Flying Lesson #100 - A Rather Economical Lesson

Lesson 100 started out most promisingly - I got there early and the winds were calm, visibility fine and it wasn't as cold as it has been the past few days. This is good as the furnace at home went tango uniform last night and the part to fix it won't be available until Monday at the earliest. Anyways, back to the flying stuff.

A nice preflight with no frost or snow or ice on the plane to speak of, fuel tanks pleasantly full and oil at 6. Since everything checked out and I was early, I added another quart to bring it to 7 as that is both lucky and good for the plane.

I was rather determined this would be a good lesson and was thinking positively and trying to brush aside all them negative waves.

Bobby then joined me and it would again be a no instrument (except for occasional glances at the altimeter) kind of lesson.

Considering the winds were calm to 5 knots this was a good opportunity for that.

Normal taxi etc and I was feeling good. Excellent no looking takeoff and i was getting the feel of the plane nicely. Good pattern, decent landing and taxi off to do it again. Even better takeoff, great pattern, come around for landing and on touch down it became problematic.

The shimmy dampener failed most impressively with the entire plane shaking. Brakes felt off as well. While the tower want us to turn off at Kilo we stated we were unable due to some serious braking issues and they had a plane behind us go around. We got off farther down the runway and taxi'd on back to Flight 101 to terminate.

That was it.

Hilariously enough, N757MK had headed out after we pulled in to park and it then had a complete steering failure and was stuck on the taxiway and had to be brought back via tug. If they lose Papa Romeo today then all 3 172s will be down.

With plenty of extra time on my hands, I drove over to the Piper-flying school on the field and talked with them and I think I'm going to make the switch. Very professional, solid layout, 7 trainers plus more advanced aircraft and mirabile dictu, a solid syllabus approach (which would have to be modified in my case).

On the one hand I think that Bob (who taught previously at the Piper school) really is a good instructor (and the Piper guy affirmed that he is too - he left there over non-instructional differences not due to any flying issues) and does want to get me straightened out, undo the screw ups by prior instructors and get me where I need to be, and I do like him and think I'm learning from him and I tend to be a bit too loyal, to my own detriment, sometimes. The problem is that if it is not the weather, then its the aircraft at Flight 101 that will likely hold me back even as I finally have an instructor that is set on getting me forward. The Piper place will cost more and the transition will eat more time.

In addition, it turns out that Crosswinds from Howell will be opening a satellite school at KPTK, but possibly not soon enough to matter.

So it was an economical lesson with .4 slowing my inexorable increase in hours and 2 landings. Overall was a darn good lesson that should have been longer but may just be enough to put me in a Piper.

Update: papa Romeo was also no-fly for students (but ok for instructors only) due to a similar nose gear problem.

Update: I called and made an appointment at the DCT, the Piper school at the airfield.

Flying Lesson #99 - Strong Winds Combined With A New Way Of Doing Things

Well, Lesson #99 just kicked my tail. Well, the winds did anyways.

Continuing on from our previous lesson of having me looking outside more, Bob made good on his promise to cover the instruments - everything but the compass, tach, and altitude indicator was covered by some evil black round fiendish rubber covers, which exuded evil - did I mention they were evil?

We would be staying in the pattern for this one.

Bob first demonstrated how you could takeoff safely without an airspeed indicator just by using proper visual and sound cues and did. He also did the whole pattern without instruments and basically just by feel, look and sound.

Then it was my turn. Unfortunately the winds were now gusting from 20-27 knots from 299-300 and with enough turbulence to shake the plane around to knock the covers off the instruments as well as make the plane do some very uncomfortable and nasty rolling movements in the air, with rolls that kept trying to tip the plane over.

Takeoff with no instruments was ok and sort of like a soft field takeoff - pull back to half a climb picture once you think it is around 30 knots and hold it until the airplane flies itself off the runway, then nose down to let the speed build and you feel the plane pushing against you and then you can go to a normal climb attitude.

Going through the pattern was similar with trim and power to get where you want and no airspeed indicator needed, which is completely the opposite of what I was previously trained on for patterns where airspeed and the airspeed indicator was king. Do we did the flaps as susual but kept them at 20 degrees due to the gust and came in on final again doing all of it visually.

Then on final in we went and between the winds, side gusts etc I was not having a great time but landed ok but flat yet again.

We then taxied on back and did it again and takeoff was better as was the pattern, landing however sucked even more as the winds were really nasty and again I landed a little rough and flat.

My impressive death grip had returned and this flight had indeed kicked my ass.

I decided that was it for the day and Bob thought that was a good call as it was getting kind of rough out there to learn a new way of doing things and handle the gusting crosswind. On the upside I certainly learned to look outside more so some progress there but it certainly shows how far off I am yet again.

