CPL Diary?
Why do it if it's not fun?
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I'm glad everyone seems to be enjoying this - I'm definitely enjoying writing it. And it also helps me gather my thoughts about each flight, too. Anyway, here's today's flight:
Day 3 - Tuesday 11th November
Finally, I've had a full day of flying!!!
The weather today was similar to yesterday, with scattered clouds at 2500' and a fairly strong, gusty wind. But the wind had veered to within 30 degrees of the runway, and the gaps in the clouds were more than big enough for us to work with, so we went flying. The weather forecasters seem to think that this is the end of the bad weather, so I'm looking forward to blue skies tomorrow. I flew twice today, performing very similar exercises each time around.
The first thing we worked on were stalls: a fully developed stall in the clean configuration, followed by incipient stalls on a simulated base-to-final turn, and on a simulated final approach. No real problems with these, although it took a couple of attempts to get the pitch on the recovery to exactly the point where the instructor wanted it. (My initial reaction was to pitch down quite a lot, in order to ensure the wing is flying properly, but particularly on the incipient stalls this is not necessary, and results in excessive loss of altitude.)
The next task for the day was slow flight. I soon had the stall warner going, but the instructor wanted me to slow down even more, to just a knot or two above the stall. It took a lot of concentration to set the aircraft up for this, to hold it there, and then to turn with 5 degrees of bank, but it wasn't particular difficult. The instructor was sufficiently satisfied that we only needed to do this one the first flight of the day, whereas most of the other exercises we practiced both times. Steep turns we only practiced once, too, to iron out the problems from Sunday's steep turns. Much better today - not quite steep enough at times maybe, but no spiral dives.
PFLs were to be the problem item for the day. We did two PFLs on the first flight. The first PFL went pretty well - we had an engine fire, and it took a reasonable amount of time in the emergency descent before it was extinguished. (The instructor later told me that we were so high that the PFL would be too easy from up there, which was why he let me descend for so long before the fire went out... but I just thought it was fun!) Once the fire was out, I set up to land in a suitable field, and made the field quite comfortably. What I didn't do so well, though, was the checks. I tried to restart the engine despite it having been on fire, then forgot to squawk 7700, declare Mayday or do the shut-down checks.
The second PFL I tried to make sure I got all the checks in. My instructor pointed out a field to me this time, before positioning me in a roughly suitable place to start the exercise, to make it easy for me. I did get the checks in - but they were very rushed, and in the process I failed to notice that my instructor's "suitable place to make it easy" was (deliberately, he claimed, although I wasn't so sure!) far too close. Once I'd finished the checks I realised we were close and high, and corrected for it, and again we made the field comfortably.
During the debrief, the instructor suggested that I need to slow the checks down. Of course I have to get them all in - but not at the expense of flying the aircraft, which is what happened on the second attempt. So, during the second flight, we did two more PFLs. This time the checks were much better, with everything completed calmy and properly. But I failed to make the field both times.
I think the problem is multi-tasking. At the moment, I'm having to work too hard on both the checks and the flying, and I can't do both at once. I need one or the other to become totally second nature so that I can get on with doing it in the background. So tonight I will study the checks again, and make sure I know where to move my hands, what to say, and when to do each check. Hopefully when we try again tomorrow this will free up some mental capacity for me to concentrate on making the field.
The final flying task for the day was some circuits - with a cross-wind, of course. No real problems here. I don't get to practice in cross-winds much since my home airfield, White Waltham, nearly always has a runway that's into wind. But after a couple of days practice here, the technique is starting to come back to me. I accepted the criticism from my instructor about not using ailerons properly on the ground (remember the soft-field take-off last Sunday???), and once I made an effort to remember this, the landings and take-offs were much smoother.
Tomorrow, as well as revising some of the general handling again (mainly the PFLs), we will be doing some navigation, and we spent a while briefing for that. The technique they like to use here is the "1/2 way mark" technique, where you make a mark 1/4, 1/2 and 3/4 of the way along each leg. I prefer the 6-minute-mark technique myself, since it's more suitable for legs of varying lengths, but I'm quite happy to use their technique for the CPL course. What I wasn't so happy about, though, was that they are insisting on me using the school's plog. I have two issues with this. The first is that it's too big - I don't like having an A4 kneeboard, and I've designed a plog which fits very nicely onto my A5 kneedboard which I normally use. We compared the two, and found that I have all the same information on my own plog as they have on theirs, but they won't let me use it. The second problem is that their plog is, quite frankly, crap! It's not immediately obvious which heading/altitude/etc corresponds to which leg. Columns that need to be filled in in flight, such as Actual Time of Arrival, are duplicated so that you need to fill them in twice. The column for the actual duration of a leg is nowhere near the columns for the actual start time and arrival time, which makes it difficult to calculate. It looks like someone has simply thrown all the information onto a piece of paper, without any thought being put into how to lay them out.
I have reluctantly agreed to have a go at using this plog. If I really can't get to grips with it (and I'm sure I will get used to it eventually, except maybe for its size) then I will have to bring the subject up with my CPL instructor and try to convince him to let me use my own plog.
Right now, though, it's homework time. I have more checklists to learn. The navigation checklist doesn't cover anything I don't do already (Turn, Time, Talk, for example, and FREDA) - although it includes some techniques that are specific to the 1/2-way mark method of navigation. I also have a "passenger briefing" checklist to learn. It covers the initial briefing for a passenger who's not familiar with the aircraft, as well as a pre-takeoff and pre-landing briefing. By the time I come to take the test, I should be able to recite all of these, and sound professional as I do so.
As well as the checklists, I also have the plan a navigation leg for tomorrow. It's a fairly short leg (30-odd miles), from a road junction close to the airport, to a point where a canal meets a lake. Once I arrive at the destination, I will be diverted, and will have to fly the diversion under the hood, making use of navaids to confirm my progress and my final destination. I'm told that my IMC rating will mean that this won't be difficult - I hope they're right!
FFF
------------
Day 3 - Tuesday 11th November
Finally, I've had a full day of flying!!!
The weather today was similar to yesterday, with scattered clouds at 2500' and a fairly strong, gusty wind. But the wind had veered to within 30 degrees of the runway, and the gaps in the clouds were more than big enough for us to work with, so we went flying. The weather forecasters seem to think that this is the end of the bad weather, so I'm looking forward to blue skies tomorrow. I flew twice today, performing very similar exercises each time around.
The first thing we worked on were stalls: a fully developed stall in the clean configuration, followed by incipient stalls on a simulated base-to-final turn, and on a simulated final approach. No real problems with these, although it took a couple of attempts to get the pitch on the recovery to exactly the point where the instructor wanted it. (My initial reaction was to pitch down quite a lot, in order to ensure the wing is flying properly, but particularly on the incipient stalls this is not necessary, and results in excessive loss of altitude.)
The next task for the day was slow flight. I soon had the stall warner going, but the instructor wanted me to slow down even more, to just a knot or two above the stall. It took a lot of concentration to set the aircraft up for this, to hold it there, and then to turn with 5 degrees of bank, but it wasn't particular difficult. The instructor was sufficiently satisfied that we only needed to do this one the first flight of the day, whereas most of the other exercises we practiced both times. Steep turns we only practiced once, too, to iron out the problems from Sunday's steep turns. Much better today - not quite steep enough at times maybe, but no spiral dives.
