Eight Patterns, Eight Landings

A photo I took today at the airport. I call it "Freedom Through the Fence" because I am a dork.

2/20/2010 C-150 N5307Q GIF-GIF

Traffic Patterns and normal landing practice

8 landings 1.5 hours

Grand Total: 21 hours

Today was an awesome day to fly. For starters, the weather was perfect: clear skies, no wind, no clouds, nice mellow temperature. It was without a doubt the most perfect flying day I could have asked for.

Despite this perfect weather, the traffic pattern at the airport was less busy than I had expected. With perfect weather on a Saturday afternoon in Florida, I'd expect tons of traffic aloft, but for the first 45 minutes or so in the air it seemed like it was just me and my instructor. A few planes joined us in the traffic pattern later on in the afternoon, but by and large our company in the air was courteous and not hurried--which is good as our little Cessna 150 has about one horsepower and putts through the traffic pattern at a fairly laid-back pace.

There was some drama on the radio, however. A flight student on a solo had gotten lost and was asking for directions. My instructor suggested he try to use a VOR* signal to triangulate his position, and the student's instructor came on the radio and suggested he try some orienteering, but the student saw some random field and opted to just land the flight and figure out where he was from the ground. Also of note, another aircraft announced that they had experienced engine failure and would be landing on the inactive runway, but fortunately it was just an engine-out drill. No actual emergency--phew!

We spent the day focusing on traffic patterns and on landings. The concept of the day was to grasp was the "Stabilized Approach," which is to say that while approaching for landing the view from the cockpit should be of the runway growing larger but not moving. A lot of pitch or yaw or roll to correct should not be necessary if one's approach is solid. On my first few patterns of the day, my approach was a touch sloppy and the landings were definitely rough. Bryan coached me through the landing: the objective is to float the airplane and not quite let it land until it's niiiiice and easy. There needs to be back pressure on the yoke to prevent the airplane from touching with the nosewheel first. Keeping the pressure on the yoke also prevents the nosewheel from mushing around and making it hard to steer.

Three problems popped up today. First, my instructor noticed that I wasn't paying enough attention to airspeed. This is a huge problem since losing your airspeed while maneuvering near the ground can cause an un-recoverable stall, which can then cause death. I wish to avoid death, and so after my instructor reminded me of the importance of airspeed I worked hard to maintain it. I think I was too throttle-shy at first, but as the day went on I grew more aggressive and learned what sort of maneuvers require additional power. My recent reading on the power curve makes a lot more sense after all that mucking around with the throttle today. I also focused on pitching for airspeed.

Problem two: I had a hard time steering after landing. Ten years of car driving kick in and I try to steer with the ailerons (the yoke) when it is instead necessary to steer with your feet, on the rudder pedals. I tried to focus on fixing that but my brain was full and so I will try to do better next time.

The final problem: when I am making my power and configuration changes at the end of the downwind leg, I have a tendency to steer the airplane to the right. It's not a huge deal, but Bryan mentioned it to me and I feel like I should work on neatening that up. After all, unintentional changes in attitude while changing configuration can become problematic.

After plenty of practice, with eight traffic patterns and seven touch-and-go's, my patterns were tighter, my landings were better, and I felt like I had made some progress and learned a lot. Bryan told me that my landings had gone from not good at all to a C+ grade, and I feel good about that. The objective is an eventual A+, so more practice is in order!

All in all, a productive day. An hour and a half more in the logbook, eight good traffic patterns, and three unassisted landings that went fairly well. In aviation, any landing you can walk away from is a good landing, but any landing that you can walk away from and still use the plane is a great landing. In that light, I think that today was a great day indeed.

Hand Props and Slow Flight

1/6/2010 C-150 N4655X GIF-GIF
4 Basics, stalls, traffic pattern entry, landing, practice approach.
2 landings. 1.3 hours.
Grand Total: 19.5 hours

Today was my third flight and second lesson with my flight instructor Brian. It is also my first flight of 2010, and another first for me: I got to see how to hand-prop an airplane.

