SkiSista

For the bits about how you are asked to describe the weather amongst your family and also how you are becoming known to your friends as the "aviator" if you like. Just a friendly joke :ok:



Lee :8

Hi Kaptain Karl,

I had a look through avsim and flightsim and the only Robin that seems to be available is a HR400. This post heres seems to support this http://www.visualflight.co.uk/forums...?TOPIC_ID=1851

If you are still interested in getting a HR400 (which apprently is similar) try going here:

http://library.avsim.net/download.php?DLID=22485
http://library.avsim.net/download.php?DLID=42704


This is the best model by the looks of it is one and was developed for FS2002 and then adapted for 2004. You ill need to get both files to get it to run well on FS2004. Any probs, please give me a shout!

Fingers

Lol, no worries Mazzy....

Was a bit sleep-deprived when reading that post, brain checked out last night in Air Law and hasn't come back yet.... ;)

(How many lessons do we have to spend flipping thru the AIP to find the right section because someone made a typo on the handout....? argggh......)

Geez Sunfish, you're game doing X winds in that kind of weather, I have to say I'm a bit more timid (usually)

Though my driving has been getting worse.... does that mean I'm a pilot yet? :E

Sky

PS - Yup Mazzy, it's gotten so a particular friend of mine, when we are at a party or whatever, will be in the background talking and will say things like "Cessna", "black box", "...it flew right overhead..." to see if he can get me to turn around and see what the convo is about.... ratbag!!!! :p

Thats awful being teased like that, although can see it would be quite funny! Best thing to do is to take one of them flying when you get your license and then, when safe to do so pretend to faint at the controls :E very irresponsible and dangerous I know - but could you ever imagine the look on their face? Makes me laugh just thinking about it :E

Yours,

the evil one :D

Yes!!! Have been thinking evil thoughts of that type, this friend is just asking for it!!!! :E :E :E

Was thinking more of waiting till I can get an aerobatics rating, flying along nice and easy, then doing a sudden wing drop or stall turn or similar (with prior approval of course!) and scaring the daylights out of him!

Can guarantee no more teasing!! ;)

But the fainting idea is priceless!!! :ok: It'd be great to get ATC in on the trick too but I suppose that'd be illegal.....

Sky

Jesus wept - that would be truly priceless - I would pay to see something like that, however, as you said, it would probably be illegal - but who needs ATC? I am sure the initial event would be frightening enough!! :E

Oh I am sure it would be, but a transmission of "passenger in XYZ callsign, if you can hear us, it seems your pilot is incapacitated, you may have to land yourself...." would really ratchet up the suspense :E

But, definitely illegal (not to mention worrying for everyone else in the circuit....!

Back on topic - how's the flying going Sunfish? Mazzy? Hog? etc etc ;)

Sky

Hour 11
 

Wasnt it such a crappy weather system this morning? Nothing but pelting rain and low stratus cloud all over the place. Well, I was pretty sure my flight would be cancelled, but as it was later in the afternoon, thought I would hang out and see. As it turns out, I got a phonecall asking if I could go any earlier - so off I was.

Turned up to nice blue sky and high cloud base, but again, quite gusty wind. Today was more stalling. We done stalls in the turn, stalls with flaps and stalls at full power. The stall with the turn was an interesting one, because depending on the way your are turning there is a different method of recover. For example, when stalling to the left, the aircraft wants to yaw to the left when you apply full power (slipstream effect), so you need a good amount of right rudder, or you will end up in a spirl descent, the airspeed will shoot up and you lose height very quick. Wait for the airspeed to reach 60, level wings then begin the climb. Pretty much the same for the right turn stall, but dont need as much, if any, left rudder, as the aircraft naturally yaws to the left.

One thing I will bear in mind, is that it is essential to keep the controls as level as possible and not be tempted to roll out of the turn on stall. This can cause a sudden wing drop and even worsen the roll already induced. The way to do it is by relieving back pressure, unstalliung the wings, applying full power also, THEN roll the wings level, then begin the climb.

Stalling with full flaps was a scary reminder/example of how an aircraft can stall without you knowing it as well as without flaps. When full flap is extended, the nose needs to be kept a lot lower, as the aircraft reaches the stall. It is quite scary as to how low the nose has to be, and still make a stall. I suppose this may catch you out when in final approach, a stall here would be pretty dangerous.

