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Showing posts from 2018

The Apple IIgs

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My History with the Apple II Apple //e My first computer was an Apple //e, which started off as the "family" computer but, when a blended family brought an Apple //c into the fold, moved into my room for late night hacking sessions. (I was 9 or 10.) That machine was pretty nicely equipped, for the day. It had an Apple IIe Extended 80-Column RGB Card  that boosted the RAM from 64K to 128K, a DuoDisk unit with dual 143K SS/SD floppy disk drives, an AppleColor 100 RGB monitor , an Apple ][ Mouse Card and mouse , an Applied Engineering Datalink 1200 modem, a SuperSerial Card , and a Kensington System Saver (fan/surge protector/front-facing power switch). It was a pretty bomb little machine, running AppleWorks 3.0 with Beagle add-on software, Publish It!, etc. I also hacked out a lot of AppleSoft BASIC and 6502 assembly code on that thing. It was eventually "enhanced" with the 65c02 chip and updated ROMs. It's still in boxes back in Missouri. Apple II GS

Samsung ML-1740 on OS X

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I have an ancient Samsung ML-1740 I've had forever, but it's been gathering dust for years. Samsung dropped support for Macs after Tiger (10.4), and while I kept it going for a while with the samsung-gdi package, for some reason that stopped working a few years ago and I never bothered to figure out why. (I had by then picked up an awesome   Ricoh Aficio SP 3510sf .) Anyway, after I picked up a Canon MF632Cdw (DOA 😡), I cleaned out the carcass of the MX870 ("Code B200") and the ML-1740 to make room for the big color laser all-in-one. Last I checked the Samsung was still working, so I figured I'd see if I could get it working with a reasonably modern Mac OS X version - specifically, Yosemite, the version I have running on the black MacBook4,2 I’ve donated tothe hangar for Garmin GPS programming duties and other light work. Set up Yosemite under VMware and found this package:  SpliX  Works perfectly.

Headphone happiness

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So Amazon put the Bose QC25  headphones on sale during Prime Day, $125 (down from $249). I’ve been meaning to upgrade from what I was using at the office (>10 year old Altec Lansing headphones ), so, done: My office setup makes cords off to the right kind of awkward: Also, I wanted to be able to easily disconnect the headphones to use the AX510 sound bar under my Dell U2412M  monitor (which is connected to the “headphone” jack of the MacBook Air) ... Long story short, I picked up the SoundBlaster Play 3 to hang off a USB port on the monitor (there are a slew of < $10 trinkets on the market that purportedly do the same job, but all had mixed reviews). The SoundBlaster Play 3 is a separate audio device the Mac can be set to automatically switch to when inserted: The Play 3 also has a TRRS jack for the headset allowing the microphone on the Bose to work with VoIP-type applications (it also has a separate microphone jack, if you want to use a headset with both pigta

Garmin updates the G500/GC500/G5...

http://newsroom.garmin.com/press-release/featured-releases/garmin-provides-key-updates-txi-flight-displays-gtn-navigators-gfc%C2%A0a This could be a game changer. “Aircraft owners can soon pair the economical GFC 500 autopilot with the G500 TXi or G500 flight displays, offering a fully-redundant, all-glass cockpit when paired with the G5.” Suddenly, the SkyView HDX isn’t the only game in town...

Styles in Google Docs

Edit (March 2023): None of the below works anymore. Boo. But now there are extensions like Code Blocks , which should satisfy the same need.

Emergency landing

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About a week ago, I met up with a friend, who happens to be a 1,000+ hour CFII and an air traffic controller. After I did a full pre-flight (oil was changed about 9 hours ago; > 7 quarts; about 27 gallons of fuel on board, plane in great shape), we set off towards Riverside ( KRAL) to pick up Sara, a Pilots n' Paws rescue: While at Riverside I filled the fuel tanks “to tabs” (50 gallons usable), and after waiting a few minutes for everything to settle, sumped the tanks. No water, no debris. Had an uneventful flight to Camarillo ( KCMA ), where we met Sara’s new “forever family.” (That was nice; usually on these flights, I’m transporting the rescue dog(s) from one rescue/foster situation to another, this was the first time I got to meet the pup’s new family.) Mission accomplished, my friend and I waited the interminable Sunday afternoon wait for tri-tip at Waypoint and then, satiated, set out towards home. After a normal run-up, Camarillo Tower asked if we wanted a left

