Ingo Noka

Posts Tagged ‘cross-country’

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Subang live updates

In Navigation on October 6, 2012 at 9:42 am

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On my way to Subang. Intention is to fly to Pangkor later.

Big scare. After Cape Ricardo the electrical system of the aircraft went completely dead. The handheld radio wasn’t strong enough to reach Lumpur Info. Eventually I managed to contact another aircraft and got cleared to Subang. In Subang the handheld radio worked and they let me land. Of course in between the batteries of the handheld had to be changed too.

That was not a pleasant experience. The battery is now completely dead, which means the alternator wasn’t charging.

I hope to get it fixed by tomorrow so that I can fly back by plane.

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Come fly with me …

In Announcement, Navigation, Uncategorized on September 21, 2012 at 12:11 am

Ready to Fly in the Morning

It is some time now since our last flight around Malaysia. This is not a good state of affairs! The VFR lanes of Malaysia are deserted and the air traffic controllers haven’t heard a fumbling low time PPL for too long. Let’s go and change that. I am organizing a flight safari from the 13th To the 16th of October and look for company. Whether you are a licensed pilot or not does not matter, everybody is welcome.

We can go either East or West. If we go West, we would fly to Malacca, Subang, Pangkor, Penang and Langkawi. on the East coast we would visit Tioman, Kerteh, Terengganu, Pulau Redang and Kota Bahru. From Kota Bahru we could also go to Thailand and spend a day there.

It would certainly be easier to go West, especially if you are concerned about returning at a particular time. There are more bus and commercial flight connections if we are stuck because of bad weather. It will also be easier to get fuel.

Please have a look at the flight program and message me if you are interested in joining.

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Tioman Checkout

In Flight Bag, Navigation on July 23, 2012 at 11:26 pm

Ingo and Saddiq after Tioman Checkout

Pulau Tioman was the last island with a usable airfield around the Malaysian peninsula I hadn’t been to.  One reason is that I was busy exploring the other places along the East and West coast, and the other reason is that you need to get checked out by a flight instructor first before you can fly there on your own.  The FRAS checkout consists of three successful landings with a flight instructor.

My first attempt failed.  Last weekend, I stayed a couple of hours at the club hoping that the weather would clear enough to have a good chance to return to Johor, but no such luck.  This weekend, the weather was better.  Lots of CB with a base of about 2000 feet and nice blue sky in between.  On Saturday, I practices a couple of landings and on Sunday Saddiq was available and the weather still held, so we took off at around 13:00.  With a tail wind of 10 to 12 kts, we arrived at Tioman a bit after 14:00.  Saddiq did a good job briefing me about the approach and I managed to slam the piper into the runway with lots of room to spare.  I had the same problems as in Pangkor – too slow on approach and not enough flare.  Nevertheless, I did two more landings to satisfy the club requirements and we went back with no drama.  Now I am signed off for Tioman and hope to get back there on my own soon.

For the readers of my blog, I have drawn a little map and provide a couple of notes on the procedures to approach and land in Tioman.  You can download the Tioman map here.

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New VOR/DME at Senai Airport

In Announcement, Flight Bag on July 21, 2012 at 10:50 am

New VOR/DME in Johor

(Update, 9 September 2012: Corrected Lane Delta, added JB NDB data, Moved Ayer Hitam and Renggam reporting points a bit, training area North of Gunung Pulai is now West of the North South highway)

Effective 23 August 2012, DCA Malaysia will commission a new DVOR/DME at Senai airport. Currently the DVOR/DME of Senai airport is about 5 nm off the threshold of runway 16 on a bearing of 150° (i.e. you have to set course 150° from the DVOR location to reach the threshold). The new DVOR station will be closer to the threshold (1000m) and also gets a new frequency, which will be 112.5 Mhz (Ch. 72 x). Setting up a new DVOR station requires a rerouting of airways and relocation of holding areas and reporting points. For us VFR pilots this is only of marginal interest. However, the DCA also made changes to VFR lanes and the TMA, so take note. The changes are detailed in the AIP Supplement 09/2012 dated 14 June 2012. All changes are included in the new version of my “aeronautical chart of Johor”, which you can download here.

