S S S S S Stuff

2009/07/09

Third lesson in three days - I'm loving it. Today's weather was sunny with a large number of Cumulus clouds and a high ceiling - the glider pilots were loving it as well.

The aircraft was back a little late, so RK and I briefed Emergency Procedures. I'm doing the emergency procedures OK, my approach to the procedures is logical and reasonable, but not exactly what the manufacturer has prescribed. Time for some more study.

Preflight was very thorough, since we were going to be doing utility-grade work today. Taxi, checklists, and a normal take-off all went well. We flew up to the practice area, staked out an area between Meech Lake and the Gatineau River, and started the upper-air work. Most of these activities I had not performed since the fall of 2006, so while I knew what I needed to do, I was apprehensive.

Stalls:

• Several power-off stalls (the C172 is very gentle in a stall). I recovered at the first sign of a stall, rather than seeing if we could get a good clean break&drop.
• Power-on stalls. The aircraft breaks a little harsher, but recovery is routine.
• Climbing turning full-power stalls - I've not seen one before. These are really interesting - one second you're climbing to the left in a very nose-up attitude, and the next second you've tumbled down to the right. This was demonstrated only, I didn't recover one myself (time constraint). Must do that someday.

Spins

• My last spin was in October 2006, so I had RK demonstrate spin entry and recovery. We lost 1,000 of altitude in the spin.
• I tried twice to put the C172 into a spin, but was too cautious in kicking it in, or we were not quite stalled enough when I tried the entry, and achieved two spiral dives - which I recovered easily.

Spiral Dives

• RK put the aircraft into a few spiral dives, which I recovered correctly and readily (in addition to the failed spin attempts).
• As a quick demonstration, RK put the airplane into a steep spiral dive and recovered. It felt like we were going to launch a torpedo attack on an aircraft carrier. Impressive. And what I am likely to see on my flight test.

And I put in a few forward slips on the way home, to lose the required altitude when leaving the practice area. Still not slick.

RK quizzed emergency procedures as I made radio calls, scanned for traffic, switched from the practice area to the aerodrome frequency. Nothing like keeping your mind busy.

Circuit good, final approach good, and the touchdown was the best yet.

Overall, I was very pleased with today's lesson. We reviewed a lot of items, I handled all of them (except entering a spin) well. Good enough to move along. I'd like to go back and review all items again, sometime in the near future, just for the practice. I was apprehensive and now feel comfortable, however, I would appreciate some additional practice.

Dual: 1.1
Landings: 1

Upper-air work - Nov 23

Today was upper-air work review, as a step towards cutting me loose to travel to the practice area solo.

Power-off stalls - Maintain altitude, slow nose-up while shedding speed, pull the stick right back into the gut and get the stall to happen, use rudder to keep the wings level (never aileron), stick forward to recover, pull back to level flight (do not induce a secondary stall) and add power.

Power-on stalls - Same as power-off stalls, but require more nose-up to make the stall happen, expect the "break" to be stronger, expect a need for right rudder to counter-act the slipstream against the fuselage. Stick forward to recover, pull back into level flight (do not induce a secondary stall), and add power.

Slow flight - Reduce power to idle, nose up to maintain altitude, when flying slow add some power to maintain altitude, keep lifting up the nose and adding power until we are at cruise RPM, but with a very slow airspeed (just above stall speed). Watch the CHT (Cylinder Head Temperature) to ensure the engine does not overheat (high RPM, low volume of cooling air flow). Practice turns (always shallow), level flight. To exit slow flight one has to lower the nose and add power (if not already at full power).

Forward slips - Throttle to neutral, left (or right) rudder to get the nose pointing away from the direction of flight, using as much aileron as required to maintain the same ground track. Use elevator to maintain speed (aim for 70 knots with no flaps, 60 knots with full flaps). Rudder should be at full deflection, use more/less stick to determine ground track, aircraft should be descending at a significant FPM due to plowing through the air sideways. To exit from the slip gently, and simultaneously, remove both the rudder and the ailerons.

