JOE HOBBS -- FINALLY FLYING AGAIN

After more than 25 years of dreaming the dream of owning my own plane, finally it could happen. I had been an aviation fanatic since I was about ten years old, built model airplanes, became a WW2 aviation junkie, got my private license in 1964, and had been in flying clubs because I couldn’t justify the costs of ownership, maintenance and operations of my own plane. I had raised my family till my son was 20 years old, finished my Bachelors and Masters degrees, and took a pension from a big company after 25 years of service. I’d began another career with a startup company, lived in Scottsdale, had a cute wife and wasn’t destitute! I hadn’t flown in about 10 years but I had always missed it.  Time to get my Class 3, my BFR and get current. Time to get into a position to buy my first plane!

How to get started? Being a technical genius, I decided it would be a good idea to go to an airport and look around. I’d grown to be a bit of a yuppie so I decided to go to Scottsdale Airport. Sure enough, I found a place that rented airplanes (they accepted Visa) and got a few ideas on getting current. I also found out about an EAA chapter meeting that Thursday and showed up for my first meeting. The Thunderbirds have been good to me.

I started thinking about my first plane. I wanted a tail dragger. Real men fly tail draggers. I had learned to fly in a Cessna 140 and I didn’t want all that pain and agony to go to waste. I asked Curtis to put a note in the newsletter, “Wanted - Cessna 180” or something like that. I was also learning about all sorts of new “experimental” types that I had never knew existed before - RVs, Glassairs, Kitfoxes, LongEZs, and on and on. Wow! And some of them were tail draggers, too!

The only problem was the “building” part. I wanted to get my butt in a cockpit, not a 5-year project. Ninety percent done, ninety percent to go was not a funny thing to hear about. Ok, the experimentals are awesome technology and I like that, but I think I can live with a nice Piper TriPacer I saw at Falcon Field. I drove right past the “authorized personnel only” signs to look at it. Not a taildragger, but nice. And old like me.

But then again, the Rutan designed Canard types had really turned my head with the design efficiency and performance. I had no idea they could be so fast and so cheap to operate. The LongEZs were like little rockets, especially if they had the Lycoming O-320. I was hooked. Not many were built and not many were for sale, but there was one for me out there somewhere.

I was on the Internet scrounging the Canadian sites and found a few possibilities. California, Oklahoma, and Florida. Not much here locally. What a bummer (I was a hippie). I started looking at the Velocity fast build option as a possibility, and was thinking about how my wife would feel about parking here precious Mustang outside in the sun for 2 to 9 years while I built my dream in the garage. Somehow that image just didn’t seem to feel comfortable. But the Velocities were very nice!

But then I started hearing about some of these experimental birds are for sale here locally! Mouth-to-mouth leads and classified ads for local aircraft became my obsession. Friendly people answered the telephones with great technology for sale at bargain prices! OK, now we’re talking. Time to get some money moved into the account to finally buy my first plane. What a thrill.

Then it happened. I was looking at the classifieds in the Central States web site - “For sale, Cozy Mark 3, I/O320, dual GPS, 186 knots on 7.5gph, …”. I looked at jpeg images and immediately called the owner. He was the second owner (David Vollrath), an A&P mechanic, and a corporate pilot. The Cozy was sharing air-conditioned hangar space with the Citations in the NE edge of Tennessee. It was represented as a clean, fast plane in perfect condition. And I could pay cash for it. I could move quickly. It was a good thing.

I was looking at it two days later. Instead of returning to Phoenix from a business trip to California, I diverted to Las Vegas where I had bummed a ride in David’s corporate jet from Las Vegas to Tri-City Airport in Tennessee. I got out of the Citation in front of the hangar and there it was in the corner of the hangar, parked on its nose. After a ground inspection and a 30-minute flight with David, I negotiated an acceptable price including six hours of dual transition time, and gave him a deposit. MY FIRST PLANE! And it was awesome! The next day we did some local pattern work and a 1.5-hour cross country flight to Memphis so I could return to Phoenix on a commercial flight. Cross-country flights in a Cozy are fast and smooth – INCREDIBLE!

Two weeks later I was back in Tennessee and the weather was cooperative. David had a very logical, fast paced transition package to finish up the rest of the six hours of transition time, including a simulated dead stick landing at Tri City. Landing a Cozy is the biggest challenge for a Cessna trained pilot. Once you get slowed down and in the pattern, putting the Cozy’s nose down in a steep glide is a no-no! There isn’t enough room in the pattern to get it slowed back down! Also, in a normal landing, the Cozy will go into a nice “ground effect” in the flare. Cessna drivers (like me) have been trained to pull back on the stick in the flare and that is also a no-no with the Cozy. The Cozy will want to jump back up into the air and make the landing look very ugly! Once these two points are understood, the Cozy is very gentle and manageable on final.