.7 with 3 landings with no looking at the instruments.

Flying Lesson #98 - Flying After A Long Wait

This morning was a beautiful one. There was a yellow ball in the sky that had been conspicuous by its absence for the past few weeks and one could actually see blue clear sky as far as one looked.

Winds were calm and started to increase as the flight went on, settling at 8 knots from 230-270 when we landed.

In short, time to fly again, finally. It had been almost a month since my last flight as mainly weather (including winds beyond my permissible limits whenever I tried to book a solo flight - hell I haven't flown solo since June) but also airplane maintenance issues whenever the weather was reasonable thwarted my leaving the surly bonds of earth. In short I had more cancelled lessons in January than actual lessons by about a 12-1 ratio.

So the preflight was fun, with frost covering yon trusty (ha! ha!) aircraft. Fuel had not been topped off but since we were at 10 in the right and 14 gallons in the left tank it was sufficient. I did have to add oil as well and scraped off ice and frost from the wings and stabilizer.

The plane started up impressively well and we headed out on ice-covered taxiways to get to the run up area. Of course at the run up area I found the left brake was extremely soft but the heck with it, we were going.

It was quite already busy at 9:15 am this morning as the nice weather had brought everyone and their aircraft out. We initially were set for 27R but then told to go to 27L to takeoff, so we went across the completely iced over taxiway between the two runways and took off from 27L and headed out until cleared to turn right toward the northeast.

Cabin heat was just about non-existent so it was about 0 degrees in the plane and -15 outside at 3,500 feet. But for all that it was good to get up and fly again. Much of the fun of it has gone and its mainly stubbornness keeping me going at this point, but whatever.

After getting to the practice area I did slow flight without a problem, a couple power off stalls, a power on stall, steep turns and turns around a point. The stalls were good but Bob showed me how to make the recovery smoother and we worked on the steep turns. The steep turns needed a bit of work which sucks as they used to be my best maneuver, but everything else is within tolerances. Again, I need to look outside more and I think he's going to cover the panel on the next flight, which is evil but probably necessary at this juncture. I'm still working on getting the right outside sight picture but it is coming along.

Landing was ok, but Bob was a bit surprised and annoyed at what previous instructors had been teaching me on landings so likely next lessons will be on landings which would be good as given the time passing I'm sure I will suck at them yet again as we haven't practiced them.

Bob did also ask a rather surprising question when the lesson ended that showed he is not just a good instructor but a great one.

I figure that I am going to interview a couple flight schools that are on the filed at KPTK as Howell is just too darn far. One is an all-Piper shop which will mean familiarizing myself with a low wing plane and another is a smaller one with Cessnas but either way it will likely mean going around in circles yet again. Of course, this is after I get a really good instructor so I'm rather torn and frustrated by the whole thing and rather undecided.

That's 1.2 and 1 landing.

Flying Lesson #97 - Maneuver Heaven

Continuing the tale of sunk flying costs, I took off in N73455 with Bob and headed to the practice area.

Once there we did slow flight, which I did better than last time, power off stalls, power on stalls, steep turns and turns around a point. We also did the engine out and I actually did ok overall with good speed management etc, emergency checklist memorized and run through and overall not bad. I'm still having issues lining up on the chosen empty field amongst many empty fields thing and making sure I don't overshoot it and maneuver to it. I mean it will land in a empty field and that should damn well be good enough really (Yes before you point it out, I know I need to land in whatever field is picked etc).

My steep turns have gotten worse, they used to be my best maneuver. The again I haven't done them since November 19th and it showed. In short, as I get a maneuver down, we move on to others and it then decays accordingly while the maneuver being focused on gets better, rinse, turn prop, repeat. This is getting stupid. If it wasn't for all the sunk costs I'd likely be doing something else by now, but I just may be too stubborn and stupid to drop it -- or maybe not.

Half the fun is getting used to a new instructor, Bob seems quite good, certainly less grabby on the controls than Ray and lets me do everything and seems to really want me to get done. I reckon if I had had him from the first I might just have been done a long time ago now.

He has a big focus on looking outside during the maneuvers and to quit focusing so much on the instruments which is probably a good corrective for me. He said my ground/oral knowledge is fine and he's not worried about that and my radio work is excellent (well yipee). Next we're going to finish the altitude maneuvers and head to pattern entry and landing stuff. Weather or not the weather will cooperate is a fun question, whether the maneuvers will then decay before the somehow always looming but never arriving checkride is quite likely.

That's 1.3 hours and 1 more landing.

Flying Lesson #96 - Cold Flight

So I arrived at KPTK and proceeded to do the preflight and scrape the frost of the leading edge of the wings, windshield etc.

