Tuesday 25 May 2010

25 May learning, improving and my first unintentional spin!

Had 35 mins of good aero's today overhead Honington (also had 30 mins yesterday too, but nothing remarkable to report!).
Anyway, I've finally realised why I go all skew-wiff on the half cuban. I haven't been centralising the rudder before pulling through into a the loop - simple really. Also managed to get it into a spin without trying. Felt it flick to the right from the reverse half cuban. Too much rudder input I think. Opposite rudder stopped it and I dived away, although I pulled on quite a bit of speed - although not quite to VNE.
Still haven't tried stall turns again though as I want a min height of 5000' and the cloudbase has been around 4000' these last 2 days. We shall see what the rest of the week brings...
Lots of fun today!!!

Sunday 23 May 2010

23 May a good ferry flight from Marham to Honington

Had a good ferry trip today; climbed to 5000' over Marham with gliders below and span, rolled, looped etc so that majority owner Adam could watch. Mind you, having watched him earlier, I realise I'm just a speck at those heights really!
I then headed north to Penteney Lakes and rendezvous'd with Flatty in his Rans S6, G-MZKE. Off we headed to Honington and Flatty got some cracking shots of me in flight - see below. Did lots & lots of turn back circles as it's quite difficult trying to fly the Nipper in formation because of the disparity in speed between our two types. Over Thetford, Flatty called Lakenheath to tell them he was descending and so I called climbing as I wasn't ready to land just yet... I quickly reached 5000' and did some more basic aero's before descending deadside to land on 27. A great little flight in perfect weather. Hopefully this week will let me explore and improve - should be fun!



Here's a very short video of me closing on Flatty's Rans and zooming away.

Saturday 22 May 2010

21st May - First spins in the Nipper and a really nice flight

Had a really good flight today, although KI was a pig to start! I took off on 01, just after Cessna 150 G-JAGS and climbed into the overhead. Following all my spin practice last week, I thought today was an ideal opportunity to spin the Nipper - I can't imagine I'll ever be more spin-current than I am now. After climbing to 6000', (allowing an extra 1000' for the unknown), I applied carb heat, slowly closed the throttle and did some practice stalls. Well, I just couldn't stall the Nipper! With the stall warner blaring away and about 30mph IAS, all that happened was a gentle nod and mush. The slightest check forward of the stick had me flying instantly, so with that in mind, I felt ready to try a spin. Throttle back, enter the stall (well, sort of!) full right rudder and she tucked in nicely. unfortunately (or fortunately depending on your point of view), KI would only do 1/2 a spin before pulling out, even before application of opposite rudder - how begnign is that! Back up to 6000' and I tried a spin to the left with the same result. Not as thrilling as I'd expected and not a patch on the Citabria, but fun nevertheless. After that I had a great chuck about with the usual loops, rolls, chandelles etc etc. Total flight time was 50 minutes, partly because I had to follow G-JAGS in and JAGS was flying massive 'GA-type' circuits. A little surprising really as it was being flown by a couple of Tornado pilots. Mind you, I expect they get all the excitement they need from the day job! Next week KI will be over at Honington, I have the week off and my mission will be to nail the stall turn, something that has eluded me on my few attempts so far...

Monday 17 May 2010

Tornado's grounded - time to play :-)

A quick 35 minutes in the overhead at Marham, the only movement there all day - Tornado's grounded due to volcanic ash! Loops, rolls, chandelles, 1/2 cubans & reverse 1/2 cubans. I was very conscious that it was just after most people finish on a weekday and that there were 4 Sqn's worth of Tornado pilot's down there probably tutting away at how poor my flying is! Still, luckily for me I'm not in a competition or trying to impress anyone - its all about having fun and improving, and I think I'm managing both. One day I'll try and get someone to video me; its very frustrating, I've never even seen KI do so much as a loop...

Saturday 15 May 2010

10 - 14 May - Spinning in the Citabria and ASK 13 Glider


Wow,
what a brilliant week I've had! I've only just returned from gliding at Halton near Aylesbury where I was taught to solo standard in the ASK 21 glider, I then moved on to the older but rather nicer flying ASK 13. Unlike the K21, the K13 will spin...

