PCDU Episodes:

Here is a full list of all PCDU Episodes since #1 back in 2009. Click on a title to visit the episode page & download or listen to the episode from there.

PCDU Episode 123: Avalon15 Alpha (It's Avalon Airshow Time :) )

By Grant (Falcon124), on February 28th, 2015%

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:30:54 — 62.7MB)

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The Australian International Airshow (aka Avalon Airshow) is held every two years and runs for 6 days with the first 3 being trade-only. The 4th day of the show is always on a Friday and the public start coming in around midday then stay for the night show, a feature of Avalon for well over 15 years. The final two days are the weekend and, as you might expect, are packed with public enjoying the action and static displays.Ep123 Cover

Once again Team PCDU are at Avalon every day gathering plenty of content for your listening pleasure. This episode holds the first block of interviews we’ve prepared while the show is still going. At the rate we’re going we’ll have another two episodes of Avalon content but for now, here’s how this one unfolds:

  • 0:03:38 – Sergeant Xavier “X” Sheriff is a loadmaster on the C130J and he’s recently returned from Red Flag at Nellis.
     
  • 0:11:47 – Flying Officer “Guns” was also at Red Flag but while he is command rated on the C130J, he spent the duration of Red Flag performing the tactical planning for each mission.
     
  • 0:21:07 – Steve caught up with Simon Hackett in his PC12 (VH-TCP) and they talk about gliding, the Cirrus SR22, the PC12 and Simon’s next aircraft, the Pilatus PC24 jet.
     
  • 0:46:37 – Maikha Ly caught up with Graeme Horne from Cirrus and they review the Cirrus Jet, the market for Cirrus aircraft in Australia and the “Australis” version of the SR22
     
    Pilatus PC24 Cockpit Mockup

    Pilatus PC24 Cockpit Mockup

  • 0:57:40 – Steve talks to Basil Lenzo about Evektor Aircraft’s Sportstar & Harmony aircraft, the scene at their home base in Perth and their new operation at Moorabbin
     
  • 1:02:57 – Grant & Steve ran into Matt Hall and had a good chat about his recent podium finish in the Red Bull Air Race, his new winglets & aircraft handling, developments at Belmont airport (YPEC) that Matt & a consortium recently purchased and QBE’s Airmanship program.
     
  • 1:17:08 – Following on from his chat with Simon in the PC12, Steve caught up with Andre Zimmerman to discuss the Pilatus PC24.
     
  • 1:24:40 – We wrap up the episode and talk about the Airbus A400M transport. We also mention that in addition to Steven Pam taking lots of amazing images, Maikha’s running around with his selfie-stick & distinctive hat. If you get your photo taken with Maikha, you’ll be in the running to get some prizes :)
The Pilatus PC24 Mock Up

The Pilatus PC24 Mock Up

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PCDU Episode 76: Air Wilpena

By Grant (Falcon124), on October 20th, 2011%

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A few episodes ago we introduced Kathy Mexted as a new member our group of occasional PCDU contributors and this episode she’s back with some great content. She recently took a few friends in a Bonanza out to Wilpena Pound in South Australia, a trip that would usually take many days to achieve by road but, thanks to general aviation, only required two 90 minute flights to get there. Originally intended to be a trip to Ayers Rock, this adventure was trimmed down to something more manageable and a journey to just south of Lake Eyre was planned.

We spend a bit of time discussing the flight, the scenery, air sickness, some geology and what it was like loading four ladies into a high performance single then blasting off to out back of beyond. Kathy also discusses staying at Mungo Lodge, the Wilpena Pound Resort and Trevor Hancock, their tour guide while they were there.

While staying in outback South Australia, Kathy and her friends caught up with some of the pilots from Air Wilpena and recorded a discussion with them about their backgrounds, the flying they’re doing and what it’s like to be flying in outback Australia.

After this we play a few interviews from our recent visit to Coldstream Airport including:

  • A chat with Judy & Andrew Doak, the owners of Coldstream Airport (YCEM)
  • Dr Bruce Searle, CEO of ACMA
  • Andrew Temby, aerobatic display pilot flying his Yak-52TW

We then move into reading some listener emails and discussing some future events on the calendar, including:

Our backing music for this episode comes from “The Groove Press” by Ron Soo.

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PCDU Episode 75: Talking Aerobatics with Anthony Crichton-Browne

By Grant (Falcon124), on October 5th, 2011%

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (65.3MB)

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Today we’re joined by Anthony Crichton-Browne, a commercial airline pilot who also likes to take his Pitts Special out for a spin (and a few other fun manoeuvres :) In addition to chatting with Anthony, we also run a chat with Grant Piper (President of the Australian Aerobatic Club) about Australia’s recent involvement in the World Aerobatic Championship, discuss aerobatics in general and also have a chat about the recent horrific tragedy at Reno Air Races where the highly modified P51 “Galloping Ghost” lost control and plowed into specators.