Winter flying sucks.

Considering that N73455's cabin heater was putting out practically no heat at all, it sucked even more.

So after a run up and taking time to get the oil temperature to even show up on the gauge, we took off to the northeast and the practice area in Marginal VFR conditions. Considering every other scheduled flying lesson I had booked since the least one was cancelled due to weather we'd take the marginal visibility. In return for the cold and lousy viz we got nice stable air and we got excellent climbing performance, so its nice to have that.

After getting to the practice area I did slow flight again and Bob pointed out I need to look outside more. Apparently Ray had me too fixated on the instruments, especially the airspeed indicator. So we practiced that a fair bit and I did ok.

Next we did a power off stall and I did that just fine, complete with the descend 200 feet after full flaps are in before proceeding to pull the yoke back and stall the plane - this had not been taught to me previously but apparently its a required part of the maneuver now, or perhaps its always been so.

As we were freezing solid with -15 C on the outside temperature gauge and probably the same on the inside, Bob decided to call it and we headed back to KPTK, using a VFR back localizer approach to come in on 27L as the viz was quite bad. Bob had me fly to ERNST and then to the lineup for it. This was kinda interesting to experience. Once we had the runway in sight we switched to 27R for landing which I did, kind of flat-ish but at least mains first, and not as stabilized as I would of liked, but it good enough a landing. After tying the plane down and plugging in the oil heater back in we went inside and went over a few tips for landings and that was that.

1.0 and 1 landing.

Flying Lesson #95 - The Serious Pre-Checkride Program

By the act of simply scheduling a solo I can make the weather absolutely sucky. Two cancelled days in sequence where I had booked to fly solo on Saturday and with Monday having been scratched due to thick fog, rain, wind, and a Low IFR overcast layer all at once it was time for a dual lesson with Bob the new instructor. Ray is now no longer a part of the picture, possibly more on that later.

I get to the airport and before even checking over the plane, Bob pulls me in for a preflight brief as to what were going to do - a serious pre-checkride flight where he'll call the maneuvers, I'll do them and then he'll go over them if they need something pointed out to improve them. This sounds good.

So I preflight the plane and N73455 is ready to go. We get a bit of a lowish overcast around 2,500 that slowly works its way upwards as the flight progresses.

I do a nice takeoff and we start heading northeast, with a slight delay as the tower has us stop our authorized turn and to fly north for a bit for separation from another flight.

We get out to the practice area and we start with slow flight. I'm a little ham-fisted and while my procedure is perfect I lose more than 100 feet of altitude while setting up for it, so we go over it again and I get it right.

Then we move on to a power off stall and again good procedure but I lose a bit more altitude than I should during setup but then get it done right after he shows me a bit more of the finesse that should go with it and the recovery.

Then we do a power on stall, which I haven't done in a long, long time, and I do it perfectly.

Then we turn to turns around a point, which again I haven't done in a long while but once I settle down I do a very nice one and he's quite happy with it.

Then on to one of my personal hang-ups, the S-turn across a road, and amazingly enough I just did it and did it pretty darn well.

Then on to an engine-out emergency landing which I flub again due to lack of practice, and we go over it, he demonstrates it, and then I do it and do a good job of it but it still needs practice though.

Then we head back to Pontiac and we initially get a base call at 2 miles, but before we hit that they have us extend for traffic and then clear us to come in and I do a perfect, and I mean perfect, approach and cross-wind landing all on my own.

After the flight we have a debrief and he says my flying is good and my procedures are good, but I need to look outside the plane more and there's just a bit of polishing to do on those maneuvers, and he expects that we will work on those and get this done and get me ready for the checkride.

That's 1.4 and one darn nice landing.

Flying Lesson #94 - Short Fields With A New Instructor

For lunch I dropped by Flight 101 for a lesson. I had it scheduled with Ray as going to Crosswinds during the week is pretty much out and I still have money on my account there I want to burn through.

It turns out that Ray isn't there and I've got a new instructor for the day, Bob. This is a bit surprising as its an unannounced change.

New to Flight 101 but with 2,000 hours to his log book, while he's another younger fellow, but he's been instructing at another school and just started two days ago with Flight 101. So we head out to the plane and I get it preflighted while he scrapes off a good layer of frost from it. So we talk about where I am in the process and what I feel I need to improve on, then he has me start it up and we head out to the runway. And I handle the entire process.

First takeoff he wants me to hold it in ground effect as the speed builds up just in case there's any frost left on it causing problems....no problems and we get a good takeoff in.

