Aircraft Information
> Aircraft Make: Cessna Model: 177RG. Nickname: Cardinal
> Aircraft Mil Civ Description: Airplane SE Piston
> FAA Category and Class: Airplane Single Engine Land
> Engine Description: single piston
Aircraft Experience
> As of: 11/5/2024
> Number of Hours Flown: 20
> Number of Times Flown: 7
> Other Aircraft Models Associated: C-177 and C-177RG
First Flown Information
> Sequence First Flown: 79
> Date First Flown: 9/7/1992
> Location First Flown: Monterey, CA airport (KMRY)
> Who and/or What Organization First Flown With: Navy Monterey Flying Club
Recollections: Wikipedia has an excellent description of the Cardinal’s history, intended as a replacement for the C-172 Skyhawk. There’s some great “test pilot stuff” in this wiki article.
While I didn’t write a technical report on the 177 from my 20 hours of flying it, I do remember thinking it was a bit more of a handful than the 172, particularly on landing. I guess that’s why the 172 survives to this day, while the 177 was discontinued (albeit after almost 4300 were built, one-tenth as many as the 172).
For me, I flew the airplane as transportation to travel all over California while attending Navy Postgrad school in Monterey. Much as I’d done during my tour at Moffett, I traveled fairly widely in California, which has to be one of the best places for personal flying in the world, owing to a tremendous variety of airports and generally predictable weather.
(c) airliners.net
The C-177 I flew was an “RG” (Retractable Gear) model and I knew this was a setup for a gear-up landing (it’s a Cessna…the gear’s GOTTA be fixed, right?) Luckily, I’m still in the “those who will” category (“there are two kinds of pilots: those who HAVE landed gear up and those that will”. I live in fear of joining the “have” category…but I check the gear down at least twice every time I land, even in my fixed-gear Birddog).
Leave a Reply