Steeps turns - Oddly, I found this most difficult. Hours or grinding out circuits have get me very used to left-hand turns, and shallow-banked turns. Lots of aileron to get a 45 degree bank, use rudder to keep the turn coordinated, add some elevator to hold altitude, and some power to maintain airspeed. I had trouble maintaining altitude.

Coming back home I did two touch&go circuits, then a full stop.

Time: 1.5 hours dual
Landings: 3

Need to work on: All the upper-air work was OK, but rusty. Need to get practiced so it is once again second-nature.

Next steps: Briefing on forced-landings and precautionary landings, off-airport. Practice same, plus continue to review upper-air work. Do a W&B, and review spins and spiral dives. Then, assuming all is satisfactory, I'll be signed-off for away-from-the airport solo flight.

Polishing the Flare - Nov 12

This afternoon I played hooky from work - I'll be writing all night this evening, so I don't feel guilty about a few hours this afternoon.

So the CFI and I went up for a some review. I always suck when I fly with the CFI. Except today, where I was so-so.

I started by having her demonstrate a soft-field take-off. I had done them, but I always end up leaping up into the air and out of ground effect and off into the blue at a comfortable but insufficient margin above stall speed.

I took control, and I tried a short-field landing, which ended up being a decent approach but a totally sloppy three-point landing. Bad. Always two-point, always. Stay off the nose-wheel.

Next circuit was a floater, and certainly not short. And left of the centre line.

In exasperation I declared the next landing was going to be a normal landing, and I was going to grease it, which I did.

Next circuits and landings were OK, but a bit of a rush.

Final landing I declared to be a forced landing. Silly me. I corrected and said it was going to be a simulated forced landing. Some anonymous person on the radio replied with "that's better".

I haven't done a forced landing for a long while, and I hadn't used a forward slip in a long while. I cramped the runway, decided to not use a forward slip, but had lots of runway. I landed past the mid-way point so I would have failed on a flight test, but it was a decent landing.

We had a good chat after the flight, and had a few suggestions to improve the flare and landings.

Time: 0.7
Landings: 6

Need to work on:

• Re-familiarize with forward slips
• My flare tends to be a bit late, and therefore a bit rushed. Try doing it earlier and with a more gentle rotation.
• Anticipate the touchdown, and slowly keep pulling the nose up, rather than start dropping and then pulling the nose up to arrest it.

Solo Circuits - October 13

Partway through the day (today is Canadian Thanksgiving) I checked the flight school's booking system, and saw that there was both instructor and aircraft availability. So I phoned them up, made a booking, and went flying.

Another great day - minimal wind, very high ceilings, fall colours, and only a few thermals.

Two circuits with David, as warm-up and check ride. Very busy... when I did my full stop to let David off there were three aircraft behind me also doing a full stop.

Today's (self-set) objectives:

• Circuits are to be crisp - fly the rectangle, don't blast through circuit altitude on the climb out, maintain altitude in the circuit regardless of what else is happening (radio, pre-landing checklist, etc).
• Practice the flare and touchdown - know there is going to be float, be patient, do not balloon, do not bounce.

In all, I was better today than yesterday.

• Circuit headings were crisp,
• Altitudes were tracked (within 50' - need to get a bit better),
• I blew through circuit altitude only a few times, and in only a minor fashion,
• Did a runway change... I was on base for runway 28 at 1100, and the aircraft departing radioed and noted that the windsock was slightly favouring runway 10 - so I did a radio call declaring crosswind for runway 10, climbed up to circuit altitude and continued,
• On two final approaches I let my speed bleed to 50 knots before putting in some horses - stall is 34kt so there was no danger, but the CFI-mandated airspeed is 60kt,
• Saw the numbers tracking up/down the windshield much easier. Seeing the peripheral things is an indicator of higher available bandwidth, which in turn is an indicator that it is taking fewer cycles to do the basics.
• Flared at a lower height (yesterday I overly-cautious and much too high),
• Was gentle with pulling back the stick, didn't rotate through cruise to nose up (OK, I think there was one balloon),
• Flew for a long time in ground effect - several times - waiting for speed to bleed. Was patient,
• Was better at getting down earlier, working for as close to the threshold as possible, thus maximizing the remaining runway,
• I was feeling the descent better - that first post-flare sinking movement when the airplane signals it wants to go down, and which is the time when you start to pull the stick back to control the rate of descent. If you're too slow in recognizing this movement then it will likely be a hard(er) landing.

