My CPL Diary

Nice one, see you there 🙂

Thank you for your kind comments guys, I am not sure writing is my niche, maybe tea making is 😉

Ian, looking forward to the MER & IR, they start in Jan when I get made redundant from work so I have a couple of months off to get some jobs done around the house, I must say the thought of having another engine there is rather comforting, especially in IMC & at night, but you know what they regarding the 2nd engine after one has failed? 😉 any truth in that I wonder teehee.

Darren thanks, I am really glad you enjoyed reading it, I tried to keep it as short as possible but at the same time giving enough detail to keep it interesting, each post barely touches half of what we did though, but as you know the posts would become too convoluted and labourious to include everything. I hope the balance was right.

Joe, with a bit of luck, some nice weather, and a couple of large towns for a nav route you too can achieve the CPL with no worries 😉
On a serious note though, you will one day mate, hang in there, keep dedicated & focused and it will be in reach.
I still haven’t forgotten about my promise to you to take you up from Filton, maybe you fancy a night flight? see how it pans out over the next few weeks or so.

Well I had better go to bed, The Flyer Show is on tomorrow in London, it’s a chance to speak to a few airline representatives to get the heads up on recruitment etc (premature I know, but I guess it’s all about putting yourself about)

Dean

Well Done Dean! 😀

I’m really pleased for you, and it’s clear from the dedication, time and effort you have put in that it is really is well deserved.

Your reports show the high level of determination, and the reflective attitude which I believe will enable you to achieve your ultimate goal of getting your ATPL.

I’ve been reading your reports from the first day, and although I haven’t left a comment until now I’ve really enjoyed reading them, and gained an enormous amount from them. The last post especially was very well written 🙂 so well done once again!

I hope that one day I will be able to achieve the same!

Rgds,

Joe

Dean – congratulations – would buy you a beer or three, but I’m just a tad too far away.

Must admit to being on tenderhooks towards the end of your last post. Ever thought of taking up writing….lol

This was the most riveting and interesting thread I’ve read in a very long time and I genuinely looked forward to your posts.

Let us know how you get on with you Multi-engine and IR.

I can’t tell you enough how pleased I am. That is the best news I’ve heard this week. Well done.

I always thought the GFT would be the most fun part and the IR would be a complete chore but the reality was that the IR was far more fun than the GFT. I think you’ll enjoy the next bits much more. Twin flying is great fun too… but not as good as 4! 😉

