Discovery Flight...achieved. Wallet, empty...

bimmerd00d

bimmerd00d

Pre-Flight
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Aug 29, 2011
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36
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Austin/Blanco, TX
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bimmerd00d
On Saturday I headed over to US Flight Academy in Denton for my discovery flight. Sat down in the FBO lobby thing and waited for my instructor. We originally booked the Cessna 172 since my wife was going to join, but she decided to pass on this. When I arrived I decided the Diamond DA-20 sounded like a more fun plane to go up in, so I switched to that. A few minutes passed and the instructor showed up, we went over the basics of what makes a plane fly. We headed out to the DA-20 and we both got in the seats. Seeing as how we're both larger than Mick Jagger, we decided to find a larger plane. We ended up in a Remos Light Sport, which oddly enough has much more space than the DA20 even though it's half the weight. We fit much better in there, so then we got out and went through some of the preflight checks as usual. A few minutes passed and we began taxiing to runway 18. It was an odd experience steering with the pedals, but I quickly picked it up. Full throttle and we began the takeoff. At about 60kts he said lightly pull back on the stick with 2 fingers and it would shoot off the ground. I picked a point on the horizon and just kept climbing until we hit about 1500, then it was a left towards the lake. We got up to cruise altitude for a bit at 2000 and headed east a few miles and he showed me the gauges, controls, and various electronics in the cockpit. We then made a hard left back to the north and flew over my house and the area for another 15 or 20 minutes while performing a few climbing and turning maneuvers, all with me behind the wheel (stick). I thought to myself "this guy is nuts giving me the controls for this, i have never even been near an airplane cockpit let alone fly one." Anyway, a call from approach (or the tower maybe) with some traffic in front of us, then he had me follow them in for the landing. Following his instruction, I set us up for base and final, then he took control for the landing. I'm absolutely hooked, I have to be a pilot. Afterwards I met up with AggieMike at IHOP and talked flying and whatnot for a few hours. I wish I had gotten more pics, but I was too busy flying :). Good times, I'm a regular here now.

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Welcome to the addiction...there is no cure, only remission!

The Remos is a fun ride. Great visibility and it'll darn near glide forever.
 
Cool story. As to that whole "this guy is crazy to let me fly this" part... well, he'll have to sooner or later! ;)
 
denverpilot said:
Cool story. As to that whole "this guy is crazy to let me fly this" part... well, he'll have to sooner or later! ;)
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yeah but as far as he knows, i'm just some wacko with a dream...which is true i guess. I race cars, I guess i'm qualified to fly :D
 
Another one succumbs to the passion for flying.......... YEA!
 
bimmerd00d said:
I race cars, I guess i'm qualified to fly :D
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Actually, except for drag racing, car racing brings to you a handicap. You get desensitized to being in coordinated flight because you accept offcenter G loading as part of a performance turn. This is where motorcycle racers gain an advantage because they are used to seeking that "straight through the seat" feel and they understand they need to throw it into a bank to make a highperformance turn or they will highside. The aircraft equivalent to getting highsided in a turn is to break into a spin.

The tendency you have to remain vigilant to avoid is trying to tighten the turn by shoving the tail around with the rudder. You need to get that wing down in a coordinated fashion as well. There are no "Flat turns" in airplanes.

The place this bites people is that last turn from base to final when the cross wind is blowing you past the runway and you push the tail around without dropping the wing to go with it and now you are "Skidding" in a turn, and if you happen to stall, the wing will tuck under in a violent motion then the Earth will rotate about 1 1/3rd times in the windshield just before you die.
 
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Henning said:
Actually, except for drag racing, car racing brings to you a handicap. You get desensitized to being in coordinated flight because you accept offcenter G loading as part of a performance turn. This is where motorcycle racers gain an advantage because they are used to seeking that "straight through the seat" feel and they understand they need to throw it into a bank to make a highperformance turn or they will highside. The aircraft equivalent to getting highsided in a turn is to break into a spin.

The tendency you have to remain vigilant to avoid is trying to tighten the turn by shoving the tail around with the rudder. You need to get that wing down in a coordinated fashion as well. There are no "Flat turns" in airplanes.

The place this bites people is that last turn from base to final when the cross wind is blowing you past the runway and you push the tail around without dropping the wing to go with it and now you are "Skidding" in a turn, and if you happen to stall, the wing will tuck under in a violent motion then the Earth will rotate about 1 1/3rd times in the windshield just before you die.
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Hmm, good info. I will try to throw all car knowledge out the door, so far it's been useless for the planes aside from understanding some of the gauges in the plane. It's no dragster :D

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If the wallet is a little thin, you're going to have to choose one passion. :D
 
EppyGA said:
If the wallet is a little thin, you're going to have to choose one passion. :D
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The Chumpcar races are beginning to phase out, one guy had a kid, one guy lost his job, the other guy is getting married. We'll probably just put the car away for another time for now.
 
bimmerd00d said:
The Chumpcar races are beginning to phase out, one guy had a kid, one guy lost his job, the other guy is getting married. We'll probably just put the car away for another time for now.
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I did Legends for a few years and it will definitely suck your wallet dry. :hairraise:
 
In my area Remos GX is the 2nd cheapest airplane to fly, at $99/hr wet, even though it is lavishly equipped with Denon PFD, primary Garmin GPS, and a large moving-map Garmin GPS (with XM datalink -- shows TFRs). The only thing cheaper is a 1976 C150M for $89/wet and $9.50 fuel surcharge. Anything else - typical rental 172s, Cherokees, and DA40 - is way above $100.

