A.R.S.E.

Totes jelly.

Another flight today. Yay. Did the preflight check first thing this morning. Small top up of the oil and one screw seemed to have fallen out of the cowling. All good though. Really not too much on the ground. Still having issues with taxiing but nowhere near as bad today. Getting easier.

Takeoff. Eh. Little less nose up.

Straight and level flying today. Took me a while to really get used to adjusting for it. Power, attitude, speed, trim. Practice at 2500rpm, 2000 with and without flaps and slow at 1800. Got used to the first three but not the last. I think the instructor asking me to raise the nose up with the trim when I couldn't trim it any further made me stress a little, that and hearing the stall warning even though we were in the green and clearly not descending. I'll get used to the visual cues too. I was getting there in the end, doing everything to not look at the panel while setting up. Managed to get there in the end. We'll gloss over the fact I tended to blow away from the ocean whilst practicing. Must keep a little bit of right rudder on to counteract it next time.

Descent was okay. Could have done with a bit more instruction on where I should visually be facing *before* I put the flaps to full. Didn't take control of the landing either, left it for my instructor to fill in with a really awesome sideslip landing.

So yeah. Wasn't as confident today. I'm not too sure why, felt like this instructor took control around all the banking and just left me to level and I felt a bit more antsy and tight gripped. Then again, the practice was simply to get used to levelling out and I got there in the end.

You will have good days and bad days I reckon. But overall you're going to improve faster than you might be aware of.

The good and bad days come and go. I thought I was having a bad day when my instructor sent me solo. I'm still here to talk about it so it must have been okay!

You just push through it and the next one will be better.

Keep working away on your theory subjects too.

Well last Wednesday was a good day right until the point where I landed flat and learned what nose wheel shimmy is. Lesson learned that day. Climbing and descending was a fair bit of fun, I will have to practice holding the picture so to speak, as well as putting my hand back on the throttle control.

I'm keeping up with the theory too. I haven't heard my instructors mention much about that side yet so I'm not sure if I have studied too far ahead. *shrug*

Another flight today. Doing as much as practical (every 4 days) until I get back to Uni at the end of next month, then it'll be more about once a week. Also means I can get my junior staff working for me on weekdays so they can't complain about having no hours over the holidays... what an excuse.

Turns today. Wow that was smooth. Properly smooth and I didn't really struggle too much here. I do need to work on my descents still and that bit of trim work, again, just getting used to where to frame the horizon for level, ascending and descending flight. Throttle control can be a little quicker too but I tend to forget just how much the throttle can move back and forth. Practice.

Compared to Wednesday, didn't land flat but rather pulled back a little too much. The instructor laughed a bit at that when we hopped out saying that it'll come with practice. That was reassuring.

Still amazing after 5(.2) hours. Figured I am going to go for my PPL now so I'm going to look for a headset while I can so I don't need to pay the $5-10 rental every flight.

I've considered selling mine... But I dunno... Maybe I'll fly again.

What's been happening Crowella? Been a month with no updates. I'm following your brave journey!

Oh... I have been flying, clocked up 9 hours at the moment. Not the past two weeks because of weather and varying reasons.

Into the circuit training at the moment. Had to do 20 degree flap landings... Started to rain. What that does to your vision on final is freaky! The distances become a little harder to judge and I was flaring stupidly early.

Just to make things more exciting, the gyro was broken on one lesson, so no DI or Attitude :-o Wasn't of much concern doing circuits where it is mostly visual.

The difficult bit is that the circuits are short so learning them means taking a lot on board quickly. Flaring takes a lot of practice too and I have ever been satisfied once.

How's the flight training going Crowella?

So according to my instructor, I am about 5 hours out from doing my first solo. Yay!

Its been going well. Naturally due to the cost and time I cant go as often as I like. Made worse since we've been at Maitland while Warnervale had a runway resurface and that's a really long trip to make when the most time I ever get off is half a day.

Last flight on Friday went well aside one touch and go where I almost sent it off to the side. After being very nervous, the video is my next landing which was a much smoother transition.

Nice landing. You know you've got it pretty right when the stall warning is going off just as you touch down.

Cool video too. Looks like it's on a gimbal.


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Thanks! No gimbal, just the stability control on the Sony action cam, which stayed mounted for once. Also was a relatively calm day but damn there are a ton of thermals near Maitland and the approach on 05 has one spot where you drop and one where you rise up which throws me off a little at first.

Still got a way to go on landings but the circuit is feeling really good. My last landing was a bit bumpier but it was slower. I also need to apply the brakes harder on full stops too. Still nervy on the ground I guess.

Maybe I can get in the air this week. If not, I can work on a small panel I'm making for X-Plane so I can practice using more representative controls. Clearly I am enjoying this too much.

Woah! So that stability control is software based? That's fairly impressive.

Yeah calm days seem to give you some pretty intense thermals. I assume it's because the wind isn't moving the heat around. On sunny clam days I used to get crazy turbulence when flying over corrugated iron roofs.


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How you been getting on Crowella??


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Been nice going through this thread from all those years ago, wondering how Crowella went - he must have his PPL by now.

Starting the wind-down to retirement by reducing to 3-4 days per week from the start of next year, and planning to start my PPL at Bankstown, supported by MSFS 2020 and VR (I bought the Just Flight Piper Warrior, which is one the key trainers used these days). Still to choose my school (probably Sydney Aviators) but fascinating that these days, a lot of the old map and paper-bashing seems to be replaced by iPads! Now the house is paid off and my wife will be working full-time for the next 15 years, I figure I have the time and resources to do this.

I took my daughter for a TIF at Bankstown for her birthday in May and that re-sowed the seed, and the potential for Ava to do some RPL/PPL training too.

So, anyone regularly flying or getting/recently got their RPL or PPL?