Official Airport Bum!?

So when you get the initial in a multi, what does the single add-on consist of? I assume you did all the maneuvers in the twin?

No. The maneuvers in the twin are limited to a sub-set. You only do some of them in the single. Others you "get credit for" like the steep turns, those disappear in the single if you do them in the twin first.

Really the best place to look is the add-on table in the PTS. It has which items in the PTS are required for add-ons, by task letter or number, so you can compare them. They have a table because there's also Commercial Seaplane Single and Multi also, which changes the whole list even more. :)
 
That's what they all say. My CFI says, "Every student will try to kill you. And they'll do it when you least expect it." :)

I still remember my primary instructor (who was pretty unflappable) yelling at me during the flare (I was pre-solo but close) "You scare the **** out of me when you do that!" I don't remember now what exactly I did, but I do remember his yelling. :oops:
 
I still remember my primary instructor (who was pretty unflappable) yelling at me during the flare (I was pre-solo but close) "You scare the **** out of me when you do that!" I don't remember now what exactly I did, but I do remember his yelling. :oops:

LOL. I don't think yelling works too well as an instructional tool. Case in point: You remember to this day that he was yelling and no clue what he was yelling about. ;-)
 
I still remember my primary instructor (who was pretty unflappable) yelling at me during the flare (I was pre-solo but close) "You scare the **** out of me when you do that!" I don't remember now what exactly I did, but I do remember his yelling. :oops:

LOL. I don't think yelling works too well as an instructional tool. Case in point: You remember to this day that he was yelling and no clue what he was yelling about. ;-)

I remember being yelled at when flaring too high. "What the hell was that?" he asked. In my head I replied, "I don't know, you're the instructor!"
 
So I shared that there was a radio "funny" during my Commercial SE add-on. Here's the transcript and the recording... someone found the LiveATC archive and clipped out all the dead air, so this is highly compressed.
I'm rarely tongue-tied, but this is just funny.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B3rrE092WcuweXB3YTlPeXlZVHM/view?usp=sharing

KAPA Tower: "November 79M, Wind 130 @ 10, make short approach, Runway 17R, cleared touch and go."
My response: [Clipped by LiveATC scanning changing frequencies]

At this point it's the power-off 180, and I'm totally focused on making this landing... I've also done something like 30+ touch and goes over three days fixing my insanely awful landings on the failed ride on Wednesday, and this is the following Sunday... taking the re-ride. All I need are two landings (we briefed it as three... a normal landing -- doesn't count for anything, just warm-up, a short field landing,

DPE: "Tower, 79M?"
KAPA Tower: "Go ahead."
DPE: "Can we get the option on this one?"
KAPA Tower: "Cleared option, Runway 17R"
DPE: "Option for 17R, 79M thanks."

Now I'm over there just working my little brain off looking at the wind and the turn and thinking real hard about making this landing on my spot... I kinda hear the DPE doing this in my headset and know "it's okay" but that's as far as I allowed myself to think about him on my radio... my brain isn't really thinking about that he's "fixing" that if I make this landing, it'll be a full-stop, and I've passed... the ride would be over with.

He had figured out that I was just in full blown "concentration" mode and had been doing so many touch and goes that I didn't even think about it and just accepted it... (and he joked later that he'd have happily gone around the patch again, but he had Easter dinner to get home to, so if I made it, we'd need to taxi in to get him on his way... hahaha... or he could have just left me hanging to ask the Tower to switch to a full-stop -- amazingly there was no one else in the pattern with us at all, it wouldn't have mattered, just say you're making it a full-stop and they wouldn't have minded...)

We're descending, and I'm looking over my right shoulder and through/around him (right pattern for 17R... it does add a little extra work to judge the turn - practice both directions!) and talking to myself at this point... Looks pretty good, slight headwind that's slacking off, doesn't look like I need to cut the corner, maybe just a touch here, Flaps... 20 degrees looks like enough... could end up just a touch short but it'll fly in ground effect with the STOL kit... round out... looks like we're a tiny bit short... keep bringing the nose up... tiny updraft right at the 1000' marker and three feet in the air... don't push... just let it settle on, it'll land easily in the next 200'... little more flare... touch... let the nose wheel down...

