Radio Operator Exam

Today I wrote the examination for my (RIC-21) Restricted Operator Certificate with Aeronautical Qualification. In plain English it is a License that allows me to broadcast on a radio frequency.

This certificate is issued by Industry Canada and is a requirement for the Canadian Private Pilot License. I downloaded the study guide and read it three or four times and then supplemented what I had learned with a powerpoint and video obtained from my online ground school.

I have to admit - I was scratching my head a lot while reading this guide. If people actually communicated on a busy frequency in the manner suggested - it would surely result in safety being compromised due to the lengthy transmissions required to say.. well to say anything. Here's an example of a standard check in, let's say this was on the ground looking for taxi to the active:


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What Industry Canada says we should say:

"Springbank Ground, this is Diamond 20, Charlie Foxtrot India Foxtrot Alpha on One Two One Decimal Eight"

"Charlie Foxtrot India Foxtrot Alpha, this is Springbank Ground. Go Ahead"

"Springbank Ground, Charlie Foxtrot India Foxtrot Alpha is at the Calgary Flying Club with Information Quebec, requesting taxi to the active for departure to the Practice Area".

"Charlie Foxtrot India Foxtrot Alpha, Taxi to runway Two Five via Alpha Charlie, Winds two two zero degrees at five knots, altimeter Two niner decimal niner two, contact Springbank Tower on frequency One One Eight Decimal Two when Ready. Over."

"Springbank Ground, Charlie Foxtrot India Foxtrot Alpha. Taxi to runway Two Five via Alpha Charlie, Winds two two zero degrees at five knots, altimeter Two niner decimal niner two, contact Springbank Tower on frequency One One Eight Decimal Two when Ready. Over."

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Sure that was an important transmission, here's how it actually goes in the practical (real) world:

"Springbank Ground, Diamond Fox India Fox Alpha at the club with Charlie, for the practice Area"

"Diamond India Fox Alpha, Ground. Taxi to runway Two Five via Alpha Charlie, Winds Two Twenty at 5, altimeter Twenty nine Ninety Two, Tower on Eighteen Two when ready."

"Two five via Alpha Charlie, India Fox Alpha"

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Granted it was nice to understand exactly how to handle the frequency during an emergency call (much different than the calls in the US) and also good to learn about some of the special frequencies and the regulations, laws, and fines related to using the frequencies.

Aside from that - I have to say that from my perspective it was mostly useless. In fact the exam itself was quite lame. Some of the questions on it had me scratching my head wondering "Why in the world would anyone actually need to know what the exact fine is for misusing the frequency?". The exam was multiple choice and 25 questions. I only needed 60% to pass. It took me less than 10 minutes for the first pass of the questions, and I spent an additional 15 minutes reviewing all of the questions. Some of them were extremely ambiguous - where I could easily have "argued" why the answer could have been A or C.

I realized during the exam, that I had not actually written a test or examination in many many many years. This is probably much easier for people who are still in High School or University - but at the same time it reminded me of the process one must go through in order to properly prepare for an examination.

I scored over 80%. I didn't bother arguing about the two questions which I still think are ambiguous and were correctly answered (I even looked it up afterwards). Not really worth it. The certificate should be in the mail.

Medical and Radio Certificate out of the way. Aside from the actual learning and practical air exercises - the only thing standing between me and a spin in the circuit without anyone in the right seat is the PSTAR examination. Now the studying can truly begin. I'm super busy for the next month and not even sure when I might fly again. Until then....

It's not as scary as you think!

When I first received my training syllabus - I read it end to end. Actually I'm pretty sure I downloaded the version online months before I actually started flight training and read it end to end. Hmm - I probably read it end to end both time as a matter of fact! The first thing that you notice on there is where it says "First Solo". The SECOND thing you notice is where it tells you that you will practice spins. Following that it says "It's not as scary as you think". Anytime I see an obvious disclaimer such as this - I get weary.

It's interesting actually that when speaking with other pilots and student pilots at the club, everyone always wants to know where you are at with your training. After they realize you are still a student they ask you "Have you had your solo yet?". If the answer is no the next question is "Have you done your spins yet?". Whether the answer is yes or no - everyone starts to go on about spins. Most people say they are lots of fun, the odd person says they are freaky. I had no idea what they were talking about - but I assure you that I was extremely nervous about the spins.

Today my flight was with I3. We were easily under the weight restriction for spins so there was no backing out. It was a warm sunny day without a cloud in site. Winds were light and no reports of turbulence. When we got into the aircraft she asked "So are you ready to do some spins today?" I answered her honestly. "I am ready to do them because I want to learn how to identify and recover from them, but I'm quite nervous right now".

I knew right from the start that the flight was going to be a good one. I felt a certain amount of confidence (not a lot, but more than usual) as I strapped in, went through the checklists, set up the radios, and began the taxi. The takeoff, speeds, and transition to straight and level on course was as smooth as any I had. The radio work on this day felt as natural as it is when I sit in front of my computer flying the simulator under virtual ATC.

On the way to the practice area we discussed the spin entry and recovery process we would be working on. I brought up the practice area because I wanted to be able to make the calls while we were in there without adding any jibber jabber. When I3 explained what area we would be hoping to work in it dawned on me that I was finally starting to understand the layout of the practice area itself and the different areas within it.

Once established in the practice area we climbed higher and completed our HASEL safety checks. I3 pulled the throttle back and pitched the aircraft into nose up attitude. The speed started to fall off quickly. I realized that I was very tense at this point and many thoughts were running through my brain. "What if I get dizzy or puke?", "What if I get all disoriented and confused?", "Why if I can't do this?", "Why am I so tense?". As the stall horn started to wail away she pulled all the way back and we entered the stall. At this point she slammed the rudder full left causing time and space to ground to a near halt.

Maybe everyone is like this or perhaps just me, but there are many times in my life when everything goes into ultra slow motion. My entire being becomes completely self aware. My thoughts are focused and all senses are heightened.

"Concentrate". The aircraft banked steeply to the left while the nose was still high.

"Keep your eyes open". The bank continued and it felt as if we were now inverted.

"Feel the moment, live the moment". The nose came around suddenly and was pointed directly at the ground.

"We are in the spin". The nose continued to point at the ground and the aircraft continued to spin. I noted how the sections of land, highways, and rivers below appeared to spin clockwise.

"Observe the instruments". Our airspeed was messed up, the Gyro was spinning, and our altitude was decreasing.

"Hey! I don't feel sick or disoriented at all!". I changed my view from outside to inside and then back outside again. Although we were spinning it almost appeared that we were floating towards the earth below.

The sound of my inner James Earl Jones baritone inner voice was interrupted by I3's voice. "Now we apply opposite rudder to break the spin and down elevator to break the stall". We stopped spinning and now the aircraft started to fly again.

This was apparent by the nearly immediate sound of the prop. As I3 gently pulled back on the elevator the airspeed increased dramatically well into the yellow arc. The noise of spinning was incredible and before I knew it we were in a nose up attitude again. The airspeed dropped off quickly and as she leveled off some power was added.