Day 19 2nd November

Well here it is, test day, and the same as yesterday there is no getting away with it, and to be honest, I don’t really want to, I want this over and done with, I had to phone the examiner in the morning to get a time to meet at Staveton, I called her and she said to meet about 9:45am, she said she may as well give me my route now, she asked me if I had my map to hand which I did, “hmmm she said, let’s go West today, take me to Hay On Wye”, she passed me her weight and baggage weight for the performance calcs as well. I thought it was Christmas, a great start, I’ve been to Hay On Wye twice during my hour building so I know where it is and know what it looks like :D, the diversion now is pretty irrelevant, I’m sure I’ll find it.
I left about 9.20am, arrived just before 10am with the route all planned out, my nerves were pretty much ok at this point, I was more nervous yesterday, but I kept telling myself to just do what I did yesterday and I’ll be fine. I started the performance calcs, did the weight & balance first, all in limits for take off and landing, then did the take off & landing performance graphs, this determined that the field length is not limiting for t/o or landing on all runways at Glouc, the charts are unfactored so I had to factor in the requirements, 1.25 for t/o & 1.43 for landing, TDR was 746mtrs and LDR was 642mtrs.
The examiner then turned up, I was getting nervous now, no problem though, no different to yesterday, I am starting to learn how to control the nerves. She asks for my particulars, log book, licence, F170A, medical etc, she takes the details down, then we go to an office for a chat. She starts off by taking me through the test and what she expects, during which she fires some questions at me, the first question was “if we are departing rwy 09, and the wind is from 050 at 20kts, what is the crosswind componant?” , no problem I thought, I sat there trying to work it out, I couldn’t do it, my brain has frozen on the spot, I start to spurt out drivel (nothing new there 😉 ), er, um, er, um, ah um…… she could see it was nerves, she said ok, runway 09, how many degrees off the nose is it? then it snapped HAHA, ok I thought, I then ran it off as though I knew it all along, 40deg off the runway, that’s 2 thirds the wind speed, so crosswind is 14kts and is in limits as the limit for this aircraft is 17kts, “good” she said, she then starts asking about my family etc, my job and my expectations after test etc, after a 10 minute chat she said “there you go, nice and relaxed now”, so this was good, she had a knack of seeing and dealing with nervous people, she’s probably dealt with it a thousand times.
We continued on through the test and what to expect, she then asked to see my performance sheets, she asked if I had checked for NOTAMS & Royal flights etc to which I hadn’t yet, then she said where is your fuel “Howgozit”? I hadn’t done one, I basically explained to her that although I knew how to do it, I had not been expected to do it through my training, I was then sent to check the NOTAMS etc, and she then had a word with the CFI, I thought “oh dear, I’ve dropped him in the proverbial here”, but having spoke to him after he said it was no problem at all, she wasn’t that bothered but to make sure he incorperates “something” onto the club’s VFR plog so the students can do it.
I checked the NOTAMS & Royal flights, nothing to effect us today, the plane was still in the hangar, so I did the A check in there then dragged her out on my own, man she is heavy, I nearly put my back out in the process.
All the guys in the club were wishing me good luck, and asking how I felt, all I could say was “a little numb” which was true, I felt like I was in tunnel vision, but anyway onwards & upwards.
I climbed in the aircraft, she said to carry on and get it started and she’ll be out in a minute, so I did all teh checks, fired her over and she started nicely, which is good because she can be a fag to start sometimes with the fuel injection system, The examiner jumps in, settles down, I tune and test the Nav radios, set the ident volumes, check the transponder, then I gave her the passenger brief which was ok, and then called for taxi, I had yet another callsign today, now instead of saying 2 on the radio I may end up saying all 3 :D, Exam 52 was ours today.
ATC said “Exam 52 taxi to C1 via Hotel, cross runway 36 & 04” that’s good, a nice long taxi to calm the nerves again, we get to the hold and there are no other planes in front of me, so we can do the power checks and get underway, after the power checks I give the departure brief, again this went ok, then called “Exam 52 ready for departure”, “Exam 52 line up & wait runway 09”, then as I was lining up they call “Exam 52 after departure, left turn to the North VFR, cleared takeoff runway 09”. So full power, lots of right rudder, Ts & Ps green, airspeed increasing, 70kts, rotate, insufficient runway, gear up, then set 25″ MAP & 2500 RPM to climb at 87kts.
We’re underway, I feel ok now, all I have to do is concentrate and fly the plane, and keep a good lookout. We pass Newent pretty quickly, I pass our ETA to the examiner for Hay On Wye which is time 07, then pass off Glouc Approach for London Information 124.75, the air is silky smooth at 4,000ft, and visibility is magnificent, almost too good. We pass Hereford, she now gives my diversion point “Take me to Stourport On Severn” she said, my goodness, it’s Christmas again, can you get a bigger town? I thought, we may as well go to Birmingham :D. I work out my track, work out the distance, then Hay On Wye comes into view, I point this out to her, and she asks if we could circle it so she can get a good look as she has only been here once.
We’re now on the diversion leg, heading 057 for 37nm, I pass her the ETA as time 25, then tell London our turning point. It was so smooth up there I was a mere passenger as well, altitude is holding superbly, as was the heading, when we passed abeam Bromyard I made a heading correction to the left by 7 degrees, I could then see Stourport, and we still had about 20nm to run, marvellous.
We approach Stourport, I confirm this to the examiner, she agrees, she then tells me to head south, put the screens up as well. time for the IF work, full panel first, she get’s me to climb, descend, do a 30deg turn, rate one turns etc etc, all goes well, now we have a panel failure, we have lost the DI & AI, she then gives me a heading to fly, so I check the compass, work out the degrees to turn, then turn at rate 1, heading is still out a tad so I correct this again. Next it’s unusual attitude recovery, she starts throwing the plane around trying to disorientate me, and I must admit it worked, I ahd no idea whether we were climbing, turning etc, but I remember what I was taught, she says “recover”, so it’s power – roll – pitch, I check the power, we’re slowing down, so full throttle, I check the wings, we’re rolling left, so I level the wings, then pitch, speed is still decaying, so I nose forward to stop the speed, then nose forward again to stop the altimeter, speed increases to cruise speed so I reset power. That went well, so did the other 2. I now had to do a position fix, I fixed it using HON VOR as just south of Malvern which was correct.
Screens came down now, time for general handing, ok she said, I want you to do a steep turn please, 45deg AOB and maintain altitude & airspeed, now remembering the instructor’s tip yesterday I decided to turn right first, so a good lookout, round we go, I am maintaining, marvellous, she told me to roll out, and she didn’t ask for a left turn 😀 Thanks to my instructor yesterday for that tip.
Next was stalling, she told me to do the first stall on the present heading, so I did all my checks, did 2 90deg clearing turns and then into the stall, this went well, as did the other 2 which were a turn to final stall & a finals stall.
Next came the part that alot of people partial their test on, the emergency procedures, she tells me we have a simulated engine fire, so I close the throttle, mixture to I.C.O, fuel off, mags off, fuel pump off, I ask her if the fire is out and she said no, so I went into a Vne dive, she told me to level out, I asked if the fire was out and she said yes, but rather than attempt a forced landing she said to reset cruise power, then she asked me what else would I have done in that situ, so I told her I would maintain 80kts in the glide, select a field for landing, call ATC with a Mayday call, ( I ran through the whole call ), then the shutdown checks, and the passenger brief, off we go abck up to 3,000ft, she now said we had an engine failure, and she closed the throttle, so I maintained 80kts in the glide, selected a field, I told her which one, I then did the “why” checks, warmed the engine, she said the engine had not restarted, so I did the Mayday call, warmed the engine, and then did the shutdown checks, and warmed the engine, we turned base leg for the field, I gave her the pax brief again, then she told me to go around when I turned final, I thought this was a bit early but never mind, then when we got to about 1800ft she gave me an EFATO, (engine failure after take off), I thought we were a tad high for that but no complains, higher the better ;), I selcted a field which I thought was good, did the relevant checks, she then said ” well I would have gone in that field (pointing to another) but never mind, go around please”. She then asked me to climb to the altitude that I was to transit to Glouc at, I selected 1500ft, she said to take us back when ready, I have idented the ADF & DME after the IF work so I don’t have to do it here, but I did a FREDA check, and then contacted Glouc for a direct rejoin for circuits, they replied with “Exam 52 join right base for runway 09, the QFE is xxxx, report 5 miles”, I requested the QNH because we need to make a QNH arrival, ATC passed it on as 1036, so I set this on both altimeters, ATC then told me to contact tower 122.90 before I reached 5nm, no worries, a job I didn’t have to remember to do, tower told me to report left base 09 I am number 4 in traffic, and then told me to take up a right hand orbit, wow this is the first time ever I have had to orbit at Glouc, it must be busy, and typical just because I am on test. I then report orbit complete and they tell me to continue in, I am number 2, I have number 1 in sight, I do my pre landing checks, report base leg and they tell me I am becoming no.1, this approach is a normal approach, but as I turn final I overshoot, the wind is quite strong up here but ATC report wind calm on the ground, damn it I thought, never mind, I corrected it, we touched down well, and off we go again, it’s really busy again in the circuit, I call downwind, this is to be a flapless, so I drop the gear, continue downwind, I am number 2 and to report final, the examiner then tells me they have slotted in another plane before us, but ATC still says we’re number 2, I ask for a position on no.3 because the final approach path is glared out by the sun making it difficult to spot the traffic, I spot No 1 on short final, we’re on base leg now, and AGAIN I overshoot the final approach, by more this time, for goodness sake, I corrected it, then on final ATC said to continue approach, there’s 1 departing ahead of us, which I thought quite bizarre because I only had 1nm to run at most, I saw the a/c line up and away it goes, I was ready to go around but no need, it lifted off and ATC cleared our touch & go.
Away we go again, the plane just departed is climbing out straight ahead so is not affecting us, but another has just turned downwind and another is overhead which then proceeds to slot in between us and the one downwind, the examiner is saying, “I’d slow down now and think about an orbit”, I told her I was doing it, we’re alot faster than the traffic ahead which was a problem, I call downwind and request a glide approach, then tel ATC that I want to orbit due to separation as the glide is conducted at about a half mile final, so we orbit again then roll out on base leg, during the orbit a helicopter flies underneath us and is heading for 09, great, I keep him in sight, then tell ATC I am commencing glide and I report heli in sight, I could see the examiner is a little concerned, I didn’t care now though because I thought I had already partialled the test on the circuits, I’ll just do my best from here on in, we start the glide, I thought we were a little high, so I drop the gear and drop all the flap down, we’re stil high so I sideslip, we’re coming down quickly, I could see she was not impressed with this, we get near the threshold and she tells me to get off the rudder now, but we were still too high but I did as she said, we landed very well, exited the runway and she taxied in whilst I did my after landing checks, we parked up and went in, she asked if I wanted a cuppa to which I agreed.
Everyone was asking how I got on, I was sure I had partialled on the circuits, typical, why was it busy now? on test of all days? oh well, it’s done now, I can’t change anything, the guys were telling me to wait and see, it may be ok, but I was sure she’d say I’d stuffed them up. The CFI walked passed and was smiling a tad, I wonder if he knows, anyway she called me into the office, and waited for the CFI to turn up for the debrief, he came in and she shook my hand and said “congratulations, you have passed, well done”, I could not believe it, absolutely fantastic, she then gave the debrief, she had a few minor points to say but they were only her quirks, fantastic, we debrifed for 20 minutes, I shook her hand as she left and thanked her for the test, took my cup to the kitchen then couldn’t stop smiling, but I had to wipe off the grin before I walked out the kitchen but I couldn’t, stuff it I thought, I have just passed my CPL skill test, I deserve to smile. I walked out and everyone was congratulating me, my CFI was overjoyed and said “told ya you’d do it first time”, and yes, he was right, fanbloodytastic.