DPE says to me... "Nice job."

I say, "Flaps coming to 10, confirmed moving... power..." and I shove the throttle in...

He says, "No, no, you passed! That's it!"

I start laughing as I yank the throttle to idle and start braking for the turn-off... it's a ways down there, so no problem... turn off and stop, clean up the airplane and call the Tower (KAPA has the tower handle the Bravo taxiway between the two runways...) and then it gets funny... My brain is STILL in touch and go mode, and I can't for the LIFE of me with the adrenaline dump that I just passed, and being happy, figure out what the heck to say to stop flying and taxi to parking...

(Sorry the audio quality is low here, part of it is that the KAPA LiveATC feed is done from off-airport so the relative power levels of the AM transmitters makes me sound quieter than the controller, and also my boom mic on my Lightspeeds has fallen down away from my mouth a bit, which happens annoyingly more with the Lightspeeds than my ancient David Clark headclamps...)

Me: "79M you want us to stay here, or taxi?" (I'm REALLY discombobulated... haven't asked the poor controller to do anything, and I'm asking him what he wants us to do... he's wondering if we are doing a full-stop taxi-back, or taxing in, or whatever, at this point... I'm happy, laughing with the DPE about passing and shoving the power up, adrenaline dump, and totally de-railed, brain-wise...)
Tower: "Say again." (Thanks man, I love you for this... just give me a huge hint... hey dummy, you didn't tell ME what you want...)
Me: "Do you want us to stay with you for the taxi, we did the option, and we're going to call it quits for the day." (I STILL can't spit out the words, "TAXI TO PARKING"... LOL...)
Tower: "79M is this a full-stop terminate?" (God this guy is good... I really need to go shake his hand someday...)
Me: "Uhhh, we're already on the ground here at Alpha... uh.... Bravo... uh... Bravo 12" (I STILL CAN'T JUST SAY IT! LOL!)
Tower: "Yeah, I see you there at Bravo 12, Taxi north on Bravo and hold short of Runway 17L at Bravo 8" (He just fixes it for me, and this is ALWAYS the transmission for aircraft taxiing to parking from 17R. ALL I HAVE TO DO IS READ BACK THE TAXI AND HOLD SHORT INSTRUCTION CORRECTLY and I'm home free... but noooooooooo... I'm still brain damaged and starting to laugh -- as is the DPE -- at my inability to form sentences...)
Me: "Okay sorry about that [mumble], Taxi north on Bravo hold short of Bravo [OOPS! DAMN IT], at Bravo 8, er hold short of 17L at Bravo 8 [now I can't keep from laughing at myself out loud], 79M"

And then when we got up to the hold short line, it all goes back to normal...

Tower: "Cessna 79M, no delay, cross Runway 17L at Bravo 8, and contact Ground point 8."
[Recording is clipped here...] Me: "...Point 8"
Tower: "Cessna 79M continue straight ahead into the ramp with me, see ya." (He knows our tail number and where we park... thanks again man... I really need to meet this guy...)
Me: "Straight into the ramp with you, see ya. 79M"
 
This week, no fly-ey.

Airplane at the end of the checkride was quite a bit over our usual oil change interval so I promised no more fly until I did maintenance. :)

Also was playing phone tag (my fault) with the pitot/static guy(s) and that was coming due.

Anyway, Sunday I got to the hangar and got the cowl off and oil draining. Left that thinking co-owner and I would finish on Wednesday and I'd go to that four letter work thing this week for the most part.

Monday morning, pitot static guy calls and says he can be at hangar around 12:30... okay, I'll be over!

Finished taking oil filter off and setting the drain stiff aside and putting that stuff away by the time he arrived. He did his magic, printed a nice report, and fiddled with our 43 year old transponder to get it to pass. It was being a little balky on sensitivity to being triggered.

