As I mentioned yesterday I had quite a bit of studying to do last night. The lights finally went out at 2:00 this morning. I got most of the reading done with the exception of the chapter on radio work. With four hours of sleep, freshman football was quite a drag. As soon as it was over I rushed to our minivan to get home. After a quick shower and review of what we were to do this lesson, We headed to the airport.
Like every other lesson, Johnny and I headed straight to the classroom downstairs to begin the ground portion of our lesson. He first assisted me in understanding the difference between a spin and a spiral (sound like the same thing?) Well it turns out that a spin is rotating while going straight down, while a spiral was a steep turn while descending. After clearing up my quick question, we entered into a very brief discussion of stalls. This ten or so minute tangent to our lesson covered why stalls occur as well as the proper recovery procedure. Getting back to our syllabus, we covered various percussion and wind correction maneuvers. The rectangular course was the first on our list. He showed as well as explained how to correct for various wind situations while flying in a rectangle shape. This made perfect sense to me. Next was the 720 degree turn (at 45 degrees of bank). He also explained this simple maneuver with special emphasis to making sure the nose doesn’t rise on roll-out (because of the surplus of back pressure required to maintain altitude in the steep turn). Then, S-turns about a road was explained using a poster. He also showed the various turns and banks required to make the maneuver successful. After our pre-flight discussion, we headed upstairs to the awaiting keys, headset, and dispatch sheet.
As my second lesson, we began the long hike to hangar P-64 (in the farthest row of hangars). P-64 housed N32403 as well as maintenance equipment (it doubled as the maintenance hangar). While inspecting fuel quantity even before climbing into the cockpit, we decided that it would be best to top off the plane. We simply pulled the plane out as Johnny called the fuel truck. After the preflight was completed, I started the engine and began the taxi to the ramp. While passing the ramp, the windsock indicated the runway 26 was best for takeoffs and landings. After the pre-takeoff checklist, I made the radio call, taxied to the center line, and took off. Because of he right crosswind, we used a lot of right aileron to correct for the wind; one of many wind correcting maneuvers to be performed. We climbed out west and to about 3,200 feet. I flew straight and level for about five minutes so we could establish a good practice area. We started with steep turns. I asked Johnny to demonstrate one first in which he did nearly to perfection. The first thought that popped through my head was, “Wow this is a steep turn.” After he demonstrated the just about perfect steep turn, I made my poor excuse of one to the left. I had a hard time of keeping altitude and rolling out at the proper heading. He explained that my attempt was a pretty good one for my first time. He said to try it again in the opposite direction. I concentrated on what I had to do and did it. The altitude fluctuated a mere 40 feet throughout all 720 degrees. On rollout, I nailed the heading and didn’t gain altitude like most students. Johnny informed me that I did that turn within tolerance. I was so shocked that I did something right. I was very happy with my performance and couldn’t wait to work on the next maneuver. Alas, the next exercises would be a tad bit harder. After finding a suitable rectangular field, we began to fly a rectangular pattern. The point is to remain an equal distance from the perimeter of the field at all times. It took me a lap or two to discover that the wind was blowing (pretty strong) from the west. When I started correcting my crab angles (the angle between the airplane’s nose and the path its traveling (on the ground)) were way off. Another two or so laps and they were almost right. I just couldn’t time the turns right. Johnny said that it was good for now (since we weren’t going for accuracy, just concept) and to watch as he demonstrated S-turns about a road. S-turns about a road are turning in a “S” pattern over a road. You want to have the curves of the “S” equal distance from the road. After completing the S-turns north on the road, he had me complete them going the opposite direction. The first two turns I either turned a little to early or late but turned out okay. The remaining turns, I hit pretty good, and Johnny was pretty impressed. I was glad too because I spent a lot of time studying that maneuver as well as really focusing on it. Unfortunately, it was time to head back to the airport. Just for fun, Johnny showed how the rudder controls the direction of the nose in demonstrating a side-slip. While banking the ailerons one direction and applying rudder in the opposite direction, the plane would be moving in a straight line. I practiced this in both directions for about five minutes as we were returning for the airport. We approached another private airport as a land mark (5 miles on the 45 from Lake In the Hills). I made the radio call and flew into the pattern. I worked the radio throughout the pattern as well as set up for final. While turning for final (the leg lining up for landing), I was just right of the runway, so Johnny took over, corrected for the slightly larger-than-usual crosswind and landed the plane without even breaking a sweat. I taxied back to the ramp, locked up, and we returned to the flight school.
So your probably wondering, “How did it pay off?”. Well, while signing my logbook, he told me that I was probably his most prepared student. I was so relieved that all my hard work hitting the books wasn’t a waste. On top of that, in the air, I’m starting to get a feel for different conditions. For example, I can now tell if I’m in a coordinated turn without reference to the flight instruments. This was the best lesson so far. I had so much fun. Two consecutive days of flying, made this one of the best weeks of my life. Unfortunately, because of my current financially situation (sitting with $36 in my flight account), I will probably not be able to fly until my birthday (September). In between now and then, I will be posting random aviation related things so stay tuned. Thank you very very much for reading this!!! I very much appreciate your valuable time.
Evan Krueger
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