Hand propping was more commonplace in the old-timey days, when the pilot would sit in the cockpit and turn the mags on while a crewman manually pulled the propeller through an arc in the hopes of starting it. With the exception of a very few very old airplanes still flying, hand-propping is uncommon these days. I never thought I would see it, until...

...I had preflighted the airplane. It was a cool morning for Florida with temps maybe in the high 40's. I was layered up good but a breeze was cutting across the airfield and I was fairly chilly. The plane looked ok: oil was good, plenty of gas, no major parts loose or missing, and despite a couple of missing screws on the epmennage, the vast bulk of the screws were still in place. "As long as most of 'em are in you're good to go" was the word from my CFI*.

We got into the plane, went through the startup procedure. Beacon lights on, master switch on, propeller area clear, turn the key. The engine whined, coughed, and ground the prop around once or twice before sighing and quitting. I pulled the key back and asked my instructor if I was missing something. He primed the engine, we re-tried, and still nothing. A few more tries while fiddling with the throttle and the primer led to nothing. "I'll go back and get a guy, and we'll hand-prop it," he said.

We left the plane and walked to the maintenance hangar to find a mechanic. A younger, gruffer mechanic came with us to the plane, complaining in a good-natured way that all of the planes needed a hand-prop in this cold weather. "First start of the day, every single plane, every single morning! All the batteries are frozen up. I can't wait until the heat gets back."

Hand-propping is dangerous. People have lost arms or died. You're grabbing and yanking on a large spinning blade driven by a large beastly engine that is designed to pull a ton of metal into the sky. The pilot turns the key and primes the engine while the mechanic grabs and pulls down on the propeller. Eventually, in theory, the pulling of the prop will act like the starter motor and bring the engine to life. I was lucky enough to be in the cockpit with my instructor, and I made darn sure that the brakes were locked before the mechanic pulled the prop through.

The first few pulls gave us nothing, but number four brought the engine to life. I roared alive and the mechanic ran back, pumping his arms in the air in the sign of victory, before the engine quit on us suddenly. "Awww, MAN! You killed it!" he said.

We repeated this sketch many times before the engine caught. Once it was fired up and running, we revved it a few times and watched it to make sure it wouldn't quit on us. As it warmed up it seemed to work better, and we began our taxi to the active runway.

Taxiing went a lot better this time around. Brian told me that instead of leaving no pressure on the rudder and then stomping it to go where I wanted, I needed to apply even pressure to both pedals and use differential braking to swing the plane around. It worked much better and the only issue was a wind pushing us to the right.

The engine runup was smooth. No problems detected, thankfully, so we taxiied to the runway and departed. Takeoff was smoother than before, and we flew North to practice some maneuvers. We practiced steep turns to a heading, and I was surprised by the difference in sight-picture between left and right turns. Right turns are harder to coordinate, at least for me, and maintaining an altitude while turning can be tricky to the novice like me. Brian mentioned that we would continue to work on those right turns but also told me I was doing well, which was nice to hear.

This entry is plenty long enough for now. Tomorrow: stalls, slow flight, and my experiences in the traffic pattern!


*This is consistent with what I've been told by other CFI's before.

Hours!

Logbook:

12/8/2009. GIF to GIF. Four basics, climbs, descents, turns, power off stall, traffic pattern entry. 1 landing. 1.1 hours.

12/8/2009. GIF to GIF. Four basics. 0 landings. 0.7 hours.

Grand total: 18.2 hours

I got hours! I got to fly! What an exciting day. After months of wanting to do it I was able to sit in the left seat and fly. It felt good to be reintroduced to the airplane and get reacquainted with the skies.

The view from the right seat, on my second flight of the day.

I drove out to Winter Haven this morning and managed to find my way to the FBO my instructor operates from. After some wandering around and nodding at people like I knew what I was doing, I found the front desk and completed some paperwork just in time to meet my instructor coming through the door.

My CFI is a local fellow named Bryan who has flown as an airline pilot in the past. He left the airlines on his own accord to change things up a little, and now flies as a CFI while pursuing his CPA to eventually open an accounting business. We made our introductions, grabbed our flight gear and headed to the plane. I was very excited to get to use my new headset, which I purchased at the AOPA summit in Tampa this fall, and it only took me two tries to figure out how to plug it in.