PFLs were to be the problem item for the day. We did two PFLs on the first flight. The first PFL went pretty well - we had an engine fire, and it took a reasonable amount of time in the emergency descent before it was extinguished. (The instructor later told me that we were so high that the PFL would be too easy from up there, which was why he let me descend for so long before the fire went out... but I just thought it was fun!) Once the fire was out, I set up to land in a suitable field, and made the field quite comfortably. What I didn't do so well, though, was the checks. I tried to restart the engine despite it having been on fire, then forgot to squawk 7700, declare Mayday or do the shut-down checks.
The second PFL I tried to make sure I got all the checks in. My instructor pointed out a field to me this time, before positioning me in a roughly suitable place to start the exercise, to make it easy for me. I did get the checks in - but they were very rushed, and in the process I failed to notice that my instructor's "suitable place to make it easy" was (deliberately, he claimed, although I wasn't so sure!) far too close. Once I'd finished the checks I realised we were close and high, and corrected for it, and again we made the field comfortably.
During the debrief, the instructor suggested that I need to slow the checks down. Of course I have to get them all in - but not at the expense of flying the aircraft, which is what happened on the second attempt. So, during the second flight, we did two more PFLs. This time the checks were much better, with everything completed calmy and properly. But I failed to make the field both times.
I think the problem is multi-tasking. At the moment, I'm having to work too hard on both the checks and the flying, and I can't do both at once. I need one or the other to become totally second nature so that I can get on with doing it in the background. So tonight I will study the checks again, and make sure I know where to move my hands, what to say, and when to do each check. Hopefully when we try again tomorrow this will free up some mental capacity for me to concentrate on making the field.
The final flying task for the day was some circuits - with a cross-wind, of course. No real problems here. I don't get to practice in cross-winds much since my home airfield, White Waltham, nearly always has a runway that's into wind. But after a couple of days practice here, the technique is starting to come back to me. I accepted the criticism from my instructor about not using ailerons properly on the ground (remember the soft-field take-off last Sunday???), and once I made an effort to remember this, the landings and take-offs were much smoother.
Tomorrow, as well as revising some of the general handling again (mainly the PFLs), we will be doing some navigation, and we spent a while briefing for that. The technique they like to use here is the "1/2 way mark" technique, where you make a mark 1/4, 1/2 and 3/4 of the way along each leg. I prefer the 6-minute-mark technique myself, since it's more suitable for legs of varying lengths, but I'm quite happy to use their technique for the CPL course. What I wasn't so happy about, though, was that they are insisting on me using the school's plog. I have two issues with this. The first is that it's too big - I don't like having an A4 kneeboard, and I've designed a plog which fits very nicely onto my A5 kneedboard which I normally use. We compared the two, and found that I have all the same information on my own plog as they have on theirs, but they won't let me use it. The second problem is that their plog is, quite frankly, crap! It's not immediately obvious which heading/altitude/etc corresponds to which leg. Columns that need to be filled in in flight, such as Actual Time of Arrival, are duplicated so that you need to fill them in twice. The column for the actual duration of a leg is nowhere near the columns for the actual start time and arrival time, which makes it difficult to calculate. It looks like someone has simply thrown all the information onto a piece of paper, without any thought being put into how to lay them out.
I have reluctantly agreed to have a go at using this plog. If I really can't get to grips with it (and I'm sure I will get used to it eventually, except maybe for its size) then I will have to bring the subject up with my CPL instructor and try to convince him to let me use my own plog.
Right now, though, it's homework time. I have more checklists to learn. The navigation checklist doesn't cover anything I don't do already (Turn, Time, Talk, for example, and FREDA) - although it includes some techniques that are specific to the 1/2-way mark method of navigation. I also have a "passenger briefing" checklist to learn. It covers the initial briefing for a passenger who's not familiar with the aircraft, as well as a pre-takeoff and pre-landing briefing. By the time I come to take the test, I should be able to recite all of these, and sound professional as I do so.
As well as the checklists, I also have the plan a navigation leg for tomorrow. It's a fairly short leg (30-odd miles), from a road junction close to the airport, to a point where a canal meets a lake. Once I arrive at the destination, I will be diverted, and will have to fly the diversion under the hood, making use of navaids to confirm my progress and my final destination. I'm told that my IMC rating will mean that this won't be difficult - I hope they're right!
FFF
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FFF you better get used to the A4 plog its what you will use on the IR. And when you write your nav log you will need all the space you can get.
:d sounds like everything is coming along nicely
MJ
:d sounds like everything is coming along nicely
MJ
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Great stuff,
I can't wait to start myself. Need to get the PPL out the way first though!!
Any chance one of the mods could make this one a sticky??
Cheers,
Funkie
I can't wait to start myself. Need to get the PPL out the way first though!!
Any chance one of the mods could make this one a sticky??
Cheers,
Funkie
Why do it if it's not fun?
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Day 4 - Wednesday 12 November
Today's flying was a mix of very good and very bad.
Once again I flew twice. The main emphasis of the first flight was navigation, with a bit of general handling, and then some more general handling and circuits in the second flight.
The VFR navigation was simple enough. The instructor asked me not to compensate for wind, because he wanted to demonstrate how to correct for an error in the wind forecast. For the CPL test, once I set my heading I won't be able to look at my chart until 2 minutes before I reach each of the four waypoints (1/4-way, 1/2-way, 3/4-way and the destination). This seems pretty stupid to me - if I have an excellent navigation feature which isn't near one of these points, but the point itself is in the middle of nowhere, then I have to fix my position when I'm in the middle of nowhere rather than near the useful feature. I suppose the reason it's done this way is to demonstrate that you know the principals of ded reckoning, but it's certainly not the most effective way of getting from A to B. Still, the navigtion itself was fine - we were right of track at the 1/4-way mark because we hadn't corrected for the wind, but we soon fixed that, and arrived overhead the destination well within the allowable time.
The IFR diversion which followed is also not done the way which I'd do it in real life. I'm expected to use a ruler to draw my diversion leg and measure it. I will then take regular VOR/DME readings, and use a ruler to plot these on the chart. I have never used a ruler in the cockpit before, I've always believed that your time is far better spent flying than plotting accurate VOR radials. But this is not the way it's done for the CPL test, where accuracy is key, and without an accurate distance to your destination you can't give an accurate ETA. Again, though, there was no problem with this leg (except that one of the DME's I was using was over-reading by several miles, as we confirmed visually).
So, onto the general handling. Stalls were fine today, as were steep turns. PFLs were far better than yesterday - I did forget to do my shut-down checks once, and forget to warm the engine twice, but after a few goes I was able to get everything done. A huge improvement all round, and I was feeling pretty good.
Then we went to do some circuits - mainly glide approaches. ATC at Fort Pierce were extremely busy, we had trouble finding a gap in which to call them. Eventually we managed to contact them, and were told to hold over one of the reporting points, expect a 5-minute delay. While we were holding, ATC told another aircraft that they were too busy to accept any more touch+goes. We decided to head a few miles north, to Vero Beach, instead.