With the exception of one greaser of a landing (which was right of centre, alas), the remaining landings involved a few bounces, no scary drops, some gentle nose-ups to manage the descent rate, and a few where I got the nose up too fast and then ballooned. Landings were not pretty, but none were scary, all were comfortably on the mains, with minimal or no yaw, and all were on or near the centre line.

I had one approach where I was slow to idle the engine and get the flaps out, and so I called an overshoot rather than doing a salvage. On another I was also slow to get down, but when I was plenty high I put in a forward slip and landed only a little bit long.

As I was climbing out on one of the later circuits, I noticed that I had to think through my radio calls or else I was going to verbally stumble, an indicator of getting tired. I was thinking full stop, but traffic got on my tail so I did a touch&go, then did my full stop on the next circuit.

Next objectives:

• Maintain the crispness in the circuit
• Keep working on gentle flares - rotate to cruise only
• ** When the aircraft starts to sink, gently pull the nose up - no balloons!

Time: 0.4 dual, 1.3 solo
Landings: 2 dual, 11 solo, 1 overshoot

Fall colours - September 29

What can you write about circuits when you've been flying them for what seems forever?

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

Needs work

• 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.

Crosswinds - September 18

I had booked three hours of flying this morning. based on progress, if things went well, today could have moved into a check ride and solo.

When waking up this morning I didn't feel sharp. Sleep has been disrupted all week, and the schedule is busy so I didn't make it to the gym.

Arrived at the flight school plenty early. Pushed out airplanes, added some oil, checked the weather, and pre-flighted the airplane. Paid special attention to the checklists since I wasn't feeling perky. - That's what checklists are for - to make sure things get done without relying on the brain to remember.

Weather

Flying was booked from 8-11am, 12-15Z.

METAR CYOW 181300Z 35010G17KT 15SM FEW020 BKN050 09/04 A3036 RMK CU1SC6 SLP283=
METAR CYOW 181200Z 35013KT 15SM FEW016 BKN050 BKN070 09/05 A3033 RMK CF1SC5AC1 SLP273=

350 True is 80 degrees to the right of runway 28 (280 Magnetic), or effectily a direct crosswind. 10 knots, gusting to 17 knots, aside from being a strong gust, was going to be interesting since the maximum crosswind component for landing this airplane is 20 knots.

Flight

During taxi the weather-vaning was serious, and I had full rudder and often a touch on the brakes, to stay on the centre line for the backtrack.

Takeoff was smooth, including a touch of left rudder (normally you need a bunch of right rudder as you apply power).

As soon as we got airborne I had a 20 degree crab into the wind to stay on runway heading.

And we were bouncing all over the place - the air was very unstable, especially for early in the day.

Flying was fine. My first downwind was a bit far from the runway since the wind had blown me south on the crosswind leg. I corrected on the subsequent circuits.

Tracking on final was difficult. I had right aileron and left rudder applied, and was still drifting somewhat left. On the first landing I did an overshoot since I was well left of the centre line, to the point of being too close to the edge of the runway.

To handle a crosswind landing one uses a side slip, with the aileron (the stick) into the wind. This generates a slow gentle turn into the wind, at the same time that the wind is blowing you back. Done correctly, the two cancel out and your ground track is straight to the runway. Because you have right aileron the nose of the airplane will be off to the right, which you correct with left rudder.

Today we had gusting crosswinds, mechanical turbulence close to the threshold of 28, and a few interesting wind shears (airspeed suddenly dropping from 60 knots to 40 knots, with a stall speed of 34 knots, can be exciting). All in all, this taxed my limited experience in handling crosswinds.

