Learning to fly, or thinking of learning? Post your questions, comments and experiences here

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By T6Harvard
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1854532
Yesterday's lesson?
Well first of all I took the advice from @TopCat . So I did some programming - honestly. If you search 'do a barrel roll' on google you'll see my aviation-themed work (or someone else's :mrgreen: ). Then I took the other bit of advice and rode a unicycle. Now I have grazed elbows and knees.

After that I got down to serious taxiing on the grass, down to RWY 08. This meant that I had to re-think the turning points for the circuit.

Anyway, TO is less fraught now. I am confident on the TO run, happy to glance down at ts&ps and ASI, and rotation was appropriate. I even managed to unwind the into-wind aileron without too much ado.

I didn't do that well on the circuits, lots of small errors or slowness to act but weirdly it felt more in control (this a/c is not as high revving and sounded like I was expecting so that helped). I was still annoyed that it is not coming together as I hoped! Silly things like edging in towards the runway on Downwind (like a moth to a flame). There wasn't that much wind early on in the lesson to cause drift and I did it 3 out of 5 times. Doh.
I also struggled to get 67kts on climb-out a couple of times. Have done that correctly plenty of times before but it was more than a bit ragged this lesson. I guess capacity overload pushed it out of the door.

One approach was way too high on turning Final but I did get that sorted and actually crabbed in once when the wind picked up a bit :D

De-brief was fair - I was a bit hesitant at times (interpretation - too much time thinking about it rather than doing it!) and I need to work on trimming correctly, but my TO and go-around was good.

Frustrating though, when I know what I should be doing.

Oh well, back there tomorrow. Had a look at the nearest TAF and expect RWY 08 again.
By TopCat
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1854546
T6Harvard wrote:Well first of all I took the advice from @TopCat . So I did some programming - honestly. If you search 'do a barrel roll' on google you'll see my aviation-themed work (or someone else's :mrgreen: ). Then I took the other bit of advice and rode a unicycle. Now I have grazed elbows and knees.

Entirely plausible. Glad to help. :thumright:

I also struggled to get 67kts on climb-out a couple of times. Have done that correctly plenty of times before but it was more than a bit ragged this lesson. I guess capacity overload pushed it out of the door.

Was it actually that, or are you chasing the instruments? Get used to the climb attitude for the speed you want by looking out the window, holding that attitude, and then after the ASI has settled, make any adjustments. There's always a strong temptation to watch the ASI, but getting the external visual picture of the climb attitude required is the thing to nail.

The other thing is, 67 +/- how much? If it's only a couple of knots then don't beat yourself up too much. The stressing over the odd knot or two will itself reduce your capacity to think ahead of the aeroplane.

The finesse will come.

One approach was way too high on turning Final but I did get that sorted

It's the getting it sorted that's important, not whether you happen to be at height X by circuit corner Y.

In the fullness of time, you'll visit airfields where circuits are completely different shapes and sizes from what you're used to, and being at the prescribed height you were taught at the base/final corner is actually completely the wrong thing to do.

The ability to look where you're going, and judge where you're going to end up at your current rate of descent (and then adjust accordingly) is what you really want, and what it sounds like is developing.
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By tr7v8
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1854570
Well yet another entry for my logbook. Weather today was interesting to say the least. Rain overnight & low cloud & blustery this morning. Still no Dear John call from the school so off we go. Was pretty nippy around 12 Deg C with a wind chill bringing it down further. Heating on at home. Wind around 15kts.
Doing the pre flights with a jacket on & pretty cold, virtually needed gloves.
So did 6 Landings & take offs, felt good, last one was by far the best. Did get a well done from my instructor. Who pointed out that there had been many distractions. These were; Helimed 60 (HLE60, callsign Alpha which means on a job) the Kent air ambulance wanting to fly across the circuit to land on a job for the prison. The gusting wind which makes things bumpy. Despite the weather the circuit was pretty busy, including a Gyro doing small quick circuits inside us & they have very different take off & landing profiles. Much steeper. It lands & takes off at 50 degrees to the deck! So myself & the instructor have necks swivelling like fighter pilots working out where everyone is. Next lesson Saturday back with the other instructor.
So now 25 lessons & 25 hours 25mins in.
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By T6Harvard
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1854579
Confessions - Sadly not just +/- a couple of kts off Vy...... more like 8kts too fast at my worse, so a completely wrong attitude. Something else to concentrate on tomorrow :D

An excellent lesson then @tr7v8 ! Good to hear.

