Tonight, while on a modified version of the Daily Dad Call, we got to talking about his plane.
It’s “vintage.”
A 1964 Cessna 172. Dad joked that we had to be careful when we walked by it, lest we get a paint chip in our eye.
When I brought photos to show my instructor (because I’d like to fly in it a bit before being completely done here and I wanted him to know what he — or whoever it would be — was getting into), he eagerly looked through the images.
“It’s…different than what I’m using now,” I said hesitantly.
“Oh, I’ve seen much worse!” my instructor said, still going through the photos.
I snickered.
I know he what he was trying to say, but it sounded bad, the way he put it.
Anyway, dad and I were talking about the plane and the possibility of getting it down here, and the fact that I really wanted to do my checkride in the plane I was using now.
Dad’s plane is “stripped down.”
I guess it doesn’t even have the standard “six-pack” of instruments.
I also lack a six-pack, but I’ll put that on one of my other blogs.
“Yes, that’s a true IFR machine,” dad said wistfully. “I follow roads, rivers and railroad tracks.”
It does have a VOR gauge, with the tuner thingy (you can see I’m in trouble here) right on the face of it. Dad informed me last week that there was nothing wrong with the device except that, on occasion, it wouldn’t turn to various frequencies.
Has anyone fed the little hamster that runs around on the wire wheel that powers the engine, or do we need to look into that? I pondered. Because I was starting to wonder.
Dad flew with a friend down to Texas once; I’m not sure if that’s when he had the VOR stuff put in, or not. But, you know, Texas is pretty big and hard to miss
My instructor tactfully mentioned to me that maybe, when I was all done, I’d want to look into getting a handheld GPS device. I have mixed feelings about that. Mainly, it’s going to take me several Pracs studies to pay for such a thing, and also, I’ve had such glorious experiences with GPS devices in the past1…
On the other hand…”vintage.”
1 Mainly, it was a long road trip with a vehicle full of many generations, one road map, two older fellows who both brought a GPS device of differing brands, and not a single agreement on the route to take rose from that collection.And oh. Me driving. And eventually swearing aloud somewhere in the middle of Knoxville, TN.