It was amazing the amount of crab we had to use to compensate for the drift due to the strong wind, when heading for a particular area, we found ourselves pointing at least 30 degrees to the right, in order to achieve the correct ground track. Upon turning downwind, the aircraft accelarated pretty quick, and this was easily noticed as we were close to the ground - quite a fantastic experience.

It wa snow time for a flapless approach. Instead of the 70kt nose low attitude, it was an 80kt shallow approach. This is quite significantly different to that of a full flap approach as the nose is a lot higher, and you are a lot closer to the ground for most of the approach. I canimagine it would take some practice to be able to perform different landing configurations on different days (hence circuit training!!). The landing seemed a lot more smoother - this may have been because of the more reactive controls due to the higher airspeed, and even the propwash producing the kinetic energy towards the wings, giving greater lift and handling.

All in all another superb lesson - I am learning so much the I never thought I could - and it is all slowly sinking into place. All the previous lessons are now being put into one; "the circuit".
Next lesson I will be doing quite a few circuits, so I will let you know how I get on with them.

Safe flights,

Lee :ok:

Went out again on Saturday for some more circuits. Did about four with Richard and then I did another two on my own.

There was this guy flying a 172 who was going all over the place, both taxiing and in the air. This brought to mind two things:

1) Thats what I must have looked like three weeks ago.

2) Instructors (at lest here) are engaged in "experiential learning" in other words they let us keep screwing things up and stop us just short of killing ourselves or damaging the airplane.

Case in point was Richard springing a go-around on me at 200 feet. Muggins here decided to raise flap from 30 to 20 BEFORE applying full power - mistake number one. We sank about 100 feet because , not content with raising the flap 10 degrees, I inadvertantly pushed the swiitch all the way up and the flaps merrily retracted completely! - Mistake number two.

You need to watch the flap switch on some 150's as there are two separate types. One has the type with a set of detents for 10,20,30 and 40 flaps with an indicator next to it.

The other has a separate indicator at eye height on the left front strut and a three position switch. There is a spring loaded flaps down position and middle neutral position and a fixed - not spring loaded, flaps up position. So if you select flaps up and don't return it to the centre the flaps will continue going up. I've done this twice now and I have to watch it.

Learning from mistakes
 

Sunfish, these are all good mistakes to make (if you know what I mean) because you have learned not to do it again! Learning by experience, i.e. learning by our mistakes, personally I think is the best way to learn something practical. When I am flying and I forget to do something or I do something wrong, like leave the landing lights on too long, I will consciously remember this for the next flight and make myself do it, so as to not make the same mistake twice. I suppose more bigger mistakes that might give you a bit of a fright, will stay with you longer!

Keep up the good work,

Lee :ok:

Hi all,

Sunfish - belated congratulations on going solo!

Interesting experiences with the flaps! Now I'm glad the PA28 has a nice simple lever - even if I do struggle to reach it!

I had a good lesson yesterday too. 0900 cloud base was about 500', but sat in the club lounge drinking coffee with students and instructors - interesting chat about the likelihood of surviving ditching in the channel - before the base had risen to 900' and began to break. Apparently it's quite difficult to get a liferaft out of a light plane once ditched - we concluded the best chance was an immersion suit.

Nice load of circuits, but with a different instructor from my usual one (who was doing far more exciting things with a X country student). Began to sort my landings. Interesting how, if you're just not quite getting something, flying with a different instructor for a lesson can help and they all seem to focus on different things. Sure I'll get solo soon???

Keep it up folks!

HH

Can i just say, this is a really good idea mazzy. I'm in the finishing stages noow, but did some revision on stalls and such that u were talking about. Even did a wing drop, I swear the door was parallel to the ground!! :yuk: NOT a good situation to be in knowing how cessna's love to occasionally open their own doors..
Great day today, come on friday :ok:
FFW

I think Cessna have fixed the door problem now, no cause for alarm.. sorry

Fortunately, a Cessna door came open during my training.

So, when I took my first passenger for a ride and their door came open I'd had experience of this and wasn't worried and was perfectly happy just reaching across and shutting it and explaining that the door was just to keep the draught off, the seat belt was what stopped them falling out.

Same ere! My first wingdrop went something like that - it was not an induced one so it went a little quicker. I'm not sure really but, I think that an induced wing drop doesnt happen as fast as one that is accidental - whether this is because when you induce one yourself, you are expecting it, I am not sure. Perhaps those who know about this can explain, as I am guessing!