Performance in the cold air is excellent and I'm hitting pattern altitude while turning crosswind from upwind. Then he has me do a couple regular landings which were decent with a bit of fun thrown in from the tower - first having us do an extended downwind after I've already start to turn base, which throws things off a bit. On the next landing on quite short final they have me sidestep to 27L as they've just had a plane cleared to takeoff from 27R after clearing me to land and I'm approaching with a plane in front of my windshield and I'm preparing to do a go round before they call for the sidestep. So I sidestep and land just fine on 27L. Overall not my best two landings but not bad and I did them all by my happy self.

Then we move on to short fields. Bob has me try one first and then we analyze and go over what needs to be worked on. While the setup and landing wasn't bad s far as landings go, it wasn't within standards for a short field and I was a tad too high and fast on final and as usual my aiming point was not right.

Bob demonstrates one and then I do some more and get better with each one. He has a different approach to it and it helps quite a bit in terms of focus on the aiming point and how to do the landing by setting the trim to set the pitch and feel to exactly make it all just so that when you think you need to push you just reduce power and when you think you would need to pull on the yoke you would add power without changing the pitch attitude to keep the airspeed locked in.

This was extremely helpful.

My final two short fields, I'm on target and stopped on 27R before taxiway Whiskey and able to turn off on it to turn back to the numbers and takeoff again.

By the end of the lesson I've got this pretty much down and have a ton more confidence in my short fields and can actually do them.

He also has me do a short field takeoff that I ace (my short field takeoffs have always been good), even though the runway is a tad slick and the right brake is feeling kinda soft while holding the plane in place at full power.

Maybe a different perspective is all that is needed and we can get this thing done finally.

That's 8 landings and 1.5.

Not Flying Lesson

Last night with the snow coming down the TAF for Pontiac was predicting lousy weather for this morning - snow, rain, low viz so i halfway expected the lesson to be cancelled.

After clearing off the Driveway of Doom™ and putting Jett back in the house and drying him off I headed to Pontiac for a scheduled flight with Ray as the weather had cleared at least enough for some pattern work. My clearing of the driveway was clearly merited and I made it down without incident. However, to say the roads were terrible would be an understatement, many looked like they had not been cleared at all and I was driving in ruts.

So it took awhile to get to KPTK and when I got there I saw this:

It's kinda snowed in and the taxiways are not yet cleared.

Worse, on closer inspection under the snow was:

A pretty solid layer of ice on the windscreen, wing, and horizontal stabilizer which means no flying for you.

We then were able to tow N73455 and N757MK into the hanger, where they should have been overnight really but for various reasons were not. Once in the hanger they defrosted nicely but not in time for my lesson and that student owes me a beer for the prep work.

At this point I'm kinda stymied - it would have easily taken at least 2 hours to just get to Crosswinds today given the roads and the weather made any planning for such a flight rather iffy anyways - driving 2 hours there and 2 back if a flight is cancelled will suck mightily, but Flight 101 is screwing the pooch here nicely as well. Then again, even if they had the plane in the hanger getitng it to the runway would have been iffy considering the taxiways were not cleared yet so it may have just not been my day to go flying. On the upside I did save money by not flying... I have a solo flight set for next weekend and we'll see what the weather brings.

Flying Lesson #93 - Crosswinds in The Cold

A rather large weather system is heading for Michigan and it seemed that everyone wanted to go flying this morning.

I was flying with Ray and first I preflighted N757Mk as it has decent cabin heat. Pre-flighting in the winter is a cold experience. Unfortunately after all that, 757Mk it would not start so me switched over N73455 and I did the preflight on it as well. I like N73455 more anyways even though its cabin heat is about non-existent. During the flight we actually were able to make it snow in the cabin as it cooled our breath to the dewpoint.

There were six planes in the run up area and KPTk switched to dual towers. Since most were going to stay in the pattern we decided we would not do so and headed to Romeo. The cloud cover was low at about 2,600 so we stayed under it at 2,000 and picked up a little ice on the way to Romeo but not very much. The winds were gusting quite a bit with a crosswind so Ray did the first landing and figured it would be challenging but good for me so I did the next two and he liked my landings and thinks I'm doing quite well. I certainly felt a lot more confident and did very nice crosswind landings if I say so myself. Then we headed back to KPTK and started picking up a fair bit more ice that was vidsible on the tires. It was more than we would like so we did the final landing without flaps just in case some had accumulated on the wings.

That's 1.2 and 4 more landings.

I need to schedule a lesson over at Howell and start getting all this stuff figured out.

Flying Lesson #92 - Recon of Diversionary Airfields

Lesson 92 started as KPTK was humming with Operation Good Cheer.

Operation Good Cheer is when volunteer pilots deliver gifts to children in need all across the state from KPTK.