(Also learned how deaf transponders are anyway...? Wow. Double digits for dB? I'm used to playing down around -120 dBm...)

Anyway, we'll be replacing that old thing for ADS-B before the next pitot/static is required, so that's probably its last.

He found a small static leak at the condenser bottle and replaced that and fixed the leak, too.

After he left, added oil and camguard, and did the leak-check start up. No leaks. Filled out the engine log entry for the oil change, and went home.

Rest of this week is work... ick. Cowl is still off and a PITA to get back on singlehanded so co-owner will assist probably on the original Wednesday date. Airplane will be ready to go.

Forecast says maybe heavy snow this weekend.

Probably not flying again until next week. Need to go fly my airplane from the right seat. Shouldn't be too difficult but there's a pretty good butt print of mine in that other seat so we'll see.

Anyway, CFI SE add-on, shortly. As soon as weather cooperates.

I was driving home tonight in blizzard conditions listening to the Rockies play baseball in light rain 20 miles northwest of me. Haha. Springtime weather in Front Range.
 
Non-update, update. LOL.

We haven't flown in a while. Had to go to work some and also weather has been sucking rocks here lately.

Instructor is working with a guy from Steamboat Springs on his instrument ticket and with the sucky weather, at least the guy got some actual!

It's interesting talking to him about the logistics of all this stuff. Today he was working with a couple DPEs seeing if the guy could get on their schedule, since one of the other DPEs went down with the flu or similar.

It's amazing all the coordination and maintenance problems that happen trying to keep a small fleet going all the time and get checkrides done.

Hats off to the clubs and owners... sometimes it really must suck when stuff breaks or people go down for maintenance. Plus it turns into soooooooo many phone calls. My oh my.

Like any other small business I suppose. If you're bored, you're probably missing something.
 
Still no update other than I'm beyond annoyed with our Spring weather and schedule.
 
Oh, I take that back. I got mailed a copy of an FAA Safety magazine that has a pre-printed front cover back page that says, "Congratulations on your new certificate!" And a letter about that.

Of course, I can't tell which certificate they're talking about with this pre-printed thing, and the last cert hasn't arrived in the mail yet. LOL.

So who knows which of the three triggered the magazine to be sent, and whether or not the new one will arrive before I have to request an extension. Haha. The last two did, but took a long time.

And probably before number three arrives, I'll have number four or even five done. Ha.
 
Dunno why ya wouldn't be flying. Just dodge the thunderstorms and hail and whatever other crap is up there...prolly some ice at times.
 
Dunno why ya wouldn't be flying. Just dodge the thunderstorms and hail and whatever other crap is up there...prolly some ice at times.

Hahaha well... yeah. It's been a sucky spring around here for flying, that's for sure.
 
Hahaha well... yeah. It's been a sucky spring around here for flying, that's for sure.
Yeah it's one thing to be going places. It's another to be stooging around focused on training.
 
Bah. Spring weather. Starting to look like summer.

We bagged on doing my initial flight in the right seat of 79M with the forecast and our eyeballs saying the thunderstorms will be arriving in an hour or so here at the field with winds gusting to 35. Ha.

No thanks. Old pilots and bold pilots...

Meanwhile the appointment for the FSDO visit to do the AGI and IGI paperwork is next week. Finally got time to call them during business hours and set that up. I always enjoy quality time with IACRA... heh. Probably hurts more when you know how websites are supposed to be designed... but it's way better than FCCs website, for whatever that's worth.

Not that it matters much but starting to watch the mail for the new green card with the Commercial SE add-on on it. Judging by the last few cards it should be arriving "soonish"... but who knows. Ride was Easter Sunday.
 
I'm a few blocks from KAPA and the rain started at 1500 so I guess bagging on the flight was the right call. Atmosphere is too stable today to blow up into supercells over the Metro so this is more like "monsoon" garbage from the south. Some lightning though.

