Round the World Flight - In a Piper Aztec

For anyone interested in trying their hand at a round the world flight or two, but having no interest in biplanes (I've had an interest in that area myself, flying Amy Johnson's famous 1930 flight from London to Australia), the Alabeo Piper Aztec is now out. Some of you may remember that in the 60s and 70s the Aztec was flown by two daring/crazy pilots on incredible round the world flights that just beg to be recreated.

Max Conrad flew around the equator in his, and then circumnavigated the earth from pole to pole, unfortunately he failed to take off from the South Pole in his little twin after he clipped the ice with his wing, and his Aztec was buried in the ice by the staff of the base, where it remains today. He set a lot of records and was a ferry pilot for Piper.

http://www.soloflights.org/conrad_text_e.html

Sheila Scott flew a Comanche for a time, but she too, swapped this for Mithre, a Piper Aztec, with which she set her own long distance records, including a flight over the North Pole from equator to equator. To simply start the flight she had to fly solo from London to Nairobi.

http://www.ctie.monash.edu.au/hargrave/scott_sheila.html

I'm certainly going to try one or more of these flights, the Alabeo Aztec is my new best friend, since it matches closely the layout of my homebuild cockpit, so I feel at home. The Aztec is old, reliable, well used and well loved, unlike the Beechcraft Duke which I tried to like, but its a real 'show off' plane built in small numbers and a rich man's toy. If I could buy a twin, its an old Aztec I could most likely afford. Since I purchased it my logbook shows that I have unbelievably flown it more hours than any of my A2A planes...

Inside and out it looks fantastic. It flies well too, though I cannot attest to its authenticity. The sounds are nice, but my Buttkicker chair vibration device just rattled and couldn't pick up many bass sounds from the soundset, so I have switched the engine sounds for those in the Milviz Baron. Lots of bass rumbles now. RealEngine 1.4 (freeware) gives me realistic failable engines that I have to watch carefully. Add Accusim for airflow, turbulence and all those squeaks and groans of an old Aztec and I am sorted.

Finally, picked up an Aztec handbook from a UK web vendor, dated 1968. I was swapping emails with the site owner who told me that the book has an exotic history, it came from Nigeria, where the plane was registered in the 70s and 80s. Now that's perfect ... an old twin bush plane from Africa should be just what I need for a round the world trip!

Bon Yoyage!! :)

Their Aztec looks nice, but the VC doesn't look much like the Aztec I got my multi-engine rating in, and externally it's got a more pointed nose, one of the later models (I flew a '66), so I've passed. But it does look good.

As for handling, I always felt that it's handling was very similar to the Cessna singles (unlike the other Piper products), except heavier on the controls (though the 206 might have been as heavy).

Enjoy.