Irish_Armada
Pre-takeoff checklist
- Joined
- Oct 8, 2011
- Messages
- 374
- Display Name
Display name:
Irish Armada
As is the apparent civic duty of all POA pilots-in-training, I figured I better post a write-up of my 150nm+ solo XC that I finished this morning in a C172. A couple of initial points though: 1) it was a total blast! the XC solos really do make you feel like an actual pilot; 2) the weather was beautiful this morning -- calm wind, clear, and 72F; and 3) this was my last requirement I needed to finish prior to prepping for the check ride. I think I can almost see the finish line...
So the plan was to meet my instructor at 6:30am this morning at University (EDU) (he is a good man by the way, to be meeting me that early) to finish up the flight plan and input winds, times, fuel needed, etc the morning of. I had prepped everything I could the night before for a XC from EDU to Modesto (MOD) to Livermore (LVK) and back to EDU, but if LVK was fogged over, my alternate was going to be to McClellan (MCC) instead. Either way, I'd be over the 150nm requirement. We call the flight briefer at about 6:40am for weather, notams, etc, and turns out that LVK will be closed at a couple sporadic hours today (maybe an airshow?) and that their self-serve fuel is closed. Our school requires that we refuel at every stop. Given all that, we decide to abort LVK and go instead from MOD to MCC and then back to EDU. No problem. But I had given the flight briefer an estimated departure time of 7:30am, which turned out to be way too ambitious in retrospect, since we now had to re-jigger my flight plan. More on that in second.
So after planning the leg to MCC, and basically relearning the mechanical E6B (it'd been a while since I'd used it, and talk all the smack you want about that thing, but whoever invented it was an absolute genius), I'm departing 17 from EDU at about 8:30am.
First up, I call up FSS on 122.05 and inform the lady that I'd like to open my flight plan. She says "uhh looks like you called this morning for a briefing but never filed a flight plan." Odd, since we did file one, but I always error on the side of the student being wrong. I basically responded "Well we did file one this morning I thought, unless we didn't..." I'm sure that was helpful. I wasn't really sure what else to say other than to let her know that I was 1 hour behind schedule. That did the trick though -- apparently if you don't open your flight plan within a certain amount of time, it sort of falls off the system and they have to go dig it up. Which she did. Lesson learned and flight plan open.
I basically had an uneventful flight down to MOD and made a great landing on 28L, and taxied my way over to refueling. Fueled up, texted my instructor that all was well and good so far, and then headed back out the run-up area at 28L. This was a good lesson for me to alllllways do a run-up -- even if I only just refueled -- because during my mag-check procedure, my right mag was terrible! I'd never felt it run so rough before, so that surprised me. With the brakes on, I throttled up to full power for about 20 seconds, reduced power back to 1700 RPM, checked the right mag again and it was smooth as could be. The left mag was fine all along. Why would so much carbon buildup on the right mag on just a 50 minute flight down from EDU? I leaned the mixture and everything so...?
Anyways, departed MOD and headed north for MCC, with NorCal approach providing flight following along the way. Again, smooth trip up to MCC. As I was getting close to Lodi (my course had me flying past Lodi so that I was east of the city), the approach controller let me know that there was parachute jumpers going out over Lodi airport (1O3), so he asked me to turn left 15 degrees. Now, the Lodi airport was at my 10 o'clock and I thought ... hmmmm, I think he meant right, but I'm the student so probably not, but seriously he must have meant right. Better check. "Approach, just wanted to confirm for 70G that you want me to adjust my heading 15 degrees to the left, or to the RIGHT?" ... "70G I meant 15 degrees to the right, sorry about that." Phew. So I guess ATC can make little mistakes now and then, so never hurts to ask.