Seat Back Removal, 1969 Mooney M20F

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The Owner’s Manual for the 1969 M20F said the rear seat backs could be removed: The rear seat backs can be removed for additional cargo space by pulling the spring-loaded lock pins at the seat back base and sliding the seat back rearward. It was a PITA, but, it’s true; here’s how. Pull the seat recline lever on the side panel back (towards the rear of the plane): While this is pulled back, “recline” the seat back forward (push the top of the seat towards the front of the plane). With the seat back leaned forward, underneath, in the “outside” corner (closest to the exterior of the airplane, i.e., if you’re looking forward from the cargo compartment, lower left corner of the left seat, lower right corner of the right seat), there will be a metal pin with a 90° bend in it; that’s the “spring-loaded lock pin” the manual describes:  Pull that pin in towards the middle of the plane. When it's about an inch or so pulled out, the corner should pop free. The other corner of the

Avionics grumbles

So a high start voltage on the pitch servo was the culprit in causing the intermittent porpoising on the S-Tec 30 in altitude hold mode. Apparently that condition develops as the brushes on the motor wear out. Yanked and sent to S-Tec for servicing (flat rate; it'll either be like $500 or $1700 or so, plus the A&P labor). Everything else on the autopilot checked out. At least the S-Tec will fail gracefully and still retain heading / GPSS / NAV tracking with the altitude hold module (pitch servo) yanked. Meanwhile, the EDM-700 is going to be swapped (trade-in program) for an EDM-730 . It's a straight swap, no rewiring, no new probes, etc., required (for the same functionality I have on the decidedly old-school -700: (4) probe CHT and EGT, oil temp, voltage). Sold. Even once the SkyView HDX is STC'd and installed (hopefully soon?!), I'll move the -730 to the right panel, add RPM and MP, and have it as a backup instrument.

Stylus holder

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Have one of these stuck to the side of the X-Naut iPad yoke mount. Perfect place to stick a stylus  (which I've basically now completely transitioned to, for in-flight notes: ATIS, clearances, etc) (though I did just toss a cheap notepad and pen in, as a backup). Wish the adhesive was a little stronger, and that you could buy them in less than a ten-pack for less than $17, but still. Worth it. Edit: A year later, I’ve worn out one of the pen holders (the rubber channel got stretched out enough it wasn’t holding the stylus securely) and love the stylus with ForeFlight scratchpads. I don’t remember the last time I used paper and a pen, and I haven’t missed my kneeboard at all.

PIREP: Between the seats storage

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Quite possibly the best $11 I've spent in aviation:  High Road Front Seat Car Organizer Caddy . As part of my "get in and go" initiative, I wanted some cockpit organization, and none of the planes I fly have any usable pockets up front. This is thin enough to fit between most front seats without getting in the way of anything (can’t be used with a Johnson bar, sadly, for manual gear Mooneys or Piper PA28s), my iPhone fits perfectly in that back side pocket, a stylus and pen clip effortlessly into the pen loops, and a flashlight, my wallet, whatever else I want to keep easily at hand (vs. awkwardly in a pocket or floating around the cabin) is all right there, at my fingertips. I wanted something like Sporty's Covered Cockpit Organizer , but it was too big, and I didn't want anything suction-cupped to the window...

Stratux AHRS only with FreeFlight GPS

So, YOLTbird has a FreeFlight RANGR FDL-978-XVR ADS-B transceiver, that does a great job providing GPS (10m accuracy), FIS-B (weather), and TIS-B (traffic) to my iPad. (The Stratux would also provide 1090 traffic, but the cons outweigh the pros.) But no AHRS. I kinda want to see if I can learn enough Go to pull off the following: Get the Stratux software stack to consume the GPS information pumped out by the FreeFlight system (in lieu of using the GPYes chip I have in the Stratux, which is occasionally problematic); and Feed AHRS data to ForeFlight, now that ForeFlight has started accepting such data from non-Appareo/Garmin sources. This will let me bury a Stratux somewhere in the cockpit (and keep it on hand as an emergency backup), without our having to have antennae strewn all over the place or a device suction-cupped to the window, and get AHRS into the synthetic vision module in ForeFlight, using hardware I already own. (A FlightStream 210 would do the same, over Bluet

Cockpit Organization

Now that I have access to a hangar and a plane with a nice interior, I’m contemplating how to organize things. I’m leaving the now communal iPad in the X-Naut case; with cell phone personal hotspot functionality, we can update ForeFlight, etc., from the cockpit during pre-flight. I’m toying with the idea of leaving a set of sunglasses in the plane. I started using the ForeFlight scratchpad feature‡ instead of a kneeboard and notepad. I’m looking for where to stash a pen in flight; my first ForeFlight scratchpad experiment was done wearing a stylish (!)  Pilot's Sleeve Pocket Polo Shirt , but without all those pen pockets, I'm not sure it would have been as convenient. But I don't want to clutter the cockpit or stick things to random surfaces. With electric landing gear, there’s a small space between the front seats where I could put a small organizer or something. I’d like to have a couple of pens, my iPhone, and a flashlight (at a minimum) easily accessible. Developing. Th