So, that is the end of my journey through the CPL course, I really hope you have enjoyed reading it and that it has given a good insight in what to expect, I have enjoyed typing it, now I have time to reflect on what is next, the Multi Engine rating followed by the Instrument Rating, unfortunately I am not sure I will be able to do an IR diary, it is such a vast course, and I have a feeling my night times are going to be taken up studying for it, but if not, they will be taken up studying for my English A Level that I took on in August and haven’t touched yet 😮

Dean

Thanks alot EGNM, I think I may need all the luck I can get.

Day 18 Wed 1st Oct

Well today is F170A day, and looking out the window there is NO getting away with it today, I have been running through the whole flight in my head over and over again making sure all my intricate mistakes are erradicated mentally so hopefully when I get in the aircraft I will replicate.
The nerves are getting to me now, I spend a portion of the morning on the loo (sorry too much info there 😉 ) , and I don’t want any breakfast but I know it’s best that I eat something, I force down 2 slices of toast, head up for a shower and then look at my flight planning, I have to be there at 12:30pm, so I will leave at 11:30am which gives me an extra half hr to do any last minute checking like NOTAMS etc.
Driving up the motorway I put my music on as loud as I can tolerate, this takes my mind off the job in hand, but inbetween every song I get that horrible stomach churning feeling, never mind, try and relax, it’ll be fine.
I walk in and my instructor is about ready, he asks me if everything is ok, I replied yes but the aircraft is still in the hangar with a plane in front of it and the hangar doors shut (they’re big doors too), so he will have to give me 15 minutes to get the plane out. I refuelled her on our last flight so she should be ready to rock and roll, I get her out and start the walkround and A checks, the instructor does not want to observe me doing this.
He books out with ATC, and joins me in the aircraft, I am feeling a tad nervous but not as bad as I thought, I was more conscious that I’d forget something more so than nervous. Anyway I get her started, I settle down by setting all the radios, and making sure the volumes are correct, I call for taxi, and away we go, I’m still feeling in a bit of a trance, I am running through the departure in my head a thousand times per second, we get to the hold for runway 04 and there are 4 aircraft in front of us, this is ok, it may help to settle things down a tad, all the power checks complete, vital actions checked, and the departure brief given which went well, all’s well and good so far.
Our route was to Craven Arms, which is about 8 miles NW of Ludlow, it was on a track of 324deg, so departing I kept telling myself, “commercial departure, turn left to track 294 until the airport is 30deg off the tail then turn onto our heading of 334deg” (drift allowance).
Air Traffic clear our departure, must be vigilant, the circuit is very busy, so full power, and wow she needs alot of rudder to counteract that 200bhp engine, no surprises here though, Ts & Ps in the green, airspeed increasing, 70kts, rotate, airbourne, insufficient runway ahead, positive rate, gear up, now trim for 87kts in the climb, passing 600ft I turn to heading 294deg, then the field is 30 off the tail and I turn to heading 334, all going well so far, 1000ft passes, landing light off, fuel pump off, Ts Ps in the green, QNH set on Cotswold, then it was a case of “oh balls” I forgot to set MAP & RPM to 25″ & 2500 for the climb, but that’s ok, max continuous thrust has a limit of 6 minutes, we’re in this limit, so back they come.
We level off at 3,500ft, I do a FREDA check, Vis is good, it’s a bit choppy today as there is an inversion layer which we’re in, we’ll keep it here for now. First waypoint passes, we’re a tad right of track, so I make a heading correction of 6deg left, I bug the heading and tell the instructor, I am settling down nicely now, then we near Bromyard, time to set the Barnsley QNH on both altimeters, and call London Information on 124.75, they’re a tad busy, they say I am number 3 and they’ll call me back. We now pass abeam Tenbury Wells, I make a further heading correction of 6deg left, so we’re now heading 322deg, I can see Ludlow & Craven Arms, London Info calls me, I “pass my msg” to them, all’s well now, Instructor then says “take me to Alcester” which is East of Worcester, ooo goody I have been there before so I know what it looks like, I draw a handsfree line on the map, then get out my ruler to make it straight, then use my square protractor to get the track of 110deg, the wind is from 010 so this gives me max crosswind, I work out my max drift to be 9deg so I need to be into wind by this amount, my heading for Alcester is 101deg, and standby for an ETA, we have 38nm to run, I work this out to be about 19 minutes, so I give the ETA as 01 (which is 01 past the hr), I am now making sure we stay on track, we touch the south of Stratford so we are slightly left of track, I make a 7deg heading change to the right, I now pass off London Info and call Birmingham Radar as we are passing under their zone and request a Flight Information Service, they pass the Birmingham QNH which I set on Altimeter 1, I leave Altimeter 2 set on Barnsley.
Alcester comes into view quite quickly, we are early in relation to our ETA, we must have had a slight tailwind, maybe I should have revised the ETA, I will make sure I do this tomorrow. I point out Alcester, he was saying “is it?” “is it?” I identify it by 3 land features, he gives the thumbs up, he ten says “I have control, can you put up the screens please”, so now for the IF work, I am at ease now, it’s just like a lesson, just don’t balls anything up I kept telling myself, we did a couple of turns, then some climbs & descents, then he failed the AI & DI, time for partial panel work, descend to 3,000ft at 500fpm please, the key here is small movements, so I set a little less power, lower the nose to maintain the speed, then set the rate of descent, this goes well. Time for some Unusual Attitude recovery, down we go into a dive and a steep turn to the left, he calls “recover”, so I remember the “power – roll – pitch” command, power to idle, roll the wings level, stop the airspeed, then stop the altimeter, perfect (ish). We now do one climbing and turning, this works well as well. A position fix prevails, this goes well, we are where I said we were, always a relief LOL
Ok screens away, in your own time do a steep turn at 45deg angle of bank, either left or right first, I do another FREDA check to settle me down, I change tanks again and note the time, then I do the left first knowing I have issues with this direction, I always seem to lose 100ft, anyway a good lookout, and round we go, and as sure as eggs is eggs, I lose the 100ft, never mind, to the right now, this one goes real well.
Time for stalls now, clean stall, goes well, base turn stall, goes well, final approach stall, goes well, wow this is going ok.
Time for an engine fire, ooo goody, my favourite :D, so, remember the checks, throttle closed, mixture lean, 80kts and maintain in the glide, props full fine, fuel off, mags off, fuel pump off, heater off, is the fire out? I ask, no he said, time for a Vne dive, so good lookout, down we go, Vne approaching, is the fire out? yes it is he says, time for a forced landing now, so back to 80kts and maintain in the glide, I do a Mayday Call, pick a field, do the shutdown checks, then ask him to unlatch the door, push his seat fully back, retighten his harness and BRACE, I then change my mind about that field, there are telephone lines in it, I go for the one next to it full of sheep, this’ll give them a fright (not really, we won’t get down that low), so, base leg, gear down, we will make the field so flaps 10, we’re definately in so flaps 25, then flaps 40, we are a tad high so time to sideslip, go around he calls, so away we go, then he gives us an EFATO, time to pick a field again, I did, go around was the call again, away we go.
Ok, take me back for circuits please, so I level at 1500ft, call Glouc for circuits, without boring you to tears even more these go extremely well, we taxi back in, shut down and go for the debrief.
He said, well done, that was a very high standard of flying, only some minor points to bring up, first off, when you turn for your diversion, pass the place & ETA to London Info, next, in the steep turns, if she asks on test to turn either way, choose your best way first, i.e. to the right, if this is perfect the left turn won’t look as bad, good point I thought there, next, in the approach configuration stall, don’t lower the nose too much, and finally the PFL was a tad high, just be careful of getting high when there is not alot of wind.
He signs my form, I am ready for test, YEEEHAA, he said my flying was of a good standard, now all I have to do is convince the CAA examiner tomorrow, fingers crossed 😉

Best of luck Deano over the next couple of days (weather permitting)!