Goodnight

Lee

Gertrude
Im imagining the look on their face! lmao. Been lucky so far, my greatest worry is losing something important, like my checklist. It would be good to put that in the training syllabus, kinda like stalls, no biggy but 'be prepared'

mazzy
My FI kept saying 'make sure you're balanced, keep that ball centred'. If you're not paying attention when practicing then it can kinda sneak up on you :eek: I know what you mean though, like watching a pot boil. I guess the whole point is to not forget that a lot can happen in 5 minutes.

You know, I feel like reading up on stalls and lateral stability...
FFW

Hi guys! Couldn\'t let this slip off the first page so I thought I\'d bump it up.
Haven\'t been doing too much flying recently due to a lack of funds but I did an hours PFLs last week. I\'m having real difficulty judging the glide angle and keep ending up too low or too high in the final stages. Oh well, practice makes perfect. 34 hours down - 11 to go......
Congrats to those who deserve it and good luck to everyone else! :ok:

Bit late now, but... Mazzy, your cr@ppy weather on Friday was exactly what I was hoping for. When you've done your PPL and got a bit of experience do an IMC rating (I did mine when I had about 70 hours total) - it's great fun, really it is... I went to Cranfield and did an ILS, then back to Kidlington for the NDB approach. If you've flown ILS's on Flight Sim you'll know how hard it is (and harder in real life as the weather is much less predictable!) but very satisfying.

I'd have done the flight on Friday anyway with foggles on if the weather had been good (it was a refresher with an instructor) but real bad weather was fantastic. We were popping in and out of the tops of the clouds at FL50 - beautiful. And there's nothing in flying quite as beautiful as the sight of the runway lights glimmering at you from the gloom as you break cloud at 650ft above the runway...

Good luck with it all - brings back so many happy memories...!

Tim

took my airlaw this morning...gulp! Shoudl get results on tuesday!fingers and toes crossed! :ugh:

Strange feeling........
 

On Sunday morning I arrived at the airfield, only to see that it was quite misty. I came from north of the airfield, where it was clear as I set off, so I was hoping the mist would dissipate soon, however, there was no wind and it was very calm. I was due to sit my human performance exam after the flight, which was booked for 1030, so instead I sat it first, in the hope that in the given time the mist would clear. I have to say that the exam was very easy indeed, by far easier than any of the others - but this is only because I studied well for it, like any of the exams - anyone can pass them with a good deal of study beforehand.

Anyway, the exam took 10 mins, so that wasnt really a lot of time to allow the weather to clear, and as it turns out I didnt end up flying. The thing is though, we would normally sit down with a cup of tea for a while and just wait, but there was another student after me so we couldnt delay things. Whilst driving home, the weather was perfect (driving back north) and I was soooo gutted not to be flying, only thinking that if I had booked the lesson for maybe 1130 instead, I would have been up there. I am not complaining of course, these things are done for a reason, but the worst feeling of dissapointment doesnt half set you up for a bad day! Sorry, I am just whinginmg now, I will get back to my pram :D

Phew - passed! :D

well done
 

Airlaw was good reading material. I recommend it for insomniacs. :E It's a shame they had you wait that long though, I'm got all my results straight after. Which one are you going for next?

No, mazzy, you're not whinging (much ;) ) j/k.... if I had gone to go flying, and couldn't I'd be so disappointed too! Never mind you can 'go another day', it's always not quite as good as going 'today', is it?

(The fact that my chosen airport is a 50min+ drive doesn't help either.....

Congrats Fingers!!! Airlaw is okay I suppose, although it does get a little weird doing Nav., Met., & AGK at the same time.... I keep sitting in class listening to the instructor, going "Hmmmm...... I seem to have heard this somewhere before....." :D

We are starting Human factors in December. I have to say, it's one of my favorites because a) most of it is common sense and b) I find it really easy, as have done a unit on it in high school! ;)

Sky

Thanks guys! Ive now passed Human Factors and Air Law. Human factors was interesting stuff and certianly the easier of the two! Im planning to do Met next followed by Nav. Sound like a good plan?

If you are doing the examsn at the same time as flying I might suggest you do Nav first. That we it frees you up to actually fly some nav. That said, if you are still bashing the circuit may as well stick to Met first. Just my two GB pennies.

Thanks C-Bert. Now ive got passed airlaw and Human Factors I can solo. The plan is to do that hopefully withinin 2/3 hours (not flown for a while so need to get back into the swing of things!) and then will probably be circuit bashing for a few hours after that 2 I expect. Think I will get Met out of the way and then concentrate on Nav when Im going to be using it practically in the air - apparently makes much more sense then!

