Ones and Zeros

Um. Yeah.

So I’m riding in the back seat of my own plane. A unique perspective. Another of the plane’s owners (J) is flying and a former plane owner (P) is riding right seat. We’re going up to pick up a King Air from where it’s based and bring it back to our home airport. P is a CFI and teaches flying for King Airs, he’s flying it back to our home airport for maintenance for the King Air’s owner.

J has more experience that I’m ever likely to have. He started with the airlines when I was one year old and flew for the Air Force before that. When he climbs or descends for example, the VSI needle is glued to the dial. His control of the plane is casual and automatic. P is familiar with a fair amount of advanced equipment, but I’m the only one who remembers this particular older GPS in our plane. So the three of us navigate visually, by VOR, and GPS to pick up the King Air.

Once there, we wait a bit before heading back. J tells a story about flying DC-3s for the airlines in the 60’s. We all trade career stories and P and I mention the startups we’d worked for that might have made us rich enough to afford a King Air ourselves - but didn’t.  The odds on a successful startup making you rich are a lot better than the lottery, but are in no way guaranteed and are probably less than 1% chance.

On the way back I’m flying with P in the King Air. My job is working the radios and change the autopilot’s altitude setting when needed. At first the cockpit panel is pretty intimidating, but on the flight back it resolves itself. There’s mostly dials and controls I already know about in front of me, just a lot more of it than I’m used to! The actual stuff new to me is relatively limited. Of course a turboprop’s operation is substantially different, but P’s doing all that.

I fumbled the initial radio call, but at least I got all the info there. And I only referred to the King Air as a Skyhawk once or twice on the way back. Habit can be strong. So J took off before us, and we beat him back home. At 100 gallons/hour and around 200 kts vs 8 gallons/hour and 110 kts fuel usage and airspeed we darn well should have too!

It’s a nice change of perspective from the backseat of my plane to the front seat of a King Air. In both cases it’s nice to see a different point of view from the front left of my plane once in a while.

All the flights now are checkride practice.  I know this stuff, it’s just getting it to click and come together and meet the practical test standards (PTS).  Instructor R and I flew to another local airport today.  A place I’d been to, but not for regular IFR practice.  I was under the hood again.  The usual menu of approaches today was ILS, VOR, and GPS back home.

The ILS didn’t go well.  It was safe enough, but I was behind the plane much of it.  R, acting as Potomac Approach, changed my routing pretty close to the airport and I didn’t recover well.  I need to keep the contingencies available instead of getting fat and happy with my routing.  I worked it out, but ended up using my one VOR for the ILS and for cross radials instead of setting up the GPS.  As I kept retuning changing the heading on that one VOR it was a ripe situation for missing something critical.  Doable, but definitely more work that it should be!  Still the approach was on track and worked.

The VOR approach went better.  I gave myself more time for the procedure turn, which helped nicely.   But I didn’t start down soon enough. I can start down when the CDI needle starts to move off the peg R tells me.  Instead I waited till it was centered.  This put me late descending and immediately over the airport when I leveled off at minimums.  It’s harder to recognize the airport when I have to look right below me than ahead of me - where I expected it!

I circled to land and did a beautiful continuous descending turn from downwind to final and landed nicely.  I’ve seen people do that continous turn instead of turn first to base, then final.  I’ve always thought it was a wonderfully smooth and graceful way to do it.  So it was nice to pull that off myself.  R pointed out later that it worked well but my power was a bit too high.  R’s of the opinion that we can always improve.  I like that state of mind.

The GPS back into home worked better too, I’m slowing earlier and setting some flaps.  That puts me in more control and I don’t have to descend so fast.  It worked better than on the long cross country flight.

Still, I wasn’t solid on my altitude on the enroute portions.  My approaches could have been more solid and stable too.  R pointed out that where there’s step downs and a glideslope I can just ride the glideslope down instead of doing all the stepdowns.  It’s less work and a more stable configuration.

So, I’m not done yet.  But close.

Being safe in flight has a lot to do with how I fly, what route I might take, conforming to necessary climb rates and similar aeronautical skills and decisions.  But, it also has to do with what I do before flying in the first place.

A pilot has to make a decision to fly a flight based on the weather at the departure, enroute, and the destination, the airplane’s capabilites and equipment, and the pilot’s capabilities and skills. Ironically the decision to NOT fly may be what makes a pilot better.

Today’s decision was easy.  Towering cumulus and cumulonimbus clouds and that yellow and red on the radar too made it clear I wasn’t flying today.  There’s always tomorrow.

Today’s lesson was a local trinity of approaches with Instructor M. As usual I’d already preflighted and filed my flight plans when I met M in the school office. We discussed which approaches to do. I wanted one of them to be the GPS approach into the home airport as I wasn’t pleased with that on the long cross-country flight.

So we ended up with an ILS, a VOR, and a GPS. The first two with circle-to-land. That’s where the approach has the plane coming in not lined up with a runway and is in low weather conditions.  I have to circle the airport to land on the appropriate runway. Since the approach minimums are lower than the pattern altitude and I have to stay within 1.3 miles of the runway, it’s a little close and low.

We did the ILS and I seemed behind the plane. Altitude control was off and, well, I just wasn’t settling in to a smooth track to the runway. As this was VFR weather we broke off and circled to land on the runway in use. After my 180 degree base/final turn, I was offset to the outside of the runway. While I could have saved the landing, I was learning from an earlier lesson and called to M, “going around”.

M said later that he thought I had too much power. I added that I didn’t turn enough either. Both contributed. He suggests that I fly a few circling patterns myself that I don’t need him for that. True enough, that altitude is an odd sight picture. Practice would be worthwhile.

I’ve noticed that my satisfaction with the lessons is about the same, but my standards are rising. For example; early on, I was happy if I could keep the nav dial needles from pinning against the side of the dial. Later, I was happy if I could keep the needles more or less in the middle of the dial. Now, I’m happy only if I’m in the middle of the doughnut (the small circle in the middle of the nav dial to the right).

We went missed to do one hold and then the VOR approach. This particular VOR approach is odd, it’s not very well aligned with the actual airport, you’re off one end of the airport property if you follow the needles. We did another circle-to-land, with a bit better results, but practice still needed.

I’m getting the descent better on this VOR approach. Slowing down helps. M says that later as I get more used to things I can come down faster. But for now slowing is good. It’s just like driving a car, your estimation of turns and such gets better with practice.

We do the GPS approach into home. I’m much happier with the descent here too. We I talk about what might have gone less well on the approach at the end of the cross-country flight and how I was more tired then too. That’s a factor that goes into ADM (Aeronautical Decision Making) and flight planning.

M says I’m basically ready. I’ll do my solo practice (sans foggles of course!), and fly once more with him and with R. If both agree I’m ready, I’ll schedule the checkride!