To say the airport was bedlam would be an understatement. Not only were they rocking dual tower operation (which happens on busy days every so often), they had dual ground going which is the first time I've seen that.

I did a straight out departure to the West to get out of the craziness and headed off to Howell staying at 2,000 feet.

Since Howell tends to be one of the local group of examiners favorite diversion points on a check ride, Ray thought it would be useful to fly there. Since I've driven there already and flown out of there it was quite a comfortable spot. I found Howell ok as a result.

I did a downwind entry and a touch and go that went quite well and then we were off to Linden, another favorite diversion points and one that is a bit harder to find - forested, three nearby lakes and a displaced threshold and it really doesn't stand out amongst its surroundings. Found it and did a landing followed by a full stop taxi back as there really isn't enough runway there for a touch-and-go, or you may end doing a touch-a-tree, which is bad form. Kinda a cool airport there are houses on the field and you can park your plane in your attached hangar if you own a house there. Pretty sweet even if you do have Flint water. But, if you mix the water with 100 octane you'll get 100 low lead for your plane so it's not all bad.

Then back to KPTK where they had us cross the incoming flight path of another plane heading on final for 27R to shift to 27L on a very tight base, Ray took that landing as it was rather tight indeed and needed to be expedited and there was a plane still on 27L aswe were on very short final so it was not a typical approach.

Overall a pretty relaxing flight and the landings were not bad.

I think I'll stick with Flight 101 for solo flights (should I ever book one in weather decent enough for solo) and depending on weather head to Howell and Crosswinds for instruction for the most part (or try to find someone else that is closer) then get signed off by Flight 101 for a check-ride once I get the nagging issues resolved and try to get this thing finished off.

That's 1.1 and 3 landings.

Flying Lesson #91 - Short Field Landings Suck

Yesterday at noon the weather was far to nice to eat lunch indoors. So I called and Ray and a plane was available and I got a lesson in.

We flew up to Lapeer (D95) to practice some short field landings.

Flight there was good, winds were light and it was nice and clear out.

So I needed to work on short field landings and that's what we worked on.

The first landing was sucky, came in too high and when landing landed long and overshot the mark beyond acceptable parameters. Half the fun is figuring out where is the "mark" exactly, not to mention the aiming point for it. It looks a helluva lot easier in books and in online videos to figure this out.

Also dropping to 40 degrees of flaps makes the plane drop very nicely, and this is moreso when you cut the power the nose drops pretty quickly so you need to rotate and cut the power at the same time once you hit your aiming point and then drift over to your mark.

The next few were ok, and maybe I'm being too hard on myself but I'm clearly not getting it. I'm certainly more comfortable flying now but this particular maneuver is not working.

We then came back to Pontiac and I did a decent but not great short field landing. However I think at this stage I shouldn't need coaching to do it and I still need that apparently.

In other news, Ray has been invited to apply at Endeavor Airlines, the feeder airline for Delta (For which I have no doubt he'll do a darn good job) so I'll likely be out another instructor shortly. He does say "I'm close" but that's been said for awhile now so it'll be fun to see if I test before or after he gets called up to the airlines. On reflection I sure as heck don't feel ready now. I can fly fine, land fine enough for normal circumstances and in reasonable crosswinds and for soft fields, but that likely won't meet the check-ride standards especially the no flap slip and short field landings, not to mention the emergency landing procedure is now rusty as is the power on stall while turning.....

For now I'd say my knowledge for the oral exam portion of the test is there, but how long it will all stay in there (it's closed book so it all must be memorized and ready to be spit back no matter how fargin' useless some of the knowledge is to actual real world flying or that in real life you can actually open the frickin' book and have the answer right there) and how long I'm going to keep reviewing it is getting in question.

So do I switch to Crosswinds and pay the lots extra and learn the G1000 setup? Downside is it will mean adding even more time and lots more travel time, probably dropping my flying lesson schedule to once a week and with weather will mean I'll be flying less than once a week. Also spending an hour driving to the field to find out the lesson is cancelled will suck. Do I stick with doing a bit at both?

Or do I just finish at Flight 101?

Do I say screw it and take the winter off as driving an hour each way to Crosswinds in the winter will suck and instead take the time to replenish the bank account and try again in the spring? Of course, by then I'll need a new medical and I think one of the new student pilots cert as mine is tied to the medical, and if we wait long enough and get to October 2017, I can do the written test again - Oh Joy!

In a few more hours, and if I can learn a chandelle and a few figure eights, I can skip the private rating and jump right to the Commercial pilot cert, right guys?

To say I haven't a frickin' clue how to proceed with this and getting kinda disenchanted with the whole deal would be an understatement.

Picking Up Ice In The Run-Up Area....