The feeling I experienced was incredible. It was not scary at all. The aircraft was not completely out of control. I did not feel all sick and disoriented, in fact it was simply to focus both inside the aircraft on the instruments or outside at the spinning earth without losing any focus.

I3 turned to me immediately and asked "OK, how was that?". "Incredible!". "I'm only required to demonstrate the spin entry, identification and recovery to you. So you don't actually have to take control for one. I can do a few more or if you would like I can put the aircraft into a spin and let you recover from it - does that work for you?"

The words escaped my mouth immediately - "HELL YA!".

We performed probably 6 - 8 or more spins from that point in both directions. After the first two I caught on and was able to recover quickly and with some authority. The terror and fear had been exorcised from my mind.

The flight back was uneventful. Traffic was light as we entered the circuit and lined up on final. The touchdown was not bad as was the taxi back to the club. The drive back was probably with as much adrenaline as my first drive out to the club a mere 5 weeks earlier.

9.8 Hours and counting...

The Flare

Imagine the horror on my face when I showed up only to find that the instructor was still sick - and that his flights that day had all been handed to I99. For a fleeting moment I considered canceling and walking out - however at this point I wanted to fly, especially after being rained out the previous day. I thought long and hard about how to identify and react to a stall during the exercise and even in the worst case scenario I'd be in the air gaining experience, even if I99 was a brutal instructor.

Everything was taken care of and ready to go 15 minute prior to the flight. I spent some time reviewing the air exercises while waiting for I99 to return from his previous flight. After this was completed I moved to reading some sections of From The Ground Up. When I grew bored of this I visited the bathroom, browsed the restaurant, looked at photos from the clubs "Solo" wall, and played around with various items for sale in dispatch. Once we hit 15 minutes AFTER the flight was scheduled, I started losing my patience.

I2 showed up on the scene and we chatted - then she asked who I was flying with. I told her I99 and that I wasn't impressed he was 20 minutes late already. Turns out she wasn't either. There was another student who had an instructor, but no aircraft - and I had the opposite. The other student left after we hit the 25 minute mark and wasn't too happy. I asked who his instructor was since I had an aircraft ready to go, but I2 apologized and said she couldn't cut into her next flight which was a flight check for a PPL Exam. 35 minutes after the scheduled start time I99 shows up in the dispatch area. Turns out he was with the whiny student from the day before who kept interrupting us. She just made my "list" as well. I99 apologized profusely and blamed "the winds". He said he didn't have anyone else scheduled after me and that the aircraft was available so we could fly as long as required. I told him I had nothing scheduled either and that we were all gassed and ready to go. He said he'd meet me out there in 5 minutes.

10 minutes later he showed up. Yes - I was pissed off. While sitting there I decided not to wait for him and started on the checklists that I could. I also considered walking out since I was concerned about my performance while this pissed off. When he showed up I told him where we were at and we headed out for the runway. During the taxi I decided it was time to tell him how I felt about everything. I told him how I felt about his briefing the other day, his cuing method in the air, and his tardiness. I reminded him that he wasn't doing me a favor by teaching me, I was paying the club for his time and the aircraft rental. Finally told him that I took the training very serious and did my best to act professionally and that I expected him to be the same. I didn't sense any attitude in his short apology and the cockpit grew quiet after that.

During the entire flight there was not a lot said aside from what had to be. I told him that I wanted to handle everything except in any cases where he had to demonstrate something or take over for safety reasons and that I was hoping for constructive feedback in all phases. I was all business after that and I nailed the flight. My recoveries from all the types of stalls we did were swift and by the book. He allowed me to retain control when we encountered an aircraft who was in the practice area but not communicating, and again while we sorted out someone else on the radio who said he was somewhere that he wasn't.

As we hit the circuit on the way back we had a brief discussion about the landing flare during which he actually gave me an excellent description of the landing from threshold to roll out. After he answered a few follow up questions from me I simply executed it exactly as he described it. The big change was to keep my nose down over the threshold while cutting power. When I finally leveled us off I was to slowly pull back on the stick to bleed off the airspeed slowly while we settled onto the runway. It wasn't a soft landing but the process of "holding it off" allowed me to understand something about landing that my simulator could never supply. Whatever the financial or emotional cost of these two flights with I99 were in the end, I can at least attribute him to teaching me one useful thing about the flare. Well a second useful thing might be that I fly really well when I'm pissed off.

On the way back into the club, I99 told me that I flew like a completely different person than the last flight. I had no idea if he was blowing smoke up my behind or not, but I did consider the possibility that my performance was poor during the last flight. After he filled out my PTR we discussed a few areas to work on and I asked him what to be prepared for next time. He told me he'd be happy to fly with me again in the near future. We shook hands and said goodbye.

While settling up my account, I2 came out of the office and asked how the flight went. I explained to her that the flight went really well because I appeared to be "on the ball" this afternoon. I then asked her to make a note on my file that I wouldn't be flying with I99 again... ever.

Tomorrow I fly with I3 and the lesson of the day is spins. I'll admit it now. I'm already freaking out about it. I have no idea why or over what - I'm just extremely nervous.

8.5 Hours and counting...

Rained Out

I'll be the first one to admit that I really didn't feel like flying much today. I had 3 late nights in a row and the most recent one involved alcohol. My family was out of town and I had no work that day so the booking was made for 230 pm which gave me ample time to sleep in and do whatever I needed prior to making my way to the club.

It was raining and windy most of the morning and I was quite certain the flight would be canceled. Up until now the weather had been perfect since I started my training and I realized that I had no clue what the process was for canceling a flight due to weather. Would they call me? I guess I treat it like baseball then. I've captained a team since my early 20's and have consistently delivered the same message when people start calling about "will we play today?" which is: "Unless you hear from ME telling you that the game is canceled, you are expected to show up". Baseball and Football are two games which are played regardless of the weather. You don't cancel a game because it is raining, the field is muddy, or it's too cold. You cancel a game if and only if the weather and field conditions are dangerous. You also cancel in lightning. I decided to apply this same philosophy to flying.

By the time I showed up things had cleared up somewhat. The clouds had broken and the sun was coming out. Granted it was still pretty windy. I ran out to the apron to complete my walk around. About that time - some dude (in a fancy instructor uniform) approached me and told me that we probably weren't flying today due to the weather. Turns out I got bumped (AGAIN) and he would be taking me up. Based on my experience from the previous day with I99, I decided that I was fed up but at least owed this guy the opportunity to explain. Turns out he took over the entire day's slate for the other "new" instructor that canceled on me the previous day. Hmmm - turns out that guy was sick the previous day as well when I landed with I99. Fair enough.

