Thursday 10 December 2009

Third Training Day

Weather today was fantastic, clear, calm sunny and mild – even worked in the garden for a hour or so this morning, very pleasant.  Even better though, I had another flying lesson booked for this afternoon.  So off to Redhill after lunch.

Had a different instructor today, so after a few minutes discussion it was off to the Aircraft for the flight.  Again, I did most of the taxiing, then pre-flight checks and line up for departure.  I did the take-off (2nd one now) and headed off to the West this time, for a change.

After a few checks on climbing, level flight etc it was on to the lesson proper.  Today was all about turning, steep turning and slow flying.  First up was a “rate 1 turn” which is a 30 degree angle of bank and a turn rate of 3 degrees a second.  Seemed to me that the Aircraft was banked so steep it would simply slide sideways out of the sky – it didn’t of course.  So round one way then the other, then turns with flaps down, slow turns etc.  Then it was on to the steep stuff.

Next turn was at 45 degrees of bank.  It really seemed like I was looking down the wing at the ground.  In a turn this steep, I needed to apply quite a lot of power to stop the aircraft from losing height and to pull back on the control column to keep the nose up – I could also feel the g-force in the turn.  So another one around the other way, and then round again.  Instructor then covered the instruments with a map so I had to judge it all by eye, then around both ways again.

Then there was slow flying with various flap settings.  Don’t think I did as well as last time, height was a bit over the place, sometimes moving plus or minus 500ft when I should have maintained a constant level.  Still practice makes perfect and I only have 2 hours training time on this aircraft.

So it was back to Redhill and the approach towards the taxiway (the narrow one with the curve…)  Again the approach seemed a bit wrong to me but the Instructor seemed happy.  Then she asked me to land the aircraft (eeeek….)  Everything seemed to happen very quickly.  Suddenly we were approaching the taxiway then it was the flare (lifting the nose up for landing), setting it gently on the ground, keeping it straight (and following the curve of the taxiway), braking and stopping.  Then it was turning around and taxiing back to the hanger.

So today I did Exercises 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10a and 15.  Also one take-off and one landing.

As a previous instructor used to say to me : “Any landing you can walk away from is a good one”.  So on the basis I didn’t damage the aircraft or it’s occupants, it was a good landing.  Actually it wasn’t to bad at all.

That’s my last flight till after Xmas.  Roll on the new year.

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