Microlight Flying Lessons - Fly NI Airsports

Mike Blyth - Round the world flight

2009-07-18T17:32:00.008+01:00

Mike is quite a famous Microlight pilot, and has done various trips mostly in a flexwing trike. He also runs an aviation business in SA and has been developing a new aircraft with James Pitman.

They left today for a round the world flight, check out their website and keep track of what they are up to. They had quite a send off by the looks of it earlier today, lots of wellwishers and press. There is a google map that tracks their progress, they should be quite a bit towards the west coast of Africa by last light. Some pics below, and lots more on their website

Cheers, Victor
www.flyni.co.uk

Microlight Pylon Racing

2009-07-17T11:58:00.008+01:00

OK, so its not the Red Bull Air Race......but the recent Microlight world air games had some pylon racing. Guys flying up and down the runway inbetween blown up 'gates', bit like slalom racing in the air

the footage is pretty spectacular and makes it look and sound very dramatic. The trikes these guys are using are topless wings, which have made an appearance over the past couple of years.

What 'topless' means is that they use metal supports from the base bar to the wing instead of wires.And...they dont require wires at the top of the wing. All of the manufacturers are either releasing them or just about to.
Means they can go faster.........and its all about speed apparently ;-)

Regards, Victor
www.flyni.co.uk

Round the World in a Microlight

2009-05-06T22:49:00.004+01:00

Some of you may remember the now de-commissioned breakfast show on Channel 4 - the Big Breakfast? Well it was essential viewing for me around 10 years ago while eating my Corn Flakes, before setting off for another boring day in work. Although it was quite funny and a young Denise Van Outen was good to look at, I didn't think it would change my life quite as much as it did.

Around the end of 1998 they wheeled on a short, posh and rather austere little man dressed in a fancy boiler suit, pointing out to the presenter where he had just flown his open-cockpit Microlight. Tales of crossing the alps, being buzzed by Mig fighters and flying across the North Atlantic seemed unbelieveable. I found the whole thing absolutely fascinating, in fact I must have talked about it so much that someone bought me a lesson - and the rest is history. Little did I know that this odd little man would inspire me to take up flying Microlights!

The Video is one of Brian's promo vids that he created when trying to sell the story to TV stations round the globe. He has just published a lot of his video material on his website, really worth a good look. And his book of the adventure is well worth a read.

Regards, Victor
www.flyni.co.uk

Tumbleweeds and Skyranger Swift

2009-05-06T20:34:00.005+01:00

Hello All,

Just when you thought that the tumbleweed had taken over the blog site, then it comes back to life!

Its been far too long since my last blog post on what's happening at the field and all things Microlighting.Since January we have had to choose our flying days wisely, seems that even the good days are far too wet and windy.And dont get us started on the so-called BBC weather forecasters (BBC Northern Ireland's Angie Phillips has a lot to answer for)

Nevertheless, we are still flying when the weather allows so dont be shy in getting in touch for your first lesson.

We've seen a few more students getting started on their training over the last few weeks, and a new arrival at the airstrip - a Skyranger Swift

Skyranger Swifts start their life as a box of tubes in a cardboard box, and after a few months non-stop work are transformed into quite an aeroplane. Performance in many respects outstrips many (of what most people would call) 'proper' aircraft.An Airborne trike will sit happily at 70-75mph, a Swift will just leave it standing with its engine almost just ticking over.

Quite remarkable....and for sale I'm afraid - so get in touch if you're interested.
Lots of other Microlight stuff happening, so keep checking back as I wont leave it for another 3 months for my next post

Regards, Victor
www.flyni.co.uk

BBC Archives - Microlight Rally

2009-01-26T11:15:00.004Z

Came across a great video the other day on the BBC website.

The footage is from 1987 and has been reclaimed and published by the blokes at the BBC archive - Fascinating to watch.

Anyway, the 30 minute film is about a Microlight rally from Cumbria to the East coast of England. Back then Microlight Flying was still in its infancy, but nevertheless was established enough to have capable airworthy aircraft available.

Most of the trikes shown are old Mainair Flash 1s which were probably top-of-the-range back then. There are still plenty of them about and flying!

We can't embed the link into the blog, so we will just have to link to it from here

Cheers, Victor

Test Success and Elvis-Leg re-appears!

2009-01-09T08:04:00.003Z

Hello All and Happy New Year,

Its been some time since our last post (which was more of a plug for our gift vouchers for Christmas - Sorry!)
And we have been fairly busy with things at the field.