Great to read through this side of things – keep the good work up!!!

Hiya Darren

Thanks alot, PM answered 😉

Dean,

Cracking posts as usual.

PM sent

Darren

Day 16 Monday 30th

I worked a nightshift on Sunday night finishing work at 6am, this gave me about 6hrs sleep before I had to depart for my 170A, I awoke to crap weather, the cloudbase was really low, there is no way I am flying today, so I resigned myself to this, I had better drive up to the airport anyway, so on the way up I was quite happy that I was not going to be flying today, I feel rather weary after the nightshift. Then looking to the West gaps started to appear in the cloud, oooo great, maybe I am going afterall, but it’s still crap, I arrive at the airport, the cloud is breaking all the while but still low, the guy doing my 170A has not come back from a flight yet, so I have to wait over an hour, when he finally arrives we come to the decision that it’s not good enough to fly, and that I should meet him tomorrow at 1:30pm and we’ll try again, the weather for Tues looks better than today.

Day 17 Tues 31st

Today I wake up and again find the cloudbase quite low, I check the METARs & TAFs on the PC and it says cloud is FEW 018 & BKN028, the wind is forecast to be blowing from 310 deg at 20kts gusting 30kts, this will put the wind outside the crosswind limits of the aircraft, again I made my way to the airport as I had to pay the test fee and maybe re-arrange the test if I do not do the 170A today.
I meet up with the instructor conducting the test and we basically agree we’re going to do it tomorrow (wed) so we have to put the actual test back till Thurs, this was done ok, and the weather is looking fantastic for the rest of the week so there is no getting away with it any longer, now my nails really are getting short LOL.
I took the opportunity to read the Flying Order Book which is our FTOs rules & regs, you maybe asked questions on this during the 170A and the test.

So here’s hoping for decent weather tomorrow, fingers crossed.

Dean

Day 15 Friday 27th

We had a debrief in the morning, and the CFI basically said we are going to do a full test run through, so this leaves 3 flights left, today’s, the F170A on Monday and the skill test Wednesday. We have had a busy week this week so it may be quite hard to keep the concentration levels going. During this flight we are going to do a touch & go at Wellesbourne which should be interesting.
During the last couple of days I was told I had to learn a passenger brief and a departure brief, and that I was to use this whenever we flew, the passenger brief is the usual thing like what to do in an emergency, what I expect them to do in the cockpit and what to do when vacating the aircraft etc, the departure brief is for the benefit of the examiner, it could go along the lines of this
This is going to be a runway xx departure from the left hand seat with a right turn to the north (etc), the field length is not limiting and there is a slight crosswind from the right (or left) and is within the limits of this aircraft, in the event of an emergency before we lift of I shall bring the aircraft to a stop on the runway, if we are airbourne I will land back on if we have the space, if not I shall land in a field ahead, I shall remain in control at all times unless otherwise advised
It sounds pretty basic but I have to roll this off the tonque whilst under pressure, I can feel a stutter coming on hehe.
So after engine start, I give the pax brief which was ok, then before we lined up for departure I gave the said departure brief and it came out ok as well (this time).
The CFI is happy with my Nav so he said basically we’ll do a very short leg first before a diversion rather than the usual longer 1st leg, so he gave me Ross On Wye to the west, we departed ok in decent (ish) weather, cloud was BKN at 2400ft, so I had to watch the old inadvertant entry into IMC, I levelled off at 2100ft, and in no time at all Ross came into view, The CFI gave me a diversion which was to Henly On Arden which is near Birmingham, it was also right on the edge of their Class D zone, I had better be careful here, also my route took us over some restricted zones, I cannot fly over these, so I made a small diversion off my planned route, I turned 45deg to the left and timed it, flew for 2 minutes, then parallelled our track, then turned left for 2 minutes then back on track and then added 2 minutes onto our ETA, this seemed to work perfectly, it’s the first time I had done this sort of thing, it’s quite nice when it goes well.
I ditched Gloucester Approach and tuned Birmingham Radar, I had better be on the Birm QNH for my transit under their zone, the last thing I want is a Class D infringement, the flight is going reasonably well so far, but still time to balls it up. I found Henly ok, I wasn’t that convinced because it was a small town, but it was the right one. We then set heading for Stratford which is West of Wellesbourne, then made an Easterly heading, Wellesebourne came into view quite quickly, I had phoned them before departure and they said the weather was CAVOK and runway 36 was in use, when I called them on the radio they passed me the airfield information, runway 18 was active with a right hand circuit, that’s ok, I can join downwind or base leg from my position, so I position downwind, but was still a little high, we were descending nicely though, then the CFI said, what runway are we landing on? and then it hit me like a brick, I was downwind (high) for rwy 36, my god, how could I have made a stupid error like that? luckily we had the height, so I orbited once to the right to swap circuit directions. OK I screwed up bad there, but time to put that behind me and forget it, which is hard to do, anyway, I tried, and before I knew it we were finals for rwy 18 😉 , and I proceeded to grease the landing which was good considering I had things on my mind, we climbed away and then the CFI said he had control, could I put up the screens, the screens went up, he said, you have just entered cloud, so I did a 180 turn at rate 1 onto the reciprocol heading, then did the checks I have had drummed into me, OAT? +05, ok we’re free of icing, and then the MSA, we’re above MSA here, good.
We then did some turns, climbs, descents, descents at certain rates of descents etc which went well, then he says to “climb to 3500ft, turn onto a heading of xxx” knowing full well they coinside with one another, it’s easy to focus on one and forget the other, so I am making a concerted effort to level off at 3500ft as well as rolling the wings level at the same time, good, he then says “track the 220 radial of HON VOR and climb to altitude 4000ft”, again this went well, no real issues there, he’s doing it to test my multitasking abilities I guess.
He then covers up the AI and the DI, we have a vacuum pump failure, we’re now IMC on partial panel, “get a position fix please”, so I use the Nav 1 VOR as this has already been idented to HON VOR, and I tune the DME to HON as well, I get the radial, get the distance and plot our position on the map, he agrees, which is always a good thing haha.
Now we are going to do some turns, so we only have our compass, turn to heading xxx please, so I use the VOR rose to help determine how many seconds to turn, we had a 27 second turn at rate 1 to the left, so I set the timer going and into the turn, I level off but we’re still 30deg out, so another 10 second turn is needed, this worked ok, then he got me to descend & climb, which went ok, there is no real issues with my IF work at all, then it’s time for the unusual attitude recovery, again these went quite well, could have been slightly better but they were ok.
Screens away, time for a spiral dive recovery, so over we go to the left, then he calls “recover” so it’s Power – Roll – Pitch, set the power which in this case was throttle closed, roll the wings level, then pitch to straight & level, then reset power, no worries here.
Next was steep turns, and again I lose 100ft in the left steep turn, and luckily I was keeping a good lookout, I spotted a helicopter about 400ft above us, this earnt a brownie point or 2 with the CFI who said the 100ft didn’t matter because I spotted the chopper, the one to the right went ok whilst maintaining height.
Stalls next, all went well, during the clean stall the CFI said be careful not to power my way out the stall, don’t be afraid to lower the nose more and lose some height to get the plane unstalled.
PFLs next, oooerrr, my favourite 😀 without boring you with the details these went ok, we made the field on the 3 we did, no issues. Now take us back for circuits please and ADF track on 210deg please, so I do a FREDA check, and this reveals the DI to be out of line by 40 degrees, I get a roasting from the CFI for not doing a FREDA after the IF partial panel work, this is noted for my 170A & Skill Test, I realign, and luckily I am already tracking 210deg, I call Glouc and report our position & level, then ask for a direct rejoin for circuits, they pass me the relevant info, and we’re on our way in, the CFI asks what is the Glouc QNH? I tell him 1017, he says no that’s the QFE, and this would have partialled my skill test, he said that setting difference would have cost you £691 for a retest, oh bloody hell, I haven’t enjoyed this flight at all, I have flown better than this, so now I am feeling a little deflated, my next flight is the 170A so I have to be on the ball, the CFI put it down to fatigue because we have had a long flight, I put it down to stupidity.
The circuits go exceptionally well, which is a bonus, no issues here.
During the debrief the CFI basically said this is the last flight with him on the CPL course, and that today I had a couple of “brainfarts” as he calls them, one would have made me partial my CPL test, but on the whole there was some very nice flying there, we talked over the points, which I already knew, and was still feeling a little cheesed off.
The CFI then said that I flew better than the vast majority of pilots, and not to worry about the test, I’ll be fine, he said that the best accolaide he can give me is that he feels totally at ease when we’re in the plane, he can relax (whilst I do all the hard work, no justice), and he feels totally safe, and I have made his life very easy during the course. I guess I accepted this, I am not a person who accepts praise very easily, I have very high standards that I expect of myself, all down to my childhood (but that’s another story 🙂 ), all I have to do now is plan for the 170A Monday.

