Flying Lesson #108 - Slip, Slide, And Away

Lesson 108 started out this afternoon on a cold and blustery day.

Temperature was 28 degrees and winds were about 13 knots from 290-300, so not bad but a bit of a right crosswind.

After a cold pre-flight inspection and then run-up, we headed out to the practice area and did maneuvers. We started out with my doing Slow flight, which was fine while keeping it to the new ACS standards of not letting the stall horn go off so it wasn't quite as slow a flight as slow flight can be. In any case I mentioned my altitude, did some truns left and right and that was good enough. Then on to stalls. My stalls both power on and power off were very good with good recoveries. Next for the first time I did a turning stall - stalling while in a 30 degree bank. This was pretty much a non-event - just drop the nose and level the wings and voila you're no longer in a turning stall.

Next on to steep turns, what used to be my best maneuver is now not so much in the Archer and it needs some work,it's not terrible, but just not as great a control over altitude and the picture still feels off.

Then we headed back to Pontiac and did a normal landing and then took off again and did a forward slip to land on final from 800 feet (1,800 MSL) [Fora normal landing you should be at 400 feet at that point]. Again, pretty much a non-event in the Archer and it felt stable as heck while dropping down, much more-so than in the 172. However, again the lesser rudder authority of the Archer caught me a bit as I banked fine for a 172, which was a bit too much for the Archer, once that was straightened out all was fine and it was a much easier maneuver than I had experienced, with the slight edge at the end where i tried to pull up as if I had a 172 picture so I did flare a bit early but it was salvageable without too much correction and a good landing.

On the next pattern the spacing got a bit too tight and we had to do a go-around due to the plane ahead not exiting the runway soon enough - no bother and I'm rather good at go-arounds. Thence back again for another landing where I came in a bit too high on final. I salvaged it with an idle-in technique and brought it in for a decent landing. Then we taxied the plane on back and shut down the lesson. Overall not a bad flight.

That's 1.5 and 3 landings.