The VFR lane Charlie does not go from Kota Tinggi straight to East of JB Airfield anymore. Instead it is rerouted via South of Kg Semangar, to make sure aircraft stay clear of Danger Area 231. For more details on that have a look at my earlier post on flying to Mersing via Kota Tinggi.  Lane Delta is also routed around the danger areas with a new reporting point “East of Kampung Sungai Tiram”.

The Eastern border of the JB TMA used to go through Kota Tinggi. It is now further West and goes through restricted area 229, which means that VFR lane Charlie (from JB Town East to Kota Tinggi) is now outside the TMA. On the Western border of the TMA not much has changed. It seems to go a little further North of Simpang Renggam than it previously did.

In case you cannot remember what a VOR is: VOR stands for VHF Omnidirectional Radio (Range). The VOR is a navigational aid that allows aircraft equipped with a receiver to measure on which radial from the VOR station the aircraft is located. The DME (Distance Measuring Equipment) on the other hand tells the pilot how far from the station the aircraft is positioned.

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Langkawi – All you need to know

In Flight Bag, Navigation on July 6, 2012 at 11:13 pm

Langkawi VFR Map

When I came back from my “Round Malaysia” trip, I promised that I would post what I had learned about the reporting points for a Langkawi island tour.

This got a bit delayed, but now I have finished a map of Langkawi, which I think contains everything a pilot needs to know for a flight to and around Langkawi.

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Round Malaysia live Updates

In Flight Log, Navigation on April 12, 2012 at 9:34 am

Round Malaysia GPS Track

Live Updates posted during a Round Malaysia trip from 12 to 15 April 2012

Aircraft: Piper Warrior II, PA 28-161, 9M-FRR
PIC: Ingo
Co-pilot: Capt. Ridzuan
Logbook PIC hours: 16.4
Airports and airfields: 14
Landings: 16

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Around (our) World in 4 Days

In Flight Log, Navigation on March 12, 2012 at 11:13 am

Maneuvering an aircraft can be hard work

From the 12 to the 15 April, the fearless aviators of FRAS Flying Club will make an attempt to circumnavigate the West-Malaysian peninsula with a formation of five aircraft and land at as many airports and airfields as possible.  I counted 15 possible places to land, but I think there are even more than that.

We have passenger seats available for club members (you can become a day-member as well). In addition there should be plenty of opportunity for club pilots to come along and fly some of the legs.

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Have a look at Pulau Rawa

In Flight Log, Navigation on February 27, 2012 at 12:07 am

Flight Log Pulau Rawa on 26 February 2012

Today I went to Pulau Rawa (a little island East of Mersing) and since I have now done it twice, I thought I would give some advice to fellow pilots who want to fly this beautiful VFR route.

Some basic information about this route:

  • Distance: 144 nm
  • Realistic time with about 5 to 10 minutes over Pulau Rawa: 1 hour 55 minutes
  • AT4 fuel usage: 38 liters
  • Flight log: download link (Apple Pages Format, this link is not going to be updated!)
  • Flight plan: download link (Apple Pages Format, this link is not going to be updated!)

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Better Scale

In Flight Bag, Gear on February 12, 2012 at 9:11 pm

Johor Airspace Map

I have updated my “chart” and trimmed it down to A4.  I have also attempted to scale it properly at 1:500,000 (i.e. the Sectional Chart scale).  The actual scale of the printed map depends very much on the printer.  The idea is to print the map on A4 without any resizing.  On my Macbook Pro it works very well with paper size A4 and a scale of 100% (in the printer dialog).

BTW: I have created these maps with Inkscape using an old TPC chart and a couple of other free resources from the Internet.  The maps are available in the source format (SVG), which can be opened with Inkscape and other vector graphic programs.  The other formats are in bitmap formats (JPEG, PNG and PDF) and cannot be edited in the sense that elements of the charts are just bitmaps and cannot be changed in shape etc.

The maps can be downloaded here.

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The one hundred Dollar Fanta

In Flight Bag, Flight Log, Social Life on February 11, 2012 at 10:17 pm

Suyoung, Nigel and Ingo

Is there a good reason to fly to Malacca, have a coffee and a Nasi Lemak and fly back straight away? No! When you find the only coffee shop closed and left with the option to buy a Fanta, there is even less reason to do so.

Is that going to stop us pilots to do exactly that anyway? Of course not.  We do it for the flying and for the surprised looks on our friend’s faces when we tell them that we will fly for a coffee to Malacca on Saturday. Read the rest of this entry »