Okay, fine. Do it. Build your airplane. But if you get killed I will haunt your ass. I will track you down and make you suffer. God will help me find you."

Suddenly at night dreams were blasting through my brain as if I were 20 years old again. Crazy dreams having nothing to do with flying, building, or sometimes anything I could make any sense out of at all. But I'd wake up feeling like I was going to be able to conquer the world. Fire, metal, saws, wood. And a Corvair engine core:

Pounding in the right places with this stuff:

Leading to this stuff:

Disassembly details for a flight engine conversion can (and should) be found here.

Curse

I don't know. It must be some kind of weird curse -- or just random in your face reality when you decide to do something that has more element of risk to it than just sitting on a couch watching TV shows.

Like, why was it that whenever I got interested in flying and then did something about it (and only then) was I abruptly confronted with "The Bad"?

What kind of bad?

Well, like Pietenpol Down bad.

That was a sad sight to see: A crumpled Pietenpol Sky Scout at the far end of a grass runway. I'd never seen a crashed aircraft in person before.

Pietenpol Sky Scouts are one-holers. Made out of wood and fabric, dope and wire. I thought: When all of those wooden sticks break into spears in a crash, suddenly moving at 60 mph relative to the pilot -- where do they all go? I pictured the pilot clutching at a wooden spike straight through his heart, blood spurting everywhere, all over the wreckage, himself, and his mighty fine vintage flight suit. What good is a dashing mustache, leather hat, and goggles when you get a stake through your heart??? And, why didn't the Pietenpol burst into flames when it crashed, killing the sole occupant, the pilot in command, an ATP (Airline Transport Pilot)?

Those are the kinds of thoughts that go through your head when you see something like that in person.

I had wondered aloud to a fellow pilot at the Kingsbury Aerodrome why it hadn't burst into flames.

"No ignition source. A Model A engine has no electric ignition."

I stared at him and thought, well, have you ever poured gasoline onto a red hot exhaust pipe? Have you ever done that? But I didn't say it. It was one of those moments where you think it but you don't say it. There was no fire because the gas didn't spill out everywhere. It didn't burst out all over the wreckage as it used to do in Formula One car crashes. No fire can also mean there was no gas left to spray. Thank the Sky Gods: An ATP will eventually return to his airline cockpit a bit the wiser, with a new story to tell. With having "just" had some broken bones and a brief spate in the hospital.

I didn't know what went wrong. The pilot didn't know what went wrong. But something had very definitely gone wrong. The preliminary NTSB report specified no cause. It said that the engine had quit. End of story. It quit -- and the pilot either spun in or crashed landed into a tree line. Brave. Alive. Very lucky. In the moment of truth he apparently pointed the nose down.

So that was the latest curse: The Pietenpol crash. And it happened on the same day I'd taken my first steps back into aviation after 10 years adrift.

But the very first curse happened on my very first flight, the so-called "discovery flight". The discovery flight is a marketing ploy for aviation; for $59 find out what it's like to fly! So on this flight, the appetizer if you will -- my very first taste of flight -- I got a real mouthful.

We flew for over an hour, stopping for gas at a small airport, Lago Vista (RYW), which was situated on a lovely hilltop just outside of Austin. When we were returning to Austin Bergstrom (AUS) from Lago Vista I had started to overhear radio communications that indicated some kind of urgent situation at the Austin airport. We were just turning base leg. The radio talk was all mumbo jumbo to me. The flight instructor was handling radio communications. Things were happening fast. I mean, for God's sake, this was my very first flight. I couldn't handle the radio, let alone an emergency. But I was flying the plane.

I said to the flight instructor: "What was that? What did the tower just say???"

"Well," the flight instructor said calmly, "There's a plane coming in with an engine out, over there on three five right -- and they've deployed fire trucks just in case."

She pointed out to starboard, "There. Do you see them?"

No I didn't see them. I didn't see anything she was talking about except the other runway. An emergency? Really?

We turned final and then all I was seeing was the runway we were assigned to land on. It was rising up at us -- vaguely like I'd experienced in the MS Flight Simulator I'd spent hundreds of hours playing on my laptop computer at home. Suddenly I was pure concentration. It sure looked cool -- just like the simulator.

But now it was the real thing. And it was relentless. There was no "pause" button on the keyboard. I couldn't go get another beer from the fridge or talk on the phone.

I focused on establishing a stable glide path back down to earth. The instructor was still letting me fly the plane. "You've got this," she said. "You're doing fine." I kept glancing out the starboard side, past her, and when we were at about 500 ft AGL I saw a twin engine aircraft rocketing toward the parallel runway at an extremely low approach angle.  My instructor saw them too.

"There they are!" she said.

The plane had one prop windmilling; I've never seen such a low and fast approach. The fire trucks were stationed, lights flashing. What was going to happen? I didn't have time to find out, because runway three five left, 9000 odd feet long, was now dominating my world.

When our little Cessna 152 Aerobat was about 20 feet above the runway I said "Do you think maybe you could make sure I don't crash us?" She laughed. "No worries," she said, "you're still doing fine."

Just before stalling onto the runway I asked her to take the controls. "Don't worry," she said, "I've got my pinky finger on the yoke." Within two or three seconds the plane touched down, and I breathed again. I was soaked with sweat, fists clenched around the yoke, knuckles white, dry mouth, and probably not smelling very good. I realized later that I must have been a little scared.

But by God for the first 45 minutes of the flight I'd been Mr Balls. All Balls! Yes -- yes I'd taken off from Austin and done VOR nav out to Lago Vista (I got this -- I'm Mr Balls!!!). And flying back over downtown Austin it was like, wow, I AM the Pilot In Command! I wasn't thinking about how the instructor had landed and taken off in a 15 knot gusty crosswind out at Lago Vista. I would have crashed us on that little runway, there and then. Smashed into pieces. Instead ... I was MR BALLS!!!

Everything had just worked.

Until that twin engine aircraft had an emergency right outside my window.

"Take the controls," I'd said. But the stall warning whined and then faded out as the main gear touched down. My flight instructor sat next to me, rather impassive, maybe smirking a little.

I thought: "Shit, I just landed this plane! I just landed a plane on my very first flight!!!"

Taxiing to the ramp, my faux balls swelled up yet again: "How much of that landing did I do myself?" I asked.

"Oh, probably 95%"

YES! I thought. All that simulator practice had paid off. Microsoft Flight Simulator had taught me how to fly! I'd gotten to take off, do VOR, fly into a pattern (like, twice!), fly the crosswind, the downwind, the base. And the final approach to a pretty smooth landing. I was like: "Dude, I have SO got this."

But I was wrong. All wrong. A curse is a wagging finger, a crooked smile, a warning. And soon enough I'd see for myself what it intended.

Steady Progress

I love air powered tools. In my little airplane single engine land construction hanger, when I fired up the air wrench, that inimitable sound meant one thing: Making progress toward an ambitious goal of flying the United States. As many States as I could. In an aircraft I had built myself.

Low.

And slow.

Like, 50 MPH slow. That's pretty slow. For comparison a 737 stalls (ie, falls to the ground) at 125 MPH. My plane would fall to the ground at 35 MPH. The top speed of a 737 is more than 500 MPH. My plane was at risk of falling to pieces in midair above 125 MPH.

So ... low and slow. By design and by desire. I want to see every horse snapping its head up, every deer dashing, every coyote running. The trees, the rivers, the lakes, the ponds, the houses and the people glancing up at me. Some mom trying to start her lawn mower. Some dad loading his SUV with groceries. Kids smoking dope in a park.

Flying low and slow in an aircraft is something of a hazard to life and limb. If you have an engine out then there's no space or time to find a clearing to land safely. You're possibly done. That's something to think about. High and fast is the risk mitigating rule. I've never been a rule breaker. I've always been compliant. Well, there's not much time left. One decade? Two? I don't like easy chairs or reclining.

Anyway, it's a bald fact that complete safety and security are an illusion. There is only risk and how you choose to experience it.

But long before those considerations would ever even be remotely relevant there were still many pieces to remove from TZero:

There are parts to save

and parts to toss:

 

TZero was going to take more time to disassemble than some engine cores would. It was stuck and wouldn't rotate. Mad Max, said my wife. Mad freakin' Max! I didn't listen to her because she had no basis to deny the beauty of a rebuilt Corvair flight engine.

Because TZero was intransigent, removing the clutch and the distributor would be non-trivial. First the heads would have to come off, the top cover and magnesium fan -- then lots and LOTS of penetrating oil had to be applied in all the right places. Tapping with wood in the right places to free it up. The exhaust logs were so rusted onto the heads that it took about 3 days of periodic spraying Liquid Wrench and tapping the exhaust logs with mallet and wood block -- then ballpen hammer and cold chisel (very, very carefully) before the exhaust logs (pictured on right above) came free from the heads.

And because I took my time the heads were still 100% intact -- which was an absolute requirement.

Build time: 1.5 hrs, 5.5 hrs total.

Sheetmetal Gone

More progress. Took all that old sheetmetal off except for the 4 pieces I'll eventually reuse. Isn't TZero nice, sitting in the sunset?

Couple other views:

My wife says this looks like something out of Mad Max and that she's going to wave at me from the ground. Also she claims that she's going to increase my life insurance policy. But this is on its way, one way or 'tother:

And on a plane (see article here):

Build time: 1.5 hrs, 4 hrs total

A Quick Wash and a Great Read

This:

To be able to see these:

Which are the case studs and the nuts that the heads are torqued onto the cylinders and case with. Luckily TZero looks in pretty good shape. Disassembly soon.

But what I've been spending my time on mostly is this absolute wonder:

This manual -- the product of intense focus and genius -- is the brilliant work of William Wynne, who's been developing Corvair flight engine conversions since 1989. Not only is it a technical document of extraordinary value, but Mr. Wynne spices it with exhortations, sharp warnings -- and years of A&P wisdom. This book is more than a conversion manual for Corvair engines, though, it's a conversion manual for life. Check this:

"By choosing to build your own plane, accepting and managing the risk, you are making a giant course correction from a life consigned to "the cancerous discipline of security." The next time you tell someone that you are building your own aircraft, and the first thing out of their mouth is how they would never build one nor fly with you, just think of (this): "In the worship of security we fling our lives beneath the wheels of routine -- and before we know it our lives are gone." That is what is going to happen to all the people with a long personal list of things they would never do. If you are persistent in pursuit of your dreams, your place isn't going to be among those who expended their lives relentlessly looking for security."

"Make your choice. If it sounds scary, it's because consumer society has had decades to teach you to doubt yourself, your potential, your dreams and abilities."

"Building a plane and learning to master its maintenance and flight is the rejection of these messages, and the replacement of them with the knowledge that you are the master of your own adventure. This is what building and flying is all about."

Build time: .5 hrs, 2.5 hrs total