Sounds like a plan...:)

I have just returned with Beth from having an "incident". I now have a large glass of wine in front of me even though its only mid-afternoon.

I'm just finishing up some lessons before taking the general flight proficiency test. Today we left the playpen of the circuit and flew to the aero club's country airstrip to practice precautionary landings as well as an introduction to gravel strips and short takeoffs and landings.

Beth demonstrates the precautionary landing procedure. Inspection upwind at 500 feet, then inspection upwind at 200 feet, then climb back to 500 feet and do a short field landing which involves selecting 40 degrees flap for the last stage of the approach.

So she does a beautiful demonstration and does a touch and go. Full power, flaps up and around again for my turn to have a go.

As we accelerated down the runway I was thinking "Gee this gravel really drags us back, we aren't accelerating very fast, I must remember that."

So we get airborne at about 50 knots which is correct for a short takeoff in a C150. I'm watching a big tree in front of me and a set of major power pylons on the hill in front of us getting bigger - only they are not going "down" the windscreen. They are just getting bigger.

After a second or two I realise something is very wrong, and for some reason I turn and check the flaps - and the flaps are still all the way down!!!. I check the switch which is in the "full up" position - flap malfunction.

I tell Beth we are in trouble and a few seconds later we get a call from the CFI who was watching us asking if we meant to take off with full flaps (Beth says No). Then he asks if we are in trouble (Beth says yes). She is in full "Aviate" mode to keep this thing flying because it does not want to.

At full power we can barely hold altitude at about 100 feet. We can't clear ANYTHING in front of us. Beth makes a 180 degree turn which we made with the stall warning horn screaming at about 40 - 45 knots - and this is with full power!! The only way she got us round was by accepting a descent - AROUND the tree. We made it across the threshold at about ten feet and dumped it on the runway. Once we turned, we could have dropped it into a paddock if necessary and accepted damage to the aircraft.

After coffee we borrowed another airplane and finished the sequence, then headed for home in our original ship with the flaps up - the CFI had fiddled with the switch and it decided to work enough to get the flaps up. I would have chicken ringed the flaps circuit breaker if I could have, but you can't do it with the old Cessna type. I did however made a solemn promise that if the flaps started moving I would flip the master switch come what may.

We were lucky in a number of ways:

1) We had a very light fuel load.

2) The airplane has a brand new motor and prop thanks to the old prop hitting a concrete kerb and busting everything. I don't think the other C150's would have had the performance to survive.

3) Neither Beth nor I tried to cycle the flap switch. If we had, and they moved, we would have stalled and would now possibly be dead.

4) We had a pure 90 degree crosswind of ten knots so we could land back onto the strip without any wind problems

We landed back at the main airport in an uneventful flaps up landing. Beth has to write this up for the regulators. She earned her pay today. Enough exitement for one day.

I've since learned that Cessna flap switches are notorious, as are electric flap systems in general. The "problem" isnt a problem in normal operation if you think about it, just in a touch and go or a go around.

If we had been at our main airport with a 3000 foot strip we would have twigged to the lack of acceleration and landed ahead no worries.

The switch entices you to "set and forget" but you need to check that the bloody things are doing what you want them to!

Pay attention to Sunfish, all you newbies!!! (inc. me!)
 

:mad: Sunfish! Glad you guys are ok..... 10/10 to Beth (and yourself too if you were as calm as you sounded...!)

Geez well I suppose you were lucky it was while you were flying with an instructor for this - sounds like a two-person job!!! On the bright side, boy are you prepared for that one next time. And we can all learn from that. I am sitting here now writing "Check Flaps AGAIN..." in my book.... :D



:ooh: My goodness, top flying from you two then!!! Glad you're still here.

Have another glass, Sunfish...... ;)

@Sunfish - Makes you think doesn't it?

I had a slight (very slight in comparison) incident yesterday as well. Practicing forced landings with instructor when I notice there is bugger all fuel pressure :ooh: . We switched on the aux fuel pump and up the pressure came *relief all round*. Just to check the problem we tried turning the aux pump off...fuel pressure drops to nothing again. Decided it would be prudent to go home at that point as we didn't want to be practicing a REAL forced landing...

My word Sunfish! What a "I learned about flying from that"experience to have! Very glad to hear your are okay though. Certianly one for me to take note of on my checklist as I fly the C152.

Hi Sunfish, I'm about the same stage as you in my PPL and that sounded extremely dodgy!

One question though, you said that you flew right around the tree at the end, low and slow with full flaps. If you'd managed to get around the obstacle (tree) couldn't you just land ahead there and then?