After chatting for 15 minutes with this instructor (who will officially be assigned I4) I decided that I liked him. He seemed passionate about flying. I decided to go through my "Instructor Interview" that I memorized thanks to some suggestions from Rob Machado. One of the biggest questions I ask is always "Why are you an instructor?" to which you usually get the standard "building hours" answer. I4 had the most interesting answer for this one yet. Turns out he is an instructor simply because he wants to be an instructor. Spent 20 years in IT as a Business Analyst and a year ago realized he was in his mid 40's and hated his job. He quit his job and his wife and him remortgaged their house while he completed his Commercial and Instructor ratings. He has held his PPL for 20+ years and picked up his IFR and Multi Engine along the way in the past 10 years. Wow - great answer.

I4 was certain that we weren't going to be flying and then asked if I was interested in perhaps doing a long briefing on a few of my upcoming air exercises. I figured I'd give him a shot. I asked him to start by reviewing Slow Flight and Stalls with me just to get a great indicator of how he stacks up against I1 and I99. Then we moved into Spins and finally Spirals. I don't think I can even begin to explain how well the briefings went. Granted we had a lot of time to complete them - but his method of communication was superior to most others that I had received - even better than I2 and the CFI.

He had great parallels, excellent examples, experience stories, drew fantastic diagrams, acronyms, and even a number of comparison charts. The level of understanding that was gained during a 60 minute briefing was amazing. One large difference that I really noticed was that he often said "Transport Canada will test you on this". This is the first time I had ever heard anyone say that to me - whether in the air or on the ground - no one ever mentions TC. I made sure to tell him how much I appreciated that. At the conclusion of the session I spent some time downstairs trying to find a spot for some airtime with I4 but I wasn't successful. As it turns out I was booked with this sick instructor again the next day and I4 wasn't scheduled to work. I went home hoping that I'd have a chance to fly with him the next day.

Stalls

I was scheduled to fly today with a new highly ranked instructor that had arrived at the school. I was concerned when I showed up for the pre flight and noticed I had been bumped to a different instructor whom I had never heard of.

As usual, everything was prepped and ready to go long before the lesson was scheduled to begin. Imagine my annoyance when 15 minutes after the start time "I99" comes out and introduces himself. After he says we're headed up to a briefing room I ask him "what materials do I need?". He quickly responds with "the same material you always need for a briefing". Umm OK then. Between the Flight Training Manual, From the Ground Up, Standard Operating Procedures, Pilot Operating Handbook, Maps, Fuel checkers, E6B, Kneeboard, Extra Package of Gum, and my Headset - there is barely any room for air in my flightbag. So there are some things which I regularly don't carry into the club because they don't ever seem to be required during the briefings. I didn't feel like explaining this to him, so I just grabbed my bag with what I had brought into the club from the car.

In the briefing room - he tells me to open my FTM to a certain page. Then takes it away from me and starts literally reading it word for word out loud to me. I am saved by this in three scenarios - all of which are equally annoying:

First, he asks me about a "number" and I answer it with confidence. "No!" he blurts at me, then follows up with "Where did you learn that?". Of course this was a number that had been relayed to me by my two favorite instructors at the school: I2 and I3.

Second, he stops every 5 minutes and reads his blackberry. Now I'll tell you what - I am a crackberry addict of the Nth degree myself. I check it like mad - however I make a point of NEVER checking it while engaged in a conversation with someone, and never in a meeting except in very special circumstances. Certainly NEVER in a meeting with a client, ESPECIALLY if they are actually paying me for my time.

Third, some other student knocks on the door frame (the doors themselves have all been taken off for painting, my assumption is they are travelling by life raft to the furthest point on the earth from Calgary - how long does it take to paint a door?) and asks if she can interrupt. My first thought is "I hope this is important, I'm paying $60 an hour for this". Turns out it wasn't. It's some other student of his who had a question about something for a lesson they were doing later that day. OMG. This couldn't wait? 5 minutes later - she knocks again and starts whining about the aircraft she was supposed to take had a maintenance issue and looks like it is grounded. So there are no other airplanes available. So what do I do? Then - she asks if she can use the aircraft that HE is scheduled to fly for my lesson. At this point I turn around, look at her and say "are you serious?". So I99 excuses himself and goes outside to speak with her. As there is no door I hear the entire thing. After he somehow manages to convince her she's better off finding the maintenance item on the ground than in the air she leaves. I can't help but wonder if I've just witnessed one of those little things that may have been the difference between life and death for someone.

Finally - I99 takes me out to the aircraft. I'm pretty annoyed at him already. In the aircraft during each phase of flight that he has absolutely no skill what so ever at instruction. He might be a great pilot (I have no clue) but as an instructor he's about as useless as looking up a dead horse's ass. I was very tentative displaying my ability to get the aircraft into slow flight mode. The stall lesson was actually quite brutal. It's obvious that I have some sort of a "fear" of certain attitudes, and he doesn't seem able to recognize that or help correct it. The demonstration of the stall is horrible and when I'm asked to do it I get next to no direction except for loud cuing which are generally useless.

Each time he took control from me he's yank and bank the aircraft all over the place. Then at one point he was trying to show me something about holding off the stall by "dancing on the pedals" which at the time made no sense to me (I told him I had no clue what he was talking about) and we eventually did some very weird roll over where the aircraft was inverted for a short time period. After that I didn't feel well at all. I wasn't sure if it was due to the Sake from the night before, the fact that I went inverted unexpectedly (first time for that), or the fact that his attitude was making me sick - I told him I wasn't feeling well. When he responded with "if you are just a bit sick we can continue" I came back with "I might puke, we should head back" (never a chance I would do that).

The flight back, approach, and landing were actually my best to date - it was almost as if my "non joy" in the aircraft - converted into me being pissed off, had actually raised my level of awareness and concentration above where it usually sits. All I wanted to do was get back on the ground and away from this guy. At the same time - all I wanted to do was show him how well I could fly this aircraft and shove it in his face.

Not the type of flight I was hoping for. I'll have to do stalls from the start again. Also note that there wasn't any sort of reduction on the briefing time. He literally rounded up from the time we spent in the room. I was so pissed off - I didn't feel like arguing over $15.

7.5 Hours and counting...

Ground School

The flying club offers ground school. 17 classes over a span of 10 weeks. Classes are typically on Mondays and Thursdays and run from 7 - 10pm. If we factor 30 minutes before and after each class - that's a total of 8 hours a week. This of course does not include all of the studying and reading one would do between classes to be prepared.

The purpose of the ground school is to cover all of the materials required to pass the Transport Canada written PPL examination. TC also requires a minimum of 40 hours of ground training for the private license.

I am simply unable to make the time commitment, specifically because I can't run away from a busy household with two little kids, leaving my wife to fend for herself (I already work long hours). So I made the decision to do the ground training of my license in a self study mode. I know that when I'm interested in a topic I have no problem focusing and putting time aside to learn what is required.

Looking around on the Internet I found that an outfit based in Manitoba offers an online ground school. The course is acceptable by TC standards for the 40 hours required. I tried to do a lot of Internet research for some reviews but to be honest came up with no other online offerings, and no reviews of the online course or its content. I decided to just take a stab at it - if it was really bad I could always try and get my money back.