I love how Remos GX flies, although it is much too small for me. My head goes into the cavity between the wings and I am entirely blind to the sides in it. It's a good thing to be short in aviation.
 
Those "fuel surcharges" are so utterly bogus. Fuel isn't going down.

It's as cheesy as "$19.95 PLUS Shipping and Handling! Operators are standing by! Call now!"

Flight schools doing that silliness (almost all of them now) should realize it's a low-class Marketing move that isn't going to attract the fiscally responsible clientele they want as long-term customers.

Anyone who can do math in their head, actually.

Cheeeeeezy.
 
denverpilot said:
Those "fuel surcharges" are so utterly bogus. Fuel isn't going down.

It's as cheesy as "$19.95 PLUS Shipping and Handling! Operators are standing by! Call now!"

Flight schools doing that silliness (almost all of them now) should realize it's a low-class Marketing move that isn't going to attract the fiscally responsible clientele they want as long-term customers.

Anyone who can do math in their head, actually.

Cheeeeeezy.
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In some cases, the fuel service charge is being used to offset the portion of the FBOs costs where there is a leaseback. THEY get the whole amount, not the owner. In order to raise the price appropriately (so their costs get covered), they would have to double down on the hourly. They can still say they have the lowest per hour rental in the area.
And really, you see the utilities do this all the time. We keep the per kilowatt hour price low but we charge you double that to deliver it to you.
Or like my water company just did. Add a $25 "base price" then charge me the same for the cubic feet rounded up. Water bill went from $26 a quarter to $56 a quarter.
 
Your first flight is a milestone that will stick in your mind, at least until your first solo. Sounds like you had a fun and successful first flight. Hopefully you bought a logbook.

A month or so ago, a 172 with US Flight Academy logo landed at our little unmanned terminal boonie airport and four guys got out with airline captain shirts on. They went in the little terminal building and had a meeting of some sort, then piled back into the 172 and headed back into the wild blue yonder. From that I got the impression that this is an ATP school. Is this correct?

Keep up the flying and keep us posted. Maybe we'll get a chance to meet someday since I'm in the same general part of Texas.

Doc
 
MBDiagMan said:
From that I got the impression that this is an ATP school. Is this correct?
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If the shirts were a pale blue, these guys were CFIs. Students in the professional pilot program (mostly internationals currently) wear a white shirt.
 
AggieMike88 said:
http://www.24hoursoflemons.com/

A pilot buddy in Ft Worth (owns All imports Auto Parts) frequently participates.
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We started off in that series but got tired of the ridiculous penalties if you got pulled in. Chumpcar is almost identical, but it's all about the racing, not the presentation.


Sent from somewhere closer to sea level than I'd like to be.
 
Hey I race ChumpCar too! And Lemons. We won the Lamest Day at Nelson in '09 :D We're running the 25 hour Nelson race with 2 cars in October. I've found racing and flying to be pretty similar as far as concentration level required. Congrats on your first flight, I'm nearing the end of my PPL training and it's been fun

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Do whatever you have to in order to pay for and see your training through. That's what I did, 160+hrs. later, no regrets. :D
 
Welcome to flying! I love reading new pilot stories. I was "hooked" because of my very first intro flight, just like you. About 7-8 months later, I became a certified private pilot. That was on August 28th 2011.

You picked a great website to post on. I've met and spoken with a lot of pilots here, and they are wonderful. Sounds like you already have some pilot connections which is going to come in handy during your training.
 
bimmerd00d said:
We started off in that series but got tired of the ridiculous penalties if you got pulled in. Chumpcar is almost identical, but it's all about the racing, not the presentation.
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Murlee once quipped that LeMons is "where cheating is encouraged".
 
MBDiagMan said:
These were white shirts.

Doc
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Students in USFA's pro pilot program. And that explains how they got four adults into the C172. These Asian guys are so skinny, a stiff breeze would blow them over.

I often see them sharing time/ride when they graduate up to the King Air, but first I've heard of a gaggle of them going up to a regional field.
 
zaitcev said:
Murlee once quipped that LeMons is "where cheating is encouraged".
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I'm convinced the only way we escaped penalty laps in the Texas race was mainly due to expensive bottles of liquor and plates of brisket, ribs, and sausage made in our pit. I was informed that just this past weekend in Iowa, our little e30 met the side of a mustang and is now totaled. We can rebuild it, we have the technology.

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I think I'm going to have to raincheck all the races until I get this ppl, the urge to race went out the window when I got into this.

Sent from somewhere closer to sea level than I'd like to be.
 
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Hey, thanks for the pics. I hadn't been in the new USFA fbo . :)
 
I can tell you Sprint Car racing is more expensive then flying, for that matter so is Dwarf Cars. I just traded one hobby for another.
 
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