Ian

Great news for your pal, I’m really pleased for him, and thanks, hopefully it’ll be the same when BR & myself get in that position.

Darren, can you divulge what airline you work for? I assume you work in the recruitment sector or HR? PM me if you don’t want to divulge.

Day 14 Thursday 26th

Sorry for my lack of updates guys, had a real busy week flying last week and did not feel like writing the report, I just wanted to sleep.

Basically today was going to be circuits & Gen handing in the morning, and a Nav in the afternoon with a touch & go at Wolverhampton.
The weather looked awful this morning, there was no way we were going to fly, so I thought, the winds were 40kts at 2,000ft, with the cloud base varying between 800ft & 2000ft in rain, this is the kind of day you wish you could make a cuppa and sit and watch the other guys fly 😀 but not so, Mr CFI likes to push me to the limits, who am I to compain? he knows what he’s doing.
Anyway without boring you with the departure procedure, we were to do circuits first then some GH, well on climbout the CFI spotted a gap in the clouds, so we cancelled the circuits and went to the SW for GH, we did the obligatory stalls, which went well, I definately got the hang of these, and then steep turns, it was very gusty and bumpy, I found myself fighting the aircraft the whole time, the steep turns are ok, but I have a tendancy to loose 100ft in the left turn, and not in the right turn, I have no idea why, it just seems to happen, it must be perspective, generally you place part of the engine cowling on the horizon and keep it there, but I still seem to lose it in the left turn, no big deal for now.
PFLs were next, I set the heading bug first on the direction of the wind to help me orientate, we were just about at the bends in the River Severn just SW of Gloucester.
So, engine failure, marvellous, I “love” the PFLs (not), so 80kts reached, lower the nose, she glides like a brick so don’t pick a field too far away, anyway I can’t locate a field so I turn downwind and spot a field straight away, all I need to do is fly a circuit pattern, taking into consideration that the strong headwind on final will mean I need to be even closer in, “why” checks now prevail, “fuel on – mags on both – throttle ok – props fully fine – mixture rich – fuel pump on – alternate air check”, engine still not restarted so now it’s the mayday call, “mayday mayday mayday Glouc App, FT29, engine failure by the bends in the river (it’s an unofficial VRP for Glouc), passing 1800ft, attempting to land in a field, 2 POB, then make sure you are happy that they receive what they need before doing the shutdown checks, so once we are established on base leg and we know we are going to make the field we go to Flaps 10, lower the nose to maintain best glide, then flaps 25, lower the nose, then flaps 40 if we are sure to make the field, well this time we more than made the field, the plane is gliding like the Warrior, VERY strange, why are we not falling out the sky?, so I did a full sideslip, we made the field (just), then the CFI called “Go Around” “you know why we were gliding well?” he added, “er nooooo”, “because you didn’t lower the gear”, oh bloody great, how did I forget to lower the gear? and you know the worse thing? the gear horn was flashing and going “beep beep beep beep” and I still didn’t lower the gear, the CFI then said to treat the gear as the first stage of flap, so on base leg if you are definately making the field get the gear down, he calls the lapse “a brain fart”, ok lesson learnt.
Next PFL goes ok, then he says to take us back in for circuits, but track inbound on the NDB a track of 040, no problemo, so radio call first “FT29, at the bends in the river, 1500ft, request direct rejoin for circuits” “FT29 join direct downwind for rwy 22, report 5 miles”, so whilst trying to sort out the ADF tracking I sped back up to 120kts, before I knew it we were downwind for rwy22, wow, and oops, “FT29 downwind rwy 22” “FT29 contact twr 122.90″, arf, I was so busy with the tracking that I forgot to report 5 miles so we can contact the tower, another lapse, never mind, put it behind me and throw it away, CFI said we had a groundspeed of 16kts coming back in, which is about 187mph, I should have set 21” MAP and 2400rpm to give our circuit speed of 105kts instead of the cruise speed. Another lesson learnt.
Circuits went exceptionally well considering the bumpy conditions and it was a hard fight to get the aircraft doing what you wanted it to do.