Flying the K13 glider with instructor Padge was great fun, although his spin entry technique surprised me at first, it put a huge grin on my face too!
Basically we would enter a gentle bank then ease back on the stick to the stall. Once stalled he applied full pro-spin rudder, full into turn aileron and full up elevator. With this input the k13 flicks on its back and enters a spin, easily recovered with the standard spin recovery technique. Massive fun!
The following day in very lumpy conditions I was signed off solo following a flight with instructor and friend Colin McInnes (there's not much that he isn't qualified to do!) and span to my hearts content on two consecutive flights. Here's a short video.



I also had 2 flights in the Citabria on Tuesday evening when gliding was finished; first with Col , just to get back in the tailwheel groove and check my spin recovery was still on the ball. Then, after a great hour with Col, I put good friend flatty in the back and we headed off for him to have a bit of hands on and for me to take him on his first ever spinning flight. Beautiful conditions with few clouds and great visibilty meant that climbing to 5000' was no problem at all. I'll let the video below show you how we got on :-)


All-in-all, a great weeks flying, in good company - my PFL's should be rather better too!

Here I am ready for solo in the K21 glider


and flying the Grob 109 motor glider


- didn't aero or spin these (the K21 doesn't spin and the Grob 109 is apparently lethal if spun!!)

Saturday 1 May 2010

1st May 10 - Excellent fun trying some new manoeuvres

Well, I had planned to fly to the Popham microlight trade fair in my Shadow last night, check out the show this morning and head back this afternoon. Unfortunately the forecast didn't look promising and I wasn't willing to take the chance of getting stuck a long way from home on a Bank Holiday weekend so I decided to give it a miss.

Anyway, as luck would have it, the weather at Marham was pretty damned good today. My partner in G-AVKI, Adam, said he was taking her up, so I thought I'd join him. We met up early in the afternoon at the fuel bowser and I'd arrived just in time to take her straight off his hands - perfect!
I taxied down 19, pulled off to the hold and completed my pre take-off checks, and then watched the gliding club chipmunk make a bouncy landing which he wisely decided to go-around from. Finally lining up on 01, I opened the taps and headed skywards. Well, it was certainly thermic, I got bounced all over the sky up to about 3000', although things smoothed out from there.
Thermalling gliders meant I couldn't practice aero's in the overhead so I headed for a blue patch of sky 2 miles to the west. After the obligatory HASELL check, I did a quick loop to get my eye in, and then had my first attempt at a reverse half cuban, which is a roll, from which you pull a loop once you're upside down. It didn't go badly at all, but I could have done with a line feature to check as I kept coming out all 'skew wiff'. It was exactly the same story with the standard half cuban (pull a loop and then roll off the top). Outstanding fun though!.

I did this for a while and then thought I'd have another go at a stall turn... Oh dear! I don't know what I did wrong, but it all got horribly out of shape, so I did the 'unusual positions' recovery; chop the throttle, lock the stick and rudder and let things sort themselves out.

I landed after 45 mins with a huge grin on my face! Time was on my side, so after a sit down and drink I had another go. This time though there was more cloud about, so my manoeuvres were done in any gap I could find! This was a great 'chuck-about' flight; loops, rolls, chandelles, half cubans and reverse half cubans, as well as yanking and banking through the cloud valleys. Just brilliant! I did my usual side-slipping power on descent to land. Amazingly this flight was just 30 minutes, but it felt like longer, what a blast!

It looks like AVKI's engine problems have been well and truly put to bed and I now have real confidence in the machine. That, combined with warmer weather and longer days means that I really feel I'm making progress.
I've no doubt that to the trained eye my manoeuvres look ragged and poorly co-ordinated, but what the hell - I don't think I've ever had so much fun in an aeroplane! Roll on the next time (groan...).

I'll try to sort out my camera mount SOON(!) so I can take some footage; in the meantime, here's a picture of AVKI all wrapped up after 4 flights today.
The organisation that had been in our hangar has moved out, so for the moment, we're all on our own with loads of space - very nice it feels too.


Here are some diagrams of the half cuban 8 and reverse half cuban 8 taken from RD Campbell and B Tempest's excellent book - Basic Aerobatics.