Regular visitors from elsewhere should be aware that runway 12/30 is no longer in use - at least for the Winter anyway. Instead, we have a new all-weather runway running 16/34. Work isn't 100% complete, so pilot briefing is essential before coming into land with prior permission required at all times.

Apart from that it's been great weather the past while and we have managed to get another two guys through their Flying Test. Congratulations to Steve Hardman and Mike O'Brien, both have put a lot of effort into getting their license with long drives across the country on many occasions - so well done! We missed getting their photos for the blog, they must have been too busy making a bee-line for the pub ;-)

One of our other students went out flying with me at the weekend and seemed to develop a severe dose of Elvis-Leg. For those of you that have no idea what I am talking about, I will explain. Elvis Leg is the condition that Microlight pilots get when they are under a bit of pressure (normally caught by student pilots but sometimes older more experienced jockeys also)

The condition manifests itself by the right leg shaking similar to Elvis' leg on stage doing a dinger in his heyday. Very funny to see from the backseat, but easily resolved. Setting the hand-throttle, resting the leg and chilling out for a minute normally does it. Anyway, no shame in it Tommy we have all been there!

2009 is lining up to be a busy year ahead. The weather gods have promised us a great Spring, Summer and Autumn and we have lots planned. I will try and update regularly so keep an eye on the blog occasionally

Cheers, Victor
m:07747806029
w:www.flyni.co.uk

Ho Ho Ho!

2008-11-23T12:55:00.004Z

Christmas is a time of Hibernation when it comes to Microlight Flying in Ireland, with good flying days few and far between, we really do have to pick our days carefully around the weather. So its an opportunity to so some aircraft maintenance, ground school with students, and a bit of maintenance on the runway!

We also do a fair bit of promotion regarding our Gift Vouchers around the Christmas period, and you should be seeing some adverts in the local press over the next few weeks. We have restructured our vouchers as 20, 40 and 60 minute lessons. This gives a bit more choice for everyone.

We also are doing a 2-hour Microlight Adventure voucher, where we take a morning or an afternoon and fly to the County Down coast, quick stop for coffee at Ards and then return. There are Free DVDs going out with this voucher for the remainder of 2008....until the stock runs out! And students remember our training rates are very different to the Gift Voucher rates.

That's the shameless marketing plug over, there is some flying stuff going on and we will update the blog very shortly with a bit of proper flying info...

Cheers, Victor
www.flyni.co.uk

Airborne E-News

2008-10-29T08:01:00.003Z

Some recent news from Airborne down under, some pricing changes to the trikes. It just coming into their summer down there, so some news of fly-ins etc while we are getting ready to hibernate for the winter (after getting a good stockpile of nuts of course)

The Ausssie dollar has fallen a fair bit in the last couple of months, making their gear a bit more attractive on the pocket!

An interesting day at Sywell...

2008-10-26T12:22:00.008Z

Hello All,

had a quick trip to Flylight Airsports in Sywell near Northampton last Friday - just a day trip courtesy of the red-eye 0700 flight from Belfast City to Birmingham. Regular travellers to the mainland UK really have a great service on their doorstep with the City Airport. After 40 minutes we were touching down at Birmingham and at Sywell for around 10ish (I got lost for a bit, but thats another story)- Thanks FlyBE!!

Anyway, the purpose of my visit was a day with Paul Dewhurst for a bit of training for my BMAA inspector ticket. Paul has been flying Microlights for donkeys years and is an Instructor Examiner - he recommends to the CAA if people are OK to be a Microlight Instructor (after the training of course) We all have to do a revalidation every 2 years, and Paul is one of the people who does this. I explained the whole Instructor Examiner thing to a friend who put a Star Wars slant on it, comparing the Examiners to Yoda and Instructors as Jedis...... I dont buy into that as I dont know anyone that looks like Yoda, and I lost my Star Wars light-sabre thing years ago ;-) Sorry, I digress

We done a fair bit of the inspector stuff, it actually took much of the day to complete and was well worthwhile. So, once the paperwork comes through we will be able to do 3-Axis and Weightshift annual aircraft inspections and check flights.

