I like this photo from today. It’s of Croagh Patrick in the west of Ireland, with its little church on top.
I think that the patterns in the snow, make it look almost moon like 
Who says that Friday 13th is a bad day to go flying? I made use of the excellent weather and bimbled through the mountains of eastern Austria (LOAN/LOGO/LOAU/LOAN).
Ötscher from the south
Looking southwest in the direction of Graz (below the fog)
Abeam Eisenerz
Approaching Liezen
Approaching LOGO (just left of the big mountain called Grimming)
Grundlsee
Altausseer See (they filmed some parts of Bond 24 there in December)
Looking back towards Altausseer See and Grundlsee
Traunsee is already partly hidden by the fog that would remain below me during most of the flight towards LOAU
What a nice way to spend a day off!
Awesome photos. And you know the names of the places too
Okay, for a bit more diversity, here some pictures from the low and slow fraction from yesterday. (EDXF to EDXE – onle letter in 3:03 hours.)
No GPS, no VOR, no ADF:
Home, sweet home.
Those are great, and I like the equipment shot. What are you flying?
I was relocating a MS880B Morane from Flensburg to Rheine against a quite strong headwind. Lowest calculated Groundspeed was 49 kt at 95 KIAS in about 2000 ft @2500 RPM. Further inland, the headwind was reduced and I had a GS of around 70 kts.
The 880 is a pretty nice plane, if you don’t confuse her with a four seater just because of the bench in the rear. With the O200 this specific aircraft can carry 240 kg. It is more a competitor to the Cessna 150 and carries more with better visibility for a lesser (purchase) price. And it handles nicer.
I am surprised to read that a 880B can do 95KIAS on 2500 RPM. That would be faster (or less slow) than the C150…
The leading edge slats are interesting, does it make a big difference in slow flight/stall speed? Presumably they drop down automatically like in the Fiesler Storch / Morane Saulnier? The Storch has incredible slow speed capability from what I have seen (regrettably, not (yet) flown)) contributed to in part by the slats. I’ve occasionally seen a Morane from a distance but never close enough to notice the slats.
@boscomantico I see no reason why the MS880 should be slower than the C150. They have similar mass, similar engines, the MS880 has a bit more trim drag but less parasitic drag and a slightly nicer airfoil and fuselage shape. The book says 162 kph at ISO, MTOM and it did around 13 kph more on a cold day in relatively high pressure (06/00 Q1016) and (most important with these small engines) around 80 kg under gross (i.e. only 2/3 of the payload used).
@CKN The MS880 is indeed a Morane-Saulnier 880 B. It stalls at 75 kph (41 kt) with extended flaps and sats (85 kph / 46 kt with slats only) power off. The Morane flies on it’s wings and not on power and thus the handling in the stall is superb. You can use this for STAL landings and take offs. A short take off routine is to accelerate and drop the flaps once you hot 50 kph and pull her up into ground effect. With the Minerva you can archieve ground Rolls below 100 Meters.
We operate a Minerva (the 220hp Morane) and on a power on stall we see around 400-600 fpm climb (depends on the loading of course).
Just 2500 RPM/WOT during the stall:
If lightly loaded, even the normal takeoff procedure is very short:
It’s a fun plane, although the Mooney is considerably faster with less power :-) But the Morane wasn’t built for speed anyway.
Friday 06-03-15