The runway at Vero Beach had far more cross-wind than at Fort Pierce, and it was pretty gusty too. It should have been well within my capabilities - but it wasn't. I managed to get on the ground safely after glide approaches a few times, but it wasn't pretty. We decided to do one normal, powered approach and then head home. And that's when it all went wrong. The approach was pretty normal - a bit high, but no big deal. But my speed control was terrible, and I came over the numbers with about 10kts of extra speed. We floated on and on down the runway, and eventually touched down over half way along it. I was aware we were running out of runway. What I should have done was get on the brakes and abandon the touch+go. But what I did instead was push the throttle in. That's right... no raising the flaps, just add power and take off with full flaps. As soon as I realised my mistake I went to raise the flaps - which resulted in the instructor having to stop me before we sank back onto the runway, and also resulted in my getting a very well-deserved b0ll0cking.
We flew back to Fort Pierce, and I managed a pretty good landing to finish off with. The conclusion from the Vero Beach incident was that it was poor decision-making. When running out of runway, the best decision is to stop. My instructor told me not to worry about it, to learn from it and move on. Well, I have learnt from it, and I have moved on - but it's hard to not worry about it. I really should be beyond the point where I can make stupid mistakes like that.
Anyway, other than this incident, I'm now at pre-CPL standard. Tomorrow morning's flight is an extra flight - not something that's required, but something I'm looking forward to just the same. You can read all about it tomorrow! And then in the afternoon I start my CPL training for real.
FFF
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Today's flying was a mix of very good and very bad.
Once again I flew twice. The main emphasis of the first flight was navigation, with a bit of general handling, and then some more general handling and circuits in the second flight.
The VFR navigation was simple enough. The instructor asked me not to compensate for wind, because he wanted to demonstrate how to correct for an error in the wind forecast. For the CPL test, once I set my heading I won't be able to look at my chart until 2 minutes before I reach each of the four waypoints (1/4-way, 1/2-way, 3/4-way and the destination). This seems pretty stupid to me - if I have an excellent navigation feature which isn't near one of these points, but the point itself is in the middle of nowhere, then I have to fix my position when I'm in the middle of nowhere rather than near the useful feature. I suppose the reason it's done this way is to demonstrate that you know the principals of ded reckoning, but it's certainly not the most effective way of getting from A to B. Still, the navigtion itself was fine - we were right of track at the 1/4-way mark because we hadn't corrected for the wind, but we soon fixed that, and arrived overhead the destination well within the allowable time.
The IFR diversion which followed is also not done the way which I'd do it in real life. I'm expected to use a ruler to draw my diversion leg and measure it. I will then take regular VOR/DME readings, and use a ruler to plot these on the chart. I have never used a ruler in the cockpit before, I've always believed that your time is far better spent flying than plotting accurate VOR radials. But this is not the way it's done for the CPL test, where accuracy is key, and without an accurate distance to your destination you can't give an accurate ETA. Again, though, there was no problem with this leg (except that one of the DME's I was using was over-reading by several miles, as we confirmed visually).
So, onto the general handling. Stalls were fine today, as were steep turns. PFLs were far better than yesterday - I did forget to do my shut-down checks once, and forget to warm the engine twice, but after a few goes I was able to get everything done. A huge improvement all round, and I was feeling pretty good.
Then we went to do some circuits - mainly glide approaches. ATC at Fort Pierce were extremely busy, we had trouble finding a gap in which to call them. Eventually we managed to contact them, and were told to hold over one of the reporting points, expect a 5-minute delay. While we were holding, ATC told another aircraft that they were too busy to accept any more touch+goes. We decided to head a few miles north, to Vero Beach, instead.
The runway at Vero Beach had far more cross-wind than at Fort Pierce, and it was pretty gusty too. It should have been well within my capabilities - but it wasn't. I managed to get on the ground safely after glide approaches a few times, but it wasn't pretty. We decided to do one normal, powered approach and then head home. And that's when it all went wrong. The approach was pretty normal - a bit high, but no big deal. But my speed control was terrible, and I came over the numbers with about 10kts of extra speed. We floated on and on down the runway, and eventually touched down over half way along it. I was aware we were running out of runway. What I should have done was get on the brakes and abandon the touch+go. But what I did instead was push the throttle in. That's right... no raising the flaps, just add power and take off with full flaps. As soon as I realised my mistake I went to raise the flaps - which resulted in the instructor having to stop me before we sank back onto the runway, and also resulted in my getting a very well-deserved b0ll0cking.
We flew back to Fort Pierce, and I managed a pretty good landing to finish off with. The conclusion from the Vero Beach incident was that it was poor decision-making. When running out of runway, the best decision is to stop. My instructor told me not to worry about it, to learn from it and move on. Well, I have learnt from it, and I have moved on - but it's hard to not worry about it. I really should be beyond the point where I can make stupid mistakes like that.
Anyway, other than this incident, I'm now at pre-CPL standard. Tomorrow morning's flight is an extra flight - not something that's required, but something I'm looking forward to just the same. You can read all about it tomorrow! And then in the afternoon I start my CPL training for real.
FFF
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FFF,
Something funny happens to me when an instructor sits next to me - I become ever so slighty more stupid than I was before. God knows what it is and I hope I can shake it. Basically, I know exactly the situations you describe, except probably a little more so and in PPL form
I have to say, this is great reading made especially good by the honest warts'n'all descriptions.
I'll be URLing in for tomorrows thrilling installment
HWD.
P.S. All we need now is Pilot Pete to continue his tales from the right seat
Something funny happens to me when an instructor sits next to me - I become ever so slighty more stupid than I was before. God knows what it is and I hope I can shake it. Basically, I know exactly the situations you describe, except probably a little more so and in PPL form
I have to say, this is great reading made especially good by the honest warts'n'all descriptions.
I'll be URLing in for tomorrows thrilling installment
HWD.
P.S. All we need now is Pilot Pete to continue his tales from the right seat
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FFF
Nice to know I am not the only one that makes basic errors (even though I am not doing CPL yet). I would much prefer to fly with someone who makes errors, admits to them and learns from them, rather than someone who believes they are perfect and never do anything wrong. I still make errors akin to someone with about 5 hours TT and beat myself up about it at times.
Sounds like you are having a great time and learning a lot.
Enjoy tomorrow.
NHF
Nice to know I am not the only one that makes basic errors (even though I am not doing CPL yet). I would much prefer to fly with someone who makes errors, admits to them and learns from them, rather than someone who believes they are perfect and never do anything wrong. I still make errors akin to someone with about 5 hours TT and beat myself up about it at times.
Sounds like you are having a great time and learning a lot.
Enjoy tomorrow.
NHF
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Great idea!
I'm starting my CPL at EFT soon too so it is interesting to hear how you're getting on.
Good luck with it all (especially the wx.) and I look forward to the next post!!
Hufty.
I'm starting my CPL at EFT soon too so it is interesting to hear how you're getting on.
Good luck with it all (especially the wx.) and I look forward to the next post!!
Hufty.
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Hi FFF,
Keep writing, this is excellent. Amazing what the presence of an instructor (esp. a new one) and completely unfamiliar surroundings can do, really, isn't it? You make the silly daft mistakes instead of the long-term complacent mistakes!
Looking forward to the next installment (oh, and well done on cracking the PFLs - sorted that out quickly, didn't you?!)
P
Keep writing, this is excellent. Amazing what the presence of an instructor (esp. a new one) and completely unfamiliar surroundings can do, really, isn't it? You make the silly daft mistakes instead of the long-term complacent mistakes!
