Cross Country (return to HKY)

...During the preflight before returning to HKY I noticed the oil was running slightly low. After adding some more oil (cold) I started the engine with a little throttle added. Immediately the plane began shaking unlike any shake I had previously experienced while idling the engine. After pulling the mixture and turning off the magnetos, I started engine a second time with the same result. Rather than cycling again, I decided to throttle up to 1700 rpm and let it run for a while. After about a 30 seconds I pulled the throttle and let it idle. For whatever reason this ameliorated the rough idle. I am currently researching reasons for observing such violent tremors. My current hypothesis considers the colder oil shocking the warm engine.

With confidence that I had cured the previous sutuation, I taxiied to the active runway and departed 35A for the 50 minute trip back to HKY. I reached an average speed of 85kts with the assistance of a quartering tailwind. Atlanta Center provided the intial flight following before transferring me to CLT approach who eventually transferred me to HKY tower for a smooth landing. An angled view of the landing can be found in the video links to the left. The pitching you observe is my teasing the plane in an attempt to grease the landing. I recommend turning down the volume to prevent the stall warning horn from blowing your ear drums. Other videos from this flight, including one on the ground at 35A can also be found with the landing video. A .kml file can also be downloaded to view my route in Google Earth. Way point 1 is a test point...I did not go that far off course.

When I come up with a better explanation for the tremmoring plane I will be sure to update the blog.