First thing to report is I have acquired a CRP-5 whizz wheel. A nice guy on a PPL Friendface page was offering it for the cost of postage. Couldn't accept that so I'm happy with a virtually brand new looking CRP-5 and he can have a beer or two. I do like the flying community.
Now on to today's lesson.
I was sure up until about 9:30 last night that today would be canned. Cloud base forecast for Staverton was 300ft for this morning but in the end, it was OK - broken at around 2,400ft.
Wind this morning was a calm 3-4kts but from the east. Never flown from 09 so it was a nice, new experience.
Call to the instructor resulted in the request to hot-foot it to the airfield ASAP so we could get up for a circuit slot at 9am. On arrival, told me that he would be doing 2 with me and then I was off on my own for the rest of the hour or longer if the circuit stayed quiet enough.
So, off we went. First couple OK - little bit of height drift. No perfectly greased landings but good enough. Out he hops and I'm back on my own.
Less nerves than the first solo - just the feeling this time that I have to get the job done.
Generally, 5 T&G's and a landing were fairly uneventful. Time seems to go very quickly in solo circuits.
My patterns weren't perfect and I noticed that my base leg was quite short on some so tried to correct later on. My track image confirms that. Was too busy watching traffic and missed one turn onto downwind and a bit of variation on the turn onto base - need to tighten up on those but was happy that I managed to correct everything OK to be generally coming in with 2 whites and 2 reds by the time it really mattered.
I had quite a few times when there was radio traffic and I was waiting for that to clear before getting either my downwind or final call in. Just as I was about to press the PTT, tower would pre-empt and give me my downwind sequence or clearance. Maybe I need to speed up a bit but the instructor said he was listening on the radio and thought I had done OK and the controller may have been a bit quick to pre-empt my calls. All good learning anyway.
On the last circuit to land, there was another joining flight on a RH circuit on downwind at the same time as me. I was given No 2 but couldn't see them. Was quite pleased to stay calm and liaise with the controller to extend the downwind and wait for their call to turn my base. Comforting once I had turned to be able to see them thought. Happy overall with my radio work though. I think I've mentioned before that I used to sort of tune out the radio as it was distracting but now the flying is getting a bit more intuitive, I'm listening and understanding the radio calls better. Glos ATC are pretty forgiving too in fairness.
Landings I think were OK. One I barely felt and a little squeak from the stall warning, the others a bit lumpier. I think I'm flaring a little early - need to get better at holding level and letting the energy bleed off before flaring. Didn't hear anyone on the hold sniggering or gasping
So, that's 20m PUT, another 55m P1, 6 landings. 1h10m P1 total so one more set of solo's and I'm allowed to fly away from the circuit on my own... the next thing to put me out of my comfort zone
Lesson 16. 17h50m.