It was good to practice, since I hadn't seen much crosswind lately. But the landings were all hectic. I got better as the lesson progressed, and even landed on the centre line a few times, but it wasn't worth continuing with the nasty gusts.

And there is no way that a rookie student should fly solo in those gusts.

Things done well:

• Patience on the landings - even when things are bouncing close to the ground, just working through them and not over-reacting,
• Take-offs - even in the crosswinds,
• Flare, and being patient while waiting for the ground to arrive,
• Reaction time when gusts, or wind-shear, hit.
• Yaw control was acceptable.

Things to improve:

• Crosswind landing - I needed more stick to handle the crosswind, but was reluctant to apply it.

Time: 0.9
Landings: 5

Round and round we go

Son of a gun, it is coming together!!!

The low-level practice, and having patience, is making all the difference. Several dozen (several hundred? it seems that way) landings ago I was alarmed at seeing the ground rushing up at me, and landing was a great big panic. Now it seems to proceed along quite nicely, there is lots of time, I think I know what to do, and there is lots of time to control the aircraft.

Wx was light occasional rain, ceiling variable between 1200 and 1500 feet above ground level. Several aircraft in the circuit.

Today's first takeoff was one of my best. Tracking the centre line dead-on. Rotate the nose, and let the plane fly when it is ready. I had been doing some reading, and the suggestion was to get the nose up and keep accelerating down the runway - the plane will fly when it is ready. It works! And is very smooth.

Circuits good. Some days (when distracted) I blast right through 1000 AGL, or don't track. Today went well.

Had one aircraft arriving from the north, crossing over the airport and joining the mid-left downwind. He announced as being over the airport as I was coming in on the downwind (having stayed in the circuit after takeoff), we I couldn't see him, and we were both closing in on the join between the downwind and the mid-left entry point. This is no time to keep sky-searching, so I called a 360 and did an orbit, then re-joined the downwind. Unfortunately I ended up doing the downwind rather close to the airport, but still shed the altitude by getting out the boards, getting the speed down to 60 knots (best L/D is 73 knots), and had a glide right in to the touch&go. Instructor approved the decisiveness when faced with the uncertain position of the closing aircraft.

I landed on the centre line a few times, greased a few landings, but had a few mild bounces.

On one landing the instructor added some right rudder to counter-act yaw, and there was another realization.... I didn't think the aircraft needed any rudder, when what actually happened was that I didn't need to add any rudder because it was being added for me. So we did the remaining 5-6 circuits with a running commentary from me.. I just talked about what I was seeing, what I was doing about it, so the instructor could determine what I wasn't doing, and what I wasn't doing yet. That way, he could determine what I was missing (and apply correction to keep us safe and minimize the wear&tear on the aircraft), and avoided having him try to guess what needed to be done (when maybe I just hadn't done it yet).

One uglier landing: I flared through cruise and into nose-up, gained some altitude, and applied a tiny bit of power since the aircraft needed the energy to have a gentle descent. Unfortunately, it needed a slightly bigger nudge of power. As we were coming down I just gave it more and more nose-up, the timing was decent, and so the landing was a bit harder, and no bounce.

Easiest and nicest landings were ones where I carried lots of altitude and eased the power to idle, then just glided in to a landing.

A few times I carried some altitude to the threshold and then eased off, had the altitude to handle the power cut, solidify the new attitude and flare through the landing.

I had one landing where I eased off the power while rotating through the flare - and that worked not too badly. Must practice that some more - there will be landings where you need to add power to get to the runway, and then have to ease off the throttle at a low altitude and low speed.

I did one landing where I started the flare comfortably high, but it was nice and slow, and that was a good landing. Landing is a good time to not rush things.