I will admit right now that I am very pleased with the content so far. The course is completely geared towards someone like me who is training for their PPL. Each section has a powerpoint presentation of between 15-80 slides, a 60 minute training video which is essentially an instructor doing the powerpoint presentation to a group in a classroom, a forum for discussion on the topic (sparsely used), links to other documentation, and a quiz to ensure you have completed the learning and understand the topics.

Aside from this they also gave me the following "free" courses:

PSTAR: Pre Solo Air Regulations
Private Air Exercises
Pilot Decision Making
Garmin GNS 430

These have all been somewhat useful already. The PSTAR is an exam which I hope to soon challenge which is required by TC to obtain a "student permit" which allows you to fly Solo under the supervision of an instructor. At the end of this course I found some great review material for my Radio Operator's certificate examination as well.

Private Air Exercises goes hand in hand with the Tranport Canada training syllabus. Each Air Exercise contains a powerpoint presentation, a ground briefing video, a forum, and an air video. The air videos are amazing. They managed to synchronize the air exercise so that you may watch it from a number of different viewpoints: Cockpit, Rear mounted camera, side mounted camera, and from a secondary aircraft filming the entire thing. This has been very useful for me - you can even watch them all at the same time!

So far - money well spent. I guess with the ground school that I'm now in full momentum towards the PPL.

For those of you interested - the material was offered by Harv's Air Pilot Training based in Steinbach/Winnipeg Manitoba - and their ground school website is available at PilotTraining.ca.

Medical Part Deux

Like most other people - the majority of the mail (real mail) I receive can usually be categorized into the following groups:

1) Bills
2) Bank Statements
3) Companies trying to offer me something better than I have with their competitors, even though they wouldn't give me this before I left them for their competitors.
4) Absolute Junk
5) Offer of more credit which has already been pre approved (see #4)
6) More bills.

Every now and then I get something that actually interests me. Today was one of those days. A letter addressed to me from Transport Canada. Upon opening it I learned that I am now officially the proud owner of a Class 3 medical certificate. Due to expire in 60 months.

I was actually quite excited. I guess it is time to start figuring out where I'm supposed to keep important documentation such as this.

Slow Flight

I was pleasantly surprised to discover upon my arrival at the club that the CFI had a nasty cold and I'd be flying with I2. The walk around seems to get easier and easier as you settle into a routine, but I can't help but wonder every time if I might have missed something. I've made a mental note that at some point I'm going to ask an instructor to do another walk around with me or at least observe me doing one so they can point out any intricacies I may be missing.

We started with a review of Slow Flight. Transport Canada defines slow flight as "that range of airspeeds between the maximum endurance speed for a particular aircraft and the point just above its stalling speed for the existing flight conditions". The purpose of learning slow speed is so that I can learn how to recognize the symptoms, maintain safe control of the aircraft, understand possible consequences when in slow flight, and how to properly recover with a minimum loss of altitude.

Before we put the aircraft into slow flight, we must always do some safety checks. I've seen many different types of acronyms used for this safety check, but this is what they are teaching at my school: HASEL...

Height: Are we high enough to perform this manoeuvre? The recommended altitude for recovery is 2000 AGL. I made a mental note that 2000 AGL would roughly be 6000 MSL (more on that later).

Area: Is the area appropriate for what we are doing? Towers, built up city areas, high traffic areas such as airways, or a control zone would be examples of inappropriate area.

Secure: We need to fasten our seatbelts, make sure the baggage is stowed, and anything else in the cockpit that might fly around during the area is secured.

Engine: We will need our engine to perform when we call on it. We'll check our gauges first: EGT, Cylinder Heat, Fuel Pressure, Fuel Quantity, Oil Temp, Oil Pressure, and electrics. Since we'll be pulling back the RPM's we will turn on the electric fuel pump and richen the mixture (The DA20C1 is fuel injected so no carb heat to pull).

Lookout: We need to make sure we look around for any traffic. We can do a series of 90 degree turns or a 180 degree turn. The purpose is to have both pilots looking above, behind, below, and in front for traffic.

On the way back downstairs she started asking me the things I knew she would...
What aircraft are we in today? Fox India Fox Alpha
How much fuel on board? 16 Gallons
Oil? 5 quarts
What's our gross weight? 1652 lbs.
Did you check the log book? Yes.
How much time is left on the engine? ummm about 30 hours to a 200 inspection.
Any deferred maintenance items? None but....

.. I noticed when doing the pre flight that the fuel gauge didn't agree with the fuel I measured. In fact I powered down the master and fired it up again to see if it changed. Then I measured the fuel a total of three times just to make sure I wasn't crazy.

[Sidebar] Now... the irony here is that the night before I was chatting with my friend "IFR" and he was telling me about a story about an aircraft accident where the pilot was taking a few friends on a trip and when he ran inside to grab something from the FBO one of his buddies did him a favor by filling the tanks up for him - but of course did not mention this to his friend. Needless to say - they were well beyond their weight limitations and things didn't turn out very well. My first comment to "IFR" was to ask why he didn't notice the fuel gauge during any of the checklists, I mean you check the engine gauges and fuel on almost every checklist you do. His response was simply that the tanks are calibrated at "empty" and this is the only time you should actually trust the gauge. This is why you should always measure your fuel. [/Sidebar]

Remembering the conversation from the night before I asked I2 about it and she did in fact tell me that they are calibrated to read properly when FULL and EMPTY (contrary to "IFR"). She told me not to worry about it and we headed for the apron.

Having completed the brief we head out to C-FIFA and jump in the cockpit. This is the first time I've ever had my kneeboard and headset (mentioned in my last post) with me. The headset fits on my head just fine but I notice that the microphone cover has disappeared. Oh well. When I first plug it in, the audio in is totally crackled. I think back to my brother telling me he used to bash it with his knee all the time and it might need a solder job - great! After some wiggling it seems to be working fine so I decide we will just go with it. At this point I realize I have no clue how this kneeboard is suppose to fit on my knee while still allowing me to access the yoke and throttle (it's tight in the Eclipse). So I just stow it next to me. I run through the checklists quicker and more confident than the last time, and finally manage to get the engine started without any problems (they are so testy!).

At this point I start setting up the Com radios - my way. When I mention to I2 that I want to set it up the way I like it she seemed happy that I had at least thought about it. I picked up Info Bravo, jotted down the runway, winds, altimeter, and continued with the pre taxi checklist. When we got to "Engine Gauges" we both immediately noticed the fuel gauge was showing only 1/4 tank. "How much fuel did you say we had on board?". Ummmm "18 Gallons, but the fuel gauge was showing 1/2 tank when I did the pre flight". She thought about it for a moment and then said - "stop the engine let's check it again". I2 hopped out and gave the tanks a measurement herself - 18 gallons. Satisfied, she hopped back in and we continued with a warm start checklist.

The radio calls are getting better and better as I almost know what to expect from the response. My taxiing still needs a lot of work but I know I'm finding it easier and easier to operate on the ground. The takeoff roll was again absolutely brutal but we managed to keep the required heading until we were turned on course. I did a horrible job hitting my climb speeds and I was completely pissed off at myself for this. Established in the climb and on course we did some navigational review. After entering the practice area we did a quick review on endurance and then started with slow flight.

