Although I'd flown with the school in the same aircraft before during a trial instructional flight (TIF), I knew my first lesson would be a different experience. Today when I arrived I was greeted by the chief flying instructor (CIF) with whom I had been in email contact arraigning my booking, and he was very welcoming. I was pleased to find out that the instructor I would be working with was the same guy who I did my TIF with, and I had enjoyed that experience due to his great instructional manner and sense of humor.
To start off I was given the handling notes for the Beechcraft Skipper 77 and plonked in the briefing room to have a read. It was great to have this document in my hands, which describes the basics of all the systems, checklists and startup procedures, performance characteristics (VNE and climbing speeds etc), as well as containing loading and performance charts which I look forward to getting acquainted with.
Eventually my instructor sat down and we went through the basics of aerodynamics, lift, aircraft controls and handling. I feel that I have benefited from studying the Bob Tait BAK book over the last couple of months as I had an understanding of the concepts, although it was beneficial to talk to someone and refresh and enhance the information. My instructor also offered plenty of helpful information on things I needed clarification on, as well alternative points of view that enhanced my understanding.
After the briefing we hopped in the Skipper and were promptly airborne. Takeoff was great, and I was able to monitor what he was doing with the rudder, which was a pretty hefty full right input to counter the slipstream effect.
After that I was able to get a feel for the aircraft in a broad range of attitude and power settings. We flew around the training area at about 3,300ft where I felt the controls at fast, slow, flaps down and up settings. It was a valuable learning experience feeling the difference in the inputs to the yoke between slow and fast maneuvers. Learning about trimming the aircraft was really interesting too. I feel I had a pretty good theoretical knowledge when going into it, but putting it into practice is another thing entirely.
Main lesson learned from the day; Pitch to desired attitude then trim and feel the resistance on the yoke. If attitude re-corrects and yoke resistance is strong, re-adjust attitude and re-trim. Repeat until desired attitude can be achieved through trim. Also, trim after each attitude change, and trim after each power change.
And also the training area, especially when hugging the mountains to the west, is incredibly beautiful. Good visibility today also meant I could see all the way over to the East coast, over Sydney CBD to the sea.
Post flight briefing my instructor was really helpful. There are a couple of additional books I'm going to get as well as a more practical pair of sunnies. He also advised me to hold out buying a David Clark headset just yet.... oh well.
No comments:
Post a Comment