This afternoon the Nav leg was to Highley, then into Wolverhampton, then an unplanned diversion, the wind was still pretty strong but not as bad as this morning, and the clouds had broken to leave a reasonably pleasant day, I still had a swift 145kts groundspeed which meant I had to be on the ball on the way up, and pretty careful with the diversion planning.
On the way up went well, as flightplan, and spot on was Highley, no issues here, Nav is generally a plus point for me, I haven’t had any issues yet, but there’s still time, and there’s still the test 😮 , when I got to Highley I noticed the CFI had not given me my diversion point, which I thought was a bit off, but he was just having some fun at my expense again, no worries, we joined downwind for runway 28 at Wolverhampton with a 25kt wind with 13 of those across the runway, the touchdown was nice, but my kneeboard was shielding the flap lever, and the runway was kind of running out, I hit the power before retracting the flaps, ooops, no big deal, just be aware, the Arrow is not certified to take off with any flaps extended, better not screw it up or the insurance company won’t pay out hehe.
On climbout the CFI said “take me to Ledbury Airfield”, a quick glance saw this about 7nm SW of Ledbury itself, so I drew a freehand line to start with to get an initial track, then once established in the cruise I can refine it, so ruler comes out, protractor comes out, ok heading is 2xx (can’t remember which), ETA is xxx, so we are going well, I make a correction on the heading as we passed Stourport On Severn, then the Malverns came into view along with Ledbury, I am now looking for this grass strip which is Ledbury airfield, 2 minutes to run on the ETA and I cannot see it, the ETA elapses and I still cannot see it, I tell the CFI this and he says to take a relative bearing from Ledbury town, so I do this and we are on the relative bearing, then the distance is the same, he said, “watch this” he rolled the wings to the left and there it was right underneath us, so the diversion worked bloody well, I just could not identify it, the strip is really narrow and hard to spot.
We now did some PFLs, these worked ok, I can tell the CFI still isn’t “that” happy with them, I don’t think he’s “convinced” but he had no comments, it’s now back for some circuits, and I know these are working well so no issues.
In the debrief he didn;t have much to say, he did comment on my landings and was saying how wonderfully hapy he was with them, he said they were spot on and sweet, which is good considering the issues we had in the Warrior.

With the loss of Wednesday this has pushed my F170A back to Monday, the test is still scheduled for Wednesday weather permitting. Am I feeling nervous already? you betcha 😉

Market a bit strange at the moment, one major operator was looking at potential redundancies recently. We’ve not had too many leavers in recent months, in fact a lot less than in previous years.

Yet its been a challenge to find suitable candidates for slots we have available, due to our expansion.

Apparently so given instructor throughput at schools (a rough indicator of the market) but you wouldn’t believe it from reading pprune!

Come next year, can you write my CV? 😀

STOP PRESS – I helped a mate get a CV together a few weeks ago having just finished his frozen ATPL. He phoned me last night to say he’s just landed an A320 job with Air Malta! Looks like things are really bright and bubbly at the moment on the recruitment front. Hope this will be happening to you two soon.

Apparently you don’t need to do PFLs on a MEP-CPL test, just assymetric work though I can;t cite a reference at the moment.

Did you you know emergency procedures can be undertaken on a sim? Appendix 1 and 2 to JAR–FCL 1.170 refers.

That is indeed correct, no PFLs in the twin on test, this is a bonus but I guess as I am finding out it’s not a big deal doing them now. One thing about the Multi CPL is that things can get out of shape very quickly, you just need to be ahead of the game alot more than you would in a single.
As for the reference to the assymetric flight in the test check out Standards Document 3, its listed in there.

Standards Document 3 also has details regarding the use of the sim as well.
Good luck with it BR, let me know how you get on.