Looking forward to the next installment (oh, and well done on cracking the PFLs - sorted that out quickly, didn't you?!)
P
Why do it if it's not fun?
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Thanks for the encouragement everyone. HWD said that he becomes "ever so slightly more stupid" when sat next to an instructor. I can relate to that I think However, the point of the CPL course is that the guy sat next to me is not an instructor, he's a passenger. I think that this is maybe even more important than the increased level of accuracy that everyone else talks about... it's all about changing the way you think about, and approach, your flying - doing everything methodically and professionally.
Anyway, a much better day today, having learnt the lessons from yesterday. Here's today's flight:
Day 5 - Thursday 13 November
Well, I didn't manage to do my bonus flight today.
You don't need an FAA license to do the CPL course, since there is no need to log any P1 time. But I thought that, since I'm in the USA, it was a good opportunity to replace my FAA license which I carelessly lost a year or so ago. That required a visit to the FSDO at Orlando. When I mentioned that I'd need a morning off to drive to Orlando, the instructor suggested we could fly there, if I didn't mind the extra cost. Cool - I was definitely up for that! The biggest airport I've flown into so far is Tucson International in Arizona. Orlando is huge by comparison, definitely an experience that I wanted. Plus I hoped to get some good aerial shots of Disney World on the way!
Well, I woke up nice and early and got a weather briefing. Although it was beautiful weather in Fort Pierce, the forecast for Orlando was fog. Sanford airport - just a few miles north of Orlando - was already reporting IMC conditions, and it was drifting south. We still had the option of going IFR, though, so I asked the briefer to give me the Notams. I'd managed to book my appointment at the FSDO for the day when the President was in Orlando - there was a huge restricted area which would effectively make it impossible for us to get home if I was delayed at the FSDO. So we had to scrap that idea, and I went by car instead - and Tucson is still the biggest airport in my logbook.
Once I got back from Orlando, it was time to start the CPL course. I sat down with my new instructor, and we spent some time going over the course. It is much more formal than I'm used to - the contents of every flight is pre-arranged, and planned to the nearest 0.1 hours, such that it works out at exactly 25 hours. Of course it's always possible that I'll have to re-do a part of one lesson, or even the whole lesson if it goes really badly, but obviously I'm hoping that doesn't happen, and that I finish the course in the minimum amount of time.
The first CPL flight is a very easy flight - climbs, descents, turns, climbing and descending turns and so on. It's basically a revision of some of the PPL stuff which we use every day, except that it requires more accuracy. I was asked to transition from a Vx climb to a Vy climb, level off at specified altitudes, turn in the climb (being sure to maintain Vy speed) and so on. We reviewed climbs with flaps, comparing the attitude to clean climbs. Descents had to be at a specified airspeed, something which I've never had to do before other than during an approach, but turned out to be very easy. We also did some glide descents, not aiming anywhere in particular, but watching where the aiming point was and how it moved as we added flaps. And we did some straight-in approaches to a runway-shaped field, starting at whatever height and distance my instructor felt like, and judging how much power and flap to use.
I had no problem with any of this, and we headed back to the airfield. On the first approach, there was an aircraft holding short of the runway waiting to depart after we'd landed. At about 100' my instructor told me that the aircraft had just taxied onto the runway, so I went around, and landed off of the next approach. I'd be lying if I said I was totally relaxed as I rounded out, after yesterday's experience, but I'd had plenty of time to reflect on yesterday and put it behind me, so I made a concious effort to concentrate on the picture, focus my attention in the right place, and flare nicely. The landing wasn't the best ever, but it was certainly good. Much happier than yesterday, we taxied in.
During the de-brief, my instructor told me that he was happy with my performance. He commented on the fact that my lookout was good, which I was very pleased with because that's something I've been criticised for in the past, especially in high-wing aircraft. His biggest negative point was in my use of checklists. I'd missed a couple of points in the 300' checklist, and forgotten to do the 1000' checklist on the departure. But he also wants me to start talking through my checks before climbing, descending and so on. Of course I will always check that the mixture is rich and the carb heat is cold before I start a climb, but he wants me to say these things out loud - or at least point to the controls so that the examiner can see that I'm checking them. He also wants me to add a check of Ts and Ps before performing these manoevres, which isn't something I've ever done before but makes perfect sense, so I'll need to make sure I remember that in future.
Tomorrow, we have two flights planned. The first is circuits, and the second is a cross-country which I will be planning tonight. We will be visiting two airfields, and crossing some military areas, so I'll need to have all the frequencies and procedures planned, as well as the distances, headings and times.
The first 1.2 hours towards the 25 hours that I need was pretty easy. I've been warned that the next couple of lessons are easy, too, but that it gets harder after that - not only do the exercises become more demanding, but the captaincy part of the course will become more and more significant as I have to stop treating the guy sitting next to me like an instructor and start treating him like a fare-paying passenger. But right now I'm pleased that I performed well, and my confidence has been restored before any more damage was done.
FFF
-------------
However, the point of the CPL course is that the guy sat next to me is not an instructor, he's a passenger. I think that this is maybe even more important than the increased level of accuracy that everyone else talks about... it's all about changing the way you think about, and approach, your flying - doing everything methodically and professionally.Anyway, a much better day today, having learnt the lessons from yesterday. Here's today's flight:
Day 5 - Thursday 13 November
Well, I didn't manage to do my bonus flight today.
You don't need an FAA license to do the CPL course, since there is no need to log any P1 time. But I thought that, since I'm in the USA, it was a good opportunity to replace my FAA license which I carelessly lost a year or so ago. That required a visit to the FSDO at Orlando. When I mentioned that I'd need a morning off to drive to Orlando, the instructor suggested we could fly there, if I didn't mind the extra cost. Cool - I was definitely up for that! The biggest airport I've flown into so far is Tucson International in Arizona. Orlando is huge by comparison, definitely an experience that I wanted. Plus I hoped to get some good aerial shots of Disney World on the way!
Well, I woke up nice and early and got a weather briefing. Although it was beautiful weather in Fort Pierce, the forecast for Orlando was fog. Sanford airport - just a few miles north of Orlando - was already reporting IMC conditions, and it was drifting south. We still had the option of going IFR, though, so I asked the briefer to give me the Notams. I'd managed to book my appointment at the FSDO for the day when the President was in Orlando - there was a huge restricted area which would effectively make it impossible for us to get home if I was delayed at the FSDO. So we had to scrap that idea, and I went by car instead - and Tucson is still the biggest airport in my logbook.
Once I got back from Orlando, it was time to start the CPL course. I sat down with my new instructor, and we spent some time going over the course. It is much more formal than I'm used to - the contents of every flight is pre-arranged, and planned to the nearest 0.1 hours, such that it works out at exactly 25 hours. Of course it's always possible that I'll have to re-do a part of one lesson, or even the whole lesson if it goes really badly, but obviously I'm hoping that doesn't happen, and that I finish the course in the minimum amount of time.
The first CPL flight is a very easy flight - climbs, descents, turns, climbing and descending turns and so on. It's basically a revision of some of the PPL stuff which we use every day, except that it requires more accuracy. I was asked to transition from a Vx climb to a Vy climb, level off at specified altitudes, turn in the climb (being sure to maintain Vy speed) and so on. We reviewed climbs with flaps, comparing the attitude to clean climbs. Descents had to be at a specified airspeed, something which I've never had to do before other than during an approach, but turned out to be very easy. We also did some glide descents, not aiming anywhere in particular, but watching where the aiming point was and how it moved as we added flaps. And we did some straight-in approaches to a runway-shaped field, starting at whatever height and distance my instructor felt like, and judging how much power and flap to use.
