Wednesday, February 22, 2006

Flights 2 & 3

Since I had started in late July, and the soaring season fades away in September, I thought I would stretch out my 5-pack over the rest of the summer, then go at it in earnest in 2006.

I arrived at the club nice and early for my second flight. John taught me how to do the Daily Inspection on the 2-33 (actually, John did the DI, but we both did the looking in all the nooks and crannies). We pulled out the tractor, towed the gliders to the flight line, got out the tow ropes, and generally got things ready for the day. Because I was first there, I was first to fly.

As a new student, flying early in the morning is a Good Thing. There is a lack of thermals, as the sun has not yet warmed the earth sufficiently, so the flights are smoother, and you can understand the effect of the controls without bouncing all over the sky in rough air. Straight and level flight is possible, even with a rookie on the stick.

So up we went, where we glided back to earth over a too-short period of time. While up there I tried to figure out how to manage the ship in three dimensions: Control speed using pitch, and control yaw using the rudder. I did much better than on my first flight.

We approached 1000' AGL, and headed for home, entering the circuit at about 850' AGL, through the circuit, and John brought us in for a landing.

Then the surprise. We towed the 2-33 back to the flight line, and I took my second flight of the day immediately, even though there were others waiting. I heard later that this was an encouragement for the students to come out early in the day... two flights before noon guaranteed, no waiting. Personally, I would have liked to have waited a little longer so maybe there would have been a few thermals up there.....

The two flights in succession made a big difference... by the end of the second flight of the day I was doing coordinated turns (shallow and medium bank), flying in an almost-straight line, recovered from a slow stall from straight flight, and while trying to fly a constant speed I wasn't yo-yo-ing through sky in Pilot-Induced-Oscillation (that's a fancy phrase for over-correction, going to fast, then over-correcting and going too slow, then nose down and too fast, and so forth).

Clearly, if one is going to get better, time on the stick was going to be the big factor.

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