Stupid weather.
 
And skunked again...

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Co-owner reported the airplane battery is dead. Long story but there was a lot of ground operation of stuff a couple of weeks ago and it may be getting weak.

No flying until we figure out if it'll take a charge and play some more, or if it's done.

Dug into the books, its four years old. So it may be time. It got a little abused this winter.

Otherwise it was gorgeous and we'd have probably taken some folks up for a little post-PoA dinner flight.

I made sure I'd stay at the table and not disappear to go try some battery charging heroics before or during dinner, by ordering a beer. Ha. Grounded!

I'll go deal with firing up the little Honda generator and hooking up the battery charger tomorrow or Tuesday depending on work schedule.

If she won't hold a charge, I'll go get the new Concorde at the parts place on the field. At least that part is easy at our airport. They always have them in stock.

Guess I'll grab the VOM and put it somewhere I'll remember to take it along and make some voltage measurements.
 
Today's fun was...

(Ranting... because I wanted to go fix the airplane...)

A work related yelling match with a psycho at a collections agency that's been going on for nearly three years after a CenturyLink billing error and fraud by an employee they fired for doing it (our President even threatened them with legal action today after he read my e-mail summarizing the last three years of screw ups by CenturyLink)...

A dog having about an hour of panic attacks about thunder miles away...

Talking to multiple CFIs and mine trying to figure out if IACRA wants a "recommending instructor" for Ground Instructor certificates... not a one of us could find anything definitive, just a list of requirements that doesn't include it, but it's IACRA so... who knows... it's not a requirement for the cert, we just want to figure out if silly IACRA will want it. Doesn't look like it.

A half an hour long phone call to the FCC to figure out what box on a form they weren't happy with so our third attempt at an application for the Air Boss radio station temporary license for an air show would finally be approved... not that we give a damn, since the frequencies and times are all approved by FAA anyway...

Finding out my CFI has (yet another) student booked in front of me this week... interesting story about where he had to fly to to pick him up and a good joke when he burned me good when I said "You sure find some interesting students!" "Well there's you..." hahaha. Damn. Walked right into that one...

And various other work related and other BS.

Tomorrow, FSDO appointment for the aforementioned Ground Instructor cert paperwork and then maybe over to the hangar to charge and then check battery voltage. I suspect the way this week is already going it'll measure out that a cell is toast, and I'll be hunting a new Concorde. This one has lasted over four years, but we easily got six out of the last one. But this one has been a bit more abused by a couple of discharge events.
 
Today's fun was...

(Ranting... because I wanted to go fix the airplane...)

A work related yelling match with a psycho at a collections agency that's been going on for nearly three years after a CenturyLink billing error and fraud by an employee they fired for doing it (our President even threatened them with legal action today after he read my e-mail summarizing the last three years of screw ups by CenturyLink)...

A dog having about an hour of panic attacks about thunder miles away...

Talking to multiple CFIs and mine trying to figure out if IACRA wants a "recommending instructor" for Ground Instructor certificates... not a one of us could find anything definitive, just a list of requirements that doesn't include it, but it's IACRA so... who knows... it's not a requirement for the cert, we just want to figure out if silly IACRA will want it. Doesn't look like it.

A half an hour long phone call to the FCC to figure out what box on a form they weren't happy with so our third attempt at an application for the Air Boss radio station temporary license for an air show would finally be approved... not that we give a damn, since the frequencies and times are all approved by FAA anyway...

Finding out my CFI has (yet another) student booked in front of me this week... interesting story about where he had to fly to to pick him up and a good joke when he burned me good when I said "You sure find some interesting students!" "Well there's you..." hahaha. Damn. Walked right into that one...

And various other work related and other BS.

