| Lesson 7 | |
| Flight time logged: | 1.9 hours |
| Total flight time logged: | 10.3 hours |
| Total takeoffs/landings: | 17 |
| Total cost to date: | $1650 |
What a nice day it was today! A cold front moved through the area yesterday with some thunderstorms ahead of it. Today, the skies are clear, although it is a little windy. I had a crosswind on takeoff today, so I got to practice my crosswind takeoff. In today's lesson, my instructor was acting like a check-ride examiner just watching my actions.
I turned crosswind after takeoff, then the instructor made me put on the "foggles" to do more instrument-only flying. He gave me altitudes and headings to fly, and I flew downwind and then out of the pattern. I flew for five to ten minutes by instruments alone. Then it was time for my lesson in recovering from unusual attitudes. This is where I have to close my eyes as the instructor puts the airplane into a steep climb about to stall, a straight dive, a spiral dive, a steep banking climb on the verge of stalling, etc. Once he says "you're controls" I have to look at the instruments, determine the plane's attitude, and recover. Talk about an awkward feeling! I was able to recover nicely from each situation he set up. He complemented me on my good recoveries.
I then had to perform slow flight maneuvers. I had to slow down to 55 knots with no flaps and then perform a few turns to headings. I then added full flaps to slow down to 40 knots and do a few turns at that speed. My instructor then had me perform a power-off stall. After the power-off stall, I performed a power-on stall. I was actually keeping my heading very well today.
Next I had to perform steep turns. I cleared the area with two 90 degree turns, and then performed a steep 180 degree turn to the left followed by a steep 180 degree turn to the right. My instructor again complemented me on performing well for these maneuvers.
The next tasks I had to perform were the ground reference maneuvers. I was at 3,500 feet MSL and needed to descend to 1,800 feet MSL. I started a 500 feet-per-minute descent. My instructor then asked me to do a forward slip down to 2,500 feet MSL. I put the plane into a forward slip and increased my descent to about 1,200 feet-per-minute. Within no time I was down at 2,500 feet. I transitioned back to a 500 fpm descent to 1,800 feet MSL.
Once at 600 feet above ground, I found a house to use for my turns-around-a-point. I performed two circles around the point. My instructor indicated that I was good a doing turns-around-a-point. I was good a making a circle of which seems easy, but not when the wind is blowing over 10 knots. It's all about changing you bank angle as you go around the point.
After the turns-around-a-point, I flew over to a straight road and performed S-turns to the right, then S-turns to the left. I did much better today than Tuesday. My instructor was convinced that I could do all of the maneuvers, so I headed over to Winder-Barrow airport for some touch-and-goes.
Over at Winder there were a few other planes flying so I really had to keep an eye out. My instructor taught me to talk on the CTAF since Winder does not have a tower. I caught on pretty fast to the communications part. I was feeling good about my performance thus far and was looking forward to practicing landings. I did three touch-and-goes, getting a little better each time, and then headed back to KLZU. I still need to work on my flares.
At about eight miles out from KLZU and after getting ATIS, I called the tower with my position and requested a landing. I was cleared fly straight in to Runway 25 on a three-mile final. I positioned myself to turn onto the extended final. My instructor wanted to show me how to use the ILS during an approach, so we tuned in to the ILS and turned on the marker beacon alerts. As I turned to a heading of 250 degrees, the outer marker beacon alert sounded indicating that I was five miles out. I was at 2,500 feet MSL starting my descent to pattern altitude of 2,100 feet MSL. I was right on the centerline the whole way in. I had to crab on the way down due to a crosswind, but managed to keep the centerline. I passed the middle marker, then the inner marker as I prepared for touchdown. The landing was a little rough, but okay. I really want to spend time getting better at my landings.
After taxiing back to the ramp and doing a post-flight, my instructor and I went in to the office to do the post-flight briefing.
I have scheduled three lessons for next week: Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday. My instructor said that we would spend Monday and Tuesday working on my landings and doing overviews on the other maneuvers. He then said something about letting me solo of Thursday. "Thursday?!," I said. He said that I should be ready in about five or so hours. I'm not sure I'm ready to solo just yet. He replied that I would do a dual flight with him first, but he would just be a passenger and not help me in any way. He said he feels comfortable with me flying the plane since he spends most of the time during my lessons just riding along. I figured I was at least two to three weeks away from soloing. Of course, I do not have to solo until I am ready, so it all depends on my confidence level. We'll see...