For the final landing I suggested a simulated forced landing at the airport. Chopped power, pointed at the threshold, traded airspeed for altitude, got to best cruise, did the cause check (oh my, throttle is at idle), had lots of altitude so went to full flaps, then kicked in a forward slip and rode that down from 1100AGL down to 200AGL. We crossed the threshold perhaps 300 feet AGL, lined up with the runway, smoothly removed the slip, and glided in to a decent landing.

Landings: 8
Time: 1.2

I'm buzzed. It is coming together.

Every day should be like this - Aug 6

Arrived at CYRP at 5:50 for tonight's lesson. Regardless of the weather, tonight was going to include lots of preparatory work.

We sat in the FBO cafeteria for 40 minutes and reviewed stalls, spins, spirals, emergency procedures, forced landings and lots of other bookwork. While a nasty thunderstorm cell rolled right over the airport and pelted us with rain for 30 minutes. After the book learning was complete, we looked out the window to find blue sky with the odd cu.

Preflight, and off we went.

Takeoff was right down the centre line. Nailed 2,000' right on the money, and maintained, while flying to the practice area, then climbed to 3500'.

Stalls... put the Eclipse into a stall, kept the stick hard back and worked the rudder pedals to prevent falling off to one side into an incipient spin. My previous record (in 2006) was 4 seconds, today I maintained 15+ seconds while losing 1100 feet of altitude, before falling off to the right, where I recovered the spin. Climbed back up to 3500', did a second stall which I recovered right away by lowering the nose and adding throttle.

Spiral Dive... Are routine to recover, the trick is to recognize a spiral dive quickly and recover before Vne (Never Exceed). Flying past Vne is test pilot territory.

Climb back up, and get into Slow Flight. A couple of gentle turns, maintain altitude.

Back towards CYRP, dropping from 3000' to 1400' using a forward slip, radio calls leaving the practice area and joining airport traffic, cross over the airport and join the mid-left downwind.

Final approach was on rails. Just after a major storm goes through the air is quite stable, and the wind for runway 28 was from 300 and slow - maybe 5 kt - so little crosswind effort and no mechanical turbulence. I chopped power at about 600' and glided it right to the landing. Rotate, and a good landing (especially for the first one of the lesson). Flare was slightly higher than it should have been, so it was accompanied by a slow rotation. No bounce, little yaw, and just to the left of the centre line. Touch&go.

Second landing. Final was on rails. Flare a bit lower. Power was at 1200 RPM until I chopped it before flare. Decent landing. Just to the right of centre line. Touch&go.

Third landing we did a simulated engine failure forced landing at the airport. I conserved lots of energy to the runway, but forgot to do the Cause Check. We were at about 40', at 65kt, and a third down the runway when I called Overshoot, throttled up and did a proper overshoot. If I had no engine I could have used a slip to get rid of the altitude and speed, and could have got it down. Or landed without the slip and stood on the brakes. Or both. But I proved I could make it to the runway and knew how to get it down, no need to do anything extreme on a simulated engine failure. Especially as a student, and at low altitude.

Fourth landing was also a simulated engine failure, forced landing at the airport. While flying to the threshold I put in a forward slip and shed 200', then glided to a decent flare and touchdown. Again, I ensured I comfortably made the runway (28 is notorious for sink approaching the threshold), so touchdown was a distance down the runway. Touch&go would have been possible but edgy (and a major issue if there was power failure during the takeoff roll), so I backtracked, worked the pre-takeoff checklist (see yesterday's blog), and did a takeoff right down the centre line.

Fifth landing was a normal full stop. Final on the rails (man, I love smooth air!), a smidgen to the right of centre, with a flare that was a touch high.... but lots of back elevator made it reasonable.

Time: 1.1
Landings: 5

What I did well:

• Final approach was on the rails
• Landing on the centre line
• Minimal yaw
• Forced landings (airport)
• Slips

What I could do better

• Flaring closer to the ground... but today was markedly better than previous.

Next flight:

• Checkride with the Chief Flight Instructor (CFI) Sunday @ 1400. And depending on her assessment.....