I had a tough time getting the aircraft into slow flight. It seems I'm quite tentative about that nose up attitude still, but after a lot of tinkering, and a demonstration from I2 I was able to consistently but us into slow flight at will with the correct attitude and speed so that we stayed above stall but didn't lost altitude. There was a lot of rudder required on this particular day and I was able to see just how the rudders could keep those wings from dropping to one side or the other. The ailerons on the hand were quite useless! At the end of the Slow Flight portion she demonstrated a power off and power on stall to demonstrate how the aircraft felt going into the stall. I will admit I was freaked out a bit during the power off stall. I kept wondering if we were going to fall backwards!

At one point during our HASEL check she asked me how high we had to be. At least 2000AGL and that would 6000MSL here. Bzzzzt! The ground below us in this area was at 5000MSL so we needed at least 7000MSL to make minimums. Note to self - the ground below you is NOT always the same altitude above sea level as the airport - duh!

On the way back I realized how great the headset was. The voice was very clear and i felt as if it picked up all of my speaking at a normal voice but none of the ambient noises coming from my body. We entered a right downwind for runway 25 and once we had the power set the approach was pretty good. As we came over the threshold I again heard an instructor say "Nose Down". At what I thought was a good height I pulled back on the stick gently to break the descent and held it there. Next thing I knew we had slammed onto the runway - on all three gear. Probably not a good thing. I taxied off and went through the checklists again.

When we finally called ground for taxi we were told to hold our position for traffic opposite direction. Coming straight for us in a 20 foot hover taxi was a helicopter. Obviously a student pilot based on the voice transmitting. My first thought was that if they messed up we were toast. The copter made a nice turn to my left and continued down taxiway C when ground gave us "A to the club".

During the taxi back I mentioned that there were some really weird vibrations coming from the engine at low RPMs. I2 agreed and after some tooling around she agreed. She said she'd head in and talk to maintenance while I tied FIFA down. I couldn't help but wonder if it was my landing that damaged the aircraft. During the debrief I2 said it had nothing to do with the landing, but FIFA was scratched for the next flight. As I left the club I saw them towing her into the hangar.

A few good lessons learned. My kneeboard needs to be better organized. Always measure your fuel. I need to concentrate during the takeoff on keeping us on the centerline. I need to be aware of my speeds in the climbout. I need to conquer my fear of nose up attitude. I need to keep the nose down over threshold. I need to pull the nose up when landing. The next few flights are heading into some serious stuff and I need to make sure I'm on the ball. I also learned that I2 certainly IS a great instructor. The ground brief and the queuing in the cockpit are perfect for me.

6.3 Hours and counting...

Flight Bag

I'm fortunate enough to have two siblings, both of whom I have relationships with to this day. I'm the youngest of three, one is 8 years my elder, the other 5.

My middle brother and I have had an ongoing "dream" for close to 10 years now. One day, we will live in the same city and co-own an aircraft. We will go flying together. We will go flying together lots. We will hire an instructor so we can obtain our instrument ratings and then go flying together even more. Three things have been holding us back all these years: We don't live in the same city, our disposable income is currently allocated elsewhere, and I don't even have a pilots license. I should also mention a fourth which is that we both have young families and professional careers that don't provide us with a lot of "free" time.

When I first started the training, I didn't call him immediately and let him know about it. He'd probably be pretty busy at work or with the kids and I'd end up blabbing to him on the phone endlessly about it. As it turns out he called me shortly after it started to tell me he was flying YXC YYC YWG and had a 3 hour layover in YYC. Would I be able to come meet him to hang out? The timing was perfect. Within 5 minutes I started telling him about what I was doing. He was speechless. The excitement I sensed in him was hard to describe, he actually appeared to be nearly as excited about it as I was. It was then that he mentioned the flight bag.

Turns out he hasn't flown in over 5 years now and has a flight bag sitting at home. He offered to send it to me since he wasn't using it. Naturally I accepted. I had him send it to my office so that I could open it in relative seclusion. Coming back from lunch today the receptionist told me I had a package in my office - the flight bag had arrived!

I ripped open the package to find a boring black attache case. Inside the case was a treasure trove. A digital stopwatch with a bunch of timers (but I love my watch). A Cessna POH. Some sectionals and TACs - long expired and all for the YVR area. An ICAO ruler. A fuel checker thingee (no clue what it is called). Then things got more exciting - an ASA VFR Tri Fold Kneeboard, well worked in....

I opened the kneeboard and nearly fell on the floor. Pages and Pages of notes in my brother's writing. Something about HASEL, lots of V-Speeds, stuff underlined, circled, and scribbled. A few small checklists, some weight and balance information, and a little Transport Canada publication titled "Meet Your Aircraft". Naturally I emptied all of this stuff out of the kneeboard so it was completely blank and stored it all in a binder so that it was never lost.

Then the coup de grace - a pair of David Clark headsets H10-20 and H10-40 models. I immediately tried them on to see how they felt. They were without question FAR superior to the ones I had been using at the club, at least that's how I felt about it. I hit the Internet immediately for the full specifications on the headsets. At home later that night I took a much closer look. Both of the headsets were well used, and thus they required some maintenance. The H10-40 needs a new gel earpiece and the microphone cover was ripped. I spent 10 minutes or so adjusting the 10-20 until it fit my head perfectly and then tightened all of the bolts. It didn't even have a microphone cover so I swapped in the one from the 10-40. During the cleaning and inspection of the unit I noticed my brother had his first initial and last name embroidered on one of the ears. All I had to do was get that first initial off, or change a P to an I somehow ;)

Seeing how I'm flying tomorrow I decided I'd organize the kneeboard. I refolded my VNC and jammed it into the right pocket, ripped the CYBW aerodrome chart out of an expired cap, highlighted the frequencies at the top and wrote in the practice area frequency. I was excited at the prospect of actually being able to write something down without fumbling around but then realized I had no paper of the correct size to put into the clipboard. At this point I also concluded that if I had paper in the clipboard, it would cover up my Aerodrome chart and all my frequencies. 3COM to the rescue! I grabbed a wad of about 15 lined post it notes and they attached nicely to the chart. Now I could write AND still read my frequencies.

I closed out my kneeboard preparation by creating my own printed copy of the speeds for the DA20 C1. Standard Rotation, 50 ft. obstacle climb, Vy, Vx, recommended app, min app, balked climb speed, max crosswind, Vno, Va, Vfe ldg, Vfe t/o, and Best Glide speed. I've been trying to memorize these numbers and there is never a better way to memorize something than to type it out a few times.

Happy with the setup of the kneeboard and configuration of the headset - I packed up the flightbag with the Kneeboard, Headset, E6B, FTM, POH, some extra pencils, chewing gum, and stowed the bag in my car for the next morning. On my way back inside I realized it was already 1130pm and as a result I'd only get about 6 hours of sleep at max before my flight in the morning. I fell asleep dreaming of how special I'd feel in the morning with my own flightbag, kneeboard, and headset.

