My last flight was last Friday, but I never wrote anything about it. So here it is
The flight picked up where I left my training the lesson before. I started the flight talking off with a simulated short field. This means that I lined up on the runway centerline with as much runway left as possible. With 25 degrees of flaps set, I applied full power while pressing the brakes at the same time. Before I let the brakes go, I made sure the instruments were in the green. One I released the foot brakes, the plane shot forward and accelerated to rotation speed in seconds. Since the field was “short,” rotation speed was 5 knots slower than normal. At 55 knots, I pitched the p[lane up and climbed away from the field. Unfortunately, I forgot that on a short field takeoff, you need to climb out at 55 knots instead of the normal 63. This allows the plane to clear any obstacle if there is one. Once my instructor told me to correct for the 55 knot climb out, I would have been already cleared of the obstacle.
I did a downwind departure and headed for the practice ground. Friday was the first time I practiced unusual attitude recovery. I liked it a lot because while you’re looking down, the instructor takes the plane and flies it in unusual movements. The first few turns and pitches I was able to keep track of in my head. But then one big negative G turn and my brain was thrown off. When he told me to recover, I looked up and was completely surprised by how the plane was oriented. There are two different types of recoveries; one for a pitch up attitude and one for a pitch down. The first one was a pitch down. So I cut power to idle, neutralized the ailerons and brought the nose back up. This ensures that we don’t speed up as we descend, and by neutralizing the ailerons before pitching the nose up, the plane won’t go into a spiral. The second time he had me recover, the plane was pitched up. So I increased the throttle to full power and pitched the airplane down. The second the nose was lowered, I neutralized the ailerons. This recovery ensures that the plane doesn’t stall and that the nose of the plane pitches to normal quickly.
For the remainder of the flight, I practiced ground reference maneuvers. At first, my circles around a point were horrible. My instructor told me I was fixating on the point too much. This meant that I was neglecting the instruments and was looking outside too much. After he demonstrated a maneuver for me, I was able to do the point turns much better. It was a lot easier when I kept glancing inside the plane to see what my altitude and airspeed was.
After getting the ATIS and contacting tower for touch and goes, I made my way back to the airport. Last time I did touch and goes, they weren’t very good. I couldn’t get the hang of the power setting for the type of landing I was trying to do. Unfortunately, last Friday, the winds were coming 60 degrees off the runway centerline and it was challenging again. Because I practiced so many short field landings last time, I did a few soft field landings this time. They went a little better than the last attempts but still need much improvement.
What I learned today:
No matter what you think a plane is doing (attitude the plane’s in) you need to trust the instruments. If you use only your nervous system to determine what attitude the plane is in, you’ll be wrong almost every time. I found this out while practicing unusual attitude recoveries. Right before I recovered, and was still looking down, I thought I knew what I should be looking at when I picked my head up; either the ground, or the sky. But each time I was wrong.
The flight picked up where I left my training the lesson before. I started the flight talking off with a simulated short field. This means that I lined up on the runway centerline with as much runway left as possible. With 25 degrees of flaps set, I applied full power while pressing the brakes at the same time. Before I let the brakes go, I made sure the instruments were in the green. One I released the foot brakes, the plane shot forward and accelerated to rotation speed in seconds. Since the field was “short,” rotation speed was 5 knots slower than normal. At 55 knots, I pitched the p[lane up and climbed away from the field. Unfortunately, I forgot that on a short field takeoff, you need to climb out at 55 knots instead of the normal 63. This allows the plane to clear any obstacle if there is one. Once my instructor told me to correct for the 55 knot climb out, I would have been already cleared of the obstacle.
I did a downwind departure and headed for the practice ground. Friday was the first time I practiced unusual attitude recovery. I liked it a lot because while you’re looking down, the instructor takes the plane and flies it in unusual movements. The first few turns and pitches I was able to keep track of in my head. But then one big negative G turn and my brain was thrown off. When he told me to recover, I looked up and was completely surprised by how the plane was oriented. There are two different types of recoveries; one for a pitch up attitude and one for a pitch down. The first one was a pitch down. So I cut power to idle, neutralized the ailerons and brought the nose back up. This ensures that we don’t speed up as we descend, and by neutralizing the ailerons before pitching the nose up, the plane won’t go into a spiral. The second time he had me recover, the plane was pitched up. So I increased the throttle to full power and pitched the airplane down. The second the nose was lowered, I neutralized the ailerons. This recovery ensures that the plane doesn’t stall and that the nose of the plane pitches to normal quickly.
For the remainder of the flight, I practiced ground reference maneuvers. At first, my circles around a point were horrible. My instructor told me I was fixating on the point too much. This meant that I was neglecting the instruments and was looking outside too much. After he demonstrated a maneuver for me, I was able to do the point turns much better. It was a lot easier when I kept glancing inside the plane to see what my altitude and airspeed was.
After getting the ATIS and contacting tower for touch and goes, I made my way back to the airport. Last time I did touch and goes, they weren’t very good. I couldn’t get the hang of the power setting for the type of landing I was trying to do. Unfortunately, last Friday, the winds were coming 60 degrees off the runway centerline and it was challenging again. Because I practiced so many short field landings last time, I did a few soft field landings this time. They went a little better than the last attempts but still need much improvement.
What I learned today:
No matter what you think a plane is doing (attitude the plane’s in) you need to trust the instruments. If you use only your nervous system to determine what attitude the plane is in, you’ll be wrong almost every time. I found this out while practicing unusual attitude recoveries. Right before I recovered, and was still looking down, I thought I knew what I should be looking at when I picked my head up; either the ground, or the sky. But each time I was wrong.
