An old guy finally learns to fly

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That used to be a good shirt!


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Woo-hooo! Way to go, Mike!

Congrats on flying a plane with the wing in the right place, too. :D
 
Congrats! Great journal of your progress....hope you continue to share it with us!
 
Congratulations, Mike! And great photos, too! It's an unbelievable feeling, isn't it?
 
Awesome! Congratulations, Mike!!
I noticed the t-shirt being a little wet. Was that from the heat or nerves?
Btw, cool Pilatus pilot.
 
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Yeah, I was pretty happy

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My instructor looks calm as a cucumber. This is him watching my first landing. I wish I had been that calm.


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Looking at the happy pictures, I say "old guy my a**!"
The airplane is older than you. At least my Cherokee is. Barely, though. ;)

Once again, congratulations, you look very happy.
 
Back to reality today. Back up with my instructor learning short and soft field take odds and landings. That is a hoot and I had a blast! Thursday will be my maiden voyage, solo to the practice area. My instructor told me to just go fly around for an hour or so. Just have fun but to be careful and be sure to be on the deck 30 minutes before sundown. And here is a little artwork by my instructor.
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Congratulations on the solo. You've now done something that only a few people on earth have done (relatively speaking). Now finish up (and you'll have a ball doing it).

What's this "old guy" stuff? You look pretty young to me. :D
 
Mike- saw over on another thread you were wanting to take Spin training. That thread is pretty bloated with nonsense so figured I would post my experience here. Not sure if it's typical or not, approved or frowned upon but in all I'm glad I did it.

Back story on stalls is I've done power off stalls solo since my 2nd time out. It was up to me to decide if I was comfortable enough to try power ons by myself which I wasn't and here's why. On my maybe third power on stall during a dual flight I almost put a 172 into a spin. After that I was really self conscious about it and was very hesitant on the controls making it a real challenge to do power on stalls. During my stage check prior to my 2nd solo I almost did the same thing again... slipped to the left and ended up looking straight down... not enough right rudder but I was unable to know how much was enough and how much was too much.

Being a bit freaked out of the possibility of spiraling out of control on a solo flight and under the suggestion of one of my CFIs I decided to go do spin training in older 152. The flight took over an hour where he demonstrated various stalls and spins and then allowed me to do them and recover... included also was accelerated and banked stalls all in a pretty stable 152. After the spins I was then able to do several power on stalls with no issues.

I have zero fear of spins now. Sure they make me uneasy but I can recognize it well before it happens now and can make the correct adjustments prior to getting to that point.
 
Thanks for that Okie! That is pretty much where I am, I don't want to be scared, but I am right now. I'll get my instructor to take me up in the 172 and spin it. I wish the Warrior was approved, I would rather do it in the plane I fly. I am not scared to learn, I am scared to not learn and die.
 
Fantastic job, pilot Mike! well done. Like the old saying goes, how did it feel to lose all the dead weight from the right seat?

I'm in my 40's - an "old guy" like you. I, too, always wanted to learn how to fly from when I was a kid. My dream was crushed when I was diagnosed as a type 1 (insulin dependent) diabetic at age 12. I resigned myself to dreaming.

Then I discovered sometime in late 2008 that the FAA has a "special issuance" procedure through which I might be able to get a class 3 medical even with my diabetes. I spent almost an entire year pursuing all the necessary tests, approvals, letters, evidence, paperwork, whathaveyou - but I finally got it late 2009. Three weeks or so later I started my lessons, and got my license in June 2010, and have been happily burning holes in the sky since then.
 
Second solo

Second solo, first to the practice area. I had a great plan. The practice area is a big triangle, my plan was to follow the boundary highways from north,west south then east to the airport. I was planning to do a couple of stalls, steep turns, s turns and turns about a point on the south leg, it is the most remote.