I had no problem with any of this, and we headed back to the airfield. On the first approach, there was an aircraft holding short of the runway waiting to depart after we'd landed. At about 100' my instructor told me that the aircraft had just taxied onto the runway, so I went around, and landed off of the next approach. I'd be lying if I said I was totally relaxed as I rounded out, after yesterday's experience, but I'd had plenty of time to reflect on yesterday and put it behind me, so I made a concious effort to concentrate on the picture, focus my attention in the right place, and flare nicely. The landing wasn't the best ever, but it was certainly good. Much happier than yesterday, we taxied in.
During the de-brief, my instructor told me that he was happy with my performance. He commented on the fact that my lookout was good, which I was very pleased with because that's something I've been criticised for in the past, especially in high-wing aircraft. His biggest negative point was in my use of checklists. I'd missed a couple of points in the 300' checklist, and forgotten to do the 1000' checklist on the departure. But he also wants me to start talking through my checks before climbing, descending and so on. Of course I will always check that the mixture is rich and the carb heat is cold before I start a climb, but he wants me to say these things out loud - or at least point to the controls so that the examiner can see that I'm checking them. He also wants me to add a check of Ts and Ps before performing these manoevres, which isn't something I've ever done before but makes perfect sense, so I'll need to make sure I remember that in future.
Tomorrow, we have two flights planned. The first is circuits, and the second is a cross-country which I will be planning tonight. We will be visiting two airfields, and crossing some military areas, so I'll need to have all the frequencies and procedures planned, as well as the distances, headings and times.
The first 1.2 hours towards the 25 hours that I need was pretty easy. I've been warned that the next couple of lessons are easy, too, but that it gets harder after that - not only do the exercises become more demanding, but the captaincy part of the course will become more and more significant as I have to stop treating the guy sitting next to me like an instructor and start treating him like a fare-paying passenger. But right now I'm pleased that I performed well, and my confidence has been restored before any more damage was done.
FFF
-------------
Dancing with the devil, going with the flow... it's all a game to me.
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Fantastic idea you've got here FFF. Just wish I'd thought of it before starting my CPL. If nothing else it ensures the school won't dick you around for fear of bad publicity.
Very cunning sir!
VFE.
*. . . .makes mental note to do the same if possible on IR*
Very cunning sir!
VFE.
*. . . .makes mental note to do the same if possible on IR*
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Good Effort FFF!!!!!!
FFF,
For what it is worth - I'm a 22 year old PPl holder just starting my ATPL ground school. I've alreqady taken your advice and gone with Bristol. It means alot to get some TRUE feedback from the flying aspect of the CPL course. Now that you have provided us with the practicle side of things, I wonder if anyone out there will be so kind as to give us a run through in the ground school!! Cheers for any advice in advance and thanx FFF for the run through!!!! I know a documentary + CPL training aint easy
All the best
Speed Bird 001
For what it is worth - I'm a 22 year old PPl holder just starting my ATPL ground school. I've alreqady taken your advice and gone with Bristol. It means alot to get some TRUE feedback from the flying aspect of the CPL course. Now that you have provided us with the practicle side of things, I wonder if anyone out there will be so kind as to give us a run through in the ground school!! Cheers for any advice in advance and thanx FFF for the run through!!!! I know a documentary + CPL training aint easy
All the best
Speed Bird 001
Why do it if it's not fun?
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Speedbird, you want a run-through of the ground school? Study, study, study and more study should about cover it! Good luck with it.
VFE - I'm not that devious, but now you mention it, that is a nice side benefit, isn't it? Actually, if anyone at the school is reading this, they haven't said anything to me about it yet. At least one instructor has mentioned PPRuNe, though, so I'm sure it's only a matter of time...
Day 5 - Friday 14 November
The first of today's flights was circuits, and in this flight I discovered the eccentricity of the Florida wind. The ATIS informed us that runway 27 was in use. By the time we'd called for taxy clearance, the runway in use had changed to 32. After a couple of circuits, the wind started changing speed and direction pretty much every 30 seconds, which resulted in some interesting non-standard r/t by the controller as he tried to let everyone in the circuit know what their wind components were. ("N123 you're cleared to land, wind is, um, er, looks like it's just swinging around to 050 - no, it's back at 010 about 10 to 15 knots. You guys better be careful out there!") Eventually, he decided to switch to runway 9, and stayed there for the rest of the day.
During all of this, I was doing a combination of flapless, glide, and "normal" (whatever normal is when the wind is like that) approaches, and handling it all pretty well. (I did screw up when the runway was changed, but soon got that sorted out.) We also had a go at a short-field approach, but twice I managed to end up far too high and went around, and I wasn't asked to do another one. Interestingly, although my first few landings were good, they weren't quite perfect - there was just a little bit of crab left on each time. But as the crosswind component increased, the landings improved, and my final 3 landings all got applause from my instructor as the into-wind wheel touched first, followed by the down-wind wheel and then the nosewheel.
The de-brief was mostly positive, which pretty much reflected the way I thought the flight went. The biggest criticism was for not flying square circuits - I tended to drift away from the runway on both the downwind and the base leg. There is another circuit session scheduled in the syllabus, and during this session we will have to have another go at short-field landings, as well as bad-weather circuits (we decided that there was a little too much low-level windshear to be hanging around at 500' for any longer than necessary today, which is why we didn't do bad-weather circuits this morning).
And so on to the VFR navigation from this afternoon. The briefing was quite long, and pretty much reinforced my opinion of the techniques I'm being taught. The reason for using the 1/2-way marks, my instructor said, is because it's very easy to update your ETA along the route. That's true - but my instructor conceded that it's also very easy with 6-minute marks (your 6-minute marks become 7-minute marks, or 5-minute marks). As for the plog, it seems that most of the instructors at the school, mine included, agree with me that it's really not suitable for the job. I changed some of the column headings around, included some that were missing, and crossed out some that are simply no use whatsoever, and eventually came up with something which I thought was useable, and my instructor thought was close enough to what the CAA have authorised for no-one to complain about.
We again discussed the idea that I'm not allowed to look at my chart except for within 2 minutes of one of my checkpoints. As I said the other day, I think this is a rather ridiculous way of flying - but it was made even more ridiculous today, when my instructor suggested that, although I'm not allowed to look at the chart, there's nothing stopping me making a sketch on my plog to show all the main features along my route, and confirming my ded reckoning using that instead!!!
Briefing finished, and there was plenty of time before the flight for me to copy all the numbers from the plog I did last night onto a copy of my "amended" plog with the more sensible columns. Once again, I was not allowed to use any wind correction, relying instead on working out the wind correction at my first way-point. (I think this is a very good idea, by the way - obviously not realistic, but it's very hard to demonstrate to someone how to get back on track if they never get off track to start with.) And then it was time to go flying - first to Okeechobee, then on to River Ranch!
The weather this afternoon was absolutely beautiful - blue, cloudless skies, and visibility which went on for miles and miles. There was a bit of crap lower down which reduced the vis to about 20 miles, and was also pretty bumpy, but above that was the best flying weather I've seen in the week or so I've been here. I hadn't quite got the hang of sketching the important features, so the visibility didn't help me all that much when the few features I had sketched turned out to be those ones that are totally invisible until you're on top of them! But it's all part of the learning curve, and next time we do VFR navigation I'll have a much better idea of what to put on my plog in order to play the game correctly.
It all started to get interesting on the second leg, though. This was the leg which took us through two Military Operating Areas. My pre-flight briefing had established that only one of those was active, but we'd still need to contact Miami Centre to get through that zone. (MOAs in the US have a very similar legal status to the UK MATZ - there are no rules preventing you from flying through them without talking to anyone, but it's not generally considered to be a clever thing to do.) I dialled the frequency, and although I could hear several aircraft I couldn't hear Miami's reply. I climbed a couple of thousand feet, and then I could hear Miami loud and clear, so I called them up - but it seemed that they couldn't hear me. Either that, or they were just ignoring me! We tried the second radio, but again got no response. I suspected a radio problem, but my instructor told me afterwards that this area is well know locally for being a bit of a radio black-spot, especially in good weather. 20 miles away in any direction, and you can talk to Miami without any trouble, but this one spot was known to be a problem.
We were now speeding towards the MOA without having been able to make contact. I wasn't quite sure where I should be going, but I knew I didn't want to be going in this direciton. I turned to the north whilst trying to figure out what to do. And here's where the whole "I'm Captain" mentality comes into play. Right now, my though process was something along the following lines: Ok - my instructor has given me a nice easy navigation leg to break me in gently. It hasn't gone according to plan - not through anything I've done - so I'm expecting him to give me an alternative destination, or possibly have me head home. WRONG! The CPL mentality should be as follows: Ok, we need to get to River Ranch. I can't go the way I'd planned, so I need to find an alternative route. This mentality is not a problem - it's something I've done many times, whether it's been for a weather diversion, or because I've been unable to contact someone, or denied a clearance. So why didn't I think to do it today? I have no idea! I think it must be this whole thing about becoming stupid when there's an instructor sat next to you.
My instructor didn't seem to think this was such a big deal. It's very early on in the training, and he expects me to still treat him like an instructor to a certain extent. He was pleased that I'd taken the initiative to make the initial turn to the north away from the MOA - so even though I hadn't come up with a positive plan of action I'd still kept us safe. Not a big problem, but I think it's an interesting mistake to learn from for the future.
Now, I know you're all wondering how I'm getting on with my new plog. Well, the plog isn't too bad. I did manage, twice, to fly the true track instead of the magnetic track (on my usual plog I fold the true track out of sight because it's not really very much use in flight) but that's nothing which a highlighter pen won't fix for the next flight. The one thing I really haven't been able to get to grips with, though, is having an A4 kneeboard. It prevents me from having full, free movement of the controls. It's big enough that when I move it in any way it interferes with the controls and I need to grap hold of them before we enter an unusual attitude. I've also followed the advice of my earlier instructor and clipped my chart to the back of it, which means that I need to turn it over constantly in flight, and also rotate it. I think I'm going to try flying with the chart not clipped to the kneeboard next time - this will save me from having to flip the kneeboard, and will also avoid the problems of rotating it. (When it's rotated, it interferes with the controls every single time instead of just sometimes.)
Both of today's flights were really enjoyable. I'm beginning to settle down now, becoming comfortable with the local area and with the interesting local wind patterns. I also like my new instructor - so far I have only once had any doubt what he was asking from me, and that was cleared up almost immediately.
Tomorrow, we move on to the IFR stuff. I can guarantee the weather will be good - it's nearly always good when I'm going to be under foggles!
FFF
------------
Good luck with it.VFE - I'm not that devious, but now you mention it, that is a nice side benefit, isn't it? Actually, if anyone at the school is reading this, they haven't said anything to me about it yet. At least one instructor has mentioned PPRuNe, though, so I'm sure it's only a matter of time...
Day 5 - Friday 14 November
The first of today's flights was circuits, and in this flight I discovered the eccentricity of the Florida wind. The ATIS informed us that runway 27 was in use. By the time we'd called for taxy clearance, the runway in use had changed to 32. After a couple of circuits, the wind started changing speed and direction pretty much every 30 seconds, which resulted in some interesting non-standard r/t by the controller as he tried to let everyone in the circuit know what their wind components were. ("N123 you're cleared to land, wind is, um, er, looks like it's just swinging around to 050 - no, it's back at 010 about 10 to 15 knots. You guys better be careful out there!") Eventually, he decided to switch to runway 9, and stayed there for the rest of the day.
During all of this, I was doing a combination of flapless, glide, and "normal" (whatever normal is when the wind is like that) approaches, and handling it all pretty well. (I did screw up when the runway was changed, but soon got that sorted out.) We also had a go at a short-field approach, but twice I managed to end up far too high and went around, and I wasn't asked to do another one. Interestingly, although my first few landings were good, they weren't quite perfect - there was just a little bit of crab left on each time. But as the crosswind component increased, the landings improved, and my final 3 landings all got applause from my instructor as the into-wind wheel touched first, followed by the down-wind wheel and then the nosewheel.
The de-brief was mostly positive, which pretty much reflected the way I thought the flight went. The biggest criticism was for not flying square circuits - I tended to drift away from the runway on both the downwind and the base leg. There is another circuit session scheduled in the syllabus, and during this session we will have to have another go at short-field landings, as well as bad-weather circuits (we decided that there was a little too much low-level windshear to be hanging around at 500' for any longer than necessary today, which is why we didn't do bad-weather circuits this morning).
And so on to the VFR navigation from this afternoon. The briefing was quite long, and pretty much reinforced my opinion of the techniques I'm being taught. The reason for using the 1/2-way marks, my instructor said, is because it's very easy to update your ETA along the route. That's true - but my instructor conceded that it's also very easy with 6-minute marks (your 6-minute marks become 7-minute marks, or 5-minute marks). As for the plog, it seems that most of the instructors at the school, mine included, agree with me that it's really not suitable for the job. I changed some of the column headings around, included some that were missing, and crossed out some that are simply no use whatsoever, and eventually came up with something which I thought was useable, and my instructor thought was close enough to what the CAA have authorised for no-one to complain about.
We again discussed the idea that I'm not allowed to look at my chart except for within 2 minutes of one of my checkpoints. As I said the other day, I think this is a rather ridiculous way of flying - but it was made even more ridiculous today, when my instructor suggested that, although I'm not allowed to look at the chart, there's nothing stopping me making a sketch on my plog to show all the main features along my route, and confirming my ded reckoning using that instead!!!
Briefing finished, and there was plenty of time before the flight for me to copy all the numbers from the plog I did last night onto a copy of my "amended" plog with the more sensible columns. Once again, I was not allowed to use any wind correction, relying instead on working out the wind correction at my first way-point. (I think this is a very good idea, by the way - obviously not realistic, but it's very hard to demonstrate to someone how to get back on track if they never get off track to start with.) And then it was time to go flying - first to Okeechobee, then on to River Ranch!
The weather this afternoon was absolutely beautiful - blue, cloudless skies, and visibility which went on for miles and miles. There was a bit of crap lower down which reduced the vis to about 20 miles, and was also pretty bumpy, but above that was the best flying weather I've seen in the week or so I've been here. I hadn't quite got the hang of sketching the important features, so the visibility didn't help me all that much when the few features I had sketched turned out to be those ones that are totally invisible until you're on top of them! But it's all part of the learning curve, and next time we do VFR navigation I'll have a much better idea of what to put on my plog in order to play the game correctly.
It all started to get interesting on the second leg, though. This was the leg which took us through two Military Operating Areas. My pre-flight briefing had established that only one of those was active, but we'd still need to contact Miami Centre to get through that zone. (MOAs in the US have a very similar legal status to the UK MATZ - there are no rules preventing you from flying through them without talking to anyone, but it's not generally considered to be a clever thing to do.) I dialled the frequency, and although I could hear several aircraft I couldn't hear Miami's reply. I climbed a couple of thousand feet, and then I could hear Miami loud and clear, so I called them up - but it seemed that they couldn't hear me. Either that, or they were just ignoring me! We tried the second radio, but again got no response. I suspected a radio problem, but my instructor told me afterwards that this area is well know locally for being a bit of a radio black-spot, especially in good weather. 20 miles away in any direction, and you can talk to Miami without any trouble, but this one spot was known to be a problem.
We were now speeding towards the MOA without having been able to make contact. I wasn't quite sure where I should be going, but I knew I didn't want to be going in this direciton. I turned to the north whilst trying to figure out what to do. And here's where the whole "I'm Captain" mentality comes into play. Right now, my though process was something along the following lines: Ok - my instructor has given me a nice easy navigation leg to break me in gently. It hasn't gone according to plan - not through anything I've done - so I'm expecting him to give me an alternative destination, or possibly have me head home. WRONG! The CPL mentality should be as follows: Ok, we need to get to River Ranch. I can't go the way I'd planned, so I need to find an alternative route. This mentality is not a problem - it's something I've done many times, whether it's been for a weather diversion, or because I've been unable to contact someone, or denied a clearance. So why didn't I think to do it today? I have no idea! I think it must be this whole thing about becoming stupid when there's an instructor sat next to you.
My instructor didn't seem to think this was such a big deal. It's very early on in the training, and he expects me to still treat him like an instructor to a certain extent. He was pleased that I'd taken the initiative to make the initial turn to the north away from the MOA - so even though I hadn't come up with a positive plan of action I'd still kept us safe. Not a big problem, but I think it's an interesting mistake to learn from for the future.
Now, I know you're all wondering how I'm getting on with my new plog. Well, the plog isn't too bad. I did manage, twice, to fly the true track instead of the magnetic track (on my usual plog I fold the true track out of sight because it's not really very much use in flight) but that's nothing which a highlighter pen won't fix for the next flight. The one thing I really haven't been able to get to grips with, though, is having an A4 kneeboard. It prevents me from having full, free movement of the controls. It's big enough that when I move it in any way it interferes with the controls and I need to grap hold of them before we enter an unusual attitude. I've also followed the advice of my earlier instructor and clipped my chart to the back of it, which means that I need to turn it over constantly in flight, and also rotate it. I think I'm going to try flying with the chart not clipped to the kneeboard next time - this will save me from having to flip the kneeboard, and will also avoid the problems of rotating it. (When it's rotated, it interferes with the controls every single time instead of just sometimes.)
Both of today's flights were really enjoyable. I'm beginning to settle down now, becoming comfortable with the local area and with the interesting local wind patterns. I also like my new instructor - so far I have only once had any doubt what he was asking from me, and that was cleared up almost immediately.
Tomorrow, we move on to the IFR stuff. I can guarantee the weather will be good - it's nearly always good when I'm going to be under foggles!
FFF
------------
Why do it if it's not fun?
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Day 6 - Saturday 15 November
Today, my instructor was off sick. That wasn't a big surprise - both he and I have had some kind of bug for a few days, but while mine started off manageable and gradually got better, his started off manageable and gradually got worse. Fortunately, though, it was possible to reschedule both of today's flights with different instructors.
This morning, I flew with one of the school's managers. The lesson was full-panel IMC general handling, and shouldn't cause problems for anyone with a current IMC rating. As I predicted yesterday, the weather was beautiful, but I had to put some foggles on and we started off with straight+level flight. Then we did climbing and descending at specified airspeeds, before doing a couple of rate one turns. No problems there, so we moved on to steeper turns, first at 30 degrees of bank, then at 45. The turn at 45 degrees of bank isn't actually required, but it's good practice just the same. It turned out to be the only difficult task of the morning - the trick, just as with visual steep turns, is to maintain the correct attitude, whilst also scanning the other instruments to check your progress, but I let the nose drop very slightly towards the end of the turn, and lost about 150'.
Now that we'd done all the necessary manoevres, the next step was to combine them. I was asked to climb to a specified altitude. Then, shortly before arriving at the designated altitude, I'd have to turn onto a given heading. We did several of these, both climbing and descending, and the instructor timed the turns so that, gradually, I needed to roll out of the turn closer and closer towards the altitude at which I was to level off. It's vital to keep the scan going - to maintain the correct attitude, and also to watch the DI and the altimeter so that both the turn and the climb/descent can be stopped at exactly the right point. But as long as your eyes can be everywhere at once, it's no problem. The task was made a little more difficult by the weather. It started off beautifully smooth, but gradually got more and more bumpy as the sun heated everything up, so I had to work quite hard by the end just to maintain the attitude - which just added to the fun, of course!
That was all for the morning lesson. The debrief was fairly short, since the instructor was happy that I could fly on a full panel pretty well. The things which I need to improve on centre more on checklists (again!) than flying. I missed the landing light on the approach checks, and he wanted to see more frequent FREDA checks too. But I can feel myself becoming more and more confident with the use of the checklists, to the point that whenever the aircraft is settled down I'm started to ask myself which checklist I should be doing. Not always - but sometimes, and that's a good sign.
The second lesson was with a different instructor, and quite late in the afternoon. We started up, and taxied out (and I forgot my taxy checks - damn!), and then did the power checks. Set 1700rpm, check the brakes are holding. Carb heat on - why has the carb heat lever come off in my hand??? We taxied back in.
Luckilly, because it was already quite late, there was a nice selection of other aircraft for us to choose between. By the time we'd fuelled and pre-flighted another aeroplane, it was getting dark - and I was about to log my first night hours of the season.
The lesson was an IMC lesson, but I was allowed to take the foggles off a couple of times to admire the night sky. We climbed above a scattered layer of cumulous clouds, and the view with the clouds and the city lights below us, and stars above us, was amazing. My instructor also took the opportunity to point out a couple of points about visual night-flying. I've never done any night-flying over the sea before, and I was amazed at how hard it is to see the horizon. It's very easy to confuse ships with stars and get a false impression of where the horizon is. Using all the instruments available when flying at night is always a good idea, but even more so over the ocean.
Back to the planned lesson, though. Some more advanced full-panel work, such as unusual attitude recovery, and slow flight (the slow flight caught me out until I figured out that we were on the back of the drag curve at 65kts - once I realised that it was easy). Then we simulated a vacuum failure, and it was time to practice climbs, descents and turns on a partial panel. All of this is stuff that is covered on the IMC course, but although I try to practice my IMC flying reasonably regularly, I haven't done any partial panel work since I passed the test, so the refresher was welcome and needed. It didn't take too long to get back into it, but I will have to try to find a way to work some partial panel practice into my regular flying when I finish the CPL course.
I was pretty pleased with my first night landing since last winter - not perfect, but acceptable - although I didn't make enough use of the instruments in the circuit and rather carelessly let the airspeed get a little low.
Hopefully I'll have my regular instructor back tomorrow.
FFF
-----------
Today, my instructor was off sick. That wasn't a big surprise - both he and I have had some kind of bug for a few days, but while mine started off manageable and gradually got better, his started off manageable and gradually got worse. Fortunately, though, it was possible to reschedule both of today's flights with different instructors.
This morning, I flew with one of the school's managers. The lesson was full-panel IMC general handling, and shouldn't cause problems for anyone with a current IMC rating. As I predicted yesterday, the weather was beautiful, but I had to put some foggles on and we started off with straight+level flight. Then we did climbing and descending at specified airspeeds, before doing a couple of rate one turns. No problems there, so we moved on to steeper turns, first at 30 degrees of bank, then at 45. The turn at 45 degrees of bank isn't actually required, but it's good practice just the same. It turned out to be the only difficult task of the morning - the trick, just as with visual steep turns, is to maintain the correct attitude, whilst also scanning the other instruments to check your progress, but I let the nose drop very slightly towards the end of the turn, and lost about 150'.
Now that we'd done all the necessary manoevres, the next step was to combine them. I was asked to climb to a specified altitude. Then, shortly before arriving at the designated altitude, I'd have to turn onto a given heading. We did several of these, both climbing and descending, and the instructor timed the turns so that, gradually, I needed to roll out of the turn closer and closer towards the altitude at which I was to level off. It's vital to keep the scan going - to maintain the correct attitude, and also to watch the DI and the altimeter so that both the turn and the climb/descent can be stopped at exactly the right point. But as long as your eyes can be everywhere at once, it's no problem. The task was made a little more difficult by the weather. It started off beautifully smooth, but gradually got more and more bumpy as the sun heated everything up, so I had to work quite hard by the end just to maintain the attitude - which just added to the fun, of course!
That was all for the morning lesson. The debrief was fairly short, since the instructor was happy that I could fly on a full panel pretty well. The things which I need to improve on centre more on checklists (again!) than flying. I missed the landing light on the approach checks, and he wanted to see more frequent FREDA checks too. But I can feel myself becoming more and more confident with the use of the checklists, to the point that whenever the aircraft is settled down I'm started to ask myself which checklist I should be doing. Not always - but sometimes, and that's a good sign.
The second lesson was with a different instructor, and quite late in the afternoon. We started up, and taxied out (and I forgot my taxy checks - damn!), and then did the power checks. Set 1700rpm, check the brakes are holding. Carb heat on - why has the carb heat lever come off in my hand??? We taxied back in.
Luckilly, because it was already quite late, there was a nice selection of other aircraft for us to choose between. By the time we'd fuelled and pre-flighted another aeroplane, it was getting dark - and I was about to log my first night hours of the season.
The lesson was an IMC lesson, but I was allowed to take the foggles off a couple of times to admire the night sky. We climbed above a scattered layer of cumulous clouds, and the view with the clouds and the city lights below us, and stars above us, was amazing. My instructor also took the opportunity to point out a couple of points about visual night-flying. I've never done any night-flying over the sea before, and I was amazed at how hard it is to see the horizon. It's very easy to confuse ships with stars and get a false impression of where the horizon is. Using all the instruments available when flying at night is always a good idea, but even more so over the ocean.
Back to the planned lesson, though. Some more advanced full-panel work, such as unusual attitude recovery, and slow flight (the slow flight caught me out until I figured out that we were on the back of the drag curve at 65kts - once I realised that it was easy). Then we simulated a vacuum failure, and it was time to practice climbs, descents and turns on a partial panel. All of this is stuff that is covered on the IMC course, but although I try to practice my IMC flying reasonably regularly, I haven't done any partial panel work since I passed the test, so the refresher was welcome and needed. It didn't take too long to get back into it, but I will have to try to find a way to work some partial panel practice into my regular flying when I finish the CPL course.
I was pretty pleased with my first night landing since last winter - not perfect, but acceptable - although I didn't make enough use of the instruments in the circuit and rather carelessly let the airspeed get a little low.
Hopefully I'll have my regular instructor back tomorrow.
FFF
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FFF,
I have nominated this for the BBC's "The Big Read"
Anyway, regarding the navigation. I was taught to do DR pretty to a similar method in my PPL as you are now. Basically, I needed to always mark down the half-way point (not quarter unless a very long leg), but this was simply to be able to quickly work-out a heading correction using my 10nm thumb as the half and quarter markers help you to make a glance estimation of how far you have travelled. The difference being that I was taught to only time to significant visual features, about every 6-10 mins as you do. My ETA updates are based on my arrival time at a visual feature with a judgement on if the ETA will continue to change (wrong wind) or it was simply being off track for a leg.
As for the not looking at the chart within 2 mins of arrival at a check-point, that is also how I was taught and still do it (more or less). I find it works pretty well, except it is pretty impossible not to think "Where am I" mid way between two check-points. My instructor was adamant that I keep looking out, rather than in. However, the lookout is something, as you mentioned, that I know I start off doing well, but will obviously require more constant practice to make instinctive.
Anyway, I will keep using this DR method in anticipation that it will be required learning for the CPL.
Cheers FFF, great reading
HWD.
I have nominated this for the BBC's "The Big Read"
Anyway, regarding the navigation. I was taught to do DR pretty to a similar method in my PPL as you are now. Basically, I needed to always mark down the half-way point (not quarter unless a very long leg), but this was simply to be able to quickly work-out a heading correction using my 10nm thumb as the half and quarter markers help you to make a glance estimation of how far you have travelled. The difference being that I was taught to only time to significant visual features, about every 6-10 mins as you do. My ETA updates are based on my arrival time at a visual feature with a judgement on if the ETA will continue to change (wrong wind) or it was simply being off track for a leg.
As for the not looking at the chart within 2 mins of arrival at a check-point, that is also how I was taught and still do it (more or less). I find it works pretty well, except it is pretty impossible not to think "Where am I" mid way between two check-points. My instructor was adamant that I keep looking out, rather than in. However, the lookout is something, as you mentioned, that I know I start off doing well, but will obviously require more constant practice to make instinctive.
Anyway, I will keep using this DR method in anticipation that it will be required learning for the CPL.
Cheers FFF, great reading
HWD.
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Q. Why foggles and not screens? I'm guessing it's some sort of FAA requirement.
I've flown with both and find screens much more relaxing - foggles tend to push down on your nose and also prevent a proper seal forming around your ear with the headset.
Having said that, knowing just how many light aircraft there are in the Florida sky, foggles are much better from a collision avoidance point of view.
Thanks for doing this FFF - it's one of my favourite Wannabe threads ever, up there with Pilot Pete's 'how I made it' essay.
I've flown with both and find screens much more relaxing - foggles tend to push down on your nose and also prevent a proper seal forming around your ear with the headset.
Having said that, knowing just how many light aircraft there are in the Florida sky, foggles are much better from a collision avoidance point of view.
Thanks for doing this FFF - it's one of my favourite Wannabe threads ever, up there with Pilot Pete's 'how I made it' essay.