We start off by hanging out with Anthony and talking about his career in aviation and more, including:

  • He has an older brother who’s also a pilot
  • He’s from Western Australia, learning to fly at Jandakot in Perth
  • He did the usual hour building & quickly found himself in a Cessna 310 then on to First Officer on a Brasillia before stepping up to Second Officer on 747-400, after which he proceeded to his current gig as First Officer on a 767
  • Anthony started flying aerobatics with friends and also scored a flight with Matt Hall
  • His aerobatic training really kicked in with a Pitts and he now has his own Pitts
  • We talk about G-Tolerance, G-LOC and beating the effects of high-G manoeuvres
  • We discuss the recent tragic accident at the Reno Air Races, including the NTSB’s preliminary report & talk further the effects of pulling-G’s
  • A discussion about stalls that leads into how advanced training really helps dispel some of the many myths, how the stall stick position works and standard GFPT training vs advanced training by groups like Red Baron in Sydney (Hi Joel! :)

You can find Anthony on his Flying Ant Online website as well as following him on Twitter where he’s known as AntCB.

We then move into the interview that Steve & Anthony recorded with Grant Piper, the President of the Australian Aerobatics Club, featuring:

  • An overview of aerobatic manoeuvre’s
  • How aerobatic competitions are managed & scored
  • Australia’s return to the World Aerobatic Championship
  • How to improve the standard in Australia with coaching by current champs
  • Grant’s career in aviation including his start in the RAAF
  • The benefits of including aeros in primary training

We then return to a chat with Anthony about:

  • The challenges of flying competition aerobatics
  • Standard aerobatic figures (loop, cuban-8, etc)
  • How scoring each manoeuvre starts at 10 points then deducts points for any errors
  • How it all has to look right from the ground
  • The issues in dealing with wind & power
  • What is the aerobatic box
  • Types of propeller blades and their benefits (blade numbers, sizes, etc)

Finally we start to wrap it up with some listener mail:

  • Ian Allen from New Zealand sent us some great ideas for more Kiwi Content
  • Errol Cavit points us at a possible Kiwi aviation podcast
  • Don’t forget to check out our Facebook page and our forums on Downwind

We then wind up with some shout outs:

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PCDU Episode 47: Bull Me!

By Grant (Falcon124), on November 23rd, 2010%

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (74.0MB)

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The 2010 RedBull AirRace season was exciting, eventful and disappointing all at once. From Adilson Kindleman’s crash in Perth to Hannes Arch’s pylon hit and Matt Hall’s “walk on water” incident, G-Stalls were everywhere. Then came the news that the last two races were cancelled and, finally, that the whole 2011 season was cancelled. As if the end of the season wasn’t bad enough, we were all stunned by the news that Alejandro Maclean had died in an aerobatic training accident.

We have already presented our “End of Season” chats with Hannes Arch and Matt Hall in previous episodes so in this one, we present our chats with Nigel Lamb and Pete McLeod.

We also officially announce the winners of our Flight City Simulator Centre B777 sim session prize (Graham Neal) and two runners up (Greg Spencer & David Mitchell), both of whom win PCDU T-Shirts.

We talk briefly about Qantas’ recent 90th Birthday event at Melbourne airport and play the quick chat we recorded with Juan Serrano, John Travolta’s chief pilot.

After another View from the Lounge segment, this time paying tribute to those serving in the military, we dive into our mailbag:

  • Steve Horton form Perth is worried that the RedBull AirRace will never return to Perth and lets us know about his great photo site
  • Peter Baxter wrote in asking about jet engine technology and again to share a great story about an Air New Zealand DC10 that helped a ferry flight in trouble over the Pacific
  • “brettkp” has some great feedback about episode 46 in our forums on Downwind

We give a shout-out to Pieter Johnson (@NascotHornet) in the UK who has just become a very proud father: welcome Beatrice :)

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Flight City B777 Simulator Session – We Have a Winner

By Grant (Falcon124), on November 22nd, 2010%

Thanks to the folks at Flight City Simulation Centre in Perth, we have been able to give away a one hour flight session in their Boeing 777 simulator to give away, valued at $275. Of the many people who correctly recognised that the airline jingle belonged to “Australian Airlines,” Graham Neal was the lucky winner.

Congratulations to Graham and also to David Mitchell & Greg Spencer who were our “runners up” winning a PCDU T-Shirt each.

Thanks to all of you who entered, even those of you who had incorrect answers. We’re working to bring in more prizes for future episodes so watch this space :)

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Competition: 777 Flight Simulator Session

By Grant (Falcon124), on November 9th, 2010%

Thanks to the folks at Flight City Simulation Centre in Perth, we have a one hour flight session in their Boeing 777 simulator to give away, valued at $275. All you have to do to win is listen to PCDU Episode 45 where we play a jingle that belonged to an Airline over here.

Have a listen to the jingle and then email us with your answer (even if it may be wrong :). We’ll draw the winner live on uStream and also announce them in a future episode.

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PCDU Episode 45: Keeping it to Scale

By Grant (Falcon124), on October 31st, 2010%

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It’s been a while since our last episode but at last we’re able to present our latest update with some more great content. First up, Matt Hall joins us once again to look back on his 2010 RedBull AirRace season, discuss the lessons he’s learned and give us his thoughts about 2011 & beyond.

