Monday, March 30, 2009

PAPI - Precision Approach Path Indicator

Today i seem to have some spare time so i decided to actually put something intellectual up for a change. Over the last 2 weeks I managed to do some night flying, just lucky to get a couple of hours. Since its night time and we do not really have any visual with the ground, the instructor was telling me to maintain 2 white and 2 red on the PAPI lights on finals (approaching the runway from around 4 nautical miles out). So what is PAPI you may ask? Well I've got a little write up on it below. Incase you dont want to read it, its basially 4 lights (either white or red) that tells you that you are high or low on the approach.

Not interesting? Nothing special you might say.. Thats true actually. Its based on a simple concept of shinning 2 lights, upper white, lower red. If you are high you will see more white, low you will see more red. The ideal approach would be 2 white and 2 red.

Now its time for the slightly more 'interesting' write up..Enjoy!


Development of PAPI


The Precision Approach Path Indicator, commonly known as PAPI, was devised by Tony Smith and David Johnson at the Royal Aircraft Establishment Bedford in 1974, and developed by them over the ensuing two years. Research Engineers (RE) were also pioneers in the development of PAPI, having produced and supplied PAPI units for the first trials conducted. The same design is still in use today.

Function of PAPI

PAPI is a visual aid that assists pilots landing aircraft. PAPI enables a pilot making an approach to a runway to acquire and maintain the correct glide path from the time that the PAPI system becomes visible until the aircraft has crossed the runway threshold. PAPI systems utilize a set of two colour high intensity light projectors. The upper half of the light beam from each projector is white and the lower half red. The transition between the two colours occurs over a very small angle. This sharp transition is an integral feature of the PAPI system.
PAPI projectors are inclined at the nominal glide path angle. Typically, the elevation setting angles of each PAPI unit vary by 20 minutes of arc, the nominal 3 degree glideslope being midway between the centre pair. The approaching pilot sees either a red or white light signal from each PAPI light projector.


Advantages of PAPI


PAPI is a digital system and has the well proven advantage that it can be interpreted as soon as the white signal becomes visible. It therefore has a greater usable range than the older VASI system which relied on the red signal being seen.


Sperms Point of View

I was surfing around and came across this...hilarious (and maybe true?)


Review - Detroit Metal City

Thanks to some free time due to the birthday of the Sultan of Kelantan, I've decided to share my thoughts on this anime/movie...i know.. i've got no life...


So, here is the summary of it... Both the anime and the movie has the same storyline...
Soichi Negishi is a shy and gentle young man who dreams of a career as a pop musician. Dreams don't pay the bills, so he ended up as the lead singer of a death metal band called “Detroit Metal City.” In stage costume he is Johannes Krauser II, rumored to be a demon, to have killed and raped his parents, to wield his giant death penis with abandon, etc. etc. Negishi despises DMC and all that it stands for but he's a terrific performer and can't walk away from that. As DMC's star rises Negishi tries to satisfy both worlds, but can he?



So here is my opinion on the two:



Anime: A must watch!!!



Movie: Probably if you're bored and you need to pass the time...(sorry after watching the anime, the movie doesn't impress at all)

*Sometimes when i read reviews ppl tend to rate the items from 1-10 or A-E. What if the movies has a rating of 6 or 7 or maybe a C? I really wouldn't know whether to watch it or not! So i'm keeping it simple...I'll just tell you to watch it or not! (Doesn't that make life simple?)


Sunday, March 29, 2009

The Massacre of a Thousand....Spiders!



The bunch of us just moved into a condo near town, sadly the place needed some extermination...The spider was a probably around the size of a 10 cent coin but they were nesting in the hundreds!!! (over exageration, probably around a 100...hahaha)

OK...i've decided to share with you the secret to killing spiders in your home armed with a mosquito aeresol spray and an empty aerosol can (can be substituted with anything that you can use to swing, i.e. a baseball bat)

1. Spray the arachnid with the mosquito spray

2. As it gets stunned, it will slowly come down from the ceiling while hanging on to its web.

3. Take the empty can (or whatever you have) and...SWING!

4. SPLAT!

5. Repeat steps 1-4 as required... (Sample below)




It has Started!!!

From a moment of madness comes this blog! I dont know what will in it yet but i guess we'll all just wait and see! so enjoy (or not)! :)