Well, my plan included getting flight following, so I take off and depart and start a climb to 3000, as soon as I get to altitude I call up Montgomery approach. The radio work was flawless, got my transponder set, leveled up and trimmed nicely. Hey wait, where he heck is the road? Boy it's hazy up here. I make a turn north......fly a little ways.....no road......turn south.....eh......no road. Back north a little farther, no road. A little farther south, no road.....Well crap, just keep flying south to the river. So off I go looking for the river. So, I am flying along looking......and I see a city, hey, there ain't no city in the practice area???? Long story shortish, I was about 10 miles too far west. Found the river, and headed home.

Get back to the airport area just fine, terminate radar services, make my radio calls, crap, didn't listen to the AWOS. What was that frequency, I have it written down, it's on my clipboard, where is my clipboard? Oh, I had already written off doing any maneuvers. Finally get the radio tuned about the time I get in the pattern, I'm just right. So I am gonna nail a short field landing, too fast, too high, forget it, normal landing. It was a bit long but nice. What the neck lets try again, higher, faster, let's do a soft field instead. BOOOOIIINNGGGG!!!!! Ugh, I parked. All in all a good learning experience, but my great plan fell pretty flat. I plan on trying again Saturday
 
And now you see why it's called "a license to learn!" At least I had the Ohio River to aim for, the field was at the bottom of a 30 mile wide arc, as long as I had a southerly component I would hit the river, then go to the very southern point and land.

The best thing you can do is to make a plan of things to do on each solo flight, and you'll waste less flight time thinking about it, or in distracted sightseeing. Be sure to allow for some fun, though; I used to practice turns around a point over my house, since it was on the way to the North Practice Area anyway.
 
Hank S said:
The best thing you can do is to make a plan of things to do on each solo flight,
Click to expand...

I did this on my second solo and it helped out. I just write a list of things I want to do; slow flight, power off stalls, steep turns, ect. That way I don't forget things.

I'm flying later this morning and now I printed off the practical test standards (PTS) and am going to work off that to ensure I'm within variance standards.
 
Update to my solo today. I flew longer than I thought I would with the hobbs coming in at 1.9 hours. However I packed basically everything into a single flight doing most everything 3-4 times. Did it in this order;

Slow flight
Power Off Stalls
Climbing turn
Power On Stalls
Steep Turns
Descending Turns
Ground Reference Maneuvers (rectangle, S-turn, Turns around a point)
Full stop followed by a Short Field take off
Full stop followed by Soft Field take off
Touch and Go
Full stop - taxi to ramp.

All in all was quite happy with the flight and maintained variances close to the standard... still need practice but was quite happy with it all.
 
Flight planning session with my instructor this morning planning my first dual XC. He helped me do the first leg, I have to do the other two. Gonna fly Monday morning. Good times!!


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Confused about what? Are you really confused or anxious?
 
I flew my xcountry solo by pilotage. I had half a tank of fuel, enough for 600nm. And flew the 150nm in about two hours. The only real prep was checking the sectional, and AF/D for the distant airfields. And having a kneeboard with the radio freqs and pattern altitudes on it.
 
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CTLSi said:
I flew my xcountry solo by pilotage. I had half a tank of fuel, enough for 600nm. And flew the 150nm in about two hours. The only real prep was checking the sectional, and AF/D for the distant airfield. And having a kneeboard with the radio freqs on it.
Click to expand...

I was required to show a DR plan but also have clear pilotage checkpoints. I got basic >D instruction on using the GPS and had the benefit (?) of ADSB traffic on MFD display.

I fly Magenta Airlines nowadays
 
mikeinbama said:
Confused isn't the right word. It's a three legged route. My instructor and I met for a couple of hours yesterday and he did the first leg with me. Keep in mind, before 7 am yesterday I had no idea how an e6b worked or how to begin a flight plan. So, he did the first leg with me and told me to do the other two myself. I am sure there are mistakes on there, but I am supposed to call him tonight and go over it. He wants me to call tonight and file the first leg. We will be off at 7 in the morning.


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Do you know how to fill out a flight log, never mind about filing a plan? Considering he didnt show you how an E6B works I have my doubts. You need a good understanding of how to calculate WCA and what the variation lines on a sectional mean.

Likely you can find a good resource on Deduced Reckoning.
 
