[biigD]

The only relic that I have is a complete Boeing 737 throttle quadrant that I got shipped to me from a company in Oklahoma.

Oh wow - that's great! I currently fly the 737, so I've very familiar with that throttle quadrant.

I was never military. I came up through the civilian ranks the traditional way (for the States, at least) - got all my ratings from small flight schools while in high school and college, instructed for a few years, then slowly worked my way up through various flying gigs until finally settling in at the airlines.

[srosefx]

Well,
for the last 26 years I have been in the film industry as a Special F/X and prosthetics artist.
I have always been interested in computers and creative CG, back in the Amiga days using 'IMAGINE' to '3D Studio Max' on PC's over the years.
I live in NZ, but I immigrated here 8 years ago from the UK for The Hobbit.
You could pop by to www.simonrosefx.com if you are curious.

I had been around SGI all my career but I haven't been in.a position to use one, now that's all changed, 25 years later I now own a few systems (only one works)
Who would have thought then, that a 16 year old cool Canadian kid (you know who you are ) could own a Onyx Reality Engine2!!!
Amazing.

Simon

[biigD]

^^^ very cool!

[Jacques]

Well,
for the last 26 years I have been in the film industry as a Special F/X and prosthetics artist.
I have always been interested in computers and creative CG, back in the Amiga days using 'IMAGINE' to '3D Studio Max' on PC's over the years.
I live in NZ, but I immigrated here 8 years ago from the UK for The Hobbit.
You could pop by to www.simonrosefx.com if you are curious.

I had been around SGI all my career but I haven't been in.a position to use one, now that's all changed, 25 years later I now own a few systems (only one works)
Who would have thought then, that a 16 year old cool Canadian kid (you know who you are ) could own a Onyx Reality Engine2!!!
Amazing.

Simon

Very cool! Would love to know if anybody still has an old 'relic' sgi workstation floating around for decoration in any of the studios there. Only watched the Making Of for LoTR 3 months ago to see some of the F/X in action.

[Irinikus]

This is what I get up to at work on an average day!

This video covers a paratrooping sortie in a CASA 212 from chock to chock. Showing the takeoff, climb, the drop, a spiral descent and finally a joining via a low-level cross-initial for a full-stop landing.

[BackPlaner]

This is what I get up to at work on an average day!

This video covers a paratrooping sortie in a CASA 212 from chock to chock. Showing the takeoff, climb, the drop, a spiral descent and finally a joining via a low-level cross-initial for a full-stop landing.

Way cool man, you do that every day?

[Irinikus]

Way cool man, you do that every day?

This is generally the type of flying we do with this aircraft. In the next few hours, I'm going to do another paradrop ta the Zwartkop Airshow.

I unfortunately wasn't able to capture video footage of sorties during my helicopter tour, as I didn't have a GoPro back then and in those days I was still walking around with a NOKIA 8800, which wasn't suited to filming, or anything more than SMSing or phoning for that matter.

Medium lift helicopters are by far the best aircraft I've flown, in my opinion, for all the pilots out there, you haven't flown until you've flown a medium lift helicopter. They give you options that fixed-wing aircraft simply don't!

When I served as an Instructor at the Central Flying School, this is the type of flying we used to do with students on a daily basis:

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[Raion]

Helicopters seem complicated to fly, and the reliance on hydraulics + movies like the Matrix make me afraid of them lol.

You have the throttle, cyclic, and collective, plus the rudder pedals and that seems like a complicated way to fly, not to mention I have no idea if it's possible to maintain control of a chopper if the hydraulics fail.

[Irinikus]

Helicopters seem complicated to fly, and the reliance on hydraulics + movies like the Matrix make me afraid of them lol.

You have the throttle, cyclic, and collective, plus the rudder pedals and that seems like a complicated way to fly, not to mention I have no idea if it's possible to maintain control of a chopper if the hydraulics fail.

In the case of a Super Puma, the controls consist of the collective, cyclic and anti-torque pedals. Once the engines are advanced to the flight idle gate, the main rotor RPM (NR) is governed to 265 RPM, so the aircraft doesn't have a throttle that you have to manipulate.

Helicopters are rather complicated to fly, as if you make an adjustment to the collective pitch, for instance, you also have to make adjustments to the cyclic position and anti-torque pedal position simultaneously, to keep the forces acting on the aircraft in balance. These adjustments are made continuously.

As you increase the collective pitch on the blades, the drag on the blades increases and therefore there is a slight decrease in rotor RPM (NR-droop), this decrease in PRM is picked up by three phonic pickups on the bendix shafts between the free-turbine stage of the engines and the main gearbox. These shafts are rotating at a much higher RPM than the main rotor blades are, so the NR-droop kept to a minimum, as the variations in RPM sensed by the phonic pickups are insignificant as far as the NR is concerned, due to the RPM reduction carried out by the main gearbox. The phonic pickups send signals to the D-ECU's which spool the gas generator stages of the engines up as required, to maintain the NR at 265 RPM. The gas generator RPM is called "NG".

As far as hydraulics go, the system is dual redundant, with the hydraulic lines being strategically separated, so if you take a bullet through one of the lines, the secondary system will still be operational. There is a left and right-hand system, each with it's own hydraulic pump, which service all of the relevant hydraulic rams in the aircraft. In the case of the Super Puma, the left-hand system is the main system and the right-hand system is the backup system. If you have a total hydraulic failure in a Super Puma, you won't be able to control the aircraft at all, as the inputs from the cyclic and collective, only actuate valves on the three hydraulic rams that move the swash-plate, so you will have no control over the cyclic or collective pitch on the main rotor blades.

[Vanne]

Lol lots of pilots in here, i guess this apocalypse is hitting us pretty hard, although I am working the same / if not more than before the shit hit the fan.
B777 is my truck, been driving that puppy for about 8 years now, GE powered of course. Looking to retire and get out of this shit-kicking gig. did it for nearly 33 years..  It was fun.

I collect gaming consoles / games  (some people call them retro, they are not, they are just old), and old PeeCee's (mostly dual socket stuff)/Mac bits too and Amiga/C64 and C128 stuff.

I started with an Indie, then a bunch of O2's and then an Octane, followed by an Indigo2 and then an Octane 2, then an O2+ and then a Fuel, latest aquizition is an Impact Indigo2. There was on Onyx 2 in there too somewhere, but sadly parted that, and kept only the rack itself with the skins)