Had a corker of a hangover this morning, you know when you go out and say to yourself “right I’ll only have a couple then stop, or I’ll regret it tomorrow”. Well I said that and it didn’t work. Any hows, getting back to my diary.
This lesson was an extension to the previous one, and I am building up slow flight time nicely. We done some more stalls, and learned different methods of recovery, like nose down, reach 60kts and no power, then the same but with power. On one of the recovery procedures, I shot the control column forward too fast and the aircraft leapt forward (great who needs a diet when you can lose 10 stone in 2 seconds?), the problem I was having was that because an immense amount of back pressure is required to keep the nose up attitude, there is always a constant pressure forwards, so when recovering, you don’t need to apply too much forward pressure, you simply control the natural force of the controls wanting to go forward, in a controlled manner. So onto full power, 60kts, wings level, back into the climb.
One thing that was more difficult to overcome was the fact that the yolk has to remain centred as much as possible, as not to induce too much angle of attack on one wing – so even if there is a slight roll as a result of the stall, I still have to keep the controls centred as much as possible – I recall from the flying training manual that roll can actually occur in the opposite direction to that of the controls in a stall attitude. One thing also today that we covered, was a spiral descent – fantastic manoeuvre to say the least. This involves banking to a high bank angle (at first I was thinking, surely this type of aircraft cant handle a bank this big) and letting the nose drop, then, to stop the nose dropping, applying back pressure – this makes the airspeed SOAR away bloody quick, I couldn’t believe how fast that needle shot round the dial – so as demonstrated, the power comes off, wings go level, nose up, power back on. I also performed it without removing the power, simply by rolling the wings level before pitching up, then straight into a climb to knock the airspeed off. I don’t know about any of you people, it may kind sound of sad, but I love a good high G feeling, its truly amazing.
I have started to develop my own external checks. The order of my checks roughly goes as follows (I wont include everything here for obvious reasons): firstly, master on with anti collision lights, pitot heat and landing light. Then outside to check these work, as well as the stall warning buzzer. Once happy, master off then to carry on with the rest of the checks. I use the fuel drainer to check the fuel etc and that from the engine, also looking into the tanks. Then I move onto the engine, looking under both cowlings. After this, I then go onto the surfaces, control surfaces, flaps, undercarriage etc. I find that doing it this way is better as it helps me to remember them in a more logical way. The order in the checklist seems a bit odd. I know this is ok, as long as I don’t miss anything out (as my instructor rightly said) so I still carry the checklist with me, and go over every item to make sure I haven’t missed anything out.
I must confess that I got a little carried away today. I was still on a high from yesterday and I think I went through my internal checks a little quick. I missed the door latch and seemed to be racing ahead, missing a couple of things out like checking left and right magnetos. So after I settled down a little I was ok. Again, the RT is coming along nicely, one thing I am trying to remember is that I should only abbreviate my call sign once ATC has done so. It’s great as my instructor is allowing me, I’d say 90% of the radio usage – it just makes the lesson a lot more satisfying when it goes right. I’ve written down a couple of the major calls, like when first contacting tower/approach. Giving position reports and intentions – I read these to myself when I drive, each time changing words (i.e. for different locations etc) and it don’t half sink in quick – its great.
Gonna start reading the human performance book, not to chase the exam, but purely as a progression thing.
Cheers
Lee
