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Unread 05-11-10, 07:57 AM
Dave Underwood Dave Underwood is offline
N456TL
 
Join Date: May 2002
Location: England
Posts: 167
Dave Underwood is on a distinguished road
My two pennies worth are as follows:

1) You have 128 gals in the aircraft which at 145 kts and 20 gals/hr gives you 6.4 hr range or a safe range of circa 600 nm, ultimate range being just over 900 nm.

2) Take either the the far north route and you have more than enough range on each leg, or take the southerly route via BGBW (Narsarsuaq) east bound with tail winds and your longest leg is 670 nm.

3) You may well want to take the northern route west bound with the head winds and lower ground speed, with the leg lengths circa 400 nm. Great scenery as well either route.

4) You just can't really do either crossing from November through March though there are lots who do. Icing and very poor weather and serious head winds.

5) On the southerly route via BGBW, unless you can fly at 25 k, you will need an HF radio.

6) The above options do not require any aircraft mods, though if you could get the extra 20 gals, you increase your safety margins and comfort factors.

7) There a several folks around who will put a tank of reasonable size in the back and plumb it into the fuel return lines. You then face all the paperwork challenges every time you want to do a crossing and have the tank refitted.

8) A better thought might be to put in a smaller tank on a Form 337 and leave it in place for Northern routes. That would be my choice.

9) The 30% extra fuel requirement on any crossing means on the St. John to Portual route you would need about an extra 150 to 170 gals or close to 300 gals. You may have to do work to strengthen the floor to carry the extra loads.

10) I think if you talk to any of the ferry pilots who do the trip regularily, the answer would be to make it simple and go one of the northern routes.

D
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