Now MCC is a huge former military airfield of a runway that is buried under Sac International's (SMF) Class C airspace, and the only way to get under SMF's Class C shelf at 1600-4100 and into MCC from my direction was to go through Mather's (MHR) Class D airspace. Again I figured I wanted to be at 1400 ft max when I got to the outer shelf of the Class C to stay under it (accounting for my non-precision flying and altimeter error). I wasn't completely sure how this process was supposed happen either so I basically just asked ATC as I got closer to MCC. "Approach, this is 70G. I'd like to stay under Sac International's Class Charlie airspace if I could, but I think that means I'll have to go through Mather's Class Delta. Please advise." .... "70G roger, Mather has you on radar since you're with me, so you can proceed with your descent into McClellan." Sweet! Again, just asking for clarification seemed to do the trick both times.
Landed on the enormous runway 16 at MCC (747's fly in and out of this place from time to time) with no problems and refueled (took forever to taxi to the self-serve ... again, big airfield), texted my instructor that I was heading back to EDU, and then headed back to the run up area at 16. No mag problems this time around. Now getting back to EDU was going to be a bit interesting for me because SMF's Class C outer shelf (1600-4100ft) overlapped with Sac Executive's (SAC) Class D (surface-2500ft). To avoid both of them would have meant that I would have to follow a very narrow corridor (basically above I-80 west) back to EDU. So instead of doing that, I decided that after departure from MCC, that I'd just call up SAC tower and ask to transition through his airspace. Plus, bonus of doing that is that I could fly over downtown Sacramento, which I had yet to do in my training. So I depart MCC (caution wake turbulence, C172 departing) and call up SAC tower.
Here's where the big question of the day came up for me that I don't know the answer to. So I call up SAC tower and ask to transition through his airspace for EDU, and he responds: "70G roger, transition approved, stay at or above 1,500." Hmmmmm ... so the Class C shelf at SMF that I'm currently under starts at 1,600, right above me and which I can't enter into, but I have to stay at or above 1,500 for SAC's Class D. Was I right to think that as long as I'm under the Class C shelf and in SAC's Class D, that I have a 100 foot section of altitude that I'm allowed to fly in? Would that be the right interpretation of their instructions? I almost asked the tower controller but decided not to and instead just made sure that I kept my altitude between 1,500 and 1,599 feet. Was that the right interpretation and decision?
I finally landed back at EDU at 11:02 am, but porpoised a little bit on my final landing. Ah well. All's well that ends well.
Oh, and I have to say that ATC all around was great today -- very friendly and helpful and plenty of "see ya's" and "have a good one's" to go around. Makes a student feel cool when even the controllers seem to be cool with you.
So the plan was to meet my instructor at 6:30am this morning at University (EDU) (he is a good man by the way, to be meeting me that early) to finish up the flight plan and input winds, times, fuel needed, etc the morning of. I had prepped everything I could the night before for a XC from EDU to Modesto (MOD) to Livermore (LVK) and back to EDU, but if LVK was fogged over, my alternate was going to be to McClellan (MCC) instead. Either way, I'd be over the 150nm requirement. We call the flight briefer at about 6:40am for weather, notams, etc, and turns out that LVK will be closed at a couple sporadic hours today (maybe an airshow?) and that their self-serve fuel is closed. Our school requires that we refuel at every stop. Given all that, we decide to abort LVK and go instead from MOD to MCC and then back to EDU. No problem. But I had given the flight briefer an estimated departure time of 7:30am, which turned out to be way too ambitious in retrospect, since we now had to re-jigger my flight plan. More on that in second.
So after planning the leg to MCC, and basically relearning the mechanical E6B (it'd been a while since I'd used it, and talk all the smack you want about that thing, but whoever invented it was an absolute genius), I'm departing 17 from EDU at about 8:30am.
First up, I call up FSS on 122.05 and inform the lady that I'd like to open my flight plan. She says "uhh looks like you called this morning for a briefing but never filed a flight plan." Odd, since we did file one, but I always error on the side of the student being wrong. I basically responded "Well we did file one this morning I thought, unless we didn't..." I'm sure that was helpful. I wasn't really sure what else to say other than to let her know that I was 1 hour behind schedule. That did the trick though -- apparently if you don't open your flight plan within a certain amount of time, it sort of falls off the system and they have to go dig it up. Which she did. Lesson learned and flight plan open.