My goal was to be ready to begin my cross-country flight back to Scottsdale on Saturday (the next day) and try to make Tulsa non-stop. The weather was an issue, but it looked like I could get to Tulsa before a frontal system moved in, stay there for the night and let the front pass before getting clean airspace for the rest of the trip on Sunday. I left Tri City at 7:45 with full tanks (52 gallons, good for 7.5 hours duration!) and both GPS systems programmed for Tulsa direct GPS. My new toy, solo cross-country, 210 mph indicated into an 8 knot headwind, 8gph, and what a thrill! I had requested flight following and kept busy with navigation and the radios. Did I say what a thrill I was experiencing???

Coming into the eastern edge of Tulsa airspace, it was obvious that the front had beaten me there by about half an hour. I had no interest in taking my new toy into marginal VFR. I noticed a nice big airstrip right under me. I hit my goto button on my Garmin GPS, got the tower frequency and was cleared to land in short order. I was about 50 miles east of Tulsa, and had been flying for four hours and ten minutes! I got parked, tied down and was pulling my shaving kit out as it started raining. Timing is everything. What a great day!

Early next morning I was back looking at the weather on the monitor. The front was not moving very fast, still raining, not even good for IFR! But the back edge of the front was very distinct and was slowly moving as expected. The coffee was tolerable and I used the time to plan the next leg. I wanted to make Albuquerque non-stop and have lunch before continuing to Scottsdale Airpark to show off my new toy. Finally, the edge of the front moved and things brightened up to the west. I got the tanks topped off and confirmed the weather and filed my flight plan requesting flight following again. And I was off. I stayed at 2,500 for twenty minutes or so to clear all the remnants of the front and then got up to 10,500 where it was smooth and cool. What a thrill!

About an hour east of Albuquerque I was thinking about how nice it would be to have a mayonnaise jar with a lid on it in the plane somewhere. I remembered all the coffee I had consumed while I was waiting. I’ll try not to do that next time. But I decided I wasn’t going to give up all this great altitude just for biological concerns. Cozy pilots are real men and can maintain control. My most severe biological challenge came as I approached the Albuquerque airspace from the east. My ground track was along the pass where Interstate 10 was visible below. I had to get down to about 1,000 AGL to clear some clouds and found myself in some pronounced turbulence. It wasn’t that bad from the aviation perspective, but in combination with the kidney pressure it was pretty painful and really distracted from the pleasure of flying my new Cozy. Deep breathing seemed to help a little bit. I was thinking about where I was going to store the mayonnaise jar in the future.

I came into the ABQ airspace and was number two behind a 727. I was hoping the 727 wasn’t going to dawdle around any and would get the hell out of the way. I had plenty of room, no wake turbulence issues and was on final when I noticed two F16s on the taxiway. I made sure they could see that my belly brake was deployed on final and it was just like their belly brakes. Flair, squeak-squeak and taxi fast to the ramp, parked close in and tried to walk normally to the terminal building. After a four hour and thirty minute flight I was soon ready for another cup of coffee. Whew!

 After a nice lunch and weather check, I was topping off the tanks out on the line. A man and his daughter were getting ready to depart in a twin Cessna and came over to look at my new toy. Of course I was happy to show it off. The guy really really liked it till he found out my Cozy cruised 20 knots faster than his twin Cessna! I told him not to ask about fuel consumption because it would really piss him off. He did anyway, and was still talking to himself when I was ready to taxi. (He can get his own Cozy!)

Twenty-knot headwinds were at all altitudes on the way into SDL and it took me two hours and ten minutes and was bumpy most of the way. I popped over the McDowell’s through one of the gaps between the peaks into a beautiful sight. My home airspace and I was in my new toy. What a thrill! The pattern I flew was the most comfortable yet. I flared and held steady letting the Cozy go into it’s ground effect cushion and squeaked into the smoothest landing yet. It was good to be home. I taxied over to Tango parking, tied down and was putting the cabin cover on when I suddenly noticed how tired I was. Tired yes, but really, really happy. My new toy looked good on the ramp.

I’m on the list for my own hangar at Deer Valley and expect to get one soon. Stop by anytime. I still like showing off my new toy!

You can e-mail Joe at jjhobbs@uswest.net