Is nature's way of telling you you're not getting a flying lesson in this morning. The presence of ice forming on aircraft not rated for flying in known icing conditions does not mix, at all.

The day started reasonably nice with a wind from 15-25 along 270-250 degrees so practically down the runway - ok for a lesson but past my solo endorsement. It's clear, a bright day with a layer at about 3,000.

So a good pre-flight, start up, and a little rain starts to fall but everything is reported and still appears VFR with about a 3,000 foot ceiling, good enough for pattern work. We get to the run-up area and....

Hey, where did the end of the runway go?

We wait for a bit and Tower reports they've still got good visibility and then we notice that while it's raining a bit more, and we're getting some carburetor ice from the moisture in the air and then...the temperature visibly falls.

"We're now picking up ice".

"Yep. we're done"

So taxi on back and we let the Tower know about the icing conditions and the Tower announces they're going IFR, so we go inside for a ground lesson where I did quite well.

Flying Lesson #90 - Gusting Winds Of November

Since I already had a lesson booked with Ray at Flight 101 I figured I'd go with it.

This would be a long lunch type lesson with some practicing for the checkride to come - maybe, eventually, someday, yeah.

Winds were gusting first around 8 knots at 200 then increasing to 12 knots at 200 then settling on around 1618 knots at 170 to 180. Lot of nasty rollers and other bits of fun.

I did 3 very good crosswind landings at KPTK and felt quite happy with myself. Ray seemed impressed as well. I guess that lesson with Don paid off.

Then we headed out to the northeast do some maneuvers and I hadn't done those in quite awhile.

Starting off with steep turns, which are a personal fave of mine now, I did them quite well.

Then on to the FAA's new definition of slow flight which does take some getting used to, and I did climbs, descents and turns in slow flight.

Then on to power off stalls and I was overly aggressive in breaking the stall on the initial try so we worked on that and I simply relaxed the back-pressure rather than forcibly pitching down.

Power on stalls were next and it was extremely hard to get it to a safe break in that configuration without standing the plane on its tail, so we tabled those for another day.

Then we did an emergency engine out and I sucked at that, having not done it in about a year or so. In short I didn't keep it at VGlide which would be a fail. I then did it again with better results locking in the airspeed but need practice estimating the whole gliding distance aspect so I don't overshoot the chosen field. It needs some work.

then we headed back and I did a cross-wind soft field landing which was ok but sporty with the way the winds were gusting and blowing. Then we asked for runway 18 as the winds were 19 knots at 180 which is one heckuva direct crosswind using 27R.

We got permission to do so, and I did an overall ok short field but messed up the ending with a sudden crosswind that messed things up. Then Pontiac got too traffic-y, lots and lots of planes coming and going all over the place, and we had to do a go-round on the next final as a helicopter had decided to sit on 18 and hadn't cleared it in time for us. Then we did one more short field on 18 and that was that. I need to work on the short field landings more.

Overall I'd say that one flight with Don had a salutary effect on my landings and is getting me back on track. I figure I'll take another lesson with him soon.

That's 2.5 hours and 10 landings.

Flying Lesson #88 - Leaping To Lapeer, Roamin To Romeo

Yesterday afternoon, being a beautiful day without a cloud in the sky and a light crosswind we headed to Lapeer to do some landings.

As it turned out, Lapeer was busy as T-shiet weather in November will get all the pilots out for another fling. I did two landings, the first one was ok but I came in a bit high, the second much better, and then it was just getting to crowded so we headed to Romeo.

At Romeo there was one plane that had departed the pattern and had announced he would be back in about 5 minutes and another one in the patter, so we entered and did three landings there and soon a few more planes showed up so we headed back to Pontiac.

On the way back to Pontiac we were flying straight into the sun and on downwind I could barely make out the runway. It got better on base and I did a nice landing on 9L and that was the lesson. Lots of practice just flying headings and holding altitudes and a few landings thrown in.

1.6 and 6 landings.

Flying Lesson #88 - The Long And The Short Of It

First we flew northeast over Romeo and then on to a new airport.

Marine City Airport, 76G is on the shores of Lake St. Clair, right near Selfridge AFB's airspace. You want to make sure to stay out of Selfridge's airspace.

It's a short field with 3,100 feet by 60 feet wide and with ditches on each side and a serious obstacle of power lines off the end of Runway 22/4 that go up 300 feet. Of course the winds had us use Runway 22, so I got to practice my short field takeoffs with a serious Vx climb up and over the power lines. My short takeoffs are very nice if I say so myself - even right into the sun I held Vx until clear of the obstacle with no problems.