Circuits! Quelle surprise! Aug 3

Flying 12-14. The day started off with stratus at 1400' (OVC014), then the cloud cover lifted a few hundred feet and broke up by the time of my lesson. I was looking at light winds from the north (right side of the runway), broken CU, and isolated rain showers.

My goals for the day:

1. Better manage my airspeed throughout the circuit, especially on short final and the flare,
2. Smooth final,
3. Nice flare and landing.

Summary: 1 was good, 2 is coming along, and I made progress on 3.

Taxi, radio, checklists, and take-off (including tracking the centre line during the take-off ) were all good.

But I didn't feel sharp. Altitude tracking wasn't precise at the start, then I decided to start putting in the extra effort and nailing the numbers and by the latter part of the lesson I was doing much better.

One thing I did much better was throttle management... I noticed I was just parking it at a certain RPM and driving the aircraft with the controls. Aircraft move in four dimensions (airspeed being the fourth), and today I was much much better with gently nudging the throttle. I've never adjusted the throttle as much as I did today.

But I had to be active on the throttle.... the usual updrafts and downdrafts at the end of 28 were out in full force today. During one approach I was on short final maybe 100' AGL and the aircraft just started sinking. I added about 800rpm and flattened out the slope, then throttled down and settled onto the runway.

Another linkage: If doing a forced landing, aim for the threshold and make sure you make it. Don't be afraid of erring on the the high side. With all the surprise sink I saw today, if I didn't have an engine I could not have glided to the runway.

Landings were generally OK. No high-altitude drops, one small bounce, a few normal-ish landings and two that were quite acceptable. And two rejected landings.

On one of the first landings I first encountered the really aggressive sink off the end of the runway, added throttle and continued the landing. I kept accelerating down so I kept adding throttle and nudging the nose up. Time to get out of Dodge - I ended up flaring, punching up full power, touching down the mains surprisingly gently, and then climbing out on full flaps. I leveled and accelerated in level flight, then nose up and positive rate of climb, went to take-off flaps and then climbed out.

After three landings I had the instructor do the landing, and I just watched the perspective so I could judge altitude. I was starting the flare way too high. My subsequent landings were much better.

Time: 1.6
Landings: 9

What I did well:

• Sharpened up. Perhaps due to the layoff I wasn't crisp. I recognized it, and put in the extra effort to fly with precision. It got better,
• Maintain 1000' AAE right to the corner of turning base. Sometimes I've dropped 50-100' just before the turn. I think this comes from the confidence that I can shed the altitude (throttle, flaps, and - if need be - a slip), and so I'm not jumping the gun on getting it down,
• Overshoots and rejected landings. If you're going to reject the landing, don't be afraid to make the decision - and once you decide then don't change your mind,
• Side-slips and forward-slips. Using these routinely now,
• Throttle management. I have never been as active on the throttle as I was today. And I wasn't just punching in a lot of RPM and then create a speed-shedding problem - there were lots of small increments,
• Final approach is getting smoother. Smaller adjustments, no pendulums, but not yet slick.

Needs improvement:

• No yaw on landing,
• Smother final,
• Don't flare so high (although I got better after I asked the instructor to demonstrate).

I'm flying again tomorrow (Monday) and Wednesday, then I have a lesson booked with the CFI on Sunday. I may solo that day... and if I'm not ready it is no big deal, as it will be good to fly with a different instructor and get some different feedback.

Debrief with instructor: I'm not doing anything which is unsafe, my situational awareness is excellent, speed management is excellent, and I've pretty much assembled all the tools I need to fly solo. What I need to do now is continue to work on putting it all together.

A beautiful night for flying - July 25

Lesson planned for 7-9pm. The day had very well-formed cum throughout the entire area, so I was expecting that we might have a bumpy flight. However, when I got to the school at 18:30 most had dissipated. Winds from 200 at about 10kt when we started, but they died down as the lesson progressed, so I notched both routine and crosswind landings.

More circuits. Various instructors have told me that this is the most boring phase of learning to fly - doing laps around the circuit, scrubbing rubber off the tires and squishing bugs, taking ~6-8 minutes of flying to get 30 seconds of final approach experience and 8 seconds of landing.