Bryan started the lesson with a vital component of every flight: the preflight. With flight school airplanes there's usually less to watch for since the planes get flown heavily, but it's important to check all flight controls and as many components as possible before getting airborne.

We began by inspecting the engine oil level and draining the carburetor to make sure no water or other impurities had accumulated in there between flights. We checked the prop and looked inside the cowling for bird nests, mice, snakes, or any other abnormal things that may have decided to make the cowling their home. Moving on we inspected the wing and the control surfaces, and also inspected the fuel tanks to make sure we had enough gas. The fuel gauges in planes only need to be accurate on "Empty" according to regulations, so visually seeing how much fuel is in the tanks is an important part of the preflight check. The empennage (the tail assembly) is checked as are the rudder and the elevators. The wheels are inspected to be sure they aren't square or flat, and the brakes are examined to be sure you can stop when you come back to earth. The remainder of the preflight is visually inspecting the outside of the plane for dents, dings, missing screws, and so on.

After a thorough preflight we hopped in and started the plane up. Taxiing was harder than I remembered and I swerved like a drunk through the parking lot and taxiway, though I suspect with practice it will become easier. Before takeoff we did an engine "run up," where you throttle up about 1/2 way and check the magnetos (magnetic coils that provide power) and the carburetor heat. After verifying that the engine was good, we taxiied into position and took off.

Takeoff was a thrill. I have not taken a plane off in almost a decade, and it was a little bit of a drunken takeoff, something I will have to learn to coordinate better over time. Bryan told me to use smaller inputs on the controls, and after a few minutes getting used to the feel of the yoke in my hands I was better able to coordinate motion. We flew North and practiced the Four Basics: Climbs, Descents, Turns, and Straight & Level Flight.

Climbing and descending is mostly about power management. In a small single engine plane at least, climbing requires full power, cruise somewhat less than full, and descent somewhat less than cruise. Takeoff power is about 2700 RPM, cruise about 2400, descent in the 2200 neighborhood. To manage your climbs and descents in VFR flight, one should find the proper position of the plane, then look outside and hold the sight picture. The horizon should stay relatively in the same position as you change altitude. We worked on power-off stall recovery, which involves pointing down to regain airspeed and trying to get power back. If it happens close to the ground, well, just aim for something flat and try to get what airspeed you can to recover.

Turns are more complex. Bryan talked about vectors of lift, which I will have to research in one of my flying tomes, but basically it is the tendency of a banking plane to want to descend. Slight back-pressure on the controls is necessary to maintain altitude during a turn. We made all turns to a heading, and did both shallow banks and banks with up to a 45-degree bank angle.

Bryan takes us through a steep turn in a Cessna 150.

Eventually the lesson was over and it was time to return to the field. Bryan helped me enter the traffic pattern and then turn, but he performed the landing after I overshot the turn from the downwind to the base leg*.

After the lesson, he took me up again as a passenger in a friend's airplane. I didn't touch the controls, as this was not a flight school plane, but it was neat to review with Bryan the proper procedures and the maneuvers during flight. And it scored me some more time in the air, observing and absorbing the lessons from earlier as we flew around.

Lined up to land at runway 11, KGIF, Winter Haven, FL.

All in all: an awesome day. 1.8 hours total added to the logbook, with the "Basic Four" and some light pattern work. I know I need to work on some things; the takeoff was a bit mushy and I was not paying attention in a descent and took us below the altitude Bryan had requested that I hold. Not too serious, but definitely a mistake I can learn from. I also overshot the turn to base in the traffic pattern, but some rigorous pattern work will help me learn that better.

On the brighter side I built confidence with some turns and some climbing/descending, and Bryan told me he thought I was doing very well; at one point he told me that he had 30-hour students who were having trouble with some of the things I was doing well with. Bryan was an excellent CFI; relaxed but in control, knowledgeable, and friendly. I look forward to flying with him again soon and building my skills!


*I will talk about the traffic pattern more in the future; basically, you circle the field in a set pattern before landing. Downwind is parallel to the landing runway opposite the direction of landing, base is a turn perpendicular to the runway as you descend, and final is the lineup with the runway and final descent.