Tomorrow, FSDO appointment for the aforementioned Ground Instructor cert paperwork and then maybe over to the hangar to charge and then check battery voltage. I suspect the way this week is already going it'll measure out that a cell is toast, and I'll be hunting a new Concorde. This one has lasted over four years, but we easily got six out of the last one. But this one has been a bit more abused by a couple of discharge events.
Wow....
Any reason in particular you're getting your AGI?
Also, not to be rude but I'm getting annoyed with your flight instructor constantly putting you on the back burner. Assuming you are paying him, you are still a paying customer and deserve your time!

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N910A using Tapatalk
 
Wow....
Any reason in particular you're getting your AGI?
Also, not to be rude but I'm getting annoyed with your flight instructor constantly putting you on the back burner. Assuming you are paying him, you are still a paying customer and deserve your time!

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N910A using Tapatalk
May I jump in for a bit...
Nate, please correct anything I get wrong.

I know Nate, I know the instructor he's working with and the DEs. It really is a small community around here, at least for those of us who've been around Colorado GA for a while. The instructor is highly regarded not just in Colorado but nationally. He has students from all over the country for all levels of advanced training with lots of recurrent. You may even recognize the names of some of these people but there's not need to mention them here. These are professional pilots on short schedules often paying not cheap rates at nearby hotels in order to work with him. He knows Nate is local and has steady income in his current position which is not aviation (at this point). Which also means he can call Nate at the last minute and say "my schedule unexpectedly opened up....are you available?"

Trust me when I say the instructor is not dumping on Nate nor taking advantage of him.
 
May I jump in for a bit...
Nate, please correct anything I get wrong.

I know Nate, I know the instructor he's working with and the DEs. It really is a small community around here, at least for those of us who've been around Colorado GA for a while. The instructor is highly regarded not just in Colorado but nationally. He has students from all over the country for all levels of advanced training with lots of recurrent. You may even recognize the names of some of these people but there's not need to mention them here. These are professional pilots on short schedules often paying not cheap rates at nearby hotels in order to work with him. He knows Nate is local and has steady income in his current position which is not aviation (at this point). Which also means he can call Nate at the last minute and say "my schedule unexpectedly opened up....are you available?"

Trust me when I say the instructor is not dumping on Nate nor taking advantage of him.

Well said. Also the VAST majority of our cancellations since about Easter (did the Commercial re-ride on Easter Sunday) have been weather.

I joked with him a long time ago that my first CFI said I'm a weather magnet. It's been true forever. If I schedule ANYTHING with a CFI, the weather is virtually guaranteed to go to complete crap -- and often just for the couple of hours we both had available.

@jesse can attest to this weather fun too. I show up to start Instrument training and we're shooting an ILS to minimums four hours later and the ENTiRE rest of the State of Nebraska is CAVU at night. Hahahaha. And then we try to schedule a DPE and the wind comes up that day well above 35 knots. I think it was steady 30 gusting 42.

This is pretty much just "my normal". Haha.

One of my CFI buddies joked with me the other day to stop scheduling and just show up at random at the airport and maybe that'll throw off Mother Nature.
 
Anyway, AGI and IGI issued at the FSDO and the green card for the Commercial for both multi and single without the Instrument limitation on the back showed up today.

If this is the Tortoise and the Hare, I'm definitely the Tortoise. Haha.
 
P.S. Oh lord was the poor FSDO Inspector hating life today. Front desk computer is an ancient Dell that is running Vista. LOL. And their IT group had just formatted and reloaded it because it had been acting up. IACRA was not pleased. Haha.
 
P.S. Oh lord was the poor FSDO Inspector hating life today. Front desk computer is an ancient Dell that is running Vista. LOL. And their IT group had just formatted and reloaded it because it had been acting up. IACRA was not pleased. Haha.

When I went to the FSDO for my AGI, two inspectors spent over a half hour trying to log in to IACRA before giving up and just having me fill out a paper 8710.
 
Airplane battery looks like it'll survive another summer. Charged up and it started the plane strongly and seemed to continue to charge up. Co-owner is going flying so he'll let me know if it acts up again this afternoon. If so, no biggie. It'd just be time for a new Concorde. Last one made it over six years, this one would be four plus, and I think it'll go another winter.