No more swapping aviation stuff with my work stuff.
No more microphone boom that doesn't adjust properly and has other people's spit, not to mention the ear jam and headsweat.
No more fumbling around in the cockpit to write something down, pull out a map, or figure out a frequency.

The dream is still alive!

A Chance For Redemption

I consider myself an easy going guy (though my wife would probably differ). I offer my friendship to other people very easily and take it away as a result of serious "infractions". I am well versed in the process of both giving and accepting an apology. Yes - I am a very forgiving person.

With that in mind, as my flying date with I1 approached - I was seriously considering canceling. I had already rebooked another lesson with I1 a few weeks in advance, but was unable to find anything schedule wise that would allow me to flip flop with another instructor and still get the aircraft I wanted, at the time I wanted, on the day I wanted. Even last night I was close to making a change and then realized that it would be a real shaft to I1 if I canceled 10 hours before our lesson. So - I made the decision to provide I1 with an opportunity for redemption.

I was a bit slow at getting in gear this morning, so I arrived at the club only 20 minutes prior to my flight. Luckily I had done a full weather briefing while eating breakfast and jotted down some notes in my notepad. This would be my first time doing the aircraft inspection without the full checklist. I only jotted down the process for checking the items that require me to be "in" the cockpit. By the time I completed the inspection, journey log review, and weight/balance it was already time to start. I1 asked me to grab my FTM and POH and head up for a briefing.

We had a discussion about Range and Endurance. I'll admit that I wasn't entirely happy with the methods used to get the point across, nor the fact that I1 wasn't able to locate the Range charts for the DA20 C1 in the POH. As we headed out to C-FIFA I was wondering if I had made a large mistake...

The plan today was to let me take care of everything. We were heading out to the practice area to do some experimentation with determining best range and endurance for the aircraft. The checklists went quicker this morning though I totally messed up the engine start and had to get I1 to help me out. Here she did a great job of explaining some of the intricacies of getting the engine going. Cockpit organization was an issue again for me - I really need to get a knee board and wear some sort of a shirt where I can easily stow my pencil. I did manage to remember to bring gum and fold my map properly.

Holding short I made my initial call to ground. Ground came back with "CFIFA, taxi to runway 16 via Alpha, Cross runway 7/25, Altimeter 3024 squawk 1072". I replied with a full readback and started to dial in the code when ground called back in a perturbed voice: "Charlie Foxtrot India Foxtrot Alpha - you cut me off in mid sentence there. Wait until I'm done!" and proceeded to give me the same information followed by some wind information. After waiting about 5 seconds to ensure he was done I replied with a simple "India Fox Alpha". I1 looked over at me and I was ready to hear her give me a piece of her mind when she simply said "I thought he was done too!". We both confirmed that I had waited a full 2 seconds after the transponder code before replying. Go figure!

Even with the windsock completely dead I managed to taxi like a blind and drunk crack addict. We ran through our runup checklist without any issues and headed for the runway. It appears that everyone (the instructors) have a different preference for how to set up the radios and I1 was no different. My problem is that I need to memorize the frequencies for CYBW and then set it up MY way the next time I fly. I know from my simming that I like to work from Com1 to standby, then flip to Com2 and standby. Everyone has their own method right! She asked me to do the takeoff brief and she'd complete it with the emergency briefing. "Rotate at 55, climb out at 65 with t/o flaps, retract at 300 AGL and pitch for 75 knots. When we get on course we'll find the powerlines and proceed as per the south/north route. I'll handle the radio work". I1 had no problem with that.

We took the runway and gunned the engine. I had a much better understanding of the amount of right rudder that would be required to keep us on the centerline. Though we certainly were not on the centerline - we weren't zig zagging all over the place like the last few takeoffs. I made sure to keep my hand on the throttle and kept glancing inside at the engine gauges, reaching 55 knots I gently rotated and we took to the sky. Did the usual climb out at Vy with T/O and then clean flaps and turned on course. I1 reminded me to switch frequencies and to check in with outer tower. I managed to make the change without mucking up my beautiful profile. After being radar identified we turned on course and climbed to our cruise altitude.

The South Ghost Route to the practice area is quite simple. You follow some power lines while remembering to keep them on your right, until you reach the dam where the power lines converge with more power lines which form the "North Ghost Route". Once our nose got down a bit I was able to clearly see the lake and its Dam, however I could not see the powerlines. I1 kept pointing them out to me, I flew a bit further south so that I could look out the right window, but unless they were cutting through a swath of trees, I could not see them to save my life. I found this very annoying but kept looking for them. After a few minutes I realized that I had not even been thinking about my power setting, altitude, or speeds - I was simply controlling it without even the slightest thought - almost like driving (not quite). By the time we made it to the dam I still could not see those damned lines.

The practice area was busy. Really busy. It took 3-4 calls by us and 5-6 calls by others in the area until we had a "section" to work in. Although I1 tried a few times to explain to me what area we had as "ours", I simply could not picture it in my brain the way I usually do for maps and this sort of thing. Something about working between Second and Third Ridge. They all look like ridges to me! Once established in our area we did a few quick turns, climbs, descents, and combination of the above. I1 seemed satisfied and then asked me if I remembered what we had discussed regarding Range and Endurance.

We started with Endurance. From straight and level at 2400 RPM we noted our indicated airspeed and started bleeding off the RPM's at intervals of 100. The expected result was that each reduction would require some more nose up attitude, and a loss of ~5 knots indicated. Once we got down below 1800 I had a tough time keeping the nose up for the altitude. Around 1600 it was impossible to keep the altitude. The nose up attitude is still something I'm trying to get used to, to make things more difficult - the annoying stall "horn" started going off. We slowly pushed the RPM's back up until we were able to maintain altitude. At this point, we had reached the "Endurance" settings for the present (based on altitude, pressure, temperature, our weight, winds, etc.). This would be a configuration used if we wanted maximum fuel conservation. I assume this would be used in the event we had to hold for some reason. Then we transitioned back to full power and did the entire thing over again using 200 RPM intervals to speed it up.

Next we moved onto Range. The idea here is to have maximum fuel conservation while maintaining a useful airspeed. The process was similar to endurance except that we were looking at how each interval of reduced RPMs affected our airspeed. As expected, most of the changes of 100RPM resulted in about 5 knots of airspeed. At some point when we reduced the RPM we lost closer to 9 knots of airspeed. Somewhere in there was our maximum range setting. Again we repeated everything.

Finally, I1 demonstrated "slow flight". This was similar to endurance, except when we hit the elbow on the curve where we could not maintain altitude, she increased the nose up attitude and the power setting. Eventually we were in a VERY high nose up attitude with higher power settings, but that damned stall horn was still going off. She demonstrated how "useless" ailerons were in this scenario. After getting used to the attitude I realized that I was looking for a button that turned that horn off, sort of like how you cancel a GPWS in heavy metal.

