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Snow-capped mountain near Susanville, CA.
Snow-capped mountain near Susanville, CA

It hasn’t really been since the middle of November since I flew last, it just seems that way…

I had a good string of flights going for a while – at least once a week. Then I took on a project installing an ADS-B solution for a friend. That is just about finished – not sure I’ll do that again for an aircraft that old (1968) with a full instrument panel and dual radio stack.

The wiring was a mess – not all the avionics were installed at the same time. Some came as replacement of previous radios, some just initial installations. It was obvious that some work was done on a time basis as unused wiring wasn’t removed.

Fogged-in mountain lake.
Fogged-in mountain lake.

That project is pretty much wrapped up – we had the transponder/encoder check done last week. He just needs to go fly it and get the ADS-B report, then apply for his rebate.

Of course, all of the time I was stuck under the panel we had weather with temperatures in the 50s. Now that I have my free time back we have barely gotten into the 40s and this is the second weekend in a row with winter storm warnings.

Those temperatures make it unlikely that I will work in an unheated hangar. Top it off with an annual that ran out December 31st and it appears that I’ll be grounded for a while. I need about a week of solid work to finish off the annual. Once in a while we have a string of nice temps that would permit it but nothing on the horizon for a while.

Anaho Island National Wildlife Refuge, NV.

So, like the rest of you in cold climates with winter weather, I’ll spend my time reading my magazines, watching videos and taking aviation courses until we thaw out. It’ll seem like a long time but it won’t be too long.

We can always start making AirVenture plans….