Thinking about installing solar on the hangar roof.

In other news, we don't get to see each other too much and we talked more about doing panel upgrades today. We both are open to getting on with doing the GPS and ADS-B transponder. So I guess we'll start quoting that and looking at shop schedules. Doing it by the September deadline to get the rebate is probably too tight with summer flying now, and we also need to decide what we're doing for an OBS... since we'll need one.

Another interesting option was a discussion about doing the GTN 625 vs the 650. The King can move down a hole as can it's OBS. You lose the frequency fill and sequence to an ILS but you actually end up with slightly more redundancy that you're not a single box failure away from no IFR. Or just go 650 up top and still keep the second OBS and King. Same redundancy but do we really need the Nav/Glideslope in the 650 was the question. There's some interesting deals on 625 + 345R combos right now.

Just initial thoughts. Anyway. Need to see what CFIs schedule is like tomorrow or into next week.
 
And I haz a sad. :(

@LDJones wanted to meet for a beer, and all that airplane battery fun this afternoon ran me out of time to get the doggies home and meet up with him!

D'oh! I guess it's good the airplane is chooching again, but missed out on meeting up with Loren!
 
Airplane battery looks like it'll survive another summer. Charged up and it started the plane strongly and seemed to continue to charge up. Co-owner is going flying so he'll let me know if it acts up again this afternoon. If so, no biggie. It'd just be time for a new Concorde. Last one made it over six years, this one would be four plus, and I think it'll go another winter.

Thinking about installing solar on the hangar roof.

In other news, we don't get to see each other too much and we talked more about doing panel upgrades today. We both are open to getting on with doing the GPS and ADS-B transponder. So I guess we'll start quoting that and looking at shop schedules. Doing it by the September deadline to get the rebate is probably too tight with summer flying now, and we also need to decide what we're doing for an OBS... since we'll need one.

Another interesting option was a discussion about doing the GTN 625 vs the 650. The King can move down a hole as can it's OBS. You lose the frequency fill and sequence to an ILS but you actually end up with slightly more redundancy that you're not a single box failure away from no IFR. Or just go 650 up top and still keep the second OBS and King. Same redundancy but do we really need the Nav/Glideslope in the 650 was the question. There's some interesting deals on 625 + 345R combos right now.

Just initial thoughts. Anyway. Need to see what CFIs schedule is like tomorrow or into next week.
Call Mark @ depot in alamosa about the adsb...he can do miracles with schedules. call / pm me and we'll talk options.
 
And I haz a sad. :(

@LDJones wanted to meet for a beer, and all that airplane battery fun this afternoon ran me out of time to get the doggies home and meet up with him!

D'oh! I guess it's good the airplane is chooching again, but missed out on meeting up with Loren!

We will connect next time! After CQ I am probably incoherent anyway!
 
Went down to Depot today for a quote on the 182 to do ADS-B and IFR GPS with brand G. :)

Ran into some hitchhiker named @murphey who needed a ride home too. Ha.

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What's that blue stuff in the top of the pics in Denver?

We finally got some. It was scattered to overcast 8000 by day's end, but morning and afternoon were flat gorgeous.

I'm sure if I'd have scheduled with the CFI, it would have been Level 5 thunderstorms instead. LOL. Go get in the airplane to go somewhere alone? Beautiful. Story of my life. Ha.
 
Talked to instructor this morning. The twin being down for quite a while (and additional bad news over the weekend on that front) has his schedule utterly and completely jacked for a number of weeks to come. He is always positive and said if anything opens or changes he'll call me right away, but I'm skeptical of circumstances more than of him, obviously. He's just buried in maintenance issues right now.

He's not the type to even suggest someone go to another instructor and yet, he said it today. He suggested I go fly with another instructor at his place.

Now that has me in a bit of a mental pickle. Obviously his partner instructor would be a good choice. I've met him and we've talked a bunch throughout this, but...