On our way back she spent a lot more time trying to show me where the power lines were. At times I was able to see them due to the sun reflecting off of them, but for the most part I simply could not see them. Perhaps it would be easier for me if they were off my left wing rather than my right? Who knows.

Tower had us enter a right base for runway 16. We scrambled through the checklists as we turned final and got us into a nice stable approach at 60 knots. As we came over the threshold I again wanted to put my nose up somewhat because I felt as if we would be flying right into the ground. I had us a few degrees pointed right of centerline and added some rudder to straighten us down, then I thought to myself - OK bring the nose up but not too much of a flare - it felt as if we fell onto the runway. We landed on all three gear! Yes, it was quite the slam to me - she mentioned it was a bit hard and that I needed my nose up a bit more. We exited the runway, completed the checks and headed back to the club.

During the debrief I1 told me that my takeoff roll needs to be on centerline but takeoff was excellent - hitting all the speeds. Flight control was excellent, radio work was probably better than some people who already have their license, approach was very stable, and the landing was actually great for someone on their third try. She mentioned that she didn't do anything at all on the landing. We talked again about the issue with ground and she said it wasn't an issue and that I handled it well by simply responding without malice on the frequency. Need to work on the taxiing and she gave a few pointers about how sometimes adding power helps you turn better. I wasn't sure what she was talking about to be honest.

All in all I'd have to say that I1 did a nice job in the air. Her cues were good, she let me do most of the work, and didn't appear to be freaking out about anything. She seemed much calmer in the air then on the ground. I did ask her at one point during the en route portion of the flight "how" she got into flying, trying to break the ice while at the same time gain more insight - she simply responded with something a la "It's a really cheesy story so I don't really tell people about it". I left it at that.

As a side note - I've hit 5.0 hours on the Hobbs now. I have no clue if they track air time or Hobbs time for my pilot training record. This doesn't include the .8 I had from the discovery flight. Hard to believe I'm already at 5.0 hours. That's actually 12.5% of the minimum requirements for a license as per Transport Canada.

Next flight is in a week with the CFI in C-GFFC. I need to review Slow Flight for that lesson. I'm looking forward to showing CFI how much I've improved since that first flight.

So would I fly with I1 again? We will probably only see this happen if someone else bumps me and I need to get the flight in. Her ground persona isn't what I'm looking for and I think she lacks some experience in "teaching" in terms of how she explains things to people and how she responds to questions. Perhaps that first impression will forever leave a mark. I'll simply move on and work with other people because even if I'm completely 1000% out to lunch on my analysis of her, this is MY flight training - and I need to feel comfortable with the people I train with.

I1 has redeemed herself somewhat, but not enough for me to put my training in her hands. This is too important for me to pull punches.

Medical

Somewhere hidden inside my genetic code lies the dormant "Procrastination Gene". At times in my life it was fully active. At other times it is utterly dormant. It has required a lot of self discipline to keep it dormant. Some people think that this sort of condition can be influenced by people constantly reminding or nagging you to take care of things. I beg to differ...

For me - it's very simply. If there is something that I WANT to do, it usually gets done. If there is something that I DO NOT WANT to do, it falls on my priority list. Wait, it gets more complicated than that. If there is something that I WANT to do, but someone else is TELLING ME to do it, then it moves over to the column that records things that I DO NOT WANT to do - even though I actually want to do it. Hope that makes sense - I know it does to me because it's one of the things that keeps me ticking away.

People warned me that I should get the medical examination out of the way as soon as possible. Some said that I didn't want to come up on that magical solo time and still not have it. Others suggested that since it needs to be processed by Transport Canada, a government agency - that there was the potential for me to get caught in a paperwork or administrative blockage. Still others told me that if I don't meet the requirements, I shouldn't bother training at all since I can never solo.

It was the last type of comment that bothered me most. What if I didn't meet medical requirements? What if I had some sort of dormant heart defect or even some sort of inner ear imbalance or my eye sight was messed up? I just needed to get this taken care of and out of the way as soon as possible - for better or for worse.

It wasn't as simple as I thought setting up the appointment. The list of doctors I found from my local flying school was incorrect and incomplete. Some of the Doctors on there were no longer certified or had moved offices while many entries were simply missing. After an exhaustive amount of googling I located a list on the Transport Canada website and started calling them all. To my annoyance - only once operated in the downtown core (which would have been most convenient for me since I work downtown). After speaking with the nice lady on the phone and telling her I need my Class 3 Aviation medical certificate she immediately said ".. and I suppose you needed this done by yesterday?". Well I guess many pilots leave it too late, but that wasn't the case for me. I booked an appointment for the following week and asked what the fee was. "$250.00 plus GST". OMG - that seems WAY more money than I was expecting. I decided to phone some others - I finally found one that was on my way home who offered the same service for only $150.00, so this was booked (and other one cancelled).

In the mean time I went to an optometrist to get my eyes checked. Apparently I have formed a slight astigmatism in my right eye that needs a correction and new contacts are thus on order. The Doctor got very excited when I told him I needed to get this done for an aviation medical - turns out he's always wanted to fly so we chatted about this at length. Hopefully I didn't cut too far into his next appointment.

I thought about all the terrible news I could hear during the next week. Somehow I managed to completely forget about the physical until my blackberry started reminding me about the appointment. After arriving at the clinic and checking in the nurse too me for my eye tests. I had a LOT of trouble reading some of the bottom lines with each eye alone AND with both eyes. She kept jotting stuff down on her charts. Now I was nervous. It was then they asked me to put on my glasses. "Glasses? Umm ya I haven't worn glasses in 15 years". After some discussion they asked me to take out my contact lenses - OK this is another thing they should have told me about. Her and another nurse said they would let the Doctor decide but there was a chance I'd have to come back to complete the medical - woe is me!

After this they measured and weighed me, took my blood pressure, and then I met the Doctor. She was extremely personable and I immediately felt very relaxed with her. We did some more eye tests, some audio test, some examination, an ECG, and a review of my medical history. I was relieved when I realized there would be no "Moon River" as part of this examination.

The end result was that my major risk factor has to do with heart disease where she wrote "Brother MI @ 41" which translated means my brother had a Heart Attack at age 41 (for which he received bypass surgery for and made an amazing recovery). Aside from that my audio was fine and my corrected visual acuity give me 20/10 vision which means I can see what the "average" person sees at 10 feet from 20 feet. Uncorrected I'd have to be at 20 feet for what that same "average" person sees at 20 feet!!

The paperwork is signed and sent in. I suppose I get some official documentation from Transport Canada sometime in the near future. Since I'm under 40 the certification is good for 5 years so I'm fine with my medical (unless something changes) until the end of August 2013.

One less hoop to jump through...

Cremona

The first thing I thought about when I met I3 was how much better she would fit in the cockpit with me. The weight and balance book at the club had her listed at 120 lbs (they have weights for all of the instructors so you can complete your weight and balance) but I'd say she couldn't weigh more than 105 soaking wet. We talked about some of the exercises we'd be doing today and I updated her on a few things that I felt I needed improvement on - as if they weren't all listed in my PTR already.

