St. Louis Flying Club Newsletter - 27 April 2014

From The President - By Charley

Members:

As a reminder we have our Club Meeting upcoming on Saturday, May 17th at 10:00. I will have an agenda out to you in the next day or two. If you have items that you would like to make the agenda, please drop me a note. We will be reviewing the work done by our aircraft improvement committee this meeting so please make every effort to attend and give your input to the improvement plan. If you have not already given Steve Heidenreich your RSVP, please do that soon. If you cannot attend Steve will take a proxy vote on your behalf if you like. John Waddell has graciously agreed to provide lunch, so plan on sticking around a bit afterwards to eat and socialize.

The Arrow annual was completed on April 28th with lots of people helping to remove inspection plates, cleaning of the aircraft and many, many other miscellaneous tasks. The good news is that it does not look like anything major is going to come out of the inspection and the aircraft should be back in service soon. Thanks to John and the crew who helped for their work to get the inspection turned around quickly!

The St. Louis Flying Club League website has been updated with the current leader board, be sure to drop a note to T.J. after you fly so he can give you credit for your flight. T.J. has done a great job of outlining the league rules and staying on top of reporting progress to keep us all up to date, including tracking some of us down to report. The best thing about the league is that you only participate if you want to and it is great way to encourage more flying by members and especially members together. Now that the weather has broken go grab a partner and fly somewhere!

The Airshow at Spirit will take place this weekend. The north runway and many taxiways are already closed in preparation for the show. A NOTAM has been issued that defines the affected airspace and closure times..

Safe flights,

Charley

Treasurer's Report - by PIC

Members,

There was a $5 increase for internet connection which increases the monthly dues by $1 to $122. Avgas went down slightly reducing the hourly fees to $78 and $102. The share value nudged up to $10,648. In addition to our 3% rebate for TACair fuel purchases through our US Bank credit card (now over $350), I've signed our club up to get a 5% rebate from Sporty's Pilot Shop. Sporty’s is a proud supporter of flying clubs and the work they do to keep flying fun and affordable. To give back, they started the Flying Club Rebate Program, a no-strings way for flying clubs to earn a cash rebate on everything members buy from Sporty’s.

• 5% rebate on all purchases made by STL Flying Club members from Sporty’s Pilot Shop
• Includes all products, even chart subscriptions
• No charge to sign up – it’s free!
• No special codes required at checkout
• We will receive a rebate check quarterly.

Bonne Terre airport (1BT) has reopened. I had the chance to fly in and check it out last month. I talked with the airport manager, Steve Vogt. He is retired (owns a 1968 Arrow) and through his tenacity, he convinced the county to provide him a long term lease for just $1/year. In turn, Steve has built 4 t-hangars, installed avgas and jet fuel tanks and a very nice FBO office (all from his personal funds). I've seen many airports close during my years of flying but this is the only one I've seen reopened. Please stop buy to purchase fuel to help their cash flow. Steve would be happy to give you a tour!

I would also like to thank Dom for answering my call for help to pull out the 172 on April 11 so the maintenance crew could fix the stuck open hangar door (fan belt needed replacement). I got a call at 1:00 from Spirit with the request and Dom made it out there by 2:00!

Fly Safely!

PIC

   Maintenance - by John

N20843

• Flaps - On 6 April, we had a squawk that the flaps did not go down for landing. troubleshooting tracked the problem to bad contacts in the flap motor connector. We took the connectors apart and cleaned them with contact cleaner and the flaps operated with no issues multiple times. Looks like the the problem was with the connector contacts and the contact cleaner should take care of it.
• Oil Change - The oil and filter were changed on 26 April. The spark plugs were cleaned, gapped and rotated.

N2242N

• Annual Inspection - The annual inspection was completed on 28 April. The compression check readings were 74, 77, 76, 76 which are good results. The DME was removed (2 lb increase in useful load) and the old DME switch is now used to turn the GDL-39 on/off. The normal switch position should be in the "on" position and only turned off, then on again to pair it if you were not able to pair the bluetooth connection to your portable display on the initial startup. The full annual inspection details will be provided in next months newsletter.

  

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