Finally Learning to Fly

Last Thursday I got more practice landings, which I clearly still need.  Mostly, we went around the pattern, as usual at Tampa North (X39), but then we left and headed south to Vandenberg (KVDF), my old stomping grounds.  We did some touch-and-goes down there, and I forgot how bumpy it can be there with all the canals and ponds surrounding the field and the thermals you get above them.

At one point we had an Air Force C-5 (one of the largest planes in the world) fly directly over us about 500 feet above us.  He must have been heading in to MacDill AFB and it was very cool!

I was a bit sloppy in my pattern at Vandenberg and was on my downwind leg, but well south of runway 23 when Jim pulled the power to idle and told me I'd had an engine failure and would have to glide it in.  I was aware that I was farther than I should have been and was trying my best not give up any altitude.  Trying so hard, that is, that I came in way too high and could not push the plane on to the ground and keep my airspeed down.  We ended up having to go around and later my buddy Alex said, "Why didn't you forward slip?"  Honestly, because I hadn't thought of that at the time!  Darn it, now I want another chance...  On my second power off landing I did better.  The landing wasn't pretty, but I got us down.

We also attempted some short field landings and my first one was way off.  I landed a good hundred yards (or more) farther down the runway than I had wanted to, but those also got better with a couple of repetitions.

I think I'm getting close to soloing.  I've got most of the endorsements in my log book that I'll need and have the pre-solo written test to take before my next lesson on Wednesday.  I've also got to go get my medical, which I've been putting off.  I'm seeing my doctor on Monday and the FAA doc on Thursday.  Wish me luck with this; this is my biggest concern at the moment.

Flight time: 1.4
Total time: 13.8
Landings: 65

Last Tuesday we went up to Hernando County Airport in Brooksville (KBKV) for some cross-wind landing practice.  The winds were out of the north so we used Runway 9 for our touch-and-goes.  It was a nice day, although a bit overcast, and the winds were at about 8 knots.  In other words, prime cross-wind landing weather.

When we arrived at Brooksville, there was a Coast Guard helicopter hovering over Runway 3 and an Air National Guard Blackhawk 'copter hovering near 9.  There was also some traffic departing Runway 3 the entire time we were there, so we had to be a bit careful in the pattern to avoid them.  In fact, one helpful pilot reminded us over the radio that the winds were favoring Runway 3, to which my instructor Jim replied that that was why we were on Runway 9!

I spent a lot of the time in the pattern practicing switching from a crab into the wind to a side-slip.  It was tough, especially going into the slip and moving the rudders and ailerons in opposite directions at the same time.  Eventually, I got better at it, at least while in the pattern.  Throughout the morning, I struggled on short final to get us lined up on the centerline, tracking down the runway, and flairing the plane properly all at the same time.  None of my landings were particularly good.

Jim did show off some, running the plane down the runway and touching down one main gear wheel, then the other, and then picking them up and doing it again a few times before we took off again.  I can't wait until I'm proficient enough to have that kind of control over the plane.

He also showed me something that I can't wait to try; a short field takeoff.  Leaving Tampa North (X39), we popped the nose wheel up almost immediately.  I still am amazed at how slow we were still moving when it came off the ground.  Then he popped the main gear up off the ground and we accelerated just a few feat above the runway.  We were also crabbed into the wind, which made it more impressive.  Maybe I'll get to try it myself in my next lesson this Tuesday morning.

Flight time: 1.3
Total time: 12.4
Landings: 53

Sorry, I'm a few days late in posting this one.  I did have my lesson last Thursday as planned.  In fact, it was a very good day in that, not only did I fly, but I got to golf too!  That made up for the rough time I've been having at work lately (big project, not going particularly well.)

Anyway, we didn't get up to Brooksville (KBKV) as we had originally planned, but we did go over to Zephyrhills (KZPH) for some touch-and-goes and then back to Tampa North (X39) for a few more.

I finally had a couple of what I would consider to be pretty decent landings, including on in a crosswind with one main gear wheel touching down first, then the other, and finally the nose gear.  And then there were a couple of particularly bad ones, too...

On one of my first landings, I got flat, with the plane no longer descending, but quickly losing airspeed, about 8-10 feet above the runway.  Obviously, had the plane stalled there, we would have dropped down to the pavement rather hard.  I'm still trying to get the feel for when and how much to flair the plane.

One of my later landings could have been very dangerous had my instructor Jim not been there to correct my bad instinct.  We were coming in very low and to a rookie like me, the natural thought is to pull up on the nose to try to hold altitude.  Of course, that is exactly the wrong thing to do!  That's a very good way to stall the plane short of the runway and instead, the correct fix is to apply power, which is what I did at Jim's urging.  To Jim's credit, his voice remained calm the entire time...

I was able to record our cockpit audio during the entire lesson and I am in the process of editing it down into a podcast, which I will publish here as soon as it's ready.  It may be a few more days, however.  I've been working some very long hours lately, including all weekend (yuck).

My next lesson is scheduled for tomorrow (Tuesday) morning.  I don't yet know what we're doing, but I imagine it will involve more landings.  Maybe this time we'll go up to Brooksville.

Flight time: 1.1
Total time: 11.2
Landings: 43

I went flying with my instructor, Jim, on Friday morning as planned.  The weather was beautiful; sunny and cool with calm winds — perfect flying weather.  As with our last lesson, we stayed in the pattern so I could practice my landings.

There is no AWOS at Tampa North (X39), but the windsock was hanging limply so we started out using runway 32 for our pattern work.  I was having a lot of problems getting my altitude down when turning to base and final and also keeping my speed down.  We did several touch-and-goes and two go-arounds, where I was just too high and fast to put it down at all.  A couple of them were OK (and that's being a bit generous), but most weren't so good.  I was coming in fast on all of them and floated well down the runway.  I'm also still having some trouble using enough back pressure to bring us down gently on the main gear.

Eventually, in order to get low and slow enough, we were reducing power to idle on the turn to base!  Of course in cool air the Skyhawk with the upgraded 180HP engine would be performing very well, but that was a bit ridiculous.  It occurred to us that there might be a bit of tailwind which was confirmed by checking the AWOS at nearby fields, so we switched around and used runway 14 instead.

Much better!  My landings still weren't fantastic, but we sure used a lot less runway for them.  Actually, my last two were too bad at all and my very last one was pretty decent, I think (for me, anyway).

Next Thursday we're at it again, but this time, instead of staying in the pattern at Tampa North, we're going to fly up to nearby Zephyrhills (KZPH) and Hernando County (KBKV) in Brooksville, and practice in the patterns up there.  I'm really looking forward to that!

Jim also mentioned that I need to take my pre-solo written exam soon, which is a good sign.  I also need to get my medical certificate.

Speaking of that, I have a couple of medical conditions that I wanted to be sure wouldn't prevent me from getting my certificate, so when we were at Sun-n-Fun last week I stopped by the FAA pavilion and chatted with one of the FAA doctors.  I should be fine to get my cert, but in our conversation he said one of the nicest things anyone has said to me in a long time.   He said, "Well, you're pretty young.  What are you, in your mid-20's?"  He seemed genuinely surprised when I told him I'm actually 40.

Just before my lesson started, I did run into my previous instructor, Mark.  He was there finishing up one of his students before fully transitioning into his new charter job.  He told me that his new job is flying for Cirrus up at Vandenberg and he's flying SR22's mostly now.  I am so jealous!

I just picked up some new equipment that will allow me to record cockpit audio and I'm planning on putting together a podcast to go with this blog, soon.  I have hosted other podcasts, so I've got some experience with them, and I'm really looking forward to doing this one.  Of course, this will depend on Jim allowing me to record our lessons, but hopefully he'll have no problem with it.  I'll let you all know as soon as I do when I'll have the first episode ready.  My pilot mentor and friend Alex and I are also looking to produce audio and/or video podcasts of our flying together as well.  I think that will make for an interesting mix of relatively new student and relatively new certificated pilot.

Speaking of podcasts, I was listening to the Uncontrolled Airspace podcast the other day, when one of the hosts, Dave Higd0n, told a joke that I liked.  It's probably a very old one, but I hadn't heard it before, so I'll end this blog entry by sharing it here:

"You know why the propeller is in front there, right?  It's to keep the pilot cool.  If that propeller stops, just watch the pilot start sweating..."

Flight time: 1.1
Total time: 10.1
Landings: 34

I'm flying again on Friday, early at 7:00 a.m.  In an attempt to avoid these long delays between lessons, I went ahead and scheduled one for each of the next three weeks, including this one.

We drove out to Lakeland on Sunday to attend Sun-n-Fun which was fun, despite the weather being pretty lousy — rainy and cold, after a week of great sunny weather.  I took some video, but it didn't come out all that well, and some photos, including these:

The USAF Thunderbirds, who (as always) put on a fantastic show, flying in formation:

My son's favorite airplane at the airshow, an A-10 "Warthog":

A couple of big ol' Air Force jets; a C-130 and a KC-135:

Here's my son standing in front of a Cessna (nee Columbia) 400, a very nice plane that reminds me a lot of the Cirrus SR22:

Here's the XFV1, an early (and failed) attempt by the Air Force to produce a Vertical Take-off and Landing (VTOL) plane.  Despite the fact that it didn't really work, it sure looks cool:

Here's the "business end" of an F-15:

And finally, my kids in front of a neat looking SeaMax seaplane:

I'm still fighting this stupid cold and I hope to be back in the air soon.  It's really a shame because the weather is outstanding here!

In the meantime, I came across this video on the AOPA web site, which looks at the new Garmin SVS system.

SVS is a "synthetic vision system" which adds display of your surroundings to the Garmin 1000 glass cockpit's PFD (primary flight display).  As you can see on the video, it's pretty amazing!  It looks like Microsoft Flight Simulator, only it's in your cockpit.  The really cool thing is that it's just a software upgrade; no new hardware required, so hopefully we'll all be seeing it in glass cockpits near us very soon.

I didn't end up flying on Thursday as planned.  I came down with a cold after working nearly all night on Tuesday night so, as much as I hated to do it, I had to cancel my lesson.  I'm hoping to be over the cold soon and reschedule for this week some time.

It was a beautiful day to be flying today!  Sunny and warm, with a bit of a crosswind at first, but then calm air later on.

I was finally flying again, this time with my latest new instructor, Jim.  He's probably in his 50's and very, very low key.  Nice guy.  Much like my last lesson with Mark, we spent our time flying around the pattern and practicing my landings.

And my landings are improving, somewhat, although I've still got plenty of work to do.  I pancaked the gear on one of them and nearly had us in the grass next to the runway on one of the touch-and-goes, but I am slowly improving leveling off in ground effect and flairing the plane.  As we taxied past the maintenance hanger afterwards, I think I only imagined the dirty looks from the maintenance guys as they had seen every hard landing I made in their plane...

I did discover, with some helpful coaching and demonstration from Jim, that having the plane trimmed and setup properly for each phase of the approach makes a huge difference in the quality of the landing!  When it's setup properly, it'll pretty much fly the glidepath and speed you need all by itself.  That sure is easier than fighting it all the way down.

I will say that my ability to get it on the center line and hold the runway heading is much improved this time.  As I think I mentioned last time, I had a real problem with that before.  No doubt the lack of any real crosswind helped tremendously there.

Next lesson is a week from today.

Flight time: 1.0
Total time: 9.0
Landings: 26

In addition to various General Aviation blogs, I also read some by airline pilots.  Captain's Log is a good one, and this post on cheap pilots was hilarious.

How would you like to fly this?

Or just drive it, as you apparently can do both.  The wings fold up for road use:

Somehow I'm skeptical that the AirCar, as it is not-so-inventively called, will ever fly (pun intended), but it is cool.

As for me, I'll be flying on Thursday with Jim, my latest new instructor.