It was after I mentioned the practice area that she told me there was a change in plans.

Rather than flying out to the practice area today - we flew out to Cremona. This is a small town 22nm north of CYBW with a thriving population of 463 as of 2006. Apparently the ride is much smoother heading out there and over the area, so my assumption is that CFI wrote something down in the book about me feeling ill last flight. I suppose this is a good thing. We talked about the various numbers from the POH that we'd need to know - glide speed (73), Vx and Vy for both cruise (60/75) and t/o flaps (57/68), and standard rotation speed for takeoffs (55). She then spoke briefly about the relationship at cruise between power and speed. For some reason I also remember this one --> +100RPM = +5 KIAS. Rough math - but a good guide in any event.

We headed out to CFIFA which was waiting patiently for us with 5 1/4 qt of Oil and 15 gallons of fuel. The pre flight had gone very smooth for me earlier and I think I might be ready for a walk around from memory next flight. She made it very apparent that during this flight I'd be taking care of almost everything. I remembered to hang the ignition keys on the attitude indicator setting knob before climbing in this time ;). The checklists were completed, engine fired up, radios set, and we headed for the taxiway. This time I didn't feel like a complete freak calling ground for taxi. I also did an OK job of keeping the aircraft on the centerline and managed to set us up for the runup next to a high wing without any troubles.

As we were coming to the hold short line for runway 25 we finished our takeoff briefing. Rotate at 55, climb out at 68, retract flaps at 300' AGL and accelerate to 75 for the climb. I kept the pressure up on the right rudder during the takeoff roll this time and as a result didn't stray so far left of the line only to over correct to the right. At 55 I pulled back gently and we took to the skies. The acceleration to 68 was simple - she called 300 feet and I pulled the flaps up and put the nose down until we hit 75 knots. Calls to tower were simple enough to do and I was surprised that I had no troubles switching over to outer tower without messing everything up.

Soon we were established at 6000 and cruising away - following Highway 22 to the North. This is when she told me to pull out my map. I had to identify a number of things on the map for her - some of which I could and others which I could not. Highways, intersections, communication towers, rivers, lakes, valleys, even small "towns", and curves in the road. I spent a lot of time with that map on my lap and to my amazement - I kept the altitude spot on following the highway. It's amazing what constant power and some trim can do! Then she started asking me to tell her how far we were from present position to Cremona, or from an intersection ahead to our position, or from there to Cremona - etc. I found it REALLY hard to count the distance lines on the map. She kept pressing me to do it and to be honest I really sucked at it. Mental note - work on map reading. We did a few timing points to calculate our ground speed - even though the GNS430 told us exactly what it was. 105 kias and 127 over the ground. Nice little wind.

Once we arrived at Cremona we did a number of exercises - turns at altitude, climbs, climbing turns at specific speeds, descents, and descending turns at speeds. I am happy to report that my altitude deviation was FAR better than the previous flight.

Then she added more to the exercise - now before any idle descents I had to turn on the electric fuel pump and richen the mixture. After levelling off I had to turn the pump off and lean the mixture. I must admit that my throttle control was far better than the day before - but the mixture really required lots of my attention.

To make things even more fun - we started doing descents with target speed and vertical rates. So now it was "Descend to 6500 at 75 knots and 500 feet per minute". I found it strange that I was able to control this so well - who knows? After doing many of these we ended with a descent from 8000 to 6500 at 70 knots, 500 feet per minute, and a right turn until we are parallel with the highway (a 210 degree turn). I think the process went very well from my perspective. I was pleased with myself.

On the way back we had a quarter headwind that really knocked us around. It was very cool flying a 15 degree offset from the highway and yet staying parallel with it. After checking in with outer tower properly we got shipped to inner. My radio work was growing in confidence - I checked in with "Tower, Diamond FIF checking in over Cochrane 6000 with Charlie, full stop". I thought I sounded sooooo cool. Perhaps tower thought I did too because their response was about 15 minutes long (or so it seemed). I did understand all that they said to me and as I prepared to key my mike I hesitated for a few seconds. I realized then that I could never read all that back so just did a "FIF". I3 asked me "did you actually copy that?". I was able to explain to her what I understood them to say and apparently I got it right.

We entered a right downwind on a 45 with no traffic anywhere around us. I3 called my speeds, altitudes, and base, and asked me to turn final on my own. It wasn't absolutely perfect but it did the job with a few minor corrections. We completed the landing checklist and she told me "You're landing the plane.". I just did my best to put out the flaps and fly the speeds she told me to fly and kept the RPMs where they needed to be. She got louder as we got closer "less power", "Nose down, nose down, nose down, nose down" (I guess I wanted to pull it up for some reason). In the flare I pulled the power all the way back, made a few adjustments for rudder and settled it down a bit left of center. Sounds great but it was a bit harder than the other times of landed in a GA aircraft. I kept us somewhat straight on the rollout, left the runway, completed the checklists, and taxied back to the club (with ATC permission of course).

I was definitely satisfied with the flight. I felt very comfortable at the controls the entire time - I had a better expectation of what ATC was going to say. I had less trouble thinking what I wanted to tell ATC. I knew where all of my gauges and switches were on the panel and what they all meant. Traffic awareness was no better but no worse. I was especially happy that I wasn't climbing during my turns, that I was much smoother on the throttles, that I trimmed instinctively, that I held my altitude during an idle descent without letting that nose down, and that I did OK at descending with a target forward and lateral speed.

(EDIT: When I say "I held my altitude during idle descent" I realize it doesn't make much sense. What we were working on was descents at a specific forward speed. My instructions were to pull back the throttle to idle and maintain my present altitude until my speed had bled off to the target speed and only then should I start the descent. This of course is tough since cutting the power causes the aircraft to instantly want a nose down attitude. The amount of pressure required to keep the aircraft level increases relative to the decrease in speed. We were operating well above stall speeds, but during my discovery flight we did idle stalls and I can remember how hard it was to keep the nose up while approaching the stall speed. Anyhow - wanted to make sure that line made more sense now! - Flightnewbie)

I need to improve on the map reading. I need to get more familiar with all of the "VFR Routes" in the area. I need to get through the checklists a little faster (I am REALLY SLOW). Hopefully the next flight will see me with even better taxi, takeoff, and landing performance.

When I asked for what to prepare for the next lesson I was told to read up on takeoffs (again), landings (again), Aircraft Endurance, memorize the numbers from the POH, and to do some practice scenarios with the VNC so that I could read the map better. My personal notes here tell me that I need a smaller clipboard for writing notes - and a shirt with a pocket in it to stash a pencil.

I3 was very calm and gave excellent cues during the flight. Apparently she was taught to fly and got her instructor rating from I2 - go figure. I would definitely fly with her again and in fact started looking to change some bookings with other instructors to her.

Oh ya - I didn't feel sick!