I'm trying to counter the boredom by developing precision in the rest of the circuit. Hit 1000' AAE exactly on the climb out, no banks more than 30 degrees, track altitudes exactly, crisp radio calls, fly the circuit at 90 degree angles with accommodation for the wind, work the checklists exactly from the checklists themselves (often, when you look down to read a checklist, the plane wanders from the intended path).

Approaches are getting better. They are not there yet, but there is much less of the wild pendulum stuff as I work down final. My goal is to get her coming down on rails.

Speed management in the circuit and on final remains good.

My angle of descent isn't right. I tend to start out high, fly in with a steeper angle of descent with the engine at near-idle, and then when it comes time to flare my speed erodes quickly because I need to arrest a steeper angle of descent.

Part of the problem is that it's just tough the get the very slippery Eclipse down from 1000' AAE (the altitude when turning from downwind to base) down to the right height in time for the turn to final. Absolutely essential is shedding speed in the last stage of the downwind before turning base, from about 115kt to 60-70 kt, and getting the flaps from cruise to take-off. Today I tried getting the speed down to 60 kt, and flaps to landing, while maintaining altitude and before the base turn. It helped - I was lower when turning final, so I could keep in a bit of engine, and have a lower angle of approach.

Sometimes still some yaw while touching down.

Touchdowns have all been on the mains. Nosewheel landings are a Really Bad Thing - not only is it hard on the nosewheel - which is not intended to take that weight - but you can have a prop strike.

Today I noticed that when the nosewheel touched down it was chattering, so I kept the plane on the ground but lifted the nosewheel, then touched it down again. My control touch is getting finer, and landing expertise is growing so I have the bandwidth to be aware that things like this are happening, and how to fix them.

Did 5 landings initially - the first one had a nasty bounce, two were not bad, two were somewhat OK, none were pendulums or scary. None had a slick final approach, but we were not dancing about the centre line. For too many of them I turned from base to final in a pear-shaped turn, so I had to come back to the centre-line extended. Must work on that.

When landing you pull the stick back, then further back, to keep the plane (hopefully barely) off the ground as long as possible. It is always a Bad Thing to push the stick forward, as you can easily end up nose down (see prop strike). The trick is to not pull the stick to far back too quickly or else you will balloon and be a good height off the runway at a slow&decaying speed (handle it by adding a smidgeon of power, then coming in and flaring again). No stick pushes today.

There is another subtle change - my instructor has a set of objectives for each lesson, but I have influence on that list and can expand or modify it. It's more of a learning partnership, than master/student. Two lessons ago he demonstrated two forced landings at the airfield. Forced landings require shedding a lot of altitude in a hurry, so I suggested we head north to the practice area, practice entering forward slips (I've done lots of recent side slips, but am rusty on entering a forward slip), then come back and do some forced landings. He agrees, and so off we went, practiced left and right slips, came back, and did three forced landings (see next blog entry).

One more circuit, the ninth landing was surprisingly good but with a bit of yaw, off to the apron, run-up, shut down, and put it in the hanger.

Time: 1.5 hours
Landings: 9 (including three simulated forced at the airport)

What went well:

• Using the circuit to be productive practice time, not just looping around time
• Take-offs - of the 9 take-offs, 7 were good, one had tracking problems (on the left side of the runway), and on one I pulled up too aggressively and kicked off the stall horn. Since starting to work on making the take-offs slick there has been big improvement, now I want to be perfectly on the centre line every time.
• Forced landings
• Forward slips
• Side slips
• Taxi, radio, checklists, lookouts, stable flight, climbing turns, etc.

What needs work:

• Turns from base to final - need to roll out on the centre line, not past it
• Smooth final - there is less pendulum, but it isn't there yet
• Speed management during flare
• I want to end up in cruise over the runway at a lower altitude - this should come with less fear of the ground
• Landing it not just near the centre area of the runway, but on the centre line.