tonycondon
Gastons CRO (Chief Dinner Reservation Officer)
My PP-ASEL student is nearing checkride (scheduled tomorrow). couple evenings ago during a marathon ground session we had about an hour discussion about personal minimums and the lowest weather that he felt comfortable flying in. he came to the conclusion that he would be comfortable with 1500 AGL ceilings as long as he had an out. I wasnt able to push him into accepting 1000 ceilings but with neatly spaced airports along the route 
snowed two inches last night. back end of the system worked through this morning and ceiling were at, you guessed it, 1500 AGL by mid day. We took off about 1 PM and went out for some fun. he got ahold of Cedar Rapids approach for flight following and soon realized that the 3000 feet we were hoping for to do slow flight was not going to happen. we got set up under the clouds at 1000 agl and just started flying around. had him navigate me to a couple nearby towns. noted the visibility differences as you started to near clouds. I put him under the foggles for a while and did some turns to headings, followed by some partial panel timed turns. he performed nicely. i started to detect a little engine roughness and he quickly picked up on it too. carb ice! interesting thing is at our OAT we were at the clear left side of the graph. BUT relative humidity was pretty high and we were at low cruise power. it cleared quickly and we were back to smooth running. a little later we had some again and it was caught quicker and once again cured. the second time actually started after giving full power for a climb. full throttle results in colder carb temps, remember! back up to the north by the home field the ceilings were clear. we were playing just under the edge of the system as it moved out. with permission from approach, we climbed in the clear to an altitude allowing us to operate above the cloud deck. were able to get slow flight, and steep turns (altitude held within 40 feet!) in. then back north, using a little VOR reference while over the undercast. back into green castle for some spot on soft field and short field takeoffs and landings. he is sooooooooo ready and it feels sooooo good he had a good lesson and we got a lot of subjects covered. when asked after landing, he admitted that maybe 1500 was a tad low, and he would like to have a little more room particularly if flying cross country.
snowed two inches last night. back end of the system worked through this morning and ceiling were at, you guessed it, 1500 AGL by mid day. We took off about 1 PM and went out for some fun. he got ahold of Cedar Rapids approach for flight following and soon realized that the 3000 feet we were hoping for to do slow flight was not going to happen. we got set up under the clouds at 1000 agl and just started flying around. had him navigate me to a couple nearby towns. noted the visibility differences as you started to near clouds. I put him under the foggles for a while and did some turns to headings, followed by some partial panel timed turns. he performed nicely. i started to detect a little engine roughness and he quickly picked up on it too. carb ice! interesting thing is at our OAT we were at the clear left side of the graph. BUT relative humidity was pretty high and we were at low cruise power. it cleared quickly and we were back to smooth running. a little later we had some again and it was caught quicker and once again cured. the second time actually started after giving full power for a climb. full throttle results in colder carb temps, remember! back up to the north by the home field the ceilings were clear. we were playing just under the edge of the system as it moved out. with permission from approach, we climbed in the clear to an altitude allowing us to operate above the cloud deck. were able to get slow flight, and steep turns (altitude held within 40 feet!) in. then back north, using a little VOR reference while over the undercast. back into green castle for some spot on soft field and short field takeoffs and landings. he is sooooooooo ready and it feels sooooo good
he had a good lesson and we got a lot of subjects covered. when asked after landing, he admitted that maybe 1500 was a tad low, and he would like to have a little more room particularly if flying cross country.
Ag pilots are afraid of heights?
