Those small little winter things

I made a small window today in plastic to stop heat from escaping through the storm window while the plane sits in the hangar with electrical cabin heat. Temperatures are going down these days. Worked pritty nice actually. Cost was 29,90 NOK + some superglue! Window is removable and allows for an electrical cable to pass through and keeps the warm air inside!

 I have E-Z Heat pads installed in the bottom of the oil sump on each engine. When they are connected to ground power, I send an SMS to the plane and engines start warming up. 1,5 hours before starting is sufficient and makes the engines start easily.

Nice little trip doing ARC-DME

Last sunday I was on a short trip with my pilot friend and we practized ARC DME procedures at the MES VOR. Perfect weather at 7000ft! Got a clearance from Oslo ATC on 124,775 and did some nice training. Allways good to have someone onboard who appreciates real flying!

I did it my way

I do not fly for a living, but as a way of life! I enjoy being back in the air whenever the opportunity comes my way! I have gradually built flying competence since I took my PPL back in 1984. Through renting Cessna 172's in the beginning, dropping sky divers, building an Experimental aircraft, flying that for some 300hrs and finally got my twin. I like flying long distances with it and having all aircraft systems in perfect condition! I just hate snag. By cruising the skies whenever I can, I do not have to worry about being a pilot for a living. No monthly flight schedules, no worries about pay cuts and no need to desperately land in crap weather at the destination! I can recommend this way of flying to all aviators!

Jeppesen Mobile FD - Great Stuff!

I have now used the Jeppesen Mobile FD app on the iPad2 for a year. It is awesome! I have all IFR plates for Europe with me all the time. Updating is a breeze! The newest version of JMFD downloads weather(icing, winds, lightning and turbulence) and overlays the info on the en-route chart. On the SID, STAR, Approach and Taxi plates, I can now highlight key info with a green marker pen! Super! Those guys at Jeppesen are doing a great job!
You can shift from day to night view and colors are great! Below you can see some screen samples.




Here you can see the night view with the route from ENHA to ENBR with icing at 5000ft overlayed.













Here you can see day view and with wind indicators overlayed for 10.000 ft. NICE!

Here, I used the drawing pen to mark the assigned STAR into ENBR.

New Landing Lights and Wingtip Lights

I have new LoPresti BoomBeam wingtip recognition lights and new dual BoomBeam landing lights! They are great and improves safety near and around airports an during approach and landing. I have been told that I am VERY visible in the pattern now. Nice!

On the above pictures, only one landing light in the nose was installed. Below, both are installed. The pictures don't really show how strong they are. It is basically as looking into the sun!