Though the fall colours have come out in the last week, and it looks like it will be a spectacular year.
Pre-flight I found my first snag - the nosewheel valve stem had no cap. Temperature was above freezing and there was no moisture, so we took the aircraft anyway. Noted it so the staff could find a valve stem cap and install it.
Slight crosswind from the right on 28, but no gusts. I did three touch&go, then three low&over, then another 5 touch&go and a full stop.
Time: 1.8
Landings: 8
I need more practice with side-slips, so I flew the low& overs at about 100-200 feet AGL to practice moving the aircraft from one side of the runway to the other while the pointy-end stayed aligned with the runway (no yaw). First one was sloppy, the second and third one had some good moments. I need to continue practicing side slips.
Tony Hunt came out and did a touch&go in his Husky, then departed to the west and arrived from the north. Both my instructor and I were confused by "Husky - i.forget - Hotel - Yankee", thinking that we were hearing Whiskey not Husky. The phonetic alphabet works as designed, you can figure out words because no two have the same phonetic construction (Canadian call signs will have Golf, Hotel or India as the first letter - but Tony was giving his aircraft designation).
Landings were all decent, a few were good.
When we got back into the school I remarked to the CFI that they must have done an engineering change to the aircraft, because everything is now happening much slower than it used to. I'm noticing a lot of the other small changes that come with increasing experience... for example, my landings used to be very focused affairs, with tunnel vision on the numbers. Now my vision is much broader - to the point where I have peripheral vision through the flare.
Done well:
- Softer focus vision
- Altitude maintenance in circuit (I wandered only once, and then by 50 feet)
- Traffic management - one other aircraft in the circuit was doing stop&go practice (soft field or short field), and backtracked on each landing. I had to manage my speed and length of downwind so we could co-exist in the circuit.
- Radio calls - anticipate a busy airspace, keep the information complete and verbiage to a minimum.
- Landing on the centre line (I had one of the left of the runway, otherwise all landings were on or near the centre of the runway)
- Smooth finals
- Minimal yaw at touchdown
- Calm, slow, gentle responses to deviations from the desired flight path when on final
- Lots of variations in landing approaches... high, low, gliding, easing off the power at different altitudes from 600 feet (and gliding in) to easing off the throttle while flaring
- Side slips
- I tried a forward slip when I was very high on an approach - it was mucky and I got somewhat right of the runway - though I did recover with a nice&slow left shuffle, and put it right on the centre line with no yaw.
2 comments:
Sometimes I race out to Carp after work for a short flight. Just a few circuits with a couple of good wheel landings blows away the stress of the office.
I started prefacing my callsign with "type" when I flew across the US, where that is the norm. It does seem redundant in the home circuit with only one other aircraft flying.
I suspected that was you in the circuit, your radio calls are very clear and distinct. It sounded like you were having a good time too.
I was having a great time - the air was reasonably stable, the view was great, the landings were re-assuring (especially after the nasty crosswinds on the previous flight).
Thank you for your kind words on the radio calls.
Next lesson is Thursday 16:30-18:30, weather permitting. As always.
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