The Flylight hangar is full of lots of different Microlights, there is even a twin-engined Lazair in the corner. There are lots of Skyrangers and Flylights newly manufactured Dragonfly. Unfortunately the wing was folded for some reason so I couldnt get a spin in one. Seems like a great idea though, a Microlight that you really can fold up and put in the boot of your car, with the wing on your roof-rack. Paul D reckons they have sold a couple of dozen so far - and I nearly bought one myself (and still could do) Just a pity there wasnt one there for a quick rattle!! Ben Ashman has put some videos on YouTube of the Dragonfly, here's a demo of him unpacking one before flying:

The all-important wing has been manfactured by Aeros and is basically their 15m hang-gliding wing beefed up for a light trike and pilot attached to it. It has been tested for a max payload of 150kg which is ample. The whole SSDR thing is very tempting in the UK as the only options for new Microlights are priced around £27k......

I managed to get a quick 30mins in a GT450 at the end of the day. It's the first time I've got a spin in one, mainly because we are so busy flying our Airborne XTs with students etc. So it was good to get a spin in something different for a change, but why are all these new trikes focused on speed?

The differences between the XT and the GT450 are quite subtle, but all added up I dont think we will buy a GT450 for our next training aircraft. In fact if I was buying one just for my own flying then I would still go for the XT. A quantum with a bog-standard 912 is much nicer to fly than the GT450.....But I would say all of that I suppose!!

All-in-all an interesting day......and I didn't get lost on the way back to Birmingham which was a bonus!

Cheers, Victor
www.flyni.co.uk

Olivier Aubert - South to South

2008-10-09T21:17:00.002+01:00

Hi There,

Olivier has updated his youtube pages with a 3min trailer
Worth a look, with the full hour-long version available from his website

Cheers, Victor
www.flyni.co.uk

Charlie Fox November India

2008-10-01T08:28:00.006+01:00

We have been pretty busy the past month, the end of summer\start of autumn always gives us a glimpse of good weather. And it was well needed, Summer 08 has been the wettest for decades according to the Metmen.

And a new arrival has made an appearance....sorry to disappoint but not a hot towel or babygrow in sight. Our new MK2 XT912 arrived at the start of September, and it has taken a while getting it up and running and (more importantly) our instructors familiar with it before letting students get their grubby paws all over it. So it is goodbye to HZ (gone to John Horan in Galway) and in with CFNI

The MK2 is slightly different to the MK1 XT, small improvements to a great design. Airborne have produced a 'Bikini' engine cowling which is easily and quickly removed for pre-flight inspections, and they have produced a windscreen which is needed now (will explain later!) Their engineers have designed a great set of hydraulic disc brakes which should be an improvement over the nosewheel setup, and the Skydat now has the latest firmware (the previous one gave some erroneous errors) The cockpit trim has changed and they have redesigned the throttle and brake pedals - again nothing major - just small welcome improvements.

The biggest change is the speed that this aircraft will fly at - out of the factory it will fly at 78mph which is quite a difference on the MK1. Thats at Hands off trim - which means hands off. The weight of your hands will take it to 80mph and beyond. And its all down to the holes in the wing!

The position of the hangpoint on a flexwing determines (along with some other things) how fast the aircraft will go. A MK2 Streak3 wing has 4 holes in the wing keel tube that can be manually adjusted. The wing parts are interchangeable with the other Airborne range, with the back hole (slowest) used for their Merlin wing. So we can only use the front 3 holes.

Out of the shipping crate the wing is set on the second hole from the front, giving the speeds above. The front hole has the aircraft sitting at nearly 85mph. All this is great for getting somewhere fast......I think its pretty obvious why we need the new windscreen!

So after a week or so of our instructors having a great time flying everywhere at 80mph...we decided to slip the hangpoint back a notch for the students :-(

Its great to have the option for a fast setting and the aircraft can still be slowed down quite easily for landing. What we need is the trike to sit naturally at a reasonable speed for training - we find 65-70 is more than enough for general flying, so back a notch it is we're afraid..... What we really need is an electric hangpoint that will move this position back and forward, I suppose that will be on the Mk3

One other noticable difference is the fuel consumption. We have a very accurate fuel flow meter in the Skydat, fantastic simple bit of kit. Anyway, we normally plan on 10-12 litres an hour for an hours flying....but this trike at the same airspeed is showing as 6-7 litres an hour with the 912 going at 3600 in level flight! A flying school's dream if it is correct

Maybe a bit of a mistake on my part - alzheimers could be starting early in my case. But the only difference is the windscreen, which I would have thought creates more drag, with us needing more engine revs? Maybe it has a different effect and as a result provides clean air to the prop at the back with less engine RPM needed???? More testing required...or get started on the alzheimers tablets.

Some pictures and more details on the way, lots of other stuff happening but will leave that for later!

