As I wrote a week and a half ago the last time I flew the Lance the engine died on the taxiway and I flooded it and drained the battery trying to restart it. Nobody has flown it since and I wasn’t even sure if the engine would start.
Since I’m the club’s maintenance coordinator for that plane, the problem is really mine to deal with. So today I went out to the airport in the cold rain and hooked the battery up to a battery charger for 3 hours or so. Afterwards I verified that the engine started just fine, ran smoothly at full rich and leaned, and there was plenty of crank left in the battery.
There’s nothing that makes you feel more like an aircraft owner than standing in the pouring rain undoing screws with freezing fingers.
You know, it’s funny, but I was thinking something very similar today. The Tripacer needed some fabric work done on the tail and the gear, so I went out today to get started on it. My version:
Nothing makes you feel more like an aircraft owner then coming home and peeling green glue off your fingertips.
My version of feeling like an aircraft owner is: once a month, roll a pair of dice. If you get a 6 or 8, write a check for a thousand dollars.
That’s on top of regular maintenance, tiedown rental, insurance, etc. etc.
Two dice, 6 or 8? That’s odds of 10/36, right? I would have thought it was more frequent than that.