Day 12 Tuesday 24th

Today we were to conduct circuits in the Arrow to see how my landings are going to perform, then in the afternoon we are going to do a Nav trip, this really is a case of “get in the aircraf and get on with it” type scenario, I guess it’s a good thing because it does not give you time to think about it, I was to be a tad apprehensive again today about my performance because I did not feel I had got to grips with the Arrow last night.
So circuits first, I was really determined to put on a good show here, my test is looming so now is the time to nail it.
After doing the walk round and A check I felt a bit more comfortable, and during the taxi out I was feeling a little more at home already, I just have to remember the speeds, it is so difficult to “dump” the Warrior because I have flown it so much, so, 70kts to rotate, climb at 77kts, not forgetting a dab on the brakes before gear up, then reduce MAP & RPM in the climb then increase airspeed in th climb to Vy which is 87kts, the rest of the circuit is the same as in the Warrior, the only difference is the speeds, so downwind we select 21″ MAP & 2400 RPM, this gives us about 105kts indicated, then during the downwind checks we must remember gear down and locked, and flaps at 10 deg, this brings the speed back nicely to 85kts for the base turn, things really do happen quickly in this bird, this is one of the hardest things to get used to, your checks must roll off the tongue, whilst talking to ATC and flying the plane. So on base leg we have powered back and are descending nicely at 85kts, flaps 25 selected, the turn to final will be earlier due to the extra speed, so round we go, nice and smooth, and I still overshoot the approach path, not by much, but by enough, we then go to flaps 40, and then the pre landing check of Red – Blue – Greens, which is mixture rich, prop fully fine and gear down & locked, we then aim for 75kts whilst remaining on the PAPIs, then as we come over the fence we drift off the PAPIs at 70kts, then into the flare reducing power slightly, then once we are level we chop the power and she sinks nicely (well ok like a brick) onto the runway with a great holdoff, and away we go again, flaps retracted, full power, and wow the yaw effect is still taking me by surprise, you can feel her bite and you can feel the weight.
Surprisingly every landing was extremely nice, I surprised myself, but I think I was aided by the fact that this bird just does not float, period, and this was evident during the glide approach, on base leg, we chop the power, I think we are waaay too high, CFI tells me to fly it and see what happens, well boy did she come down, it was almost unreal, she fell out the sky very impressively, I must make a note of the fact that we are in nil wind conditions here, and we still only just made it down when I thought we were well high, in a nice strong headwind this will make the perspective worse, so I must remember to stay high for longer still, if this was the Warrior we’d be touching down on the reciprocol threshold :D.
Taxying back in the CFI said that was excellent, and again the accolaide flooded in by him saying that was the bext circuit session he has known in a very long time and that I should be pleased, I guess I was but he knows how hard I am on myself, if he says it then it must be true. So that was the easy bit over with, next is the Nav trip, “take me to Hungerford” he says, ok great, I like Hungerford, it’s easy to spot from the air, but one problem, Brize Zone sits in the way, well only just, we are more over Fairford MATZ than Brize but I best get a transit incase we just touch the zone. Then we were to divert again so this would be north bound back through the zone, no problem here as I would have already received one clearance, so the chances are they’ll do it again, then after the diversion it’s off to Kemble for a touch & go and then back for some General handling.
During the flight planning stage I started to panic, we were to have an outbound groundspeed of about 170mph, which is far greater than I have experienced, things are going to happen REAL quickly here, my first waypoint is Cirencester, and it’s only 7 minutes after departure, this includes the climb, oh marvellous, this is going to be a barrel of laughs if nothing else.
Ok, so off we go, after takeoff checks complete, changed to Glouc Approach and reported outbound, reached top of climb at 3,000ft and my goodness, there’s Cirencester on the nose, and Fairford MATZ is just in front of it and to the left, I had better dump Glouc and speak to Brize, “Brize Zone FT29 requesting flight information service & zone transit”, then came a “FT29 standby”, ahhh, I don’t really need to be standing by at this point, the zone is coming up real fast, then to my relief I received “FT29 pass your message”, it’s time to get the RT done pretty quick, so I let it roll of the tongue “FT29 is a Piper Arrow, Glouc – Glouc, Navex via Hungerford then an unplanned diversion, currently 3miles north of Ciren at 3,000ft VFR heading xxxdegrees requesting flight information service & zone transit”, “FT29 roger squawk xxxx”, so up went the squawk code quickly, “FT29 is cleared to enter the Brize zone at 3,000ft, flight information service”, phew I can relax now a tad. The next thing I knew we were approaching Hungerford, so I point this out to the CFI, then he gave me a diversion to Stow On The Wold, so I work out the track & heading to fly, turn onto that track, then work out a groundspeed and gave the CFI the estimate, now we’ve turned onto a heading of 335deg and are settled time to give Brize another call to request another transit, this was granted as long as we could climb to 3,000ft, we had a change of altitude due to cloud hence why we were a tad lower.
We found Stow ok, now time to divert to Kemble, so I worked out a heading of 235deg, and gave the CFI an estimate, now I had a bit of a problem, I could not see out the front windscreen due to the sun, this is going to make it real hard to spot Kemble, we got to Ciren again and Kemble is not far away from here, I could see something on the nose but could not identify is as Kemble as I couldn’t see the runway, but it was fast approaching and we asked for a direct join and not an overhead join, so we were to join right base for runway 26, the CFI was getting a little jumpy with me now, because I had not turned base, but I said I cannot see the runway, I still did not know it was Kemble, he said to use the heading bug, turn it to point in the direction of the runway then orientate yourself, I did this but I still could not see the runway, how can I know where base leg is if I can’t see it? he said you didn;t have to see it, I still disagreed but I know he is right, the runway did come into view then and there were extremely busy so we had to slide in quick and slide out again expeditiously. Off to the north we went after the touch & go for some instrument flying, so up went the screens, he made a point now of really firing off the instructions, and he has a canny knack of telling me to “climb to 3,000ft” and turn to a heading of xxx, knowing the 2 will coincide with one another, then it was “descend at this speed and 500fpm”, so I am looking making sure I am going to do it right and he’s saying “come on, do it now”, so off I go, then he says, 30deg turn to the right please, now, 30deg left, now climb to 4,000ft, so what he’s really doing is testing my mental capacity, just to see if I can do it all quickly, now we have the usual panel failure, so it’s unusual attitude recovery on partial panel, this seems to go well and I don’t feel anywhere near as sick as I did the first week, it must have been the small virus I had that effected me.
Ok IF was ok, now we’re going to do some PFLs & engine fire, so he calls “engine fire”, first off I do the shutdown checks, “is the fire out?” no came the reply, time for a Vne dive, so I roll into the dive, this is dissorientating because you loose sight of where the wind is coming from, it doesn’t go well, I didn;t speed up enough, I asked him if the fire is out? no came the reply, well it’s pretty irrelevant now because we have to land in a field anyway, so I conducted a PFL which went ok. The CFI was not happy with this, he says the turn to get me into the dive could be the problem, so we’ll do it without the turn, also my checks are not right, I am forgetting the cabin air controls, which is a fail on test, during the next one I did the same thing again, I forgot the cabin air controls closed, I really must focus the mind and learn the checks so they are 2nd nature, it just shows your not really in autority with the aircraft, which is the last thing you want to be doing on test, this is a CPL afterall, and you are the commander, that’s what’s it’s all about, concerted effort next time then I tell myself.
During the PFLs it was the same as the glide approaches, it’s surprising how close in you need to get the aircraft because she does not want to glide, she “falls” rather than glides, so make sure we are close in, especially in strong headwind conditions.
After landing, the CFI wrote a list of things wrong with the flight, as follows.
Initial climbout and level off, I was trying to level off and talk to ATC at the same time, do one or the other, we spent some time 20kts under our cruise speed because I was trying to do both.
During the Zone transit, if you have to change level due to cloud you MUST inform ATC, this is a failure on test if I just dropped the nose and descended, it’s controlled airspace, so do as you are told.
Orientation during visits to unfamiliar airfields, use the heading bug to help you, if in doubt, do an overhead join.
IF work good.
Fire drills, get them right or you wil fail, and forget the steep turn, just nose down to Vne and land in a field.
On the whole he said during taxi in that I must not think that to pass the test I need to raise my game 30%, just keep doing what you are doing and you will pass, just put the gloss on it, which I guess makes sense, I also feel quite at home in the Arrow now, mainly due to the fact that I can actually land the thing without getting a rollocking from the CFI, bloody tops 🙂

When we got back in the CFI said my test will be next Wednesday, so we have a week, but first you must sit an F170A flight, which signifies you are ready for test, the 170A is basically a test flight, but must be signed off before the actual test, this is scheduled for Friday, or Monday if Wednesday is bad weather wise.

Day 13 Wednesday 25th

As expected, the weather was bad all day today, so no flight, looks like the 170A is Monday, not ideal as I have to go to work Sunday night for one shift, which means 5hrs sleep in 30 for the 170A, not good.

I’ve flown a 235hp Cherokee and it didn’t ‘alf go. The extra power should bring out the devil in you, but as I found with the equally tough-armed Maule you’ll be glad to go back occasionally to something a bit more staid. In any case, bigger aircraft makes you more manly. Just pretend you’re enroute and preparing to flying a Lanc 😉

Just found out my FTO includes the cost of the MEP rating in their ME-CPL, which actually makes it cheaper than the SE-CPL option.

Apparently you don’t need to do PFLs on a MEP-CPL test, just assymetric work though I can;t cite a reference at the moment.

Did you you know emergency procedures can be undertaken on a sim? Appendix 1 and 2 to JAR–FCL 1.170 refers.

Hi Blue

Interesting thoughts, the CFI is limiting the “roll over” to 45deg bank so I think this manouvre is out the window. I have this month’s Flyer but haven’t had time to peruse it yet, maybe the weekend.