I basically had an uneventful flight down to MOD and made a great landing on 28L, and taxied my way over to refueling. Fueled up, texted my instructor that all was well and good so far, and then headed back out the run-up area at 28L. This was a good lesson for me to alllllways do a run-up -- even if I only just refueled -- because during my mag-check procedure, my right mag was terrible! I'd never felt it run so rough before, so that surprised me. With the brakes on, I throttled up to full power for about 20 seconds, reduced power back to 1700 RPM, checked the right mag again and it was smooth as could be. The left mag was fine all along. Why would so much carbon buildup on the right mag on just a 50 minute flight down from EDU? I leaned the mixture and everything so...?
Anyways, departed MOD and headed north for MCC, with NorCal approach providing flight following along the way. Again, smooth trip up to MCC. As I was getting close to Lodi (my course had me flying past Lodi so that I was east of the city), the approach controller let me know that there was parachute jumpers going out over Lodi airport (1O3), so he asked me to turn left 15 degrees. Now, the Lodi airport was at my 10 o'clock and I thought ... hmmmm, I think he meant right, but I'm the student so probably not, but seriously he must have meant right. Better check. "Approach, just wanted to confirm for 70G that you want me to adjust my heading 15 degrees to the left, or to the RIGHT?" ... "70G I meant 15 degrees to the right, sorry about that." Phew. So I guess ATC can make little mistakes now and then, so never hurts to ask.
Now MCC is a huge former military airfield of a runway that is buried under Sac International's (SMF) Class C airspace, and the only way to get under SMF's Class C shelf at 1600-4100 and into MCC from my direction was to go through Mather's (MHR) Class D airspace. Again I figured I wanted to be at 1400 ft max when I got to the outer shelf of the Class C to stay under it (accounting for my non-precision flying and altimeter error). I wasn't completely sure how this process was supposed happen either so I basically just asked ATC as I got closer to MCC. "Approach, this is 70G. I'd like to stay under Sac International's Class Charlie airspace if I could, but I think that means I'll have to go through Mather's Class Delta. Please advise." .... "70G roger, Mather has you on radar since you're with me, so you can proceed with your descent into McClellan." Sweet! Again, just asking for clarification seemed to do the trick both times.
Landed on the enormous runway 16 at MCC (747's fly in and out of this place from time to time) with no problems and refueled (took forever to taxi to the self-serve ... again, big airfield), texted my instructor that I was heading back to EDU, and then headed back to the run up area at 16. No mag problems this time around. Now getting back to EDU was going to be a bit interesting for me because SMF's Class C outer shelf (1600-4100ft) overlapped with Sac Executive's (SAC) Class D (surface-2500ft). To avoid both of them would have meant that I would have to follow a very narrow corridor (basically above I-80 west) back to EDU. So instead of doing that, I decided that after departure from MCC, that I'd just call up SAC tower and ask to transition through his airspace. Plus, bonus of doing that is that I could fly over downtown Sacramento, which I had yet to do in my training. So I depart MCC (caution wake turbulence, C172 departing) and call up SAC tower.
Here's where the big question of the day came up for me that I don't know the answer to. So I call up SAC tower and ask to transition through his airspace for EDU, and he responds: "70G roger, transition approved, stay at or above 1,500." Hmmmmm ... so the Class C shelf at SMF that I'm currently under starts at 1,600, right above me and which I can't enter into, but I have to stay at or above 1,500 for SAC's Class D. Was I right to think that as long as I'm under the Class C shelf and in SAC's Class D, that I have a 100 foot section of altitude that I'm allowed to fly in? Would that be the right interpretation of their instructions? I almost asked the tower controller but decided not to and instead just made sure that I kept my altitude between 1,500 and 1,599 feet. Was that the right interpretation and decision?
I finally landed back at EDU at 11:02 am, but porpoised a little bit on my final landing. Ah well. All's well that ends well.
Oh, and I have to say that ATC all around was great today -- very friendly and helpful and plenty of "see ya's" and "have a good one's" to go around. Makes a student feel cool when even the controllers seem to be cool with you.