Cessna / Carolina Liar / Show me what I’m looking for

In this part of the story, I am roughly 43 or 44 years old and CEO of a rapidly growing computer forensics company.

I have to go to Washington, DC for a series of meetings with my clients. They are large federal agencies, like the FBI, IRS, even the Secret Service, perhaps the....

I am under enormous pressure to grow revenue and increase profitability.

As usual, I book travel to Washington DC through either Delta or Airtran Airways. Both of these carriers have routings to DC which hub through Atlanta. This looks simple: a quick trip to Atlanta, a quick flight change, and I’m on my way to DC.

Except, this time, the trip takes a detour. My flight routes to Atlanta, and is very late. I miss my connection to Dulles airport. Instead of arriving around 10:30pm on my scheduled flight at Dulles, the carrier ‘graciously’ reroutes me to Reagan National on another flight. This alternative gets me to DC much later, and at the wrong airport, perhaps 25 miles from my hotel.

The flight arrives DC around 12:50 in the morning. We are probably the last flight of the day to arrive at Reagan.

I trudge to the rental car kiosks, across from the arrival concourse. They are closed. I have no rental car.

It is 1:15am. I am tired.

I go to the cab line location. There is no cab line. Reagan airport has gone dark, it is a virtual ghost town.

I pull out my cell phone and start calling 411 for cab phone #s. All have answering machines or answering services. They are booking cab rides for early morning rides; but none are operating now.

I call my wife. We have friends in the DC area; she calls them and they are willing to put me up.

I pray. Please God help me.

I cry. Literally. I am a middle aged business man, sitting in a dark airport, with no one around. I am crying.

A police officer approaches from nowhere. A cheerful black woman, I ask (beg) her to help me. Does she know of any cab companies which operate at 2:00am? Yes, she does.
20 minutes later, a cab pulls up.

I am on my way to my hotel. I arrive there at 3:00am. I had smartly prepaid for my hotel room (Priceline, I think.)

As luck would have it, Priceline had put me into a Marriott (Fairfield? Courtyard?) property. It would be a nice room, if it was waiting for me. But it wasn’t, my room has been sold; there is no room. The fact that my hotel room is prepaid is irrelevant. The hotel clerk is probably shocked that I showed up. But NOT TO WORRY, another cab is ready to take me to another motel, perhaps 6 or 7 miles south of Dulles area hotel. (Many hotels are full).

I check into my new no-brand motel. I see an insect move across the floor of my room. I call my wife; I settle into bed at 4:00am in the morning. I rise at 7:30am to prepare for my first meeting of the day. I am furious, beyond tired, and pissed.


Now I am one or two years older.

I purchase a nearly new Cessna T206H airplane. It hauls me, my sales people, and 300 pounds of trade show gear direct from Wichita to Dulles (940NM nonstop). I never again miss a flight. I always arrive when I want, where I want, and I never again go through security. My dispatch reliability is excellent, and I always found a way around bad weather. When I needed to, I delayed my own departure to accommodate safety. I exercised my instrument rating, and flew in the flight levels. Once, I cruised along at 300 knots groundspeed, in part due to a 130 knot tailwind.

I flew the plane 900 hours over a 3.5 year period.

I often arrive at Signature Flight Service at Dulles. I enjoy free ice cream, the serious, professional atmosphere in the lobby, and the fact that I am rubbing shoulders with Gulfstream drivers.

Once, I see Harry Reid (Nev – D) from 15 feet away in the Signature lobby. He is with private security (or Secret Service agents?). He does not seem to mind the fact that he is preparing to get on a jet and head home, while converting thousands of pounds of Jet A into vicious carbon. I will not remember this when the auto companies are pilloried for flying their jets to DC, so they can testify before congress.

Mostly, I enjoy the freedom and convenience of flying my efficient GA airplane.


Now I am 48 years old.

Kathy and I sold the business. 4 months later, I looked at the airplane, and realized that I had flown the T206 less than 2 hours in 120 days. Two months later, I spot my plane on an internet tracking website (www.flightaware.com) and it is running around the Bahamas. The wholesaler I sold my bird to told me it was headed to South America.


Now I am 51 years old.

I arrive at IAD, on a commercial flight which routed through Chicago. The flight was over an hour late, because of a mechanical issue. Thankfully, I am not rerouted to Reagan. My flight arrives Dulles late. I get in the cab, and provide the driver with my destination hotel in downtown DC.

The cab driver turns left, and we pull directly in front of Signature Flight Service. A lone Cessna is parked on the flight line. It is surrounded by dozens of jets, of all sizes. The tarmac is thick with jets.

I sigh.

Trike morphing

I'm sitting here at Chicago O'Hare, enroute to DC for a trade show. (No - not in the Belite! :-)

Thanks for your input on the Belite Trike. I received great posts and feedback, not only here, but by email, and from a Yahoo Group fan as well.