Day 11 Monday 23rd

Today was another Nav trip, this time to Little Horwood which is just west of the Luton Class D CTA, must be careful here for obvious reasons, I didn’t like the look of this route because the diversion was bound to be over Brize Norton to the SW which would have meant 2 zone transits, one south bound and then again north bound. Zone transits are ok but when you are diverting you have to do all the “flight planning” from the cockpit, as well as holding heading & altitude, you just haven’t got enough hands or eyes to do it all, also if ATC messes you around and denies or put’s a limit on the transit then your workload can increase threefold, but ah well, this is a CPL route so we must fly it.
During the drive up there was some low lying fog hanging around, also the Cotswold Hills had a blanket of fog on them making them look like chocolate cake with cream on the top 😀 , but I’m sure it’ll be ok when we go as it’s quite patchy.
Well, on departure we lifted off rwy 27 to the West and turned north then East for our en-route heading, as soon as we were high enough to look over the cotswolds we could see that the whole South & East of England lay under about 200ft of fog, it certainly was a Kodak moment, all you could see was the odd pylon sticking up and Didcot Power Station pumping out it’s thing, okaaaay, we need to scratch that plan, so we inform ATC and then divert to Long Buckby which is just NW of Northhampton, this is about 45nm from our point, it was made easier due to the fact that it was really calm conditions, so I drew a straight line on the map, calculated it was 45nm away, got a track and then set heading, the ETA was worked out using our TAS which was about 103kts, so that was 10.3nm in 6 minutes (1/10th of our TAS & 60 minutes), this worked out about 27 minutes, so I give the CFI a time. En-route was good, the vis was great (above the fog), our track was to take us south of Gaydon where they build the Aston Martin?, but we were on track to fly overhead, so a heading adjustment was needed, I estimated a 6deg right turn to ensure we reach Long Buckby, we did this ok, now the CFI asked for a diversion to Croft Farm which is in Warwickshire between Evesham & Great Malvern, so again, same technique to calculate a track and ETA, this one worked out even better which was marvellous, next was the Instrument work, screens go up, we’re now in cloud, what do we do? ok first thing is a 180deg turn out of cloud, this didn’t work, we’re still in cloud, what next? ok, the checks, which is are we in icing conditions? so a quick check of the OAT sees +04deg reading, then we check the MSA (Minimum Safe Altitude), we’re above this so great, now we do some climbs, descents, 30deg turns, descents whilst maintaining an airspeed and rate of descent etc, then we have a vacuum pump failure, so it’s now partial panel IF, only the turn co-ordinator, ASI, magnetic compass & Altimeter to fly with, now I had to demonstrate a climb, a descent and some compass turns, remembering on partial panel to make small inputs whilst climbing & descending, and watch the ASI & Altimeter for a trend, now it’s time for UA recovery (Unusual Attitude), these were the ones that made me feel sick a couple of weeks ago, so the (nice) CFI put the plane into a steep descending turn, so check, Speed, rising, so throttle idle, wings level, which will include overbanking in the opposite direction on the turn co-ordinator slightly, then pitch up to stop the speed, once the speed has stopped then pitch again to stop the altimeter unwinding, which will then start the speed decaying back, then when we are within 5kts of our required indicated we reset cruise power. The CFI always does a steep climging turn as well, the procedure is identical except you have to advance the throttle first, then roll the wings level, adjust attitude to stop the speed, then adjust again to stop altimeter, then power up to normal cruise setting whilst remaining level.
Time now for a couple of PFLs, CFI chops the throttle, engine failure, ok, set the best glide speed, then pick a field, now do the “why” checks, fuel – change tanks, magnetos – on both, primer – locked, mixture – full rich, fuel pump – on, carb heat – on, engine still not restarting so we do the MayDay call, then the shutdown checks, doors unlatched, seat fully back and re-tighten harness, and BRACE, good in theory huh? it didn’t quite go like this, if you struggle to locate a field then your checks become disjointed and rushed, doing the PFL is all about being decisive, something I do lack now and again during PFLs, and certainly during this one, “ok go around” was the call, so up we go, back to Glouc for circuits.
Now I cannot remember much about how it went believe it or not, we had a really busy trip here, coupled with 2 more flights yesterday (Monday) as well has frazzled my brain, but basically after the circuits we landed (obviously), and at the debrief the CFI said it went well, it is above test standard, but we need to work on PFLs & Circuits, we have an hr left in the Warrior so we’ll use that to brush up on the said points.
So off we go again for PFLs, just remember the “plan” is what I kept telling myself, and don’t be afraid to pick a field underneath us if necessary, without boring you to tears (if I haven’t already) the upshot of it was that the PFLs went really well, we “made the field” on the 3-4 that we did, all the checks went ok and the plan worked every time, this was pleasing that I seem to be nailing the PFLs now.
Back for circuits, we did about 4, a normal, a flapless, a glide and a low level circuit to land, again, these went well, the landings are really coming on now and I am grasping the technique required, which is great because we have now just dumped the Warrior for the Arrow, woopeee, a real aircraft with retractable undercarraige and a wobbly prop, it seems a bit daunting to say the least and even though I was a tad excited I was a little apprehensive to say the least.
We had a great brief for the Arrow, this included all the speeds we were to use for circuits, gear procedures as well as RPM and MAP (Manifold Pressure) settings, once I was happy it was out to the aircraft to fly, again I won’t bore you with the checklisting of the A Check.
We received our taxi clearance, and off we went, the first thing that is really noticable is how heavy it feels, it felt like a bloody tank to be honest compared to the feather-like Warrior, it really was difficult to turn round corners, the rudder input was very tough. The CFI said I may as well fly everything, and he’ll talk me through rather than demo it. So on our takeoff roll, we’re looking for a rotate speed of 70kts, then climb initially at 77kts, so full power, wow, this bites, and boy does it yaw, that’s the 200hp engine for you, again it was alot of work to keep her straight on the centreline. We hit 70kts, with one hand on the throttle and one on the control yoke I could not pull it off the runway, I had to use 2 hands, as soon as she unsticks she is heavy but stable in the climb, and the climb performance is good, ok, next thing is “insufficient runway left”, dab the brakes (stops wheels rotating for retraction), then positive rate, gear up and locked, then at 300ft AGL set MAP to 25″ and RPM to 2500, then climb at 87kts which is Vy.
It was getting dark so this flight was only going to be a familiarisation flight, I levelled at 3,000ft, then let the speed build, I found her much harder to level off than the Warrior, because the speed has to build further from 87kts to 120kts, constantly pushing the nose down and re-trimming as she sped up. We did a few steep turns, again, she was heavy in the turn, you had to pull back further to maintain level flight in the turn as she is heavy. We then returned to Glouc, the approach was to be flown at 75kts, remembering in the pre-landing checks to put the gear down and check 3 greens, then on finals we check “Blue – Red – Greens”, blue for prop fully fine, red for mixture fully rich and greens for landing gear down & locked, over the threshold we went, 70kts, power back a tad, into the flare, power off, and she falls like a brick, a ncie hold off and touch down, wow that was much better, there is absolutely no float in this aircraft.
Back for a debrief, a hard day’s flying today, 3 trips and about 4hrs of flying is tough, time to go home for a shower and to see the family.

I’ll type Tuesday’s tomorrow because the weather has to be pretty aweful 🙂

Thanks for reading

Dean

Well this pull-through thing is not something I tried. Remember all the old the war films where a flight of Spits in formation would peel off one by one. That’s what I’m thinking… not quite fully inverted then a half-loop commited by pulling through. You might call it a Split-S. Mind you the phrases “bank limited to 60 deg” and “bank limited to 90 deg” might remind you about something you learnt in ATPL theory 😀 Might have pushed this on a SEP reval in the Robin once and no, for a change, the barf bag remained stashed. I really want to get proficient again and some aeros for fun in a R2160 would do the trick. Don’t think my body could stomach it though. Mind you I’d start the CPL tomorrow also, guess I will have to wait…

Brian Lecomber explains slipping and slip turns in this month’s FLYER.