So we did a couple short field landings, and with the road 15 feet from the threshold we had fun going over an RV - it felt kinda close. The takeoffs and landings were in a light crosswind were ok. The taxi backs were fun as at the runway end if you mess up your turn you'll fall into a water filled ditch on either side of the runway.

Then Ray had me put some foggles on and practice flying without outside references as that will be on the flight test.

He had me navigate by instruments only giving course and altitude corrections and ended up with me lined up on Pontiac's 27L for landing, at which point I took the foggles off and landed the plane with a pretty decent landing.

That's 3 landings and another 1.5 hours.

Flying Lessons #86 and #87 More Crosswind Practice

Yesterday the winds were blowing from around 110-180 gusting away from 9-1 or so. This meant it was Runway 9L time and lost of fun with the crosswind practice.

Lots of bumps and pushes form the wind and various times. All in all not bad on the landings and they're getting better.

We did full stop taxi backs for them and it wasn't too bad, and a few landings were quite excellent. After being bashed around by the rollers and turbulence we called it a day.

1.1 Hours and 6 landings.

Today was much of the same, but the winds were from 180-210 at 8-13 making for use of Runway 27R with a right hand pattern. It was also much less turbulent up there. There was also some bright sun and combined with some haze out of the south made finding the runway on the downwind difficult at times, as in it almost felt like IFR in that direction in some spots. Other than the visual fun, I did some good patterns and had pretty good control throughout even when hitting some rollers at times.

The cool air made for some excellent climb performance. We were doing touch and goes so it was down and then right back to it.

We were asked by the tower a couple times to cut the base in close for some other traffic and those landings went quite well.

No matter with the haze, I did some really good crosswind landings, a couple were flat-ish which is my ongoing bugbear, one was a carrier landing from flaring too early to counter the flat-ish landings, and the rest were damn nice if I say so myself. Nothing like a crab followed by a side slip with the left wing down and the rudder kicked right to keep the nose down the runway, then puling back on the yoke and turning it more left simultaneously to keep the crosswind correction in. Ray said my last three landings were solid A+s. I'll take it, and maybe I'm getting out of this slump.

1.0 and 8 landings.

Flying Lesson #85 - Getting Back To Standards - Good Landings In Gusty Winds

Today was marginal VFR with 2,400 foot ceilings or so and gusting winds.

When I was scheduled to fly the winds were forecast to be (and in fact were) gusting 12-20 knots but right around 270 degrees (or 260-300 at times) so mostly lined up with runway 27R which was rather convenient.

About an hour before the lesson Ray had texted to see if I still wanted to go given the conditions and I said based on my checking the weather (aviationweather.gov rocks) while going elsewhere VFR was pretty much out, it should be ok for pattern work. Besides I need pattern work.

Ray said that sounded good to him.

So I got to the airport and it was pretty quiet. Apparently all the other students had cancelled their flights.

During the pre-flight of N73455 the Piper Cub stationed at the field went by.

We'd be seeing him later in the air.

So after a good taxi and run up we had clearance to takeoff from Runway 27R but the controller asked us to fly left traffic. That was kinda strange as that puts you across 27L's zone and then the downwind is on the opposite side of 27 L and the base back to 27R crosses the approach path for 27L.

It turns out he did that as the next plane was going to depart 27R with a northern heading so it got us out of his way. It made for a weird pattern that felt very, very wrong as I was crossing 27L's departure and approach paths. Since no one at the time was departing or arriving on 27L it made it better.

The first pattern was fun with some neat gusts, and a massive kick when we flew over the lake which Ray had told me to expect, and quite a crab angle, but it felt pretty decent. Gusts and crab angles were the order of the day, as was a shifting wind that varied from 260-300 but often was kind enough to hang around 270. The landing was pretty decent and they got better from there.

The next pattern the tower had me fly straight out and not turn crosswind until they called it. They were fitting in the Piper Cub for spacing and it all worked out nicely with him on short final by the time we turned base. Since the 172 is faster than the Cub it worked out pretty well.

I then had another decent landing, still a little flatish as my flare tends to be rather consistently not enough soon enough. Part of the fun is doing this with a crosswind correction and trying to roll the crosswind in, pull back to get the elevator in and keep everything lined up.

A few more planes came in and went.

The next one I was pulling back more and Ray kinda helped get me to do more so we ended at full elevator by the time we touched down and it made for a nice gentle landing. That seemed to have helped me "get it" and the next two landings I did were quite nice and A+s in Ray's book. Then I did another one to make sure I knew what I was doing and while not perfect in that I had touched down before full extension I then said I wanted to do another one and then did a darn good landing if I say so myself.

I felt pretty darn good and a lot better than I have in quite awhile - I was pretty good at judging if I was too high or too low on base and final and did all the adjustments accordingly and it was a lot better, and I was using trim more t take the pressure off the controls to quit being so ham-fisted.

