Just did the single longest trip as PIC that I have in an airplane. It was glorious and trouble free (as far as N5931S goes).
The trip was to Santa Barbara on the CA coast (I landed at Santa Ynez airport in the CA wine country).
Going there I took the coastal route from RNT to EUG (Eugene), EUG to SAC (Sacramento) via Arcata on the coast and SAC to IZA (Santa Ynez) via Paso Robles. Coming back I took IZA to RDD (Redding), RDD to HIO (Portland-Hillsboro) and then HIO - KLS (Kelso Longview), KLS to RNT. Each way took about 6.5 on the tach.
All the legs except the final one yesterday were IFR. I was up at 10000 most of the time, though I did go as low as 8000 and as high as 12000. I had to wait out a rain storm and extremely low cloud at Kelso before continuing to RNT on the one VFR leg.
We had some problems caused by human error. The line boy managed to get the chain pin tangled with the fuel cap and forced it shut - necessitating a 2 hr delay to get a mechanic to fix it. Then we had a problem with the hot start at SAC - and I called Kent for advice. It was on the right track but didn't completely work. So I pulled out my iphone and surfed the web for "Beech bonanza hot start problems". The one I used worked just fine and I used on all the hot starts - started first time every time. The procedure is below if you are interested.
The only glitch as far the airplane was concerned was that COM 1 was not transmitting. COM 2 was used throughout and COM 1 was used for listening.
The procedure is below (taken from the Hangar Flying Forum at the American Bonanza Society site)
Hot Start Procedure
1. pull the throttle and mixture knobs out
2. run the boost pump for 60 seconds (purges the fuel vapors out of the engine)
3. shut off the boost pump
4. throttle and mixture knobs full in
5. boost pump on till it just hits max flow (maybe 2 or 3 seconds)
6. boost pump off
7. throttle full out and then five 1/2 turns in
8. turn the key and crank the engine while slowly turning the throttle in until the engine starts.
Usually starts right up but not as quick as a cold start so don't release the key until you know the engine is going. Be prepared for high rpm with feet on brakes and twisting out the throttle to a reasonable 1000 RPM until ready to taxi.
Now on to the Apple Cup 25th anniversary aerobatic competition at Ephrata tommorow.
