Northwoods Cargo PAYA to CYXY Dry Goods Run

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Had a flight on the board for the DC-3 today that was to run some dry goods up to Whitehorse, along with some engine parts. I think there was even a goat back there but I can't say for sure. Could have sworn I heard it though.
Anyway we took off out of Yakutat about 3pm local time. The weather was pretty shotty on our side of the mountains, rain and low clouds but things looked to be pretty clear if we could get above it over the mountains.

Leaving PAYA





Got her up off the ground and making a turn, heading for ALATY as part of our route before turning towards the mountains.



Great flight so far. We are at altitude now and starting to get into the mountains. Well above the weather now.





Making our way through the mountains now cruising about 9000FT.







Really can't believe how great the clouds look with this new version of ActiveSky. The layering is something you never seen in the last version. At least I sure didnt.
Here we are coming out of the mountains. Nice to see a little green again





Getting close to making the turn for Whitehorse now. Just beautiful weather, getting into some clouds now but im not caring too much







Lining up on final for Whitehorse. Was a great long flight. I dont recall when I have enjoyed one this much in a while. This plane and the weather just really made for an immersive flight.





On the ground safely in the YT, goat and all





Very enjoyable flying there. Not sure what Imgur has done to their stupid interface but its a confusing mess now so I hope I got these images in the right order

[Deleted]

Very cool Todd, and yeah, the pics seem to come across very well. Those are some pretty high mountains there. Must'a been sucking on that bag going across there <LOL>

[Deleted]

Haha ya they are high. I need to look into a different route to Whitehorse from Yak. I think I almost caught the engines on fire getting over those mountains

Suggestions?

[Deleted]

I wasnt kidding I heard a goat!

And he had clearly been told already to put his dang seat belt on!

[Deleted]

<ROTFLMAO>!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Thats the funniest thing I've seen in quite a while!!! GREAT shot!!

Suggestions? Well, I did notice your power settings were awfully high. They kind of demand (although not as much as A2A aircraft) that you fly this one more or less by the numbers. I go with initial climb power of 40"/2400 rpm until I get a thousand feet, then 36"/2350 rpm to altitude. Climb at 115 to 120 indicated. It's slow if you're heavy, but this is an old airplane and that's the way they are. For cruise I usually go with 33"/2000 RPM. Descent never less than 20" (and I try to keep it at 23" or more to prevent shock cooling). Takeoff of course, is about 49" and full RPM.

Hope that helps .

[Deleted]

Hah yes sir that does.
I was trying to be easy just not easy enough in the right ways.

Thats Hector by the way. He is now officially the Northwoods Mascot Goat. He will be along on many flights to come im sure.

[olderndirt]

Believe it or not.  Yakutat FSS was our first married assignment in 1962.  Lot of nostalgia in your shots - what a place to have fishing gear.

[Deleted]

Oh man I bet so. Being a life long lover of fishing I cant imagine how great it would be to live in Alaska for that reason alone.
I would have to win the lottery if I ever moved there because I would lose my job from going out fishing when I should be at work

[Deleted]

Yeah, radials especially can be tempermental. Contrary to what you would think, cooling is a serious problem with them. They either run too hot (most often) or shock cool really easily. Usually both, and that's a recipe for cracked cylinders. I remember with the Beaver, the minute the floats were off the water and you were starting a positive climb, you grabbed both the throttle and the prop controls together (same time) and came back on them immediately to climb power. If you held takeoff power for more than 2 minutes, you were going to have serious problems down the road. Regular piston aircraft are like that as well, but not as bad. Nevertheless, it really pays to handle them correctly. Full power is usually only rated for a maximum of 5 minutes. As soon as you have your obstacles cleared (and I don't mean Mount McKinley that's 20 miles away <LOL>), you get the power back to climb. On the 185 for instance, that's 25 squared (25"/2500 rpm). Then when you get to cruise, you want to run between 65 and 75% power, which at 3000 ft or so is roughly 23"/2300 rpm, but you can use any combination you want (more or less). Meaning, 22" / 2400 rpm is the same as 23 / 2300 which is the same as 21 / 2500, etc. On newer engines and turbocharged engines it doesn't matter much but on older machines like the 185 you generally want to keep the manifold pressure below the RPM values. In other words, you don't want to hold 24" and 2200 rpm. That's not that big a deal on that plane, but the cylinders on the older engines weren't designed for that. As I say on turbo or supercharged engines (the Beaver and DC 3 are the latter), you normally hold a higher MP than rpms (the DC 3 is usually cruised at 31" / 2000 RPM. Used to fly the Beaver at 28" / 1800 rpm or so). Engine management is critical for the pilot's well being, believe me. If it lets you down at the wrong time, you can be really screwed . Anyway, hope you don't mind me minding your business on this . Don't want to take the fun out of it for you.

By the by, on the A2A aircraft, just a suggestion - every version you fly, hit SHIFT+7 and run it through and complete overhaul before you fly it. Only really have to do that once (unless you abuse those engines - they WILL fail on you if you do!), but I'm finding their damage modeling is set way too high. I've had 3 major control surface failures in the past 6 months, and that's just wrong. I flew 17 years IRL, and most of that in the bush, and the only control surface failure I ever had was once when the flaps on the 185 froze in the 10 degree position because they had been sprayed with water on the takeoff (on floats) and then froze in the cold air on the way to the lake to pick up some people. Hardly a crisis situation. Maybe I was lucky, but A2A's failure rate is way too high, and even doing the preflight doesn't guarantee you'll pick up a problem. I had an aileron freeze in flight (connecting rod broke) which locked it in position. It should have just flapped away in the breeze, so that part wasn't correct anyway, but even after it failed, I did the preflight back on the ground again and it showed nothing out of the ordinary. Only when I put it in the hangar did it get flagged, which is annoying because who has the AME do a complete inspection prior to every flight. I fixed it, but next time I have a failure like that, the damage control gets turned off. That is the ONLY thing I dislike about A2A's aircraft.

[Deleted]

Oh no not at all. I appreciate you taking the time to explain all that. Very helpful information Glenn.

Thank you