In short a darn good lesson and I'm feeling a heckuva lot more confident and feeling like I may actually be able to get this, which is better than I've felt in awhile.

1.1 hours and 8 landings.

Private Pilot Oral Exam Prep With A Fellow Student

The Oral Exam takes place before the flying portion of the Private Pilot test and it's apparently become quite involved and apparently gotten tougher since the ACS was adopted.

So a fellow student pilot Peter, who is at pretty much the same stage I'm in (he started just before I did) got together last night and over pizza studied by quizzing each other on topics needed for the oral exam.

We quizzed each other on the various markings on the sectional and airspace, as apparently if you get more than two answers wrong on that portion of the oral, the entire exam is discontinued, and every single marking on the sectional is fair game and you can't consult the sectional legend or the FAA's helpful list of sectional markings.

So we finished and felt pretty good about that, and then went on to cover privileges and limitations and the documents and items needed to fly legally.

There's a lot of stuff required in the oral that in real life you will either never use while flying or will simply look up in the FAR/AIM or other reference material if you actually need it. Yes, some stuff should be memorized but there's an awful lot of chaff to lock into your brain along with the wheat. It's a "You're not a Jedi yet so we can make you jump through these hoops" kinda test. That it's closed book test so you have to memorize some pretty arcane stuff is annoying, but the thinking seems to be they want to make sure you're willing to put the time in and be serious about learning the stuff to demonstrate you're serious enough about it before they let you go off all certificated.

That was a good study session and we'll do it again as we get prepped for the flying test.

Flying Lesson #84 - Crosswinds And Positive Improvement

Ray was back and the weather was suitable for flying but with a 10-12 knot direct crosswind. Yep, time for crosswind landing practice.

Unfortunately, one aircraft was out in use on someones' longish solo, one was down for maintenance, and N757MK had an shimmy damper problem, as in non-functional, at all. So much so that landing on it could pose a control problem. So the name of the game was "Be nice to the nose wheel". No touch and goes, just taxi backs.

I was rather determined to set aside the variety of negative thoughts I've been having regarding learning to fly recently and be positive, light on the controls, and really fly the plane. Deliberately forcing a good frame of mind seems to have helped.

So I had a good takeoff of 27 with the wind coming in at 180. I had quite the crab angle in on the downwind but flew a good pattern and my first landing was pretty decent.

Second one was even better as was the third and the fourth was a textbook crosswind landing - landing on the downwind wheel first and holding it off, the upwind wheel coming down next, and finally the nosewheel.

For the fifth and sixth I didn't quite do as well as the fourth, still landing crosswind ok but flat-ish with less of a delay between the downwind and upwind mains touching I need to really keep the aileron into the wind as I was tending to relax it a bit at touchdown.

Certainly one of the better flying experiences I've had in a while and I'll try to keep this on the upswing.

I've gotten some good advice recently from Murph, Brigid, and Comrade Misfit, and it's all appreciated.

Flying Lesson #83 - Crosswind Craziness

Today, while a nice day weather-wise, had a wind that decided to make life difficult with a gusting crosswind.

The wind was gusting from 10-16 knots from 360 degrees, so it was a direct 10 to 16 knot crosswind from Runway 27. Cessna 172Ms are rated for a 15 knot crosswind.

Henry stated we were going to work on pattern flying and mainly doing low passes over the runway to work on my coordination and confidence.

I'm lagging using the rudder and apparently not paying enough attention outside the plane for coordination and relying on the instruments too much. When I look down at the ball I'm already behind which is a problem so we worked on that, as well as where I'm looking in the traffic pattern which is actually counter-intuitive at times. In this wind everything was very noticeable and it was not easy flying by any means.

So we did the pattern with quite a crab angle in and I did some low passes and practically touching the runway and then doing a go round down the runway, with the tower occasionally having me shift from 27R to 27L but maintaining a right pattern because they were bored or something. Overall not bad but that wind sure made everything more interesting, and each go around on the low pass for some reason felt crappy compared to my typical go rounds which are (or were) quite good.

I did three full stop landings with quite the crosswind correction on each.

Overall I was doing better than last time, but that was a very challenging lesson. I'm still not sure how I feel about it as to whether I'm improving or getting worse. I know I was better than this before.

Henry said I did well in terms of the landings and that I wouldn't be flying alone in these kind of conditions so it was good. I just need to work more on coordination and to relax more. Apparently, I'm unconsciously having both feet on the rudder pedals so I'm pressing both rudder pedals at once - heavier in the direction I want the rudder and slightly on the other pedal which isn't helping.

We'll see how this goes.

That's .9 and 3 landings.