Cheers, Victor
www.flyni.co.uk

Solo Success for Mark McLaughlin

2008-08-24T10:36:00.003+01:00

We've had a bit of unexpected success during the week at the Airfield. Thursday night turned into a fantastic evening, flat calm in the circuit with no breeze.

Mark was out with instructor William Byrne at the time and took full advantage of the conditions by polishing off a bunch of 'greaser' landings. William was getting pretty bored with absolutely nothing to do, so decided to get out and send Mark out on his own for the first time.

And off he went...and came back in one piece! So congratulations from all at the club, especially for sticking at it and getting to solo in just 17 hours. And in such a short time too, considering the awful weather this summer.

Some more solo work and cross country flights to complete now in the school's Airborne XT before Mark does his flying test. Hopefully in a few weeks time we will be reporting on Mark's successful flying test!

BBC1 Northern Exposure - LLB & his wife Jackie!

2008-07-31T08:10:00.003+01:00

Hello All,

We had a couple of b-list celebs down at the airstrip at the start of June to do a TV show.Lawrence Llewellyn-bowen(does the BBC holiday and Changing rooms programmes) and his wife Jackie travelled across Northern Ireland visiting all six counties, trying out restaurants, hotels and activities in each of them.

For the Armagh programme they visited the airfield and LLB went for a quick flight. Things didnt quite go according to plan, but not too sure how much the BBC will dramaticise the fact! They got some decent air-air footage with bullet cams mounted on the wing and front strut, and we managed to get a great spell of weather for it.

The Armagh edition is showing on BBC Northern Ireland at 9pm Friday 1st August, with a repeat on Sunday. The BBC IPlayer will have the show online for a week after the showing. Hopefully it will be listed as one of their favourites and will be listed on the Northern Exposure website from Friday night. Hopefully they will have got my good side ;-)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/northernireland/northernexposure/

Cheers, Victor
www.flyni.co.uk

Aerotrekking

2008-07-16T08:28:00.006+01:00

Most of you will know of Anti-Virus software, in fact if you are sitting at a PC chances are that your machine has some installed.

John McAfee was one of the first pioneers of AV software, with his company McAfee being one of the market leaders in the AV industry. He sold his stake in the company years ago and went off to do other things.

With $100 million in his back pocket he has decided to buy a bit of land in americas southwest and form a band of aviators known as the Sky Gypsies.

The National Geographic Article in the June/July Edition details what you can do with a spare $100m in your back pocket ;-)

Probably the best quote that John made in the article that defines what is different between Microlight and 3-Axis aircraft is:

"I learned to fly in a Cessna back in the mid-seventies and it didn't turn me on," says McAfee. "It was like flying a tin can. But when I flew a trike, I thought, OK, this is what flying is supposed to be about. I could feel the air, I could smell the vegetation. It's as close as you can come to being a bird."

And of course...their recent PR exercise seems to have sprouted a video...

By the way...for those of you that didnt immediately notice, John is in his sixties and has a girlfriend in her twenties. I dont think he will be reaching for his pipe and slippers just yet!

Zdra-stvu-eetee (Russian for Hello)

2008-06-24T20:15:00.013+01:00

A bit of summer sunshine usually gets the phones ringing, everyone looking to fly. Compared to our usual weather expectations in Ireland, May 08 was a pretty good month with lots and lots of flying going on. June maybe hasnt been quite as good, but we can't have it all our own way!

New students are always a challenge, every move they make you need to be watching and waiting for their next mistake. Some go the extra mile to keep you well on your toes. We got a mail from an old student recently, who had done a couple of hours flying and is looking to get back at it again. Quite unremarkable you might think, until I explain the last conversation I had with David while out flying. It went something like:

Me - 'OK David, lets start heading back to the Airfield. We will join overhead and have a look and see what the windsock is doing'
David - 'Huhhh?'
Me - 'Are you OK David?'
David - ' I'm really sorry but I think I'm going to faint..'
Me - Speechless
David - Said nothing....but made a fabulous impression of someone after 10 pints of Stella Artois on a Friday night. Head and arms hanging out of the cockpit with his foot stuck on the throttle!

No need for the rest of the story, I'm here to tell the tale which is all that matters. He IS back for more though which is a bit concerning. William (our other instructor) may have to complete his training ;-)

Other students are progressing well. Of particular note, Mark McLaughlin needs his landings polished off before going solo and Ilmars (who I thought was a Mad Latvian in a previous blog post) has turned out to be a complete natural. He isn't mad at all, just the most enthusiastic student we have had yet.....he has agreed that if I teach him to fly, he will teach me Russian

Uvidimsia! (See you!)

