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Forced runway change

Posted: Sat Apr 10, 2021 12:50 am
by Rich
Starting Monday our main runway (10/28 - 5700-ish ft. long, 75 ft. wide ) at Prineville, OR (S39) will be closed through, in theory, June 4th. This means we need to use 15/33, (4000 ft. x 40 ft. wide). This runway, though devoid of potholes or pavement breakup, has lots and lots of pavement cracks. It tends to be a favorite of our tail-draggers, especially those with big balloon tires, as they eschew crosswinds of any degree.

The real conundrum for most of us is this runway has no dedicated taxiway. So you either continue rolling on to the end or turn around and taxi back. Either option is inconsiderate of the guy who may be behind you.

I haven't used this runway in many years for these reasons, but in spite of the length of the runway and our 3250 ft. elevation, my plan is to use only the last half of the runway and roll out to the end. I confirmed today this will be no big deal.

Re: Forced runway change

Posted: Sat Apr 17, 2021 7:35 pm
by Rich
Change of plan. The taxiway is blocked off and does not permit ramp/hangar/fuel pump/shop/office access. Therefore landing on 33 requires turning around and taxiing back on the runway, and departing 15 requires taxiing the wrong way before takeoff. This likely means we'll all have to fly wider/slower patterns when following others operating on the runway.

So I need to get serious about short-field landing technique to minimize the time going the wrong way when landing 33. But takeoff 15 will require a bit more thinking. I know I can get by with less than half the runway, but don't want to try. Methinks downwind takeoff 33 would be preferable if the wind is not too strong.

It's going to be an interesting 6-7 weeks.

Re: Forced runway change

Posted: Mon May 10, 2021 11:11 pm
by Rich
Grounded for the next 11 days as the airport will be closed starting tomorrow. Time to take care of a few maintenance items like rotating tires and rebuilding my jacks.

Re: Forced runway change

Posted: Mon May 31, 2021 1:14 am
by CBeak
Be glad you have options. At KSGU, the whole airport closed for 4 months in 2019. Runway was only 7 yrs old but had settled so badly that landings were reminiscent of a roller coaster. How that happened was a whole other story.

Re: Forced runway change

Posted: Wed Jun 02, 2021 12:54 pm
by photoSteveZ
CBeak wrote: Mon May 31, 2021 1:14 am Be glad you have options. At KSGU, the whole airport closed for 4 months in 2019. Runway was only 7 yrs old but had settled so badly that landings were reminiscent of a roller coaster. How that happened was a whole other story.
I had wondered what happened to close SGU. Do you have a link to the backstory?

Meanwhile, my home airport (EIK) is closing next week, for two weeks, without prior warning: the NOTAM just popped up yesterday. Apparently rwy 15/33 is becoming 16/34.

Re: Forced runway change

Posted: Wed Jun 02, 2021 1:33 pm
by Rich
An (almost) post-mortem on the experience. I should have only one more required use (on Friday) of the less-desirable runway, for my return from KPLU.

With one exception for winds I have been able to take off on RWY 33 and land 15. This eliminates the back-taxi operation. There has been a certain amount of luck involved, as touch-and-go operations have not been ongoing when I have used the runway. In other cases the pilots have worked things out with additional communications. :thumbsup:

There was a period of 11 days when 15/33 was also closed as the 10/28 work impinged on it. This meant the airport was closed altogether.

I’m told that 10/28 will waken from its dormancy Friday evening as 11/29. So far publications have not been updated to reflect this change. As with this runway and KEIK there has been a continuing process of re-designating runway nomenclature due to Magnetic Pole migration.

Re: Forced runway change

Posted: Thu Jun 17, 2021 9:54 pm
by Rich
Now an actual postmortem.

As it turned out they were late opening the long runway, but it did emerge from hibernation a few days ago, having morphed from 10/28 to 11/29, as expected. I was curious whether the charts and other related information would reflect the change. I noticed yesterday that the AOPA airport information site had appropriately changed. But Foreflight still reflected the previous cycles' runway information, as the new chart cycle publication date had not yet arrived

Then today being the "applicable" date for all chart, information and database update for what is now the current cycle, FF now shows the new information for the runway AND the RNAV procedures for the "new" runways 11 and 29. The procedures for 10 and 28 have disappeared. This is as expected.

Not expected, but makes sense, is that the magnetic courses on both procedures increased by 1 degree. If a particular course had been 285 deg it is now 286. This true for ALL courses associated with both procedures - feeder routes and all.

Also not expected and it's unclear why, the LP MDA for the RWY 29 is 60 ft. higher than it was for 28, while the LNAV MDA is lower than before by 20 ft. MDA for the two are now the same and pretty high, 420 ft. AGL. The IAF, FAF, and MA fixes for RWY 29 seem to be in the same locations, though the waypoints between FAF an MA points were shuffled toward the FAF a bit. The same names - just re-positioned for some reason and their altitudes adjusted upward due to their relocation, as far as I can tell.

Re: Forced runway change

Posted: Fri Jun 18, 2021 1:04 pm
by Rich
Post postmortem:
Yesterday, the very first applicable day for the new procedures, both were NOTAM'd as NA for unknown reasons :scratch: , leaving S39 with no IAPs :tap:

Re: Forced runway change

Posted: Sat Jun 19, 2021 1:33 pm
by Rich
The issue is that the flight-check of the new procedures, scheduled for last Monday (6/14) was cancelled due to the thunderstorms we had all that day. I'm informed it's been rescheduled for this Monday (6/21), so the NOTAM will likely be rescinded next week. :thumbsup:

Re: Forced runway change

Posted: Wed Jun 30, 2021 10:43 pm
by Rich
They did that flight check on 6/21 and the NOTAMs were removed on 6/22.

Now, with the newly removed 300 ft. of the approach end of 29, combined with 6,000+ ft DA the last week, coming over the beginning of the runway at 60 KIAS doesn't cut it for easily making the first (unmoved) turnoff. So I'll start using more like 1.3 Vso, i.e. 55 KIAS in hot weather.