I also know it's likely if I want to do anything as an independent I'm eventually going to have to go over to the "big club" and start talking to folks I know there, figure out their "system", make myself useful, etc. If nothing else to have access to rentals and be on someone's official instructor list.

I don't think I can do that at the current place. It's more tailored to the couple of instructors who are there and a particular clientele who needs full timers who can dedicate a week or more to each student. Since I'll be a part timer, that won't work. Even if it was an option and I don't think it is.

So... the mental debate (and need for more information) begins.

Thank him for everything (already have done that but he deserves a bigger thanks -- it really is a pleasure to fly with him) and head on over to Big Club(TM) and join and start fresh with an unknown instructor (or more likely a recommendation from their chief pilot after a meeting) or switch over to my instructor's partner instructor to get the SE knocked out and the -II...

And of course the "joy" of switching instructors, but we've all done that, and know it's a pain but a fact of life.

Anyway. I'm sleeping on it.

Oh. Forgot to mention. Obviously one of the benefits of using this instructor was he's not concerned about doing stuff in owner's airplanes. So the SE stuff was being done in my Skylane. The Big Club may not have instructors who'll do that. Hmm.

Things both got more complex and also simpler today. I didn't want to bail on my instructor over these rough maintenance and weather patches that aren't his fault. Felt wrong. But if he's down to admitting it's a mess and I should make some phone calls and get it done... that's a bit of a relief. And a new set of problems. Not huge ones, but it creates a new "to-do" list, for sure.

I have to be in the office at the day job at least a couple full days this week after being out on a trip Friday last week. Today was WFH. So that's going to mean some phone calls to start off with before I can take some time to go talk to some folks at the airport in person.

An instructor change in and of itself doesn't bother me. It's just the logistics of it. But that's all quite "normal" for life at the airport. LOL.

The plan never survives the war...
 
Well, just to keep the thread alive...

Airplane co-owner texted today that he wanted to do a test flight of the multiple camera setup he's been designing and playing with for our airplane, so I said I'd be happy to come along and play dumb safety pilot.

We flew and the cameras and the one external strut mount didn't fall off, so we didn't bean any innocents on the head with a GoPro, so that was all successful. Maybe we'll have some video to share later on... don't know.

Anyway, saw my CFIs truck on the ramp and hunted him down at his hangar. He had also seen my car at my hangar and was not surprised when I pulled up at his.

Quick talk about the plan, and he wants me to fly with his other full time CFI later this week just to move things along and get me comfortable in the right seat of my own airplane (which I don't think will be any particular problem) and then I can go out and practice all the maneuvers and landings and what-not on my own, and we'll get on with firing up the brain cells for oral prep and what not again soon-ish. That'll work for me. And I'll get some time with the other instructor and you always learn something new flying with different instructors.

So... back on track with a new plan... plan number thirty or forty by now, I guess. Haha. But whatever...

Was fun to fly with my co-owner and have no specific flight duties in the right seat as a pax... haven't done that in a LONG time. Gave me lots of time to diddle with Garmin Pilot in flight on my iPad and also to observe his chosen tool, WingX on his in the mount over on his side. Also got to fiddle with seat location in our airplane for a "comfortable" spot for teaching in a 182 where you could be fully on or off the controls if needed and also see the majority of the steam gauges from the more acute angle.

@jesse mentioned that seeing our ASI from the right seat is damn near impossible. And he's right. Haha. I know the instrument better so I could take a better guess at what it was reading from the portion of the needle that's visible from over there, but he wouldn't have been able to tell at all... can't see the low speed range at all from over there unless your seat is quite a way back, or reclined quite a bit.

Anyway, was also fun to think through how I would be instructing if I were instructing from over there, and things I noticed another pilot doing. My co-owner has flown for over 50 years, so he's a good stick. I did chuckle when he made a very nice landing three or four feet left of centerline and didn't say a word, but for fun and practice giving feedback in a nice way, I mentioned it later in the hangar, and I know he won't mind me sharing. (Praise in public, criticize in private always, of course, but this one is no big deal...)