Victor
www.flyni.co.uk

Microlight Loop

2008-06-24T20:02:00.003+01:00

Not sure if this guy went straight over the top, but not to be tried at home
Lots of reasons why you shouldnt do this in a trike, but hey...makes for a great clip to watch on a wet day

Test Successes

2008-06-09T21:56:00.015+01:00

Hasn't the weather been fantastic? We have been busy with a few of our students in the month of May, getting them all up to test standard, pre-flying tests, solo hours, qualifying cross countries and of course their flying tests themselves.

In fact we've been so busy that we are almost glad to see the back of them...just kidding! Congratulations to Adrian Parry, John Horan and Liam Flannery. All three of these guys travelled from Galway and County Clare on lots of occasions over the past year, so well done for sticking at it.

The picture below is of a delighted Liam Flannery, just after passing his flying test. And before you ask, yes we do cater for the over 50s at the flying club; but I have to say that Liam is the most senior member so far...

Our facilities team (thats me mostly with a bit of help from some others occasionally) have sorted out the front of the clubhouse with a bit of decking and some stones. Nothing special, but it makes a difference from what it was before. It almost makes the decommisioned British Army portacabin look like a proper office now. All we need now is a couple of half-decent flying instructors, two aircraft and we could (almost) call ourselves a flying school ;-)

More soon.... on a mad Latvian that wants to learn to fly, an even madder flying instructor that will have to teach him to fly and a Z-List daytime TV celebrity that got a pink flying suit to match his shirt

Cheers, Victor

www.flyni.co.uk

Dragonfly Microlight

2008-05-22T11:56:00.010+01:00

Came across this the other day, while looking for something on the interweb...
Flylight have taken advantage of the rule changes for Microlights in the UK, and have produced a small lightweight 1-man trike and mated it with an Aeros hang-glider
I wont bore you all with any more 'techy' details, about engines etc etc
Great video though...and yes, it is fine to switch them off occasionally as long as they restart OK!

Looks like Spring has arrived?

2008-05-19T09:48:00.004+01:00

well it was a long time coming, but it looks as if Spring has arrived. Two fantastic weeks of weather in early May kept our instructors busier flying, rather than doing the rounds picking the best weather forecast to go by! That said, even the 'best' weather forecast gets it wrong sometimes....thats where our well-honed experience comes in ;-)

Lots of students (old and new) got the hint that summer was here with frantic phone calls and migration North (for the southern guys) following shortly afterwards. So a busy time for all, with two first solo flights and a flying test completed. For those of you that have done some lessons and are thinking of coming back and finishing, get back at it. No excuses of 'we are skint cos of the credit crunch!' Payment can be made in a variety of ways, Euro, Sterling, Visa, Mastercard, Tesco vouchers, Chickens or a even downpayment on the Audi at the Prentice garage at the end of Tarsan Lane. Seriously though, if you have dropped out of the course for whatever reason, get back at it. Sitting on top of a layer of cloud at 4000ft in an open cockpit Microlight is absolutely priceless...the credit crunch wont matter then.

A powered parachute has made an appearance at the club. Raymond ONeill has almost completed his hours required for his license, so that will be a first for the school when completed. For those of you that dont know what a powered parachute is, have a look here. They are great fun...but are very weather dependent. Excellent for a nice summers evening, but definitely no crosswind takeoffs.

lots and lots of other things going on, or about to happen...but hey, we have to save it for another post or I will have nothing else to write about. Last thing...I now have an examiner rating so you can do the whole kaboodle under one roof lessons, ground exams & flying test.Just something to make all our lives a bit easier when it comes to doing your test.

Cheers, Victor

www.flyni.co.uk

2008-05-09T12:11:00.001+01:00

Hi There,

we have finally come into the 21st century, and have created a blog for our website. For those of you that have no idea what Microlight Flying is all about, the blog should (hopefully) be informative and interesting.....hopefully inspiring you to come down for a lesson!

For qualified pilots and students we will drop on details on new aircraft, how students are getting on, what existing club members are getting upto. Hopefully a bit of a resource for non-pilots and pilots that will be worth a look occasionally.

There are some techy stuff that needs sorted out with the blog and the website over the next week, so please bear with us as we upload some interesting stuff on the web.

In the mean time, check out this video clip from Olivier Aubert: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G3bsUJet_es&eurl=http://www.flyni.co.uk/

Enjoy!!

Cheers, Victor
www.flyni.co.uk