I read it but when you started with being confused, I assumed you needed more ground instruction. E6Bs typically require more famiarity than one can get in one session. I'd recommend you spend some time working these nav problems.

And honestly I am concerned that you are more interested in defending your instructors competence than gaining your own. You are biased toward him and its understandable and expected even. All I'm saying is that navigation and planning is a foundational skill and you cannot take short cuts here. I spend 1/2 a semeter in HS doing it, so when I saw it nearly 20years later in 141 Geoundschool it was a refresher. Many of my classmates struggled. You're not the only one.

But in real life youre likely to let the whiz bang stuff do the math for you. I find flight planning a fun exercise. Even I fly Magenta Airlines too.
 
mikeinbama said:
You really do seem to be one of the good guys here and I appreciate your input. But people are really quick to jump on an instructor without having the whole story. And lastly, I was using this thread more as a diary, so just airing my thoughts that are sometimes poorly worded, I will be more careful in the future so as to not give the wrong impression. I am very excited for the XC in the morning!!
Click to expand...

Yes, folks here are "very helpful".
 
So, first dual XC was this morning. It was pretty uneventful. My instructor and I did a two hour flight planning lesson on Saturday where we did the first leg together. I then did the other two legs myself. All in all I did pretty well, I had made a couple of errors in my calculations, but nothing big. We fixed those, filled, and off we went. I missed my first checkpoint, I just couldn't see it. I hit all the rest on the way up, 77 nm to ANB. We closed the plan there and reviewed the next leg, talked about radio work, check points and the weather. Filed the plan and off we go.

Ok, this is the part where I did the nav log, I missed my first checkpoint, it was too close to the airport and I picked a tower, it was completely obscured in the haze. However, I pretty much hit every other one the rest of the way home, 82 nm, ANB-ALX-1A9. It was a good flight, I learned a lot. Night flying this week with a night XC on the 12th, things are really moving along. My instructor told me to get out and fly solo some, just call him before hand for a briefing. He suggested I stay in the pattern and tighten up my landings, he said they could be better......lol. This is so much fun .
 
Good job, Mike. Just remember, when you finish up, the certificate is called "a license to learn" for good reasons. I'm still learning after 7 years, and expect to continue learning as long as I'm still flying.
 
What helped me with the planning is watching Youtube videos on how to use the E6B and using a planning walk through write up similar to this link- http://www.mwaugh.com/Aviation/Student/x-c-planning.htm
7 XC Legs in (2 Solo) I still find these helpful. My first XC plan took me almost an hour and a half to come up with the 3 legs. I can probably do the same one in about 20 mins now... or less, guess I'll find out this week when I do it.
 
BTW worked out the plan tonight for my long solo XC tomorrow. Little over 30 mins. Most of it is just transcribing info from the AFD to the Navlog form and remeasuring checkpoints.

I'll do weather/wind/briefing tomorrow and put in the corrected heading. Truth be told though I'm going to do it mostly with GPS and verify the log forms... or maybe do it via the log forms and verify via GPS... haven't decided yet.
 
I have Foreflight on my iPhone but I haven't used it flying yet. My instructor doesn't mind. I just want to get a good grasp of how to figure it out the old way.


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Did quite a bit of flying today mostly by GPS. I tracked fuels consumption through total flying time but kept course heading through the GPS. I had a sectional on hand if something went wrong with the GPS.

Did my long solo XC with 3 stops, 169NM total in both C & D airspace. That left me with .7 hours required for solo XC time so I went ahead and did a fairly quick 117NM flight. After some more night time and some simulated instruments all that I have required to do is the practical practice. I'm still short by about 5 hours of the required 40 hours so I have some time left still.
 
You will need 3hours of test prep anyway, so that only leaves you 2hours to fill. Just remember, it's only a numbers game to you, your CFI will sign you off for the checkride only when satisfied that you are ready, prepared and likely to pass.

It's extremely hard, but try to be patient. Seven+ years later! my CFI still complains about how hard I pushed for the checkride sign off. Fortunately we are still friends.
 
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