Skubies Blog 2016

After our previous aircraft Skubie, was destroyed by a freak storm on the ground at Msembe airfield, we bought a new aircraft which we were now waaiting for in Stone town. 

So, we are now ensconced in our el cheapo hotel in Stone Town, which actually has beed upgraded since I last stayed here two years ago whilst getting my Tz license.  There is now Wifi, air conditioning, a fridge in the room, and the bed bugs have been kicked out.  Probably won't be writing much until we have the engine installed in Iringa, as there will be a blur of activity once the engine is released and we start installation.  However, keep checking to see the next instalment...

 August 30th

 Now for the bad news.  The next morning (early), as Anette and I were checking out the aircraft prior to going flying for my checkout, we heard a graunching sound coming from the gear box area as we were manually turning the propeller.  After some calls to Rotax in Sa, they asked us to remove the oil drain magnetic plug to check for metal shavings.  There should normally not be any with a healthy engine but ours had heaps.  Initially, we thought we could get by with a new gearbox, which would only have been a few hundred dollars, but Rotax informed us that since the engine and gearbox share the same oil, the engine itself was likely damaged and would have to be replaced.  This was a huge blow to us, as you can imagine, since we couldn't fly any more with that engine.  It was a miracle that Anette had made it up without incident, across 3 countries and 20 hours of flying without incident.  An engine failure over some of the country she had flown over would have been disastrous.

Unable to believe our luck (or lack of), yet again, we resolved to try to get a new engine, and flew down to Joberg for a couple of weeks to organise it.  Our good friend Dave, from Ballito, volunteered to come up with the engine and install it for us.  Since he was an instructor also, he would check me out on the aircraft after the new engine was installed.  As it turned out, the trip to SA was a good thing as my SA license had expired and I needed to do approximately 3 hours of flying, plus a flight test to renew it.  This is sheer unwarranted bureaucracy, since i had already done more than 86 hours on a microlight last year, but a French Registered one, but of course SA doesn't recognise those hours!

Anyhow, that was all done, and we jetted back to Dar to await the arrival of the engine, two weeks later.  (for some inexplicable reason, the engine had been sent via Amsterdam, and luckily for us the transfer to Dar happened without incident).  Again, no-one had told us what to expect so we had a very stressful morning yesterday (Sat 27th Aug), trying to brief a receiving agent quickly to make sure that the engine was processed by Tuesday.  Dave, our mechanic/instructor was due on Wednesday, and could only stay a week max, as he had business back in SA.  Anne had been organizing the paperwork so she headed off to find the agent, whilst I hung around outside customs looking after the bags.  She was surrounded by would be agents who all wanted the business, and insisted on following her everywhere, until she eventually told them to piss orff.  (That is the correct South African pronunciation).  We had planned to head off to Zanzibar after the engine was organised, hence my carrying all the bags around with us.

Eventually the agent was briefed and we just had enough time to catch the Coastal Air flight to Zanzibar at 1230.  The idea being, that we would have a few days chillin' out in Zanzibar before the engine was released and we drove up to Iringa with it on Thursday.  With a mad dash, we made the flight and immediately after touching down in Zan, we started to relax.  It really is a magnificent place to unwind.  It really is unspoilt, like Bali was 30 years ao, and incongruous sites greet you on every corner, such as the one below:

 September 9th Friday

Apologies for the sporadic updates so far.  Reason being that our engine issues were bigger than expected.  We initially thought that we just had a gearbox problem, but turns out the gearbox shares the engine oil so that metal slivers were found in the engine oil filter.  This means they could have scored the sides of the cylinders so we couldn't take the chance and had to order a new engine from South Africa.  As to cost, don't even ask!  Given that we had no work until the new engine was fitted, we went down to South Africa to catch up with our friends, something that we were going to do next year.  

As usual the engine shipping to Dar did not go smoothly, (please check Anne's post below), but as usual with anything we have ever done in Africa, the engine arrived literally at the last minute.  Even a day later and our mechanic friend Dave, from SA, wouldn't have been able to do the engine change for us due to prior commitments.  As it turned out, the routine engine change we had been promised was anything but.  Although we were replacing with exactly the same engine, as the original engine was quite old, and the new engine was not exactly the same size.  The only way we could fit it into the original engine mount was to remove all the ancillaries, carbs, ignition coils spark plug leads etc, almost disassemble the engine, put the shell into the mount and reassemble it.  Quite a task, I can tell you.  So what should have taken 3 days stretched out to 4.  We even had to grind down a flange on the starter motor to be able to fit it into the engine mount, as the new starter was too big.  This proved an even bigger task than normal as we couldn't get a battery powered grinder and had to use a plug in one, for which we had to get a diesel generator which proved a bitch to start.  After serveral attempts at pulling the starter manually, we decided to try to pull the starter cable with the land rover and promptly broke it.  In desperation, I thought I would use white man magic and found a battery which proved to have enough charge to kick over the starter motor (which was in such poor condition that we thought it wouldn't work).  Thus charged, Dave managed to grind down the offending flange and the motor fitted finally!

 Skubie II put to bed for the night, with the usual magnificent Ruaha Sunset.  Note extra heavy tractor tyres for tie downs.

Not having this aircraft overturned! Hangar being built in background...but not for us sadly.

After here, we are back to Rungwa, then returning to Dar on the 24th October to leave for France on the 26th.  Will post some photos soon to flesh all this out.  Thanks for your patience!

 After our time at Rungwa, we flew back to Kibebe farm for the 25 hour service.  Eve Jackson, a bit of a legend in microlight circles, as she flew the first microlight from London to Sydney back in the 1990's, had kindly volunteered to help, given as she was a qualified mechanic (and I am not that comfortable with mechanical things!).  During two action packed days, we managed to perform the service as per Rotax specifications, and I flew her out of Kibebe and back to Msembe so that she could catch her Coastal flight back to Dar.  Again, a few histronics getting off the strip in Kibebe, as we were heavy, and high, (5200 ft), so the aircraft was struggling; but we made it!

I remained at Msembe after dropping Eve off, and waited for Anne to arrive in the Landy with all our gear.  A few cosmetic changes have been made to the park, such as some new signs, but in essence it has not changed at all.There is room for a bit of innovation, but let's' not go there!  We have now been here in Msembe (Ruaha National Park) since Tuesday, and it feels like we have never been away.  The only disappointment is that we were not able to secure the Bandas this time as they are full.  That is where you share your space with ele's strolling through, giraffes sleeping outside your door and lions just being noisy.However, we have a cottage right next to the aircraft which is quite comfortable, and we can keep an eye on the aircraft.  Apart from the vervet monkey's stealing half our food and the gas running out in the first few days, we are surviving. Here in Ruaha, we are flying 20km squared, transects for STEP, which we hope to be able to repeat monthly, so that we have an idea of how the elephant population changes with time.

 Skubie II is performing well, though this is a challenging region for a microlight.  Everywhere here is high, and of course hot, so we have to fly early in the morning when it is cool and the engine performs best.  Rungwa in particular is a challenging strip, situated at 4200 ft, and always having a crosswind that forms a rotor when coming accross the trees.  every landing there has been a nailbiter, though unlike the original Skubie, we do have enough roll control with the Zenair's full span ailerons to handle anything.  Every morning we have to "gurgle" the engine ( a bit like burping a baby ).  That entails rotating the prop, 8 to 10 times to make sure oil gets distributed through the sump.  After this, the engine gives a satisfying belching noise, which lets us know all is well.  I don't know what we would do if the engine did not "gurgle".  Probably frantic calls to Dave in Durban I would suspect!