Lesson 12

This morning the predicted low clouds were hanging around outside. Though if you looked to the north you could see the dry line coming but it wasn't close enough yet. I checked the online metars for Addison, Denton, Collin County, and Grayson County and then called the local FSS. She echoed a lot of what I'd already learned ... most airports were reporting multiple cloud layers between 1700' and 2600', broken to overcast. Then she told me something I didn't know ... that the winds at 3000' were reported as from 230 at 47 knots. Yikes.

I tried calling my instructor but he didn't answer so I drove out to Addison. When I got to the parking lot I didn't see his truck there so I thought he might be running late so I tried calling him again while I sat in my car. He answered his cell this time so we talked about the weather and agreed that we should do a ground session later at 10 am. He is going to see if another student wants to join us. So I drive home to have a little breakfast.

When I get back to Monarch at 10, C asks me if I drove out there this morning. I admitted I had and said I didn't see his white truck. "Oh no, I drive the maroon truck. Peter drives the white truck." Doh! Now I feel like a dumbass. He thought it was funny though.

By this time the clouds were nearly all gone and the sky looked beautiful so C asked me if I was sure I didn't want to go flying instead. Hmm well maybe. C does a weather check and then dials up Denton's AWOS on the radio and they've got a 60-degree crosswind going. Woohoo! Crosswinds ... let's go.

I go out and preflight 364GW (the streaks of graphite are still there ... after a night of rain). We hop in and do the pre-engine checklist, start up, and tune in Addison's ATIS. Winds are from 230 at 9 knots. The runway here is 15-33. So I remember to move the controls while we taxi to account for the wind (dive away as we're paralleling 15 headed for the runup area). We're the only aircraft in the runup area today. After the pre-takeoff checklist is complete we get clearance for immediate takeoff and a turnout to the right to head to Denton. We line up on the centerline and I move the controls all the way to the right against the right quartering headwind we have. Full power and as we lift off the controls come back to nearly level but we've got the right wing down a little and I put in a little more right rudder to swing into the wind and we crab our way up to pattern altitude.

During the short flight to Denton C goes over the steps I need to do during a crosswind approach and landing ... turn onto final and establish a crab and track the center line, then transition into a wing down cross control so we line up with the centerline and control the drift with the ailerons. All the time keeping that right wing low (since we have a crosswind from the right). When we arrive, after getting the AWOS info and contacting the tower, we find one very quiet airport.

BTW, last night's rain had washed all the junk out of the air and the view today was spectacular!

So my mission today is to improve on yesterday's mistakes (not keeping backpressure in the turns and coming in too low on final and landing flat) while learning how a crosswind feels. Mission sort of accomplished. I did 5 touch and goes today with another go-around when I bounced and couldn't get back on the centerline.

I felt more controlled in the pattern. I was remembering to reduce power and put in the first notch of flaps at midfield. Then pitching for 85 knots, turning base (using backpressure in the turn) and pitching for 75 knots. Then turning final I would stay at around 70 knots and C also allowed me to use 20-degrees of flaps when I felt I needed to slow down more.

Tracking the centerline was fairly easy all the way down until the flare. But then things started to fall apart. Generally, my problem was that I was not using the ailerons enough to keep centered. So when we touched down I would have the controls level instead of turned to the right. Reflecting on it later I'm thinking that my brain is still making the automobile steering wheel association with the yoke even though I KNOW that's not the case. I have to drill it into my head that having the controls turned to the right is not going to make the plane turn to the right during the flare. The rudder is for that.

During the last two landings when we touched down C would say "look at where your controls are" and sure enough, the yoke was level!

Like I mentioned, I did 5 touch-and-goes and while they weren't pretty they were better than yesterday. And I learned that crosswinds aren't as scarry as I thought they may be but you definitely cannot be complacent during the landing. I have to be hyper-alert to what the plane is doing and correctly correct for drift while keeping that nose straight. Again, I have to remind myself to be aggressive with the controls ... to not be so timid.

The ride back was unevenful and quick .. now with a steady tailwind. The gusts seemed to have picked up while we were doing touch and goes and sure enough when we got back to Addison they were reporting winds from 240 at 16 knots with gusts in the 20s (I can't remember exactly).

The approach was a straight-in to runway 15 and I double-checked that Nav one was tuned to the ILS. So I used it to guide me in. I did this partly because I noticed before that I have trouble judging when to start letting down when on that long approach. I end up arriving at the airport well above the glideslope, though I suppose that's better than arriving too low!

On short final the tower told us that the winds gusts had really picked up and were becoming more varied. On short final she reported winds at 5 knots then at 17 knots. At that point C took the controls and said that was too gusty for me on my first day of crosswinds. So I got a front row seat to a perfect crosswind landing. It really was perfect, right wing low, hardly a sound out of the tires and directly on the centerline. Sigh, I've got a lot to learn yet.

