Lesson 8: Pattern work at KEAU

Pattern work at KEAU, a truly humbling experience.

My third lesson of the week, weather was looking awesome around lunch, but I knew some potential rain was heading our way this afternoon. Sure enough, the sky became overcast around 4 pm. However, the clouds stayed high enough, so when I got to the airport, there was just a light rain. Still perfectly safe conditions to fly, so Jack said we were staying in the pattern today at KEAU. So, out to the plane, Jack helped with the preflight so we could get into the air faster. Preflight good, new runway today because of the wind. We took off from runway 32, via taxiway charlie, which isn't really marked by signs, so I needed Jack's help with the directions on that. Getting much better taxi-ing. Run-up, good! Call up tower and off we go. Also, noticed I was getting better at keeping the plane centered on the runway on take off, but that would be the last of my confidence building today. I hit my first of probably a few learning plateaus, today was rough. The air was pretty smooth, but my flying not so much. We basically made left traffic for runway 32 the entire time for touch-and-gos, for those not familiar with those fancy aviation terms, that means we flied in a circle taking off and landing. I wouldn't say I backslid today, but it became very clear how much Jack was helping me on all the previous landings. He really tried to make me do most of the flying from takeoff to land, and I think its safe to say, I haven't had a completely unassisted landing yet, Jack intervened, although sometimes only slightly on all my landings today. My climbs were ok at best, I thought I had my climbout pitch and technique down, but I couldn't quite keep my wings level, my pitch was all over the place, and my speed always seemed too fast. Jack caught me frequently trying to stretch my neck and look over the nose of the plane to judge my pitch angle, he corrected me several times... "watch the level of your wings on climbs." The wind was also pushing me off centerline on take off, consequently I would drift after lift off, and then have a terrible crosswind turn. And then, landing....

I know exactly what I need to do, but I don't seem to be putting it together: Mid downwind, should be coming up on pattern altitude, level off, reduce throttle to 2300 rpm, do the prelanding checklist: GUMPPS (Gas, Undercarriage Welded On - No retractable gear on this plane, Mixture Rich, Propeller Spinning - Fixed pitch propeller on this plane, Primer Locked, Safety Items - Belts, Lights). Abeam the numbers, throttle to 1500, pitch to horizon to slow within flap range, then 10* flaps, set your pitch attitude for 75 knots. Ok, watch that runway, make your base turn about 45* on your wing. Watch your rollout to account for the wind, add that second notch of flaps, adjust your pitch slightly to maintain 75 knots. If you are high or low adjust throttle but in coordination with your pitch, maintain those 75 knots. Before turning final, get that carb heat off, maybe another notch of flaps and adjust that pitch slightly again. Keep those numbers in the same spot in your windshield, start transitioning to looking down the runway. Over the numbers, slowly easy back on that throttle, start to flare, not too much, throttle should be all the way out, flare, hold it, hold it, remember that landing sight picture! Touch down, hold that nose in the air as long as possible, gentle set down.

That is the way its supposed to be, for the most part I need a lot of work. I have trouble keeping myself centered on final, this is partly because I need to start crabbing into that wind better on approaches. Also, to be blunt, my flares absolutely suck, on one landing I flared a bit too much and surprised Jack a bit, he of course recovered no problem. Not to mention the lesson wouldn't be complete without a bounce, but I actually recovered ok from that. I think part of it, is that I still need to get comfortable getting so close to the ground during landing. Of course that is necessary (hah!), but particularly on my turn to base and final, the plane is slowed up so much, I am so nervous I am going to stall the plane, and Jack actually catches me wanting to pitch up without throttle.

So, I had about 10 landings, with one go-around. During the very first circuit, there was traffic that chirped up just as we turned downwind saying they were also on the downwind on the same runway! Yikes! I saw the traffic ahead, but Jack couldn't pick it out. So, I watched the traffic and he took over. Turns out the gentleman was unintentionally on UNICOM instead of tower frequency. Fortunately he realized it and graciously abandoned his approach and let us continue. I did several landings, and Jack must have sensed I was getting a little frustrated, so he took over for a full lap, then had me try again. I did some more again, then he took over once more. We finally did a couple more, than Jack said, ok, one more and we are done. That one I felt pretty good at, although Jack mentioned later that my earlier landings were better than my later ones. He could tell I was getting information overload, and it was time to call it a day. So, another 1.2 hours for the log book, almost 9 hours already.

During the post-lesson debrief, Jack said given where I am in my training (hours), I should be really pleased with myself. He said to try not to get too discouraged or hard on myself, learning to fly is not an easy challenge, and I need to push through these times of frustration. So, he advised, to take the weekend off, relax, I have some more lessons next week. He also said, that for the next few lessons, this would be it, perhaps a mini-cross country up to Chetek, but my next major hurdle is where I am. So, I am very pleased that I appeared to have sufficiently learned the fundamentals, and I can look forward to getting the landings down. I also figure there will be more stall and emergency training ahead before Jack thinks I am ready for solos, so I expect that still to be several weeks away at my current pace (~4-5 hrs/wk). This has been a very busy week, lots of flying and fun. Plan to catch up at home this weekend with some yard work, more baby preparations, some grocery shopping and maybe even some WoW with Lori and Bryan.