This is the story of owning and operating a 1993 Beech Bonanza A36 in the UK and some of its adventures.
About 18 months ago I visited Aerofair at North Weald with a friend and his friend who happened to deal in aeroplanes and while I was there I purchased a pair of Sennheiser HMC400 Noise Cancelling headsets for my Cessna 182.
The headsets came with a battery pack and also the plugs to wire them into the plane. During the flight home the front seat passenger and I were most impressed with how it made the plane seem it was flying without the engine running. In fact if I am honest I had to keep switching the noise cancelling off to reassure myself everything was OK.
During the journey home I was discussing the imminent arrival of my latest child and what problems it would cause with lack of seats in the Cessna and my passenger (who sells planes) suggested he could sell the Cessna easily for me and he knew where there was a beautiful Beech Bonanza A36. I had to say I was skeptical that he could sell the plane quickly but I thought I would give him a try.
Within a week he had an offer on the table and within two weeks the plane had been inspected and a deal finalised and before long the Cessna 182 had gone.
Anyway back to the Bonanza and the Sennheiser headsets. I decided that when I purchased a new plane I would get the headsets permanently wired into that. I don't know if anyone reading this has tried this but it seems impossible to remember to switch off the battery packs of noise cancelling headsets. You can remember to switch off your GPS etc but brains are just not programmed to switch off a little dangling battery pack when you are leaving headsets in a plane. Perhaps it is not so bad when you remove your headsets but it is just impossible if you don't. Inevitably when you come to use the headsets the battery packs are flat and you end up with no noise cancelling. Its bloody annoying and during my 18 months ownership I have hardly ever used the noise cancelling feature of my £800 pair of headsets.
Still it took me 18 months to do something about getting the built in power supplies fitted to the new Bonanza A36 and in the end it was only when Simon from Pool Aviation organised for it to be done for me that it actually happened.
Thankfully the work has now been completed so next time I go flying I will look forward to a lovely if strangley quiet flight.
The costs for the headset update were as follows:
Repair to one headset as cable had frayed: £58.00
Fitting of plus and wiring into Bonanza A-36 system: £380
Update of both Garmin 430 databases £94
A total bill of around £580.