Today: 1.4 hours
Landings: 5
Total: 16.7 hours

Lesson 11

My last flight was on 1-23 and so I was really looking forward to today's lesson. Last weekend I was sick and cancelled and the weekend before the weather kept us on the ground. The outlook for today was looking pretty bad ... rain and low clouds. So this morning I got up and checked the NOAA Aviation Weather website and got the following:

Addison ADS
1247Z
temp 50F/dew point 39F
a3015
wind from 180 at 5 knots
visibility 15 miles
cloud cover info "missing"

Grayson County GYI
1245Z
temp 46F/dew point 36F
a3013
wind from 200 at 9 kts
visibility 10+ miles
scattered clouds at 4300
scattered clouds at 12000

I also looked up the latest TAF for Love Field (KDAL) and they were predicting that ceiling wouldn't come down until around noon (they predicted 4000'). My lesson was scheduled for 8am so things were looking up. I called the Fort Worth FSS and talked to a briefer who told me there was light rain reported at Grayson moving to the east at 30 knots and that the ceiling at Addison was reported as FL250. He also said that the winds at 3000' were reported as 24 knots from 230-degrees.

So the lesson is on!! I packed my stuff in the car and drove to Addison. I was a little apprehensive about today because I really felt rusty. And I haven't been studying as hard as I should be. But I just kept telling myself that I could handle anything my instructor threw at me and that the plan was to do a bunch of touch and goes so the worst that could happen would be a simulated engine out in the pattern.

C gave me the keys to the plane and asked me to preflight and then come back in the building, and then he asked for my logbook. Hmmm, ok. So I preflight the plane, everything on it looked great except the nose had a wash of what I first thought was oil streaked down one side. But it started right at the front edge of the cowling which would be a difficult place for oil to come out (we're talking Skyhawk here). So I stuck my finger in it and it definitely didn't feel like oil. Later, C said that it was some kind of graphite powder (maybe) that was used around the cowling as a fire retardant (maybe). It wasn't something that we needed to worry about.

Finishing the preflight I walked back in the building and C and I went upstairs to brief. He asked if I was ready to solo!? Umm, no, not really. We talked about where we left off last time and that I hadn't been to an uncontrolled airport yet. "Oh, OK, I thought we'd gotten further than that." Whew, no solo today. While I feel that in general I'm up to it. Having taken three weeks off from flying I definitely wanted some more practice before trying that.

So we took off for Grayson County to learn the uncontrolled airport pattern and do a bunch of touch and goes. The taxi and runup and takeoff went fine. I managed to do the flow during the runup and not rely on the checklist. I handled the radio and got all our clearances, etc. The takeoff was straight down the centerline and at 60 knots I gently pulled back the yoke and we started a 75 knot climb. And I managed to keep the speed pretty close to 75 all the way up to 2000'. After leveling off and turning north I did the cruise checklist ... checked fuel, brought the power down a little, pulled out the mixture, and trimmed for level flight. But I didn't SAY that I did this until finally I realized and said something to C. He laughed and said that he was about to pull out the POH and point to the section on checklists. Doh! I really got to remember to verbalize what I'm doing and thinking. Though, I'm sure he did see me doing the checklist items.

The flight up to Grayson only took about 18 minutes. Our southerly tailwind helped tremendously. The GPS said our groundspeed was around 143 knots. When we arrived we found one plane, another Skyhawk, in the pattern doing touch and goes. We had been monitoring the CTAF but hadn't heard anyone but once we got there we saw him. So we announced our intentions. The first couple of times around this guy kept silent. And I could tell that C was getting more and more angry about it. Then a twin arrived and announced a full stop (I can't remember the make and model). With three of us in the pattern this guy finally started making radio calls. But that was limited to once per pattern, generally when he was turning downwind.

Anyway, the first couple of times around C handled the radio so I could concentrate on flying and good thing he did because I was all over the place! Those three weeks really hurt! What was happening was that I was getting behind where I should be doing things. So intead of dropping my first notch of flaps at midfield on downwind I would do it when I was abeam the numbers. My speed was all messed up and I would lose too much altitude and come over the runway really flat. So when I pulled the power back to idle and flare the bottom would drop out and we'd smack down on the runway. Or I'd pull too hard on the yoke and we'd float. Once (ok maybe twice) we bounced pretty hard.

Finally, C took the controls and demonstrated the pattern and approach. After that it started getting better, but then he had me start to make the radio calls. The radio bit was easy, but I was getting distracted and would let the altitude drop too much in the turns and so was still coming in flat.

C did pull the power for a simulated engine out once. We would not have made the runway, I completely mismanaged the situation. I didn't trim for best glide quickly enough and we lost a lot of altitude before turning final. We did a go-around and C pointed out what I was doing wrong. That was an eye-opener. There's no fooling around here, I have got to get this right. Finally, it all started to come together and I started to do better. The last three were ok. On one my final approach was a mess but salvaged it and managed a decent landing. For the next two I was more controlled all the way around and managed a good approach and a good landing. All in all I did 11 touch-and-goes and all of them were great learning experiences, especially the really ugly ones.

For the flight back our lovely tailwind turned into a vicious headwind that at times made seem to be barely moving at all. The ceiling was most definitely dropping though the Addison ATIS was still reporting a ceiling around 8000'. Sure enough, we passed under some low clouds and got rained on but then it opened up and was remarkably clear near the airport. This was the first time for me to fly in the rain and it was much less of an experience than I thought it would be. It was a light rain though but it did give the plane a nice washing ... except that graphite stuff. It's incredibly stubborn.

I'm on the schedule for a lesson tomorrow but we're going to play it by ear. If we get a good crosswind then we'll go do some crosswind landings. Otherwise we're going to do a ground school session.

This flight: 2.1 hours
Total: 15.3 hours