Cheers,
- Michael

Mmmm,

Sunfish, I'm sure your instructor made carefully thought out decisions, but turning back, very low, with the stall warner going sounds really dodgy to me.

I'll stop moaning about the manual flap lever in the Warrior now!

Was there no suitable field ahead?

HH

No suitable field ahead, you CAN make a low level turn if you have full power as we had. ONce we had turned 180 we could have dumoed it in the paddock easily, but chose to carry on about 100 yeards and dump it on the airstrip.

FingersR, you will find (I think) that the C152 flaps now only go the 30 degrees and apparently this is the reason!! I've since heard anecdotally that this is an "Old" problem, however its not written down anywhere I have found yet.

One bloke confidently said "Yeah I know about the problem so when doing a short field go around or touch and go, I check flaps are moving before applying full power".

A Boeing driver has said that Boeing go around speeds are calculated assuming flaps are full down and won't come up.

I guess the lesson is that if your aircraft won't fly on full flaps and you use them, then if something breakes or jams, you are committed to land.

Thanks for the info Sunfish!

Sunfish - very scary indeed, glad to see you and Beth are ok. Thanks for making that post, it is a good reminder to the rest of us and may even save a few of us having the same problem in the future.

Keep it up peeps

Lee :ok:

Sunfish,

Thanks for clarifying the circumstances. I guess even if there had been a suitable field ahead, there would have been hard choices to make. Important thing is, as Mazzy says, you're both ok and ready to keep piling on the hours.

Useful learning for all of us though.

HH

Flew my practice QXC yesterday. Southampton - Bristol - Exeter and back to SOU. A good trip although I thought £42 to land at Bristol was a bit pricey!
Longest I have flown to date and I got back home absolutely knackered :zzz: It's amazing the level of concentration that can be required but I had a good instructor who kept me buzy. Shame I didn't get to see many of the sights though.
Now I have to do it all on my own...:eek:

RT Oral
 

Whoever said this was easy must have had about 40 hours in training. As you may well be aware from my diary, I am only on 12 hours. I took the all day, one to one RT course, with the well known RT guy :rolleyes: at Liverpool. Let’s just say that the first thing I done when I got home, was go straight out on the ale. What a stressful day.

It started with us going through all the theory, different types of ATSU’s and classifications of airspace etc. This was quite easy as I have studied the reading material a couple of times and was OK with it. This took us right up to about 1400 (we started at 1000). With it being a one-to-one course, I could ask as many questions as I like along the way and this was good because there was never anything that I didn’t understand. So after lunch, we got back and it was decided that we do some practice. I had the northern chart, with a route drawn out on it, which went out of the Liverpool zone and through a MATZ to the south. Seems simple doesn’t it in theory, but when he leaves the room to go next door and you are all on your own, it is only then that all your previous training and knowledge seems to play a vital role. We had a simple two-way intercom device, designed to simulate the real environment, and to be honest, it really does feel real. It is easier however when you have a nice desk in front of you and no aircraft to fly!

Now this is the point where I was struggling. I will detail what I thought was relatively straight forward and what I couldn’t seem to grasp.

Requesting taxi, very straight forward:

1) Who you are talking to
2) Who you are
3) What you want.

No we have established the three ‘W’s. very important indeed. Now at this point it was stressed to ignore the standard phraseology around Liverpool, because usually, when at Kilo requesting taxi, it goes more like this:

Liverpool tower, G-####, is at kilo, with information Charlie (ATIS), QNH1013, ready for departure – or thereabouts with regard to order.

So this meant that requesting taxi was actually less work than I was used to. So after taxi, ready for departure, ATC (I will refer to examiner as ATC from now on) says:

“G-## clearance”

This is my first point of confusion that I seemed to keep screwing up:

“Request clearance G-##”

WRONG! What I was suppose to say is “affirm” or “ready for clearance” or similar, this means that ATC is asking me am I ready to write down all the clearance details. This did slip my mind a few times, but in the end I got it.

Every now and then, ATC would slip in something I wasn’t expecting, like a conditional clearance, which I had done a few of (these are quite regular at Liverpool due to busy traffic). I was ok here, always remember to read back the clearance. This can be an instant fail if you don’t. So now we are airborne, tell ATC you are leaving the zone and request a freq change. Fairly simple, and ATC usually always approve (until the test, the buggar).

