Flight Safety

For 35 years, Howard Fenton’s been telling airplane owners about the health of their engines by analyzing their oil. Howard has spotted everything from broken piston rings to excessive bearing wear to worn valve guides. Once he tracked down an airplane he was convinced was about to throw a jug — and it was. In […]

It is a sure sign of old age that you spend your time talking about the past. I almost never do unless asked. Today I found myself getting a hundred-dollar hamburger at an airport greasy spoon with a teenage student pilot son of a friend. He wanted me to tell him some “true stories” about […]

I‘m sure that I’m not alone. All of us, at one time or another, do something stupid. There are no doubt a great many dumb things that I’ve managed to do in my more than seven decades of life, but as an aviator, two particularly stupid and dangerous events stand out. Towing the Line Several […]

Eye of Experience#63:Confession Time – (Articles – Feb 12, 2003) Admit it: You’ve done some stupid things while flying, haven’t you? We all have, and it is always better to learn from someone else’s stupid mistakes than to make even more of our own. AVweb’s Howard Fried has told us about a lot of things […]

Yes friends, it’s that time again. I just had another “tape talk” so now it’s your turn. I was less than pleased with mine, so I have some work to do. So do you.To bring a little order to the process I thought I’d make a “Top Ten” list of things we should do for […]

The genesis of E-Ox occurred several years ago when I stopped by the White Mountain Products Group booth at AOPA Expo in Atlantic City to look at a miniature emergency oxygen system they’d introduced. To be honest, my first reaction was skepticism. To begin with, I was a little put off by the melodramatic name […]

My thanks to those who are patiently (and not) putting up with the many problems on AVweb for the past couple months. The new owners changed servers, changed a lot of the software, and more changes are coming. The system is extremely slow, at least for some, and the messages section where readers respond has […]

AVweb’s John Deakin has been studying, testing, and teaching about piston engines for a long time. This list is a collection of all his Pelican’s Perch columns related to piston engines. Pelican’s Perch #7:Run That Fuel Tank Dry! Pelican’s Perch #8:Go Ahead, Abuse Your Engine! Pelican’s Perch #15:Manifold Pressure Sucks! Pelican’s Perch #16:Those Marvelous Props […]

From time to time it happens that several of the flight instructors here at the virtual airport wind up in the pilot’s lounge talking about all manner of things aeronautical. When that I happens, I may delay my drive home because the exchange is usually on a higher plane (sorry) than the usual “There I […]

George F. “Rick” Adam Jr. was born June 29, 1946, in Pasadena, Calif. His father, a career Air Force officer, flew B-17s and -29s in World War II. Rick grew up on Air Force bases and wanted to follow his father into the cockpit, but a color vision deficiency kept him out of Colorado Springs. […]