Next up we are proud to introduce our latest advertiser, Flight City Simulator Centre at Jandakot in Perth, with their Boeing 777 simulator. We chat with Richard Zandvliet, the CEO at Flight City, about their various simulators, the courses they can offer for the professional pilot and the packages they have for the general public. Richard also makes a generous offer of a one-hour flight package in the 777 simulator that we can give away on the show (see below).

While Grant’s been able to go flying in some full sized aircraft (check out the photos on our Facebook page), Steve’s been catching up with some slightly smaller aircraft. He’s been out to the Victorian Scale Aircraft Association’s state championships and interviewed John Lamont, Noel Whitehead & David Law from the Packenham & District Aircraft Radio Control Society.

Finally, we wind up the episode some mailbag & shout-outs:

  • Peter Baxter wrote in and suggested the brilliant idea of following up some engineers about jet engine issues
     
  • Alex James wrote in from China with some comments
     
  • Camper English from the Alcademics blog is producing a catalog of Aircraft Drinks Menus and, as mentioned in Grant’s Fly Me Friendly blog, we think you should give him a hand
     
  • David Vanderhoof has started his own podcast called the Hitchhiker’s Guide to Military Aviation – well worth checking out!

NOTE: We had some additional content from our Matt Hall interview that was no longer current so we’ve moved it from the episode to our Extras collection. You can find it at our “Extras” page.

Competition: Win a one hour flight package with Flight City Simulator Center’s Boeing 777 simulator

Just listen to this episode to hear a jingle from the past. If you know who owned that jingle, send us an email at planecrazydownunder@gmail.com telling us who you think it was. We’ll draw the winner live on uStream in the near future.

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PCDU Episode 32: Switch to Plan Delta

By Grant (Falcon124), on May 13th, 2010%

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This episode features a discussion with Peter Gibson, the manager of corporate communications at CASA. He’s joined us to explain the airspace changes that will come into effect on June 3rd, changes which will impact Class D, see the transition of GAAP to Class D and introduce the mandatory carriage of radios at all certified, registered or military non-towered aerodromes (plus any others as designated in the ERSA).

We also talk to Owen Zupp just before he departed on his There and Back trip around Australia as well as Tim Pryse and Ken Evers a few days prior to the start of their Millions Against Malaria trip around the world. We feature another “View from the Lounge” and introduce ATC_Ben‘s new “Controllers Corner” segment.

As we wind up the show, we discuss the Australian Capital Territory funding yet another feasibility study for a much needed secondary airport near Canberra. You can read more about it in an news entry from Australian Aviation and also follow up progress through the Canberra Region Aviators Association web site.

If you want to see a 737-200 land at Jandakot (Perth’s secondary airport), check out the video of the landing that Ed Stubbs pointed us at. Not bad.

Just in time to make our cut off for this episode, we had a quick chat with Owen as he was half way around his trip. A great update on his progress and how things have been going.

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PCDU Episode 31: Red Bull all The Way

By Grant (Falcon124), on May 8th, 2010%

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The Red Bull Air Race came back to Perth this year and Steve was there, flexing his newly minted press credentials and discovering the amazing world of the Red Bull media centre. Sadly, Grant was working in Indonesia and so couldn’t be there to help hang out, rub shoulders with the stars and quaff a few cans of Red Bull.

Fortunately Steve was well & truly up to the task and managed to capture a few interviews while he was there. First up in this episode we have Steve’s summary of the race, including his interview with Hannes Arch, the press conference at the end of the race and a collection of content from the Red Bull Media Pool.

After the break we get to hear a great chat with Nigel Lamb recorded while he was in Rio getting ready for the third race. We learn about how he flies the race and just what benefit he is getting from those amazing winglets. Grant drops a clanger during the interview but fortunately Steve cut that bit out, putting it at the very end of the episode in the bloopers ‘cos hey, no one ever listens to them, right? Right? (“Please don’t!” says Grant) :)

The final pair of interviews are with Lenny Raulson, Matt Hall’s mechanic at the time of the Perth race. He finished up with Matt’s team just after the race and they’ve now transitioned to an Australian mechanic, Jack Moshovis. After Steve’s chat with Lenny, we have a chat with David Lyall, Matt’s team coordinator. He tells us what it’s like to work with Matt, why they changed from Lenny to Jack and much more.

We hope you enjoy the episode. Feel free to leave us feedback via email, comments on the site or on our forum on Downwind.com.au.

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PCDU Episode 25: Fan Boys

By Grant (Falcon124), on February 13th, 2010%

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Yes, Steve & Grant are Fan Boys (big Fan Boys, in fact :) and this episode we demonstrate it once again by interviewing Matt Hall and hanging out with some more fans at the Flight Experience Melbourne Facebook fan page open night in their 737 flight simulator. Seems we’re not the only ones who think a publically accessible 737 simulator is a great thing :)

Here’s how this episode flows:

As usual, our theme music track is “YouNameIt5” by Brian Simpson (aka t3cat5) and our sound effects come from SoundSnap.com.

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