(you can see our Yahoo Group at:)

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/belite-aircraft/

As a result, the Trike is morphing. We're going to try and pull off the impossible, which is get a brand new Trike configured and showable for Sun N Fun.

Here's the changes coming:

1) Out with the aluminum tail boom, back to trusty chromalloy steel (benefit: any Belite can become a Trike)

2) We're 'flipping' the main gear to make it a Trike (benefit: any Belite gear can be used on a Trike)

3) Nose gear is being rebuilt using beefier aluminum (benefit: stronger)

4) I'll be playing with getting a MZ201 on this plane (benefit: better performance, but at a price).

I'm also working on some exciting avionics options, and also at one or two more ways to squeeze pounds out of airplanes. I aim to keep it interesting!

Stay tuned, fly safe, have fun!

-- James

Need input on the Trike

The Trike demonstrator has not flown since we returned from Sebring. It sustained some very minor damage as we were loading it into the truck for the return home; the Superlite was a higher priority for us to work on after we got back. Also, the move into our new workshop location had consumed four weeks of our energy.

Based on the number of inquiries on the Trike, I know people want it and it's important to get this new plane up and running.

So here's my comments, and I want your feedback:

1) We redesigned the fuselage on the Trike to use an aluminum tail boom. You can see the black powdercoated tailboom in the photo above. It looks cool. It was supposed to save weight and reduce production complexity. It doesn't really save any weight, and the additional welding complexity on the tail feathers and rear landing (now main) landing gear largely offset welding savings on the rear fuselage. Should we use the original steel welded fuselage? Or stick with the aluminum boom?

2) The main gear of the Trike were designed from the ground up to use fiberglass rods. Although strong, this involved creating a couple more weldments that require fabrication. It would be easier to use an 'A' frame rear main gear similar to, if not identical, to our existing gear on the taildragger models, and forget the fiberglass rods. In other words, changing the gear design will save some money, and make this plane more affordable.

3) The nose gear works great; but we've discovered that the strength of the aluminum on the gear is a little marginal. Nothing really to discuss here; we're rebuilding the nose gear with some stronger aluminum.

4) The ground clearance is a little high, making taxiing tips slightly more likely.

5) I think many people want this with a bigger engine (think MZ-201 with 45HP) and light wings (think carbon fiber) so that it's weight legal in part 103. This would be an option, but would cost $$.

I have to make decisions on all of these over the next two weeks.

What do you think?

Flight Review of Belite

This post was updated on June 30, 2010:

For a direct link to the Flight Review mentioned below in this post, click here:


BELITE FLIGHT REVIEW by Scott Severen



Has anyone flight reviewed a Belite?



Why YES! Someone came to Wichita and and performed an independent and thorough review of the Belite. We expect to see an article published in April, hopefully in time for distribution at Sun N Fun. Last week, Scott Severen came to our airport and took the bird through its paces. I was nervous, anxious, excited. What would happen?

Scott has a long history in the aircraft (and especially the ultralight) market, having been a principal at Airbike and TEAM aircraft. He knows his stuff. I met him at Sebring back in January, and we'd hoped to have him fly the aircraft at that time. Since that didn't work out, he came up to Wichita from his home near Dallas. He's writing the article at the request of one of our industry periodicals.



I helped Scott with a long preflight briefing -- we covered just about every nut and bolt on the airframe, along with discussions of speeds, stall technique, flying characteristics and more.

And then he took off.

Does a Belite really sound like that?

It was odd to watch our Belite fly overhead, without me in it.

I saw Scott do things with the airplane I am not (yet) capable of doing. I was amazed.

I'm looking forward to reading his entire experience and review in the article.

In the course of the day, we shot hundreds of photos. The best will be in the magazine article, but a few are in this blog.



Scott flew the Superlite, with a Hirth F23 engine. The aircraft was equipped with big tires, brakes, minimal instrumentation, carbon fiber wings, composite tail wheel spring, carbon fiber firewall, carbon fiber floorboard, carbon fiber seatback and bottom, 5 gallon spun aluminum fuel tank (beautiful), wood instrument panel (minimal, but beautiful), UV treated ceconite wings, naked tail, full 4130 black powdercoated chromalloy fuselage (safety), BRS full frame parachute (safety), electric start, dual ignition, and full wrapover windshield. The engine was spinning a 60 x 36 prop, and it ran smoothly. For a battery, I was using a 1.5 pound Lipo battery, with a quick disconnect battery plug. The engine was throttle stopped at about 75% power, which I've verified is capable of producing the fastest possible cruise in a part 103 aircraft.

Here's some things I'm hoping Scott talks about:

1) flight characteristics
2) takeoff and climb performance
3) glide rate
4) landing and runway control
5) slips
6) fun factor
7) transition requirements
8) world's best turn and bank indicator (that would be the breeze on your face) :-)
9) trim
10) stalls, both power on and power off

Scott, come on back and fly the Trike!!

Speaking of the Trike, tomorrow I'll be publishing some comments on the Trike program and where we are at.