2001 by Steve Mahoney
My wife and I where invited to a baptism/welcoming party for a newly born baby girl by an old College friend. This was a big deal as my friend was married for some 14 years and unable to have children. After many years of trying, they had just received a call from the adoption agency telling them they had a 2 week old baby girl . This was an event my wife and I really wanted to attend to share in their happiness and excitement. The only problem was they live in Idaho and we live in western Oregon some 6+ hour drive away. This is where the BD-4 makes all things possible.
After filling the tanks with fuel, (we carry 56 gallons), We departed our home airport McMinnville, Oregon and climbed east toward Mt. Hood in the Cascade mountain range. After passing through 5000 feet we where out of the haze and bumps and it got incredibly smooth. We reach our cruising altitude of 11,500 in no time. I bet we had averaged better than 1000fpm from ground to cruise altitude. As I got the engine all leaned out and set up for cruise, I thought back to the BBD days (before BD) when I would rent Cessna 172 to fly friends to get a view of the active volcano Mt. Helens, it would take almost 1 hour just to reach the 10,000' summit level. It was incredibly scenic as we cruised across the Cascades, at our altitude we could see almost across the entire state, and the Peaks (Mt. Rainer, Mt, Saint Helens, MT. Jefferson to the south) Life doesn't get any better.
I watched the ground speed on the GPS and the miles click down to our destination... we doing 195 mph over the ground (some tail wind ) why I like to go high when heading east. When I go high, its usually smoother, it gets quieter in the cabin, and my fuel consumption goes down. We arrived at the Pullman- Moscow airport in only 1:45 ! As we had some extra time to kill before the service, I found an inexpensive rental Car and took my wife on a grand tour of Washington State University where I had attended engineering school some 22 years earlier. (I don't know where all these young kids came from all over campus). We then drove to Moscow, Idaho some 6 miles and found the church, and went in to attend the service. My friend Nils and his wife Chris where so overwhelmed to see us. They had no Idea that we where coming and where taken totally by surprise. I think they had sent us the invitation primarily as adoption announcement. We sure had fun visiting with the them at the reception in the church basement. (it's a good thing the reception was held in a church, as the punch didn't contain alcohol, so I could still fly home (had lots of that punch).
After the reception, I visited the bathroom, it's never fuel, but me, that limits our range in the BD. We took off and had a great flight home. My wife timed it.... 2:00 hours ( some headwind) I saw 175mph on the GPS most of the way. We where at 10,000- 12,000 for most of the time. The triped consumed about 32 gallons, a little less than it would have cost to make the same trip in our Dodge Caravan.
The best part ..... after we had returned home, I overheard my wife talking on the phone..... sorry we where gone today ...we had to attend an unexpected last minute Baptism in Idaho..... no, no, we went just for the day... Oh, we took the airplane ....no, no, that's actually that's not quite correct, we weren't gone for the whole day....Just the afternoon. The BD-4 really is an amazing traveling machine. It's performance has made many trips possible for me and my family that normally would be out of reach by any other means. Those of you that are building keep it up, your day will come. Keep it light, and reduce the drag wherever you can and you will be handsomely rewarded.