He joked that he didn't notice it and he's always done it. Every CFI he's ever flown with eventually comments on it. It's never more than a few feet and it's always left.

He asked me if I tended to do it in either seat in any of the airplanes I've flown. Honesty is the best policy, so I said yes... I have in the past at times, but the work up to the Commercial ratings literally beat it out of me. LOL. Centerline, centerline, centerline.

I have a technique up my sleeve if we ever do any actual student/CFI work that I'll try out on him someday. Hahaha. Perfect test case. :) And we get along so I know there'd be no hard feelings! But I bet I can get him to plant that nosewheel on the paint... hahaha. Evil, scheming, CFI brain... every flight gives opportunities for improvement!

That said, his landing was very nice. He likes partial flap landings (not my top preference, but with the STOL kit drooping the ailerons, it's still way more "flap" than a stock 182) and he is really consistent with them, so it's nice to see someone making a nice landing from the other seat as a pax... and it was a mild crosswind landing and the ailerons came all the way over after touchdown... he really does a good job flying the 182.

I've offered and he's interested, if I get the CFII he's thinking about adding an Instrument rating. I think it would be a good way to knock around my brain a bit and work on my teaching techniques and we already know we get along in the cockpit, so it's a definite possibility later this year. I'd be proud to help him earn it. Was talking to my CFI about the idea and he seemed to approve also... it's a decent way to not dive off the deep end immediately after earning the CFI tickets. And... I know my co-owner is a self-motivated studier, which helps a lot... when he's in study mode, it's serious. I'd be working just to make sure I stay ahead of him on the stuff he likes. He'd earn the ticket real quick I think. He's just never done it.

Also segways nicely into the probability that we'll update the avionics in the 182 sometime soonish. He'd get a lot of use and enjoyment out of a nice IFR GPS if he had the ticket, as would I.

We've already joked about that. "Economically it makes NO sense..." haha. Yeah, aviation...! "Tell me about it! I went and got my MEI! It'll probably pay back by about maybe, 2027. If I'm lucky." LOL!

Anyway... fun flight. I haven't been "just a passenger" in my own airplane for a very long time. Was nice to look around at stuff a bit, help scan for traffic, and generally just be there to annoy the PIC! Heh.
 
Neat day. Started with flying with different CFI and working on landings from the right seat of my airplane. They were somewhat ummm, unstable for the first three. Last four were "okay" but I'm happy enough with them to go do some solo practice. I gave myself a "C" but it'll work out. Practice time now.

Variable from 360 to 090 and 15 knots. Great workout. Windsock pointing somewhere different for almost each landing.

I feel like I'm landing about ten degrees out of whack from that seat, so I'm glad I waited until I could go up with another CFI. Strangely I never felt that in the Seminole. Switching seats in that airplane was a non-event.

Today made for some funny moments...

"More rudder!"

"Which direction? Oh... yeah more to the left!"

... as I'm trying to figure out which way the airplane is going... only took three of those to figure it out.

After that I'm just fighting a mental feeling that I'm crooked when my eyeballs clearly say otherwise. Put the rudder in, take it out, put it back in, take it out... very similar to a case of the "leans" in Instrument training.

"You haven't done much taildragger flying have you?"

"Nope!" LOL.

Ran into multiple people I haven't seen at the airport and had lunch with one of them. It's cool to see folks out of the blue like that.

And in-between flying and lunch, I got to shake the hand of a freshly minted Instrument pilot who passed his checkride today. First congrats after his DPE and his instructor. That's fun.

Very cool. Kinda screwed up my schedule plans for the rest of the day, a little bit, but in a good way.

1.4 and 7 landings. APA's closed runway made almost every lap around an "extend your downwind" call. Which was fine since I needed to play with the sight picture a little bit anyway.

Now I just need a nice calm morning to go work on it. I at least can guess what the airspeed is now only seeing half of the ASI. Ha.
 
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