There's an air ambulance based at my airfield and for a couple of weeks another one has been popping in for training. They are brilliant on the radio so we always know where they are and what their intentions are.

I forgot to mention our other companions though...... a few pheasants are regularly appearing on the grass taxiway. Yesterday my Instructor spotted one sneaking into our path. He said when he flew Commercial jets they could sound the engineers' horn to scare them (the birds, not the engineers, one assumes) but as it was we just had to hope it ran back into the corn field.
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By TopCat
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1854639
T6Harvard wrote:Confessions - Sadly not just +/- a couple of kts off Vy...... more like 8kts too fast at my worse, so a completely wrong attitude. Something else to concentrate on tomorrow :D

Even better. Higher airspeed in the climb, cooler cylinders. Better for the engine. Better view over the nose.

I never climb at Vy unless I have to, especially in the summer, and if I do, I'm watching the CHT gauge.

I'm being intentionally contrary, here. Obviously you want to do it as your instructor says to. And if you climb at a particular airspeed, it should really be intentional. But Vy isn't a magic number that it's wrong not to climb at.

:)
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By T6Harvard
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1854651
Well I did in excess of 20 circuits flying the sofa last night, trying to speed up and smooth out actions :mrgreen:
Looks like light winds, favouring 08.
Aiming for 67kts climb-out to set myself up for the circuit as in School diagram, not as per my personal redesign on Monday :lol:
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By Paul_Sengupta
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1854660
TopCat wrote:Even better. Higher airspeed in the climb, cooler cylinders. Better for the engine. Better view over the nose.

I never climb at Vy unless I have to


There's another, more important reason to climb faster than Vy. After the weather, the biggest killer these days is the departure stall, possibly after an engine failure. Keeping the speed up on climbout means you have more time to react. We seem to have pretty much cured the "base to final turn" stall/spin in this country, we need to do the same with the climbout stall.
By TopCat
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1854669
Paul_Sengupta wrote:After the weather, the biggest killer these days is the departure stall, possibly after an engine failure.

Really???? That's amazing.
Keeping the speed up on climbout means you have more time to react. We seem to have pretty much cured the "base to final turn" stall/spin in this country, we need to do the same with the climbout stall.

Vy is typically about 20 kt above the stall isn't it?

Is that really such a tiny margin that people are freezing with the stick back for so long that they stall and spin in? :shock:
By Crash one
#1854676
I think 90% of all this flying by numbers plus or minus a gnats ass is to train discipline into the student for the time when you do really need to fly accurately, perhaps in the commercial world that they think we all aspire to.
A descending gradual turn from the end of downwind to final with “constant aspect” view of the touchdown point is a lot safer than a relatively quick 90 deg turn at each corner. But those are not “normal” today!
However, not to offend anyone. Do what he’s says you should do.
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By TopCat
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1854684
Crash one wrote:I think 90% of all this flying by numbers plus or minus a gnats ass is to train discipline into the student for the time when you do really need to fly accurately, perhaps in the commercial world that they think we all aspire to.

At some airfields the noise complaints will roll in if people fly circuits that don't accurately avoid all the noise sensitive areas. Some of these can litter an ATZ.

So in fairness to the schools that have to run the gauntlet of the locals' ire, accurate circuits can be important.

But I do wonder if sometimes it's about getting people through a course, rather than teaching them to fly.
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By T6Harvard
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1854723
I enjoyed circuits today. More than my Instructor, I dare say, but I was not behind the aircraft all the time, and there were a couple of really good approaches in amongst the mediocre ones. Turns were at the right place, speeds, excluding climb-out (- see below) were much more accurate and consistent. Turns onto and maintaining headings were much better (back to what I can do if not overloaded).

A recurring fault was letting the nose drop on climb-out when cleaning up the flaps (in stages!) and therefore losing the datum attitude and gathering speed. Am annoyed with myself about that but at least it is fixable. The last time it was almost sorted out.

What made the difference to all the rest? After the first circuit, which was a bit various :mrgreen: , my Instructor said to leave the trim alone and just fly the next circuit with no adjustments and there would be no prompting on anything.

That was it, removing one thing from the tasks required and I found I had capacity for the rest. Possibly sad but true :oops:

I think it was @editmonkey who said it is easier when the Instructor sat quietly and the student could concentrate more...so that probably helped, along with the psychological effect of being fully responsible for what was happening.

Debrief covered the issues I had recognised and we agreed that I was much more confident today and although it wasn't always pretty it felt loads better. "You'll look back and wonder why it seemed so hard." :lol:
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