Now this is the point that I kept screwing up, and I will tell you why I kept screwing it up later. Ok after a few practice tries, I still didn’t have it in the bag. It was time for the test. Very very nervous indeed, at the thought of failing and having to do it all over again. I think the most important thing for me was the following (which had been established from the start):

Report:

W – who your calling
W – who you are
W – what you want

Another report:

Call sign and type
Departure and destination
Position (overhead ….)
Level
Additional details
Intentions

Another one:

O – overhead
L – level
E – ETA next turning point.

Now with this firmly in mind, back to the test. Left the zone and am approaching a MATZ, so I make the initial call “WWW”. They then ask for my details. This is where it was going wrong. I kept getting confused as to which position report to give? Do I give “OLE”, or the full report? So I kept giving the wrong one and ATC was getting very peeved indeed! I would give the full report twice, maybe not enough and I just couldn’t understand what I was doing.

Let me tell you the very easy method I used to get around this and never make that same mistake again. I simply wrote “1, 2, 3” next to each report. i.e. WWW is one, full report is 2 and OLE is three. THAT’S the order you give to the ATSU/MATZ. When you first make contact, use report number one, when they ask for your details, use report number 2. When they request you to contact them at your next checkpoint, use 3. you only need to give the first and second report ONCE – this establishes that they have your details, so you should now only need to give OLE.

After I realised this, things seemed a lot easier, and I wasn’t making these mistakes any more. The test was a the full works, PAN call, MAYDAY relay, 3 MATZ, 5 turning points, a divert, collect weather from another MATZ, even had to get a True Bearing from another frequency.

To me, this day was a tough one. Lots and lots to take in and mentally tough if you have not had much experience. The thing is, you HAVE to get it right, there is no room for error on the test.

Here’s my two cents worth of advice.

1) When giving a mayday call, or relay, MAKE SURE you give the position, this is the most important part of the call – if you miss that out, you’ve failed. Even if you miss out most of the rest, please remember this.
2) Same for a PAN call.
3) Revise the above, make sure you get the position reports correct and in the right order (like I didn’t at first hehe).
4) Revise what needs reading back and what doest – when confirming landing clearance, don’t read back the weather!
5) Be ready for ATC to throw things in, and listen out. If you don’t understand what is said, request “say again”.
6) Don’t rush to get back to ATC, remember, in reality there could be 20 mins between talking points. Take your time and be clear.
7) Try not to request too many “say again” as I found out. I requested another read back of the landing instructions, and was asked “bloody hell can you read me OK” (or similar words)!
8) Study beforehand, know what you are going to say – in the famous words of Pratt “engage brain before opening mouth”.
9) Don’t forget to change the frequency on the intercom device, ATC will be watching!
10) Have fun.

Having fun is important, although it doesn’t seem like much fun at first, when you get something right, it feels good.

We finished at 1830 – with the words I had wanted to hear “you are successful”. This means that now I can start learning RT – it doesn’t mean I am now a super literate radio operator, it is important to realise this.

Best of luck to anyone who is to take this, and sorry if it seems I am putting you off – just want you to know the necessary points!

Who ever said RT course was easy?

Best regards

Lee



Hour 12

Well, I cant possibly write more here can I – I have already had my share of the pot today, so I will close it with 5 successful circuits with no problems. Got 2 right hand orbits in to give way to Easyjets and made some great approaches.

Safe flying

Lee :ok:

Well done Mazzy.

Now I have loads of experience on both airband and other radio networks (I hold my marine radio cert too), but you've scared the Cr*p out of me!!! Some useful tips in there though. I'm leaving my radio exam until I'm further through the ppl (and after I've finished my MBA in October!).

Should have been flying today, instead of writing this, but got weathered off. Tried to book further lessons over the next couple of weeks, but my club has an instructor off and the earliest I could get was 30th Sept - now booked several slots!. Arrrrrh! Back to MS Flight Sim for my fix!

HH

LOL - before yesterday I was the same, because I hadn't flown for 2 weeks, I actually found myself on MS flight sim too - the thing is though, I used to think it was real (that was before I had started training). I just dont see much similarity at all with the flying characteristics, especially if you download the aircraft you are training in. I remember a while back I read a post about the flight sim, and a lot of people said that it was good for instrument training and the like - I see why now! Still good though for a quick 'flying fix' :D

Sorry if my RT post has scared anyone, that wasn't the intention. Please remember that everyone is different, and what I find difficult, someone else may find easy. A lot of people had actually told me how easy it was prior to me doing it, and that there was nothing to it, so no doubt a lot of people will feel the same!

Cheers,

Lee