$200 hamburger run

Today my Dad and I took a mid-day flight to grab lunch at 57 Alpha, the cafe at Rutherford Co airport, KFQD.

We made a detour on the way there to overfly KCEU, Clemson, SC. We both went to school there so it was nice to take a quick peek.

After landing at KFQD we found the place fairly deserted, no doubt due to some cloudiness in the area. We enjoyed a nice lunch at the cafe: I had a chicken burrito with banana pudding (their specialty - very good) and my dad had a hamburger. After that we just walked around the airport a bit to enjoy the scenery. It's in the foothills of the mountains, so the skyline was nice to look at.

For the crank up to leave FQD, I was a little worried the engine might be tough to start. It had been turned off for about 45 minutes, and I wasn't sure if priming the engine a bit would be bad or good. Normally if I've shut down for just 15-30 minutes I don't prime, so that's what I did this time. It actually started quite quickly with no priming at all, so that worked nicely!

During the flight I tested a new electronic CO detector I bought, the CO Experts Model 2010. It was quite back-ordered, so took a while to get to me. It's very sensitive and worked well for the flight. Only went off once, for just a moment, right before we did the take off from FQD. I think it must have just detected a minute about of CO from the engine. Other than that time, it was reading zero ppm for the flight.

I've been told to never use one of these as they have been shown to give false readings (not change color in the presence of CO) and expire quickly, so I decided that the CO Experts one was the way to go, especially since I take my young boys on trips in the airplane.

Comments

Me said…
You have the IO550G(b)2 engine? If so I have some tips for not-cold (i.e